Yale Daily News -- Week of Nov. 4th, 2022

T H E O L D E ST C O L L E G E DA I LY · FO U N D E D 1 8 7 8

NEW HAVEN, CONNECTICUT · FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2022 · VOL. CXLV, NO. 6 · yaledailynews.com · @yaledailynews

Yalies protest for affirmative action Bass steps AASA, BSAY, MeCHA and NISAY represented

BY ANIKA SETH STAFF REPORTER Over 40 Yale students joined an intercollegiate delegation on the steps of the nation’s highest court on Monday as justices heard arguments for two cases that could eradicate race-conscious admissions.

Students for Fair Admissions brought two lawsuits to the Supreme Court, separately alleging that the race-conscious admissions policies practiced by Harvard University and the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill are discriminatory. Legal scholars predicted after the hearings that the court’s conservative majority will rule against affirmative action in both decisions this spring.

The Yale delegation — which included 41 students drawn from across the University’s four primary cultural activist groups — joined students from at least four other universities to express their support of the practice. Other Yalies, who remained in New Haven, organized on-campus efforts to promote awareness of the hearings.

Yale students joined an intercollegiate delegation on the steps of the nation’s highest court / Rachel Shin,Contributing Photographer

SEE ACTION PAGE 4

CT Dems poised to sweep midterms

BY YASH ROY AND CHARLOTTE HUGHES STAFF REPORTERS Connecticut voters will head to the polls next Tuesday to decide a slate of state and local races, including the election for governor.

Democratic incumbent Ned Lamont is in a good position to fend off a rematch challenge from Bob Stefanowski, leading between 10 and 15 points in recent polling. Sen. Richard Blumenthal and New Haven House Representative Rosa DeLauro are both poised for landslide victories.

The sole congressional race where Republicans appear competitive is the northwestern 5th district — their top pick-up opportunity in New England. Voters will also decide on an amendment to allow early voting in the state.

Democrats are confident about sweeping the state, but warn that voter turn-out will be a major barometer of success.

“This election is the most important in our lives,” said DeLauro. “Voters’ rights are on the line. Women’s rights are on the line. Our state’s economic health is on the line. Funding for our cities is on the

line. If we don’t show up, then everything is on the line.”

In New Haven, a historical Democrat stronghold, local organizers from New Haven Rising, labor unions and the League of Women Voters are working on driving up the vote for statewide candidates as well as New Haven’s delegation in the state legislature. All nine incumbents are running for re-election.

Led by Lamont, Democrats are arguing that four years of sound fiscal governance including

down as New Haven Indy editor

Managing ed Tom Breen to fill role

BY KHUAN-YU HALL STAFF REPORTER After 17 years, Paul Bass ’82 will step down from his role as editor of the New Haven Independent and return to full-time reporting.

A lifelong reporter, Bass launched the Independent in 2005 after stints at various area papers. The paper’s online-only format and Bass’ strong community ties gave his scrappy newsroom a competitive edge against legacy papers in decline. Produced with a small budget and tight team of reporters, the Independent’s production of daily stories and deepdive investigations have received national recognition from media experts and organizations as a uniquely successful and hyperlocal form of journalism.

“I saw that big corporations are buying up local media, eviscerating their newsrooms,” Bass said. “So I felt the need to be a new model for local news.”

Tom Breen, who came to the Independent in 2015 and served as managing editor, will now oversee the paper’s day-to-day operations.

Produced in conjunction with the Online Journalism Project, a non-profit organization that promotes local reporting across SEE PAUL BASS PAGE 5

YaleHarvard Campus undergoing eleven projects tickets sell out SEE ELECTIONS PAGE 4

BY EVAN GORELICK STAFF REPORTER

Yale has a slate of major facilities projects in the works around campus.

Last week, University Provost Scott Strobel released Yale’s annual facilities report, detailing 11 ongoing major projects. The flurry of construction and renovation projects has shuffled students and faculty around research spaces, offices, residences and classrooms at a rapid rate.

“Each of these projects is the result of many hours of planning by Yale faculty and staff who have dedicated their time and effort to defining the programmatic needs for these spaces,” Strobel wrote in the report. “We have also benefited from many donors whose generosity has made these ambitions possible.”

Here’s a closer look behind the blue fences and yellow tape.

Kline Tower renovation Renovations of Kline Tower will position it as a new hub for computational, mathematical and statistical research.

In November 2019, University leaders first announced the renovations plans for the building, which will soon house the departments of Astronomy, Mathematics and Statistics & Data Science. Prior to the renovations, the building was dominated by laboratory space. The 186,000-square-foot renovation will convert existing laboratories into new academic offices.

The tower will also house the brand new Institute for Foundations of Data Science, which launched earlier this month.

“Planning for the Kline Tower spaces has been proceeding with faculty engagement on questions of how these spaces best function for the kind of research that goes on in mathematical, data-driven, and astronomical and astrophysical domains,” Dean of the School of

Students panic after accidental early release

BY SARAH COOK AND SPENCER KING STAFF REPORTERS

SEE CONSTRUCTION PAGE 5

SEE TICKETS PAGE 5

Last week, Provost Strobel released an annual facilities report, with 11 ongoing major projects / Tim Tai, Photography Editor Engineering & Applied Sciences Jeffrey Brock told the News.

While many faculty members were pleased to see their departments unified at one node for the quantitative sciences, others were concerned that the physical space would be cramped.

The renovations will add two floors to the top of the building and a large concourse at the base of the tower. The concourse space will serve as a quantitatively focused satellite location for the Poorvu Center for Teaching and Learning. The Poorvu Center intends to use the space for programs including peer tutoring, Undergraduate Learning Assistant office hours and teaching workshops for graduate students.

Although renovations were initially set to finish last summer,the tower is now scheduled to reopen in the summer of 2023.

CROSS CAMPUS

INSIDE THE NEWS

THIS DAY IN YALE HISTORY, 1987.

Yale agrees to first graduate union election

University announces their place to examine Pierson college. Following Inferno, three students were brought to the hospital due to overconsumption.

Peabody Museum of Natural History renovation Historic renovations to Yale’s Peabody Museum are also approaching completion.

Renovation began in October 2020, though administrators had reportedly been considering the project for over a decade. The update is the museum’s first comprehensive renovation in over 90 years.

“We are excited to reopen our doors and welcome students and visitors of all ages into new and transformed galleries that better reflect the breadth of our collection, advances in scientific research and the rapidly changing world we live in,” the Museum’s Associate Director of Communications and Marketing

Just before noon on Tuesday, rumors began circulating that a link to buy undergraduate student tickets for the Yale–Harvard Game on Nov. 19 had been released.

Students scrambling to the site were met with a variety of error messages as the website failed to load for many. Eventually, some lucky students were able to purchase a ticket after reloading multiple windows on phones, laptops, iPads and other devices.

Yale athletics has claimed “full responsibility” for the incident.

“The link was live while we were in the process of establishing, ‘Okay, what is the set time we’re going to communicate to students to go online and buy these tickets?’” Executive Deputy Athletic Director Ann-Marie Guglieri said.

“While it was live and we were in the middle of coming up with our plan, it was shared amongst the students, and people were going online and buying them.”

It remains unclear how the link was initially leaked or if additional tickets will become available in the future. The link now takes students to the Yale Campus Recreation member portal with no mention of tickets or The Game.

Students reported that around 3,000 tickets were originally available for Yale’s population of 6,494. Many anxiously watched as the num-

PAGE 7 NEWS

PAGE 3 EDITORIAL PAGE 6 NEWS PAGE 13 BULLETIN PAGE 14 SPORTS PAGE B1 WKND

MAJOR A new computing and linguistics joint is the latest to intersect engineering and humanities.

PAGE 7 NEWS DANCE Yaledancers will perform this Thursday, their first before a full audience since the pandemic began.

PAGE 12 ARTS

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YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2022 · yaledailynews.com

THROUGH THE LENS

T

he Hindu celebration of Diwali is often known as the Festival of Lights—its traditional name, Deepavali, derives from the Sanskrit word for “row of lights”.

But Diwali is far more than a Festival of Lights: it’s homecoming. Mythically, it celebrates the return of the deity Rama to his homeland after 14 years of exile. And for the South Asian diaspora, at Yale and across the globe, it represents a great convocation, a gathering of community to celebrate Home. Not just a location, but a people, a tradition, and a culture. As we celebrate Diwali, we’re swept away in an undercurrent of cathartic familiarity, a return to a cultural experience that, for the diaspora, we don’t often get to access. To experience Diwali is to understand the sights and sounds of a homecoming: the subtle thrill of celebrating our identity with warmth, openness, and solidarity.

Words and Photos by GIRI VISWANATHAN.

Happy Diwali. And welcome Home.

YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2022 · yaledailynews.com

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OPINION S TA F F C O L U M N I S T AW U O R O N G U R U

Donda Kanye “Ye” West is a smooth, round stone rolling down a very steep hill. Those of us that have followed his career saw the first signs of smoke when he said that slavery is a choice. One could look back further, to when he interrupted Taylor Swift mid VMA acceptance speech. Whatever poison you pick, the fire is burning now. The list of people West continues to disrespect and violate gets longer and longer by the day, and includes his own wife and children. We scroll through social media spaces in disbelief of what he is reported to have said that morning. We ask, will it stop?

As it happens, there are several possible excuses for Kanye’s behaviour. His fans and supporters call for mercy given his mental health struggles. They appeal to his recent divorce and

his struggles with single(ish) parenting. They appeal to the grief of losing his mother.

W h a t ’s a mother to a AWUOR Black man?

ONGURU She exists like a shaded backWild West ground, a tree under which he rests. Studies show that Black parents will often “coddle” their Black sons while simultaneously raising expectations of their Black daughters, which leads, in adulthood, to the creation of the same systems that subjugate Black women by labelling them as indestructible, and therefore, deserving of disre-

spect. Kanye isn’t the only Black rapper (or, Black man) that loves his mum: the intro to UK rapper Stormzy’s new single, “Mel Made me Do it,” features him and his mother celebrating her new wealth in light of her son’s fame: “Claim it, mummy! Claim it!”

Similarly, Donda West, Kanye’s mother, stood as a central pillar to his personal and artistic journey. She’s the subject of two of Kanye’s most recent albums. He talks about her constantly. It’s a culture, amongst Black men, to want to ‘make it’ for their mothers. To do right by them.

Is Kanye’s outburst an appropriate response to this loss?

Grieving is a universal human emotion. It doesn’t turn people into anti-Semites. The excuse that Kanye is acting out because he is missing his mum is an appeal to the dark and misogynistic social structure that exists between Black men and Black women, and Black women and the world. Black women are both the social ideal and the social nightmare for Black men like Kanye, who live their lives towing the line between worshipping their Black mothers and disrespecting them. Donda, the album

dedicated in it’s entirety to the memory of his mother, featured artists like Marilyn Manson, who has recently been accused of sexually assaulting women, DaBaby, who hit a woman in the face after she shone a flashlight at him, etc. (I use etc here to imply that this list is non exhaustive. In fact, the misogyny in Donda has been extensively covered since its release.)

Does Kanye truly love his mother, and therefore Black women, by extension, or is he simply in love with the idea of making his mother a martyr? While the academy he created in her honour and his penchant for naming his artistic projects after her may point to the former, to attempt to excuse his racist, misogynistic tirades as an attempt to be closer to her memory is facetious. Donda West died due to complications in the aftermath of her cosmetic surgery. Recently, Kanye took to Instagram to cyberbully Vogue Editor Gabrielle Kareefa Johnson after she called him out for his “White Lives Matter” stunt at Paris Fashion week. The same man whose mother died trying to change how she looked, making fun of another Black woman, for how she looks.

It’s behaviour that I’ve witnessed several times. Black women are held under the impossible standards of being both saints and sinners. Black men, publicly facing Black men in particular, uphold their mothers as pillars of godliness, while at the same time tearing down and destroying Black women. DaBaby, who features on the album in celebration of a Black woman, continues to support Tory Lanez, a man who shot Meghan Thee Stallion, another Black woman (and seems to have gotten away with it). The idea is distant from its reality, and intentionally so, because to embrace the reality would mean to embrace years of disrespect towards Black women. Kanye’s idea is beautiful to uphold. The reality, that Black women still live at the bottom of the social totem pole, is less stunning. In this light, Kanye’s mother is no angel. She is yet another victim of the world he continues to perpetuate.

AWUOR ONGURU is a junior in Berkeley College. Her column, “Wild West,” runs on alternative Tuesdays.

Contact her at awuor.onguru@yale.edu .

LETTER 10.30: Affirimative Action Today, 18 students from the Asian American Students Alliance — along with 23 representatives drawn from the Native and Indigenous Association at Yale, Black Students at Yale and Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlán –– rallied at the steps of the Supreme Court to defend diversity on college campuses. Yale’s Asian American Students Alliance, the primary vehicle for Asian American organizing on campus since 1969, unequivocally calls for affirmative action to be upheld, legally protected and respected.

Students for Fair Admissions, the plaintiff represented in both of today’s oral arguments, is using Asian Americans as pawns to sow further division among communities of color. The model minority myth comprises a large part of the rhetoric against affirmative action.

It homogenizes Asian Americans as a highly educated, hardworking group of mostly East Asians who successfully navigate the American meritocracy. This myth ignores the structural barriers to educational and college preparatory resources that lead to discrepancies in university enrollment rates among subgroups of the Asian American community. Furthermore, the case against affirmative action exaggerates Asian American opposition: 70 percent of Asian Americans support affirmative action, while 16 percent oppose it. The limited opposition in the community follows a generational divide: second-generation immigrants born in the United States are three times more likely to support affirmative action than their first-generation parents.

A primary reason for this divide is a

misconception known as the false equivalency of nonwhite disadvantage, wherein first-generation Asian immigrants recognize that people of color experience oppression but may not be familiar with the historical nuances that differentiate the mode and magnitude of discrimination experienced by different racial groups. As sociologists Jennifer Lee and Van C. Tran argue: “Some Asian immigrants feel like they are both victims of discrimination and victims of affirmative action who are penalized for their race while blacks and other minorities are rewarded for theirs.”

The case exploits these misconceptions like the model minority myth and false equivalency to use Asian Americans as a vehicle for anti-Black and anti-Latinae agendas. It effectively pits minority groups against each other in the perceived zero-sum game of college admissions. In reality, minority groups have historically expanded access to higher education by working in coalition to build power.

It is no coincidence that the coalition of Asian, Black, Latinae and Native and Indigenous students in Washington D.C. today mirrors the central organizing groups of the Third World Liberation Front strikes of 1968. This series of protests at San Francisco State University and UC Berkeley are the longest student strikes in the United States. They culminated in increased minority representation on university campuses and the founding of Ethnic Studies as an academic discipline. Their work has inspired decades of similar organizing at universities across the country, including at Yale.

For more than half a century, AASA’s central goal has been to

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advocate for students of color on campus by fighting for institutional support systems, like Yale’s cultural centers and the program in Ethnicity, Race and Migration.

Inspired by BSAY, AASA organizers in the 1970s campaigned for years to win their own space

YALE’S ASIAN AMERICAN STUDENTS ALLIANCE UNEQUIVOCALLY CALLS FOR AFFIRMATIVE ACTION TO BE UPHELD, LEGALLY PROTECTED AND RESPECTED. to accommodate growing numbers of Asian Americans on campus, and the Asian American Cultural Center was opened in 1981.

Nearly fifty years later, members of AASA, BSAY, MEChA and NISAY collaborated in the Coalition for Ethnic Studies to protest Yale’s failure to retain faculty of color and offer meaningful support to the ER&M department.

Affirmative Action is a critical component of our work. We’ve seen that without it, diversity on campus

plummets. In 1996, voters rejected the use of affirmative action in the California State University system.

Since the 26-year ban, the Black, Latinae and Indigenous student populations in the UC schools have sharply declined. Similarly, University of Michigan, another top public college, was forced to end affirmative action programs when voters decided to ban affirmative action in 2006. In 2021, Black enrollment reached a measly 4 percent in Michigan’s main campus of Ann Arbor.

In two amicus briefs published in August 2022, representatives of University of Michigan stated that “despite persistent, vigorous and varied efforts to increase student body racial and ethnic diversity by race-neutral means, the admission and enrollment of underrepresented minority students have fallen precipitously in many of University of Michigan’s schools and colleges.”

The “race-neutral” metrics used to make college admissions decisions are not neutral at all. Standardized tests, internship and research positions, extracurricular involvement and more are set up to favor white students over students of color by exploiting the racial wealth gap and failing to account for cultural differences. The “race neutral” admissions processes that University of Michigan and the UC system have been forced to turn to produce racist outcomes. These outcomes offer a sobering glimpse into a future without affirmative action and undermine decades of multiracial organizing to increase diversity in higher education.

Of course, our work does not end with the oral arguments. The Supreme Court’s decision on affir-

mative action is not simply about the admissions process of Harvard or UNC, but a part of a broader right-wing playbook seeking to weaponize diversity measures against racial progress (Edward Blum, the right-wing strategist behind SFFA, gutted the Voting Rights Act in 2013 using the same arguments he’s using now against affirmative action). The current threats to affirmative action also threaten the precedents that establish considerations within Title VII, which prohibits employee discrimination, threatening diversity measures implemented by affirmative action employers like Yale.

These broader implications make it critical that we support affirmative action now.

As Asian Americans, we have a responsibility to talk with our wider communities about how histories of racial oppression necessitate measures like affirmative action. We must present a unified front in the face of future attacks on affirmative action and related diversity measures. If you have no idea where to start, drop by one of our open AASA meetings!

Talk with our members — ask them questions, share your own reservations. Above all else, the central mission of the Asian American Students Alliance is to build the biggest tent possible. We hope you’ll join us in our fight to defend diversity and affirm opportunity.

NAINA AGRAWAL-HARDIN ’25, RESTY FUFUNAN ’24, MICHELLE LEE ’26, JANE PARK ’26 AND YOLANDA WANG ’26 are members of the Asian American Students Alliance at Yale.

GUEST COLUMNIST K E YA B A J A J

A tale of two homes Sometime in my first few weeks at Yale, my suite of four — with its mahogany wood floors, its ground floor view of Prospect Street, its open casement windows and the snatches of conversation that slip through them — assumed that weighty title of “home.” Perhaps it was after a late night on Old Campus or maybe in a rushed exchange at Commons; nevertheless, in casual conversation, “home” settled into my new Yalie dictionary, its four letters uniting with the kind of compelling connotation that had so far only been afforded to my eighteen years in the same house on the same street in India.

My life in Bombay was framed by familiarity — by 14 years at the same school; by evening walks with friends, parents of friends, even grandparents of friends, in a park overlooking the Arabian Sea; by the owner of my local store, who reminded me in the days before I left for college of the way

I used to scan his shelves, brighteyed at the possibilities of a new LEGO set, back when I couldn’t even reach the counter.

How then, in three short weeks, was I experiencing such solace in waiting for that elusive signal change at Prospect and Trumbull?

Why did I feel such comfort in a set change from stone to red-brick and anticipate unbridled consolation in curling up in even the crustiest couch in my common room?

How could a place so foreign feel so like home — and why, in my quick adjustment to college life, did I feel a twinge of guilt, the slightest sense of self-reproach?

Each time that hefty word “home” slipped into dialogue with admirable ease, I found myself wishing it were a little clumsier in my parlance, a little shy of the betrayal I knew I was committing. To call Yale “home” meant casting aside the place I’d left behind; it meant banishing it to a secondary position,

throwing into the ring a new contender for its title and challenging it to retain its badge of honor in a duel I refused to referee. Sometimes, I hoped to rid myself of the duplicity of this word, to unknot myself from the quantum entanglement of my existence, from that sense of being neither here nor there that I was now condemned to. Because as much as it plagued me, calling Yale “home” also marked the culmination of 6 months of irrepressible excitement since December 16, of daydreaming and night-dreaming of the intellectual haven that wanted me to join its hallowed halls, that granted me the rare opportunity to delight in hearing the bells of Harkness Tower resound across campus on a rainy afternoon.

Read more online at yaledailynews.com .

KEYA BAJAJ is a first year in Benjamin Franklin College. Contact her at keya.bajaj@yale.edu.

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YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2022 · yaledailynews.com · @yaledailynews

FROM THE FRONT

“When I was a kid, I couldn't see life outside ramen noodles and Kool-Aid.” JASON REYNOLDS AMERICAN AUTHOR

Yalies protest in defense of affirmative action as SC decision looms ACTION FROM PAGE 1 “Following the oral arguments, it seems all but decided that affirmative action will fall next year,” wrote Tony Ruan ’25, the co-political chair of Yale’s Asian American Students Alliance. “While obviously frustrated, and a little hoarse from a bit of vocal strain, I also feel a profound sense of pride and gratitude for our community.”

In the lawsuit against UNCChapel Hill, SFFA claims that the consideration of race in college admissions processes violates the Fourteenth Amendment rights of white and Asian American students.

In the Harvard case, the group argues that Asian Americans’ equal protection rights are infringed upon.

Research suggests that repealing affirmative action would sink the admissions rates of Black, Latinx and Native students by 50 to 60 percent.

Though the Yale Office of Undergraduate Admissions is not making any assumptions about the future of affirmative action, admissions staff are taking steps to continue promoting diversity, even in a post-affirmative action world.

“Earlier this year, the Admissions Office completed a review of the race-neutral initiatives we currently use to build a diverse student body,” Dean of Undergraduate Admissions and Financial Aid Jeremiah Quinlan wrote in an email to the News. “We will expand those initiatives, and we are working closely with the partners across campus to identify ways to obtain the benefits of diversity, even in a changed legal environment.”

SFFA also sued Yale in 2021, alleging similar discrimination in its admissions practices. The lawsuit is currently on hold, pending the resolution of the ongoing Supreme Court litigation.

University Interim Vice President for Communications Karen Peart also emphasized Yale’s support for affirmative action in an email to the News.

Peart referenced an amicus brief that Yale filed alongside 14 peer institutions earlier this year. She noted that both a federal trial court and appellate court have already ruled Harvard’s consideration of race and ethnicity to be legal.

“Today, the Supreme Court is being asked to uphold 40 years of its own precedent affirming the importance of diversity in higher education,” Peart wrote. “Yale is firmly committed to complying with all legal requirements for admissions and is confident that a

diverse student body will remain a central feature of a Yale education.”

Student delegations take D.C. Forty-one Yale students — 18 students from the Asian American Students Alliance and 23 from across the Native and Indigenous Association at Yale, Black Students at Yale and Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlán — gathered at the Supreme Court to protest in defense of race-conscious admissions.

They joined over 100 Harvard students as well as delegations from other schools, such as UNC and Morgan State, among others. The New York Times reported that a line of individuals hoping to watch the Court stretched at least two blocks away.

The students woke up at 7 a.m. and marched together to the Supreme Court Building, where student activists, nonprofit leaders and elders spoke about the benefits of affirmative action, according to Quinn Luong ’26.

Ruan emphasized the importance of building community across ethnic groups.

The four cultural advocacy groups — AASA, NISAY, BSAY and MEChA — expressed their excitement about the collaborative efforts leading up to these demonstrations. The trip represents the biggest cross-cultural undertaking since the 2019 protests to bolster the Ethnicity, Race & Migration program.

In an Oct. 30 letter to the editor, AASA members reflected on the value of the current endeavor, expressing their pride to continue a history of “radical student activism,” Ruan wrote, a sentiment other protesting student groups agreed with.

“We were inspired by the history of intercultural advocacy and solidarity between BSAY, NISAY, MEChA, and AASA and we were honored to continue in the footsteps of previous student leaders,” BSAY’s Social Justice co-chairs, Momona Hadish ’25 and Anna Elesinmogun ’25 wrote in a joint statement to the News. “We hope that our organizing this week builds community that will last beyond this action — that it continues to set a precedent of dialogue, activism, and collaboration between cultural organizations on campus.”

Some individuals and groups — like the center-right think tank American Enterprise Institute — have levied critiques of pro-affirmative action advocates, calling them “obsessed with race.”

But for Ruan, racial analysis is a critical part of progress toward racial justice.

“What these critics fail to see is a broader critique of not just racism, but power,” Ruan wrote. “If being ‘obsessed with race’ means building solidarity across racial groups to critically reflect on the circumstances in which Asian Americans can be used as a political pawn to roll back affirmative action policies proven to advance economic and educational justice for racial minorities—including Asian Americans themselves—then perhaps we are obsessed with race.”

On Oct. 30, the day before oral arguments began, Yalies attended a celebration of diversity organized by non-profit legal organizations, including the NAACP Legal Defense Fund. Civil rights leaders and student speakers — including AASA co-moderator Resty Fufunan ’24 — discussed the value of diversity in education and the need to preserve affirmative action.

Among the students in D.C. was Anh Nguyen ’26, who said affirmative action goes beyond “checking a box.”

“It's the ability to authentically express yourself,” Nguyen told the News.

Efforts on campus AASA organizers are also working to actively promote on-campus awareness of affirmative action.

On Oct. 31, the same day oral arguments began in D.C., Yalies hosted an affirmative action teach-in at the Asian American Cultural Center. The event included representatives from the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, Lawyer’s Committee for Civil Rights Under Law and Asian Americans Advancing Justice to discuss the significance of race-conscious admissions and what ongoing litigation means for its future.

Last week organizers from AASA created and posted a fact sheet, with the objective of spreading information about race-conscious admissions policies and their current precarious legal standing. Members also set up an informational session on Cross Campus on Sunday, Oct. 30, to disseminate information to the general Yale community.

AASA members also worked with Yale Splash, an student-run program in which Yale students teach classes to students in grades 7-12, to offer an informational session on affirmative action this past Saturday, Oct. 29.

Per AASA cultural chair Aly Moosa ’25, the class taught with

Splash included a research-based educational overview of affirmative action as well as a summary of the legal contexts of both SFFA cases.

“We aimed to introduce a conversation to high schoolers, igniting 1.) a critical approach to thinking about college admissions and the future of admissions and 2.) an understanding of the tension within the Asian American community,” Moosa wrote in an email to the News. “We hope that more students (both in college and high school) can continue to work and talk about Affirmative Action. The fight isn't over—it has just begun.”

The oral arguments The proceedings opened at 10 a.m., when the Supreme Court heard arguments for the UNC case. Harvard lawyers began their presentation around 1:00 p.m., and the sessions concluded around 3:00 p.m.

A core component of the SFFA argument is that the Supreme Court previously prohibited the use of racial classifications to increase diversity in K-12 school assignments. The Court has also forbid colleges from using race to hire more diverse faculty. As such, SFFA holds that it does not follow for racial classification to be used in college admissions.

Harvard lawyers contended that the Constitution and its amendments are not inherently race-neutral, as the plaintiffs purport. Specifically, they noted that the 14th Amendment — which contains the equal protection clause — was passed with race in mind.

The equal protection clause holds that American constitutional rights extend to all citizens. It was initially implemented in 1868 to grant equal rights to newly-freed slaves.

In an SFFA press release that its founder Edward Blum sent to the News, Blum criticized prestigious schools, asserting his belief that they harm national values.

“Elite universities like Harvard and UNC are diminishing, rather than growing, the power and profundity of American individualism,” Blum wrote in the press release. “As individual Americans, we are all minorities.”

Blum added that a “significant majority of Americans of all races” oppose race-conscious college admissions policies and consider an affirmative action repeal to be a step toward the nation’s original civil rights principles.

In fact, public opinion around affirmative action is murky. Survey data suggests that reported support

or opposition varies based on question phrasing and the racial identity of the surveyed person.

Of more than 10,000 adults surveyed in March by the Pew Research Center, 74 percent said that race or ethnicity should not be considered by colleges when they decide which students to admit. In this poll, 79 percent of white respondents said that race and ethnicity should not be a factor, but only 59 percent of Black people responded that way.

Another survey, conducted this month by The Washington Post and George Mason University, found that 63 percent of more than 1,200 adults would support the Supreme Court in banning the consideration of race in college admissions. The same poll, however, also found that 64 percent of respondents supported programs designed to increase racial diversity among college students.

A New York Times and Siena College poll of registered voters in September asked participants specifically about “affirmative action.” Of the 1,400 adults contacted, 40 percent said they either strongly or somewhat favored the use of affirmative action in college admissions. Twenty-eight percent said they strongly or somewhat opposed the idea, while 24 percent said they had never heard of affirmative action.

During the hearing, SFFA was represented by Consovoy McCarthy, an Arlington, Virginia-based law firm.

Patrick Strawbridge, one of the partners representing SFFA, previously represented former president Donald Trump’s 2020 campaign in a case that sought to block the counting of Pennsylvania mail-in ballots.

Strawbridge also formerly clerked for Clarence Thomas, a current justice seated on the Supreme Court. Ginni Thomas, the justice’s wife, sits on the advisory board of the National Association of Scholars — a conservative organization that filed an amicus brief in support of SFFA’s suit. Ginni Thomas’s board role has raised questions about the justice’s impartiality toward the two affirmative action cases presently before the Court.

Four of the nine justices currently sitting on the Supreme Court are alumni of Yale Law School.

Read the rest of our affirmative action coverage on our website.

Contact ANIKA SETH at anika.seth@yale.edu .

Democratic incumbents likely to stay in office ELECTIONS FROM PAGE 1 funding increases and rainy day fund stabilization, an effective response to COVID-19, as well as conservative threats to reproductive access and voting rights makes them the right party for government in Connecticut.

Stefanowski and down-ballot Republican candidates argue that ineffective federal, state and local Democratic governance have exacerbated the cost-of-living crisis, inflation and crime across the state.

“It’s unconscionable that [Lamont] knows that there are people out there that can’t afford food, smiles in the mirror and says ‘I’m off for the day,’ even sitting on $6 billion in reserves,” Stefanowski said at an October campaign event in New Haven.

Lamont and Stefanowski faced off against each other in 2018 with Lamont prevailing by 3.2 percent, or roughly 50,000 votes.

Where does the governor’s race stand?

The Republican messaging against Democratic incumbents doesn't appear to be sticking in much of the state.

Lamont has maintained a double digit lead over Stefanowski since September. Polls released

by WTNH/Emerson/The Hill on Tuesday have Lamont up by 11 points, while a Quinnipiac poll has him leading by 15.

While Lamont maintains the polling advantage, Stefanowski has outraised him in individual contributions. Stefanowski raised $341,380 in the last quarter, while Lamont raised $217,760.

Stefanowski has $2.24 million on hand, while Lamont has $110,000 on hand.

Both candidates have spent large sums of their own money on the campaign — double what they each spent in their 2018 matchup. In total, Lamont has donated $14 million to himself while Stefanowski has donated $10 million.

In New Haven, Lamont kicked off his campaign’s get-out-the-vote campaign on Oct. 15. His campaign plans on knocking on the majority of doors in the city. New Haven Rising and UNITE Here Local 34 are also supporting Democratic candidates.

New Haven Rising organizer Elias Estabrook told the News that New Haven Rising was going to knock on doors three times a week through the election.

“Under the Democrats we’ve seen an increase in funding for New Haven through PILOT,” Estabrook told the News. “We need more funding for the city, and I don’t want to see Republicans wipe out our progress.”

contribution to New Haven’s budget. Carlson, who has run for Mayor in 2018, argues that Democrats have been in power for too long without any real progress.

In the State House, three of the seven incumbent Democrats – District 92’s Patricia Dillon, District 94’s Robyn Porter and District 95’s Juan Candelaria – are not facing a Republican challenger.

In District 93 Democrat Toni Walker is facing off against Republican Percy Senders and in District 116 incumbent Trenee McGree is running against former state trooper and West Haven fire commissioner Aaron M. Haley.

In District 96, incumbent Roland Lemar is facing off against New Haven Republicans co-chair Eric Matroianni while in District 97 Alphonse Paolillo is running for re-election against Republican Anthony Acri.

New Haven ready to re-elect nine-member state legislative delegation New Haven has two senators in the state senate and seven members in the state house. All nine are currently Democrats, indicative of strong Democratic support in New Haven.

State Senate Pro Tempore Martin Looney and Senator Gary Winfield are facing challenges from Republicans Steve Orosco and John Carlson respectively.

Orosco is the founder and CEO of Smash Global — a company that organizes Mixed Martial Arts fighting events. Looney is the senior most Democrat in the chamber serving in the Senate for 29 years.

Newhallville’s Winfield is running for his sixth term arguing that he has helped push for long term changes in the state such as increasing the state’s

Stephanie Thomas likely victor for Secretary of the State Democrat state representative Stephanie Thomas faces Republican Dominic Rapini in the race for secretary of the state, which oversees elections. Such offices across the nation have received attention this year; deniers of the 2020 election appear poised to win the office in several battleground states.

Rapini, a salesperson for Apple, was born in New Haven and now lives in Branford. He is the board chair of Fight Voter Fraud, Inc., which has filed unfounded claims of voter fraud during the 2020 election to the Connecticut State Elections Enforcement Commission.

Gayle Alberda, an assistant professor at Fairfield University said that Connecticut’s Secretary of State election has particular significance in

the current political climate since the secretary chiefly oversees election administration, including running the elections, supervising the counting of ballots and certifying results.

“This will likely work against Rapini as polls show that threats to democracy are a top three issue for Connecticut voters,” Alberda wrote in an email to the News.

Connecticuters to vote on early voting amendment Connecticut voters will also decide whether the state should allow early voting next year. On the ballot, voting “yes” will permit the General Assembly to provide early voting as Connecticut is currently one of four states in the nation that doesn’t have early voting.

Though a similar effort failed in 2014, New Haven organizers are hopeful about this measure’s success.

Founder of New Haven Votes Coalition Aaron Goode told the News that while there wasn’t originally high voter knowledge on the issue.

“The education effort has been pretty strong, pretty robust around the ballot question, and I think it will do very well in New Haven,” Goode said.

Republicans’ only hope: Connecticut’s fifth The only congressional seat where Republicans may pull off a victory in the state is Connecticut’s fifth district which covers the western border of the state including Waterbury, New Britain, Meriden and Bristol.

Jahana Hayes, first elected in 2018, is locked into a tight race with Republican challenger George Logan. Last Wednesday, Cook Political Report moved the Fifth District from lean Democrat to toss-up.

Logan was the only Black Republican in the state Senate during a two-term tenure that ended with defeat in 2020. He has proved to be a stiff challenger in a district that is rated with a partisan rating of D+2, which measures how strong support for either party exists in a congressional district.

Last Thursday, WTNH/The Hill/ Emerson College’s poll gave Logan a one point lead in the race. Thursday’s poll is a shift from a July poll where Hayes was up by 8 percent.

Emerson polling’s spokesperson Camille Mumford broke down their polling in the race saying that independents currently favor Logan 53 to 38 percent while 55 percent of women favor Hayes. 57 percent of men favor electing Logan.

“Logan is presenting himself as a more palatable candidate than most national Republicans,” Mumford told the News.

In the most recent fundraising quarter, made public on Oct. 15, Hayes raised $750,000 which was more than double that of Logan in the same quarter. Hayes enters the final stretch with $1.5 million, while Logan has $250,000 on hand.

Outside groups have spent $7.2 million on the race according to analysis done by the California Target Group. Democrats are currently outspending the GOP by a little more than $1 million.

Nutmeggers can still register in their town’s designated voter registration site up through election day, Nov. 4th.

Contact YASH ROY at yash.roy@yale.edu and CHARLOTTE HUGHES at charlotte.hughes@yale.edu .

YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, NOVEMEBR 4, 2022 · yaledailynews.com · @yaledailynews

FROM THE FRONT

PAGE 5

“Some fan literally broke into my house...He brought me three boxes of noodles.” RICH BRIAN INDONESIAN RAPPER

University to build new theater performance spaces for students PAUL BASS FROM PAGE 1 Connecticut, the Independent is funded largely by charitable donations. That makes public service the newsroom’s primary motivation, Bass says, rather than clicks and ad revenue.

“I believe that local news is the raw material of democracy,” Bass said. “And if you don't have fair, smart, citizen-engaged, two-way, local news reporting and debate, you don't have the means with which to have a democratic system.”

The Independent began as just a supplement to traditional news. But demand from avid readers pushed Bass to raise money, hire a staff and grow the publication.

Over four decades, New Haven has experienced rapid downtown development, declining crime rates and a blossoming arts scene but also corruption scandals, reckonings with police brutality

and perennial budget woes. Bass has been here to capture it all.

“New Haven has always had personality,” Bass explained. “It’s always been down-to-earth. It's always been small enough where you can make a difference and big enough that it's interesting.”

Bass’ journalistic skills started young. He created a newspaper for his neighborhood when he was 8 and wrote for his school papers in middle and high school. Bass arrived at Yale in 1978 and wrote for the News for two years before being taken on by the New Haven Register and Advocate.

Bass, now 62, hopes this move will allow him to keep doing what he loves without getting burned out. As Bass transitions to his new role, focusing more on writing and supporting the Online Journalism Project, he will also help support Breen as he takes over the role of editor.

“It's healthy to have talented younger people assume positions

of leadership in all sectors, including journalism,” Bass added.

Although Breen has been interested in writing since an early age and wrote for a magazine in college, he did not begin pursuing a career in journalism until he came to New Haven.

Breen started working in New Haven in 2010 at Yale University Press and began freelancing for the Independent in 2015, writing movie reviews and interviewing local filmmakers after work.

“It really is a trailblazer in the world of nonprofit, online, local journalism …the Independent has been and continues to be rooted in the community that we write about,” Breen said. “I just love it so much.”

As editor, Breen hopes to live up to the legacy Bass has left and the high standard for journalism that he fostered at the Independent. More than just writing articles and covering events, Breen is also focused on maintaining the local and community-first

approach that Bass has cultivated. For Breen, what makes the Independent special is that readers know that the articles are written by their neighbors.

“The Independent’s coverage has a mission,” Breen explained. “It’s not just news for news’ sake. It is to make this a more vibrant, engaged, informed, democratic community.

We do our small part to make people feel more connected to one another and more involved in public life.”

Over the Independent’s nearly two decades in New Haven, it has also helped train reporters and introduce students to journalism.

Alex Werrell ’13 GRD ‘19, an English and Art History teacher at Taft and former resident of New Haven, praised Bass not only for his faithful coverage of local issues but also for helping recruit and encourage students journalists of all ages.

“I think one of the most impressive things about the Independent is just the amount of ground and time they

are able to cover with these reporters, these journalists,” Werrell said. “They don't discriminate between the importance of events. If it's in New Haven, if it concerns New Haven, if it involves New Haven, the first source that I go to is the Independent.”

Ko Lyn Cheang ’21, now a reporter at the Indianapolis Star, was another student journalist who came up under Bass.

“I'll always be really grateful to him for that because he takes chances on student journalists who may not have a ton of prior experience but have a heart for local reporting,” Cheang said. “Paul was just incredibly encouraging at a time when I was still finding my feet as a journalist … The internship was, without a doubt, one of the best journalism experiences. A lot of what he taught me that summer I continue to carry with me till today.”

Contact KHUAN-YU HALL at khuan.hall@yale.edu .

Students scramble for Yale-Harvard tickets TICKETS FROM PAGE 1 ber of available tickets displayed on the website dropped rapidly.

The first instance where the event appeared as sold out was shortly after 2:30 p.m, but some students were able to secure tickets after additional batches appeared on the website at various moments later in the afternoon. Tickets were fully sold out by around 3:30 p.m.

“It was awful,” Josh Donovan ’26 said. “We spent two hours on this website before we got tickets. I skipped class to do this.”

The 138th iteration of The Game will be the first hosted at Harvard Stadium since 2016. The 2020 Game was canceled due to the COVID19 pandemic, while the 2018 Game

was played at Fenway Park in Boston. Because virtually no current students have attended The Game at Harvard Stadium, it was sometimes difficult for students to distinguish errors from usual protocol in the rush for tickets.

Yale College administrator Paul McKinley told the News that there is typically an annual message from a student affairs leader that is a “bundled message” with transportation, ticket and housing information.

“It’s unfortunate that there was no advanced notice given about tickets being released,” said Agastya Rana ’24, events coordinator for the Yale College Council. “The primary way most people heard about it was wordof-mouth, which definitely shouldn’t happen for an official school event.”

Rana told the News he had recently contacted the Yale College Dean’s Office and Yale Athletics in order to request information about The Game so that he could try to communicate that information with students. Rana said he had yet to hear back from Yale Athletics or receive logistical details from YCDO representatives.

Marissa Blum ’24 wrote that she bonded with other students in the Elm who were trying to get tickets over the shared frustration of either having to “pay the price of delaying the completion of our coursework” or take the financial loss of changing travel plans.

“Where the problem really came in was that I was not able to purchase my tickets for nearly two hours,” Blum wrote to the News, “I have had plans to go to The Game with friends for quite

some time and even changed my travel plans home for Thanksgiving with the knowledge that The Game was taking place in the Boston area.”

The ticket launch, however roughly implemented, brought The Game to the forefront of campus discourse. Players on the team said they could feel the excitement building around campus.

“We are ready to bring our best to the school up north,” starting cornerback Sean Guyton ’25 wrote to the News. “We continue to improve across all phases of the game, offense, defense and special teams, so we are excited to see Bulldog fans flood Cambridge for The Game. It is really cool to hear how students are going crazy for tickets! We love the support.”

Tickets available for Harvard students sold out on Oct. 19. It

is unclear how tickets were split between the universities’ two undergraduate populations.

Students lucky enough to secure tickets during the rush will be able to use them despite the confusion surrounding their release.

“The tickets that were sold all went to Yale students and they will all be valid,” Guglieri said. “I’ll just say again, this was on us. This was an error on our department, we take full responsibility for it.”

The official capacity of Harvard Stadium is 25,884, and the capacity of the Yale Bowl is 61,446.

Contact SARAH COOK at sarah.cook@yale.edu and SPENCER KING at spencer.king@yale.edu .

Strobel explains ongoing campus construction in facilities report CONSTRUCTION FROM PAGE 1 Christopher Renton wrote in an email to the News.

New classroom spaces throughout the museum will also bring teaching inside the Peabody, providing ample opportunity for hands-on learning with the museum’s extensive collection of objects and specimens.

When it reopens, admission to the museum will be free to the public.

Physical Sciences and Engineering Building construction The University will soon break ground on the new Physical Sciences and Engineering Building, which Strobel called “one of the largest facilities projects in university history.”

The Physical Sciences and Engineering Building will serve as a 600,000-square-foot hub for quantum computing, engineering, materials science and advanced instrumentation development.

“We’re looking forward to the PSEB giving our faculty a stateof-the-art space to conduct their impactful research, particularly in the areas of quantum information and computation, quantum materials and devices and quantum sensing, as well as the fundamental physics and computer science that drive and enable these endeavors,” Brock told the News.

In addition to laboratories, classrooms and a state-of-the-art clean room, the building will be home to the new Advanced Instrumentation Development Center.

The building will be located near Wright Laboratory, north of Bass Center and east of the Class of 1954 Chemistry Research Building. Its footprint will be almost as large as the Yale Bowl.

The PSEB is scheduled to be completed in 2029.

Osborn Memorial Laboratories renovation The University will soon begin a top-down renovation of Osborn Memorial Laboratories to add new offices, labs and computational space to existing facilities.

The renovations come as part of the University’s new Planetary Solutions Project, which directs significant University resources to address “global challenges of climate change and biodiver-

sity loss through the integration of the natural, health, and social sciences, engineering and humanities at Yale.”

The building, which now principally houses biology labs, will soon be home to the department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, the Yale Center for Natural Carbon Capture and the Yale Institute for Biospheric Studies.

The building will also serve the School of the Environment.

“At the YCNCC, we are very excited about having our permanent home at OML,” the Center’s Managing Director Anna Schuerkmann wrote in an email to the News.

The YCNCC develops new approaches to natural carbon capture and reduction, and the YIBS takes an interdisciplinary approach to studying the biosphere.

The renovations are still in the planning stages, with more information to come.

The Divinity School’s “Living Village” construction The Divinity School’s new Living Village project is another example of the University’s environmental priorities coming to fruition.

The Living Village will be a new graduate housing facility that is both sustainable and regenerative, with a “wide range of green features.” The Village will satisfy the performance standards of the Living Building Challenge, an international sustainable building certification program created in 2006 by the International Living Future Institute.

Green features will include net-positive energy use, recyc l e d a n d e nv i ro n m e n ta l ly friendly materials, open courtyards, constructed wetlands and onsite wastewater treatment.

The project is still in the planning stages, but it is expected to break ground in the winter of 2023 with an expected completion date in 2024.

Social Sciences on Hillhouse Avenue construction and renovation The University has also begun several interconnected social science renovation projects in the Hillhouse Avenue area.

A brand new building at 87 Trumbull Street will provide a unified space

for the Economics department and the Tobin Center for Economic Policy.

The building connects, on all levels, to 28 Hillhouse Avenue and 30 Hillhouse Avenue, the home of the Cowles Foundation for Research in Economics. It also connects on its first floor to the Institution for Social and Policy Studies, thereby creating a “large, interconnected complex for social science research at Yale.”

“The Department looks forward to housing all its faculty under one (large) roof for the first time, the beginning of a new era for the Department,” Economics department chair Tony Smith told the News.

When renovations at 87 Trumbull Street are complete, the University will begin renovating 24 and 37 Hillhouse Avenue, which houses the Linguistics department, the Institution for Social and Policy Studies, and the Data-Intensive Social Science Center.

According to Linguistics department chair Raffaella Zanuttini, renovation will start in summer 2023 and should be completed by the end of 2024.

The Linguistics Department will move in as soon as the renovations are finished, possibly as early as December 2024 or January 2025.

Lower Hillhouse renovation In February, Strobel and University President Peter Salovey announced the creation of the School of Engineering & Applied Science as an autonomous faculty body within the University and the expansion of its faculty by 30 positions.

Renovations on lower Hillhouse Avenue will support the continued growth of SEAS. “Some of the buildings in the lower Hillhouse Avenue area date back to the turn of the last century and need reimagining,” Strobel wrote in the annual facilities report.

The first of the renovations will be the conversion of Kirtland Hall — which now houses Psychology department offices — into a dedicated classroom building. The project is scheduled to begin in 2023 and conclude the following year.

Strobel said that more detailed plans for lower Hillhouse will be announced in the coming months.

82-90 Wall Street renovation At 82-90 Wall Street, the former home of Wall Street Pizza, a comprehensive renovation will provide new modular classroom spaces, an academic lounge, restrooms, exterior social spaces and “connection to the neighboring coffee shop.”

That coffee shop — formerly Blue State Coffee — was recently purchased by Common Grounds Cafe, another small New England chain.

University leaders envision the spaces, which are across the street from Silliman College, as updated homes for the Program in Ethnicity, Race, and Migration and the Yale Center for the Study of Race, Indigeneity, and Transnational Migration.

According to ER&M chair Ana Ramos-Zayas, the department plans to move into the space “early in 2024.”

“At this point, we’re both excited and still trying to get a sense of how much space we are exactly getting,” Ramos-Zayas wrote in an email to the News. “We are hoping to get more space so that we can continue to grow as a program.”

Corner of Crown and York Streets construction The University is nearing its fundraising goal to construct a new dramatic arts building at the corner of Crown and York streets.

The new facility will include state-of-the-art theaters, performance spaces and classrooms for the David Geffen School of Drama, the Yale Repertory Theatre and the Theater, Dance & Performance Studies Program.

The building will also provide new rehearsal space for the Yale Dramatic Association. Faculty and students welcomed the proposal, which is still in a design phase, as a much-needed overhaul and described current spaces as “terrible” and “falling apart.”

“We expect the new facility will include a proscenium theater with a fly tower and orchestra pit, a studio theater, green rooms, rehearsal studios and production shops,” Strobel wrote. “It will usher in a new era of talent and storytelling in New Haven, while growing Yale’s tradition of artistic accomplishment.”

The building will soon enter the pre-design stage, which will last about two years.

100 College Street renovation On the University’s southern end, a major renovation across seven floors of 100 College Street will bridge the Faculty of Arts and Sciences and the Yale School of Medicine to explore the frontiers of the mind.

The FAS Department of Psychology and the School of Medicine’s Department of Neuroscience will co-inhabit the new space alongside the new Wu Tsai Institute, which synthesizes these disciplines to facilitate breakthroughs in human understanding of cognition and neuroscience.

The new institute was first announced in February 2021 following a donation from Joseph Tsai ’86, JD ’90 and Clara Wu Tsai, his wife.

“Dramatic renovations at 100 College Street are rapidly transforming seven empty floors covering hundreds of thousands of square feet into a modern research building,” psychology professor and the Institute’s inaugural director Nicholas Turk-Browne wrote in an email to the News.

Turk-Browne said that some of the floors are nearing completion while others remain at earlier stages of development. The renovations are expected to conclude in the late spring or summer of 2023.

101 College Street construction Construction next door at 101 College Street has just begun as well. The building will serve as an incubator space for local biotech startups.

Neither 100 nor 101 College Street is owned by Yale, but the University aims to be “an anchor tenant in both facilities,” according to Strobel’s statement, and will lease out approximately 125,000 square feet.

This project is intended to help New Haven continue to develop as a national hub for life sciences innovation and research.

New Haven Works, an organization that seeks to connect city residents to good jobs, established a partnership agreement for 101 College Street that gives preferential consideration in hiring to residents of the adjacent Hill and Dwight neighborhoods.

Contact EVAN GORELICK at evan.gorelick@yale.edu .

YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2022 · yaledailynews.com

PAGE 6

NEWS

“Noodles are not only amusing, but delicious.”

JULIA CHILD, AMERICAN COOK

Yalies celebrate the Festival of Lights

BY ANIKA SETH AND FATOU M’BAYE STAFF REPORTER AND CONTRIBUTING REPORTER On the darkest day of the Hindu lunar month Kartik, which typically lasts from mid-October to mid-November, over one billion people across the world celebrated Diwali — which fell on Oct. 24 this year.

Diwali, also known as Deepavali, marks the Hindu Festival of Lights.

Observers traditionally illuminate their homes — often with diyas, which can be clay lamps or tea lights — to dispel darkness and instead invite Lakshmi, the goddess of prosperity and fortune, into their homes.

The holy day also holds significance for Sikhs and Jains, and is celebrated in India, Nepal, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Guyana, Malaysia and other countries with South Asian diasporas.

On Oct. 28, the Yale Hindu Students Organization and the Chaplain’s Office co-hosted the puja — or prayer — to Maha Lakhsmi at the Omni Hotel, with a catered vegetarian Indian dinner following the service.

“Celebrating Diwali for me was way more than observing a religious festival,” wrote Maanasi Nair ’25. “Diwali to me means carefree celebration, filled with the warmth of friends, family, good food and a lot of mutual love for everyone. Connecting with the larger community and seeing everyone there genuinely enjoy themselves really did touch me, and left me feeling so much more rejuvenated.”

For Nair, who is from Bangalore, India, celebrating Diwali at Yale was “comforting,” especially while being far from home. Nair is also vice president of India at Yale, an undergraduate association that describes themselves as working to host social and political events that bring the Indian community closer and proliferate interest and awareness about Indian issues on campus.

In an email to the News, Director of Hindu Life Asha Shipman explained that Diwali is a five-day celebration, with the third day — the Lakshmi Puja — considered the main day.

Even within Hinduism, there are various legends behind the celebration of Diwali. The most popular Hindu legend comes from the Ramayana, a Sanskrit epic that tells the story of the exiled Prince Rama.

According to the Ramayana, Diwali marks the day that Rama, his brother Lakshmana and his wife Sita return to their kingdom of Ayodhya after a 14-year exile. Here, the lighting of the lamps on Diwali represents the people of Ayodhya lighting the way home for Rama, Lakshmana and Sita.

“In this sacred story the Divine is born in mortal form as Lord Rama, a Hindu prince,” Shipman wrote.

“He is born to restore the balance of good and evil in the world. This third day of Diwali is celebrated as the day that Lord Rama is said to have returned to Ayodhya after quelling the forces of evil.”

In Sikhism, the day is celebrated as Bandi Chhor Divas, which translates to Day of Liberation. The Sikh hol-

GIRI VISWANATHAN/PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR

The Yale Hindu Students Organization and the Chaplain’s Office co-hosted a Diwali puja at the Omni Hotel on Oct. 28.

iday commemorates the historical freeing of the sixth Guru, or teacher, of the Sikhs. Guru Hargobind Singh Ji released 52 prisoners from Gwalior Fort, who had been imprisoned by Mughal Emperor Jahangir.

Sikhs often celebrate Bandi Chhor Divas by lighting up their homes and gurudwaras — Sikh places of worship, whose name translates from Punjabi into “doorway to the Guru” — and through celebratory processions. Some also put on fireworks displays to honor the day.

In Jainism, Diwali marks the nirvana, the spiritual awakening or liberation, of Lord Mahavira’s soul.

Lord Mahavira is the twenty-fourth Tirthankara, or, roughly, supreme preacher, and also the last Tirthankara of the current cycle of the Jain cosmic wheel of time. Some Jain scriptures refer to the day as Diaplikaya, which refers to light leaving the body.

Lord Mahavira is said to have attained his nirvana at the dawn of the new moon, or the darkest day of the lunar month. According to the Kalpa Sūtra, a Jain text containing the biographies of the Jain Tirthankaras, many gods were present during the event and illuminated the darkness. However, the following night was pitch black, as neither the gods nor the moon were present. As such, Jains light candles and lamps to symbolically preserve the light of Mahavira’s knowledge.

Shipman noted that many consider Diwali to be a “pan-Indian festival” regardless of religious affiliation. Often, Yale Hindu community members invite non-Hindu friends to join the celebration.

“Holy days and festivals can be a time of great homesickness for our Hindu community members who are missing the rituals, customs, flavors, sounds and sights of these important annual events,” Shipman wrote. “Last year during our Diwali celebration, a graduate student from India shared with me that attending Diwali puja made him feel like he was at home for the first time since he joined Yale.”

Sikhs at Yale celebrates Bandi Chhor Divas Some Sikh students at Yale are part of Sikhs at Yale, an undergraduate organization that aims to raise the cultural and spiritual awareness of the Sikh faith among Sikh and non-Sikhs alike on Yale’s campus.

Normally, Sikhs would go to the gurudwara on Bandi Chhor Divas.

There, they light diyas and keep them lit until the flame dies out.

Last year, SAY students took a trip to the nearest gurudwara, which is in Hamden. This year, however, the holiday fell on the Monday after fall break, so they were not able to attend. Instead, they plan to go on a subsequent weekend.

“Even if it’s post-facto, I think it will be a good thing to celebrate it,” said Jasmin Gill ’23, the president of SAY. Explaining the story of Bandi Chhor Divas, Gill noted that the holiday’s name literally translates to “prisoner release day.” She explained that the sixth Guru, Hargobind, was imprisoned in the Gwalior Fort through conflict with the Mughal empire — and though his personal release was negotiated, there were 52 other kings and princes who were imprisoned alongside him by the Mughals.

“He said, ‘I won’t leave by myself, I want to release these ones, too,’” Gill explained. “The people who were imprisoning him [told him] however many prisoners could hold onto his clothes could leave with him, so Guru had a special cloak embroidered with 52 threads hanging off the back of it such that each raja, or prince, was able to hold on and then be released.”

According to Gill, when Sikhs heard that Guru Hargobind Ji was being released, the Punjabi city of Amritsar — one of the holiest places in the Sikh religion — lit up with diyas, fireworks and all kinds of celebrations of light. The Golden Temple, a central and holy religious place for Sikhs, is located in Amritsar.

Gill is from Lodi, California, near Stockton, where the first gurudwara in America was built. She grew up going to the Stockton gurudwara and was surrounded by a strong Sikh community.

“Overall, there are not too many Sikhs at Yale,” Gill said. “There’s big communities all over America, kind of centered in California, New Jersey, Texas, but there’s not too many at Yale. I think in my first year, there were maybe 15 people total in the GroupMe.” Looking forward, Gill hopes to get more sophomore and firstyears involved with SAY, especially because most of the executive board are seniors.

Speaking of the holiday, Gill pointed out similarities in the themes of the Hindu and the Sikh holiday.

“The Hindu celebration is a celebration of light over darkness in Hindu gods and in battle,” Gill said. “[Bandi Chhor Divas] is completely different historically, but it’s the same message of light defeating the darkness. And again, the whole concept of Bandi Chhor is applied metaphorically too, of how God or the gurus are the freer of the imprisoned. They also free the people who practice the religion from the prison of vice and sin.”

Nepali Students Society celebrates Tihar The Nepali Students Society, a newly-formed association, also organized celebrations of the holiday.

Nikita Paudel ’25, president of the society, described the Nepali sequence of events. Paudel noted that for Nepalis, the holiday is called Tihar — which essentially translates to “celebration.” Tihar, as Paudel explained, is a five-day celebration. Among these are Kaag Tihar, Kukur Tihar, Lakshmi Puja and Gai Tihar, Govardhan Puja and Bhai Tika.

In Kaag Tihar, Paudel explained that observers celebrate crows; similarly, Gai Tihar is for cows. In Kukur Tihar, Nepali observers honor “the

love and loyalness” from dogs, as Paudel put it. This year, at the Nepali Students Society’s Kukur Tihar observation, Yale’s Handsome Dan made an appearance.

Lakshmi Puja is a day dedicated to celebrating women and the “prosperity” that they bring. During this day, Paudel said they decorate homes with lights and color, as well as rangolis, which are colorful, often circular designs placed in front of doorsteps. The goal is to welcome the goddess Lakshmi into the home.

The final day is Bhai Tika, which is when sisters place a seven-colored line on their brothers’ forehead, and brothers offer gifts in return. For the Nepali students’ celebration of Bhai Tika on Oct. 27, undergraduate and graduate students came together at Luce Hall, offering food and gifts for all present.

Paudel launched the Nepali Students Society after observing a lack of space for Nepali students on campus.

“There’s a lot of South Asian spaces, but Nepal is very unique because we’re also considered a Himalayan country,” Paudel explained. “We do have very close ties as well to Tibet, Bhutan, and even China in some cases, so we’re like an amalgamation of all the different Asian countries around us. So we really wanted to create a space for all Nepali people to come and be comfortable.”

Paudel noted an acute lack of awareness of Nepal and of Nepali issues on campus, specifically describing occurrences of being asked if Nepal is in India or if it is in China. As such, the group’s goals are to promote Nepali awareness, from cultural and religious affairs to activist work, and to encourage other Nepali people to apply to Yale.

“We really wanted to make sure that people on campus know where our country is and how proud we are to be here,” she said.

Per Paudel, there are about 15 total Nepali undergraduates at Yale.

Including graduate and postdoctorate students, as well as residents, in that figure, Paudel says there are around 32 Nepali Yale affiliates — “bigger than I could have ever expected.”

For the Nepali Students Society, Tihar may be one of their biggest events of the year, but it is not their only one.

Going forward, Paudel hopes to also work on events and campaigns highlighting migrant and workers’ rights abuses of Nepali and other South Asian minority workers in Qatar, particularly with the World Cup — which Qatar is hosting — on the horizon.

“It’s like bringing home to us,” Paudel said, speaking of the society and their events.

Paudel began to form the Nepali Students Society last spring, during her first year at Yale.

Contact ANIKA SETH at anika.seth@yale.edu and FATOU M’BAYE at fatou.mbaye@yale.edu .

Roshni lights up Woolsey Hall

BY YASH WADWEKAR CONTRIBUTING REPORTER Last Saturday, Yale’s South Asian Society hosted their annual first semester dance showcase, Roshni, in Woolsey Hall.

Roshni — meaning “light” in Hindi — featured four of Yale’s South Asian dance teams alongside four acts from first-years, sophomores, juniors and seniors.

The event also included individual acts like singing and juggling.

Yale’s four teams regularly perform around campus and each boasts a distinct style of South Asian dance.

Kalaa, which opened the showcase, performs classical Bharatanatyam, Kathak and Kuchipudi styles of Indian dance.

The group practiced weekly for two hours and every day leading up to the Woolsey Hall performance.

“Kalaa is usually for people that have had dance experience before,” Maanasa Nandigam ’25 told the News.

MonstRAASity — a play on the word “Raas,” a form of Gujarati folk dance — followed Kalaa.

The dance style was faster-paced than the slower, traditional Kalaa, and performers held sticks that clicked together on various beats.

Raas is predominantly performed in the Indian state of Gujarat and, as such, cultivates a strong sense of Gujarati community on campus.

“It means a lot,” Raj Pandya ’24 told the News. “There’s nothing else on campus that’s specifically for Gujuratis so it’s really nice to connect with them [other members].”

The Jashan Bhangra team came next, adorned in customized bhangra wear embroidered with a sparkling “Y” on the back.

The clothing was uniformly shimmering and colorful, with splashes of light greens, purples, blues and yellows. Bhangra’s costuming, like that of all of the other dance teams at Roshni, embraced South Asia’s celebration of colors.

Yale’s Bhangra team is competitive and performs at national competitions. It involves faster-paced music similar to Raas, often emphasizing songs from Punjab — the state in India where Bhangra originates.

A notable diversity of members comprise Yale’s Bhangra team, as none of the groups are exclusive to South Asian auditionees.

“We are an open team to people who are not Punjabi and that

makes the team much better,” Chiraag Sachdev ’26 told the News.

He continued that he appreciates the diversity of cultural perspectives represented by the team.

Rangeela closed the team dance segment of the showcase, performing recognizable Bollywood hits like “Badtameez Dil” while also fusing sound bites of Western and hip-hop oriented music into their setlist.

Rangeela’s modern palate of both genres is familiar to many in the South Asian community, especially those who grew up in America.

“As somebody who listens to a lot of Bollywood music and hip-hop, being able to dance to the music I’ve been hearing since I was little was something I couldn’t pass up,” Pranav Pattatathunaduvil ’25 told the News.

Dhvani, a new classical Indian music group featuring Carnatic and Hindustani vocalists and musicians, also performed at the showcase.

In addition to Yale’s South Asian music and dance teams, a number of class and individual acts shined in this year’s Roshni. The class acts — performed by a small group of South Asian Society students from each year — competed with one another through an audience cheer meter.

The senior dance team came out

GIRI VISWANATHAN/PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR

Roshni, which is Hindi for light, featured four of Yale’s South Asian dance teams. victorious with a resounding cheer of applause after their performance.

The individual acts involved a number of singing and technical acts.

Pranav Pattatathunaduvil ’25, Shrea Tyagi ’25 and Ojas Mehta ’25 all sang Bollywood songs while Arnav Narula ’25 shared a juggling performance.

“Attending Roshni was a wonderful experience that allowed me to connect back to my Indian roots

and heritage,” audience member Avi Patel ’26 said. “It allowed me to regain a sense of my culture amidst the busy life of a Yale student.”

The South Asian Society hosts one main dance event for each semester. Its next showcase, Dhamaal, will occur between March and April 2023.

Contact YASH WADWEKAR at yash.wadwekar@yale.edu .

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YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2022 · yaledailynews.com

NEWS

“Noodles are not only amusing, but delicious.”

JULIA CHILD AMERICAN COOK

Yale to honor grad worker union election

BY MEGAN VAZ AND MIRANDA WOLLEN STAFF REPORTERS Yale will recognize a union election for graduate workers for the first time in history, marking another significant step forward in Local 33’s three decades of organizing efforts.

The move, announced on Oct. 28 by University Provost Scott Strobel, came days after Local 33 leaders submitted an election petition to the National Labor Relations Board in Hartford.

The petition was backed by authorization cards signed by over 75 percent of the graduate and professional school workers with full time or parttime jobs. In accordance with federal labor law, Yale was granted two weeks to respond to the petition and begin negotiating election parameters with Local 33 and the NLRB. “The petition serves as a formal request for a union election that will be conducted and overseen by the NLRB Regional Director to ensure a fair, inclusive, and democratic election,” Strobel wrote in his statement.

“Yale will honor this request for a secret ballot election.”

In this election, all Graduate School and professional school full time and regular part-time workers will have the chance to vote. Unionization will be determined by a simple majority vote, and Local 33 has already received election authorization support from at least 3,000 of the 4,000 graduate and professional school employees who would form a bargaining unit, according to Local 33 organizer Abigail Fields GRD ’24.

The Graduate School has emphasized that graduate workers must approach the union question with careful and extensive consideration. GSAS Dean Lynn Cooley reiterated to the News that “the results of that election will determine the next steps and be binding on all eligible students, whether or not they choose to vote.”

Updates on election agreements can be found on the NLRB website.

If workers vote in favor of unionization, it is unclear how long negotiations will take.

“It’s nice to see the Yale administration finally acknowledge us as

workers with a right to have a union election, something that they have not done until recently. The National Labor Relations Board did that six years ago, and we have known for a long time that our work makes Yale work,” Fields wrote in a statement to the News. “However, it’s disappointing to see university leaders pass up the opportunity to make a real commitment to leave union-busting tactics in the past.”

Strobel’s statement, aside from the landmark announcement, drew such criticism over perceived “union-busting” language.

In response to recent calls for the University’s neutrality on the union question, Strobel wrote that neutrality “could be understood” to mean barring faculty members from expressing their opinions to the public and the graduate students they supervise, which Yale opposes. The statement did not address Local 33’s specific definition of neutrality, which they previously argued would entail an end to explicit antiunion sentiments shared in the past

by President Peter Salovey and the University, as well as an end to the alleged discouragement of “yes” votes through communications with the student body.

In response, Fields shared an Economic Policy Institute report on employers’ common anti-union intimidation tactics with the News.

The report repeatedly references a national survey naming “management pressure” as the top reason employees vote against unionization, often prompted by the threat of job losses and employers encouraging supervisors to have one-on-one conversations about unionization with their subordinates.

Strobel’s statement encouraged graduates to “educate” themselves through communication with “peers, faculty and leaders of [their] school” before they “vote [their] conscience.”

Strobel’s statement comes on the heels of widespread debate online over faculty’s rights to express opposition to graduate worker unions, prompted by a series of critical tweets

by Nicholas Christakis, Sterling Professor of Social and Natural Science,

GAVIN GUERRETTE/PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR

The University’s statement affirms it will honor Local 33’s petition for an official election via secret ballot.

Internal Medicine and Biomedical Engineering. After Christakis speculated that unionization could result in faculty hiring postdocs instead of graduate workers and force PhD students to pay tuition, many academics and students accused him of making threats and resorting to intimidation.

After receiving thousands of comments in backlash, Christakis amended the tweets’ settings so only people he follows and/or those he mentioned in the thread could reply.

He also added to the thread over the following days, explaining that he was “not anti-union as an omnibus political or philosophical stance,” but rather believed that “being a grad student is a different sort of thing.”

He refuted allegations that he was making threats as an employer, most notably after labor economist Aaron Sojourner ’95 wrote that he hoped the NLRB would investigate Chris-

takis’ “evident attempt to coerce [his] subordinates.”

Local 33 also responded to Christakis on Twitter, naming an independent grievance procedure toward employers as one reason to unionize.

Graduate student unionization efforts have colored the school’s history since the early 1990s.

In early 2017, Local 33 held individual elections across nine departments in an NLRB-approved “microunit” approach.

Eight departments voted yes, but the Graduate School legally challenged their elections, arguing that it was inappropriate for select departments to unionize while others did not.

Soon after, the union withdrew its petition for election authorization, citing the new Trump-appointed NLRB’s “hostility to workers’ rights”

and its reversal of the previous board’s approval of microunits.

The Biden-appointed NLRB’s 2021 affirmation of the board’s 2016 ruling, which concluded that graduate workers at private institutions have the right to organize, has given the union renewed avenues toward a school-wide election and ultimate recognition, according to Local 33 organizers.

According to the NLRB website, Yale will be represented by Proskauer Rose LLP. Local 33 will be represented by McCracken, Stemerman & Holsberry LLP throughout the election agreement process.

Contact MEGAN VAZ at megan.vaz@yale.edu and MIRANDA WOLLEN at miranda.wollen@yale.edu .

College offers new computing & linguistics major

BY ALEX YE AND PRANAVA DHAR STAFF REPORTER & CONTRIBUTING REPORTER This fall, Yale College is offering a new computing and linguistics joint major for students interested in the computational study of human language.

Led by newly-installed Director of Undergraduate Studies Robert Frank, the major will require students to undertake coursework in four core areas: math, statistics, linguistics and computation. Stu-

dents have the option of completing either a Bachelor of Arts and a Bachelor of Science program, with the Bachelor of Arts program requiring 11 credits beyond the prerequisites and the Bachelor of Science program requiring 14 credits beyond the prerequisites.

Regardless of degree program, all students must complete two math core courses, one statistics core course, two linguistics core courses, two computation core courses and a senior requirement.

“I noticed a need for this major through my experience working with Yale College students on projects in computational linguistics,” Frank said. “I found that there is interest from both computer science majors who lack linguistics training and linguistics majors without programming experience. The major comes out of a desire to provide a path for students to learn about all of the relevant areas within a single program.”

GAVIN GUERRETTE/PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR

The new major is being established amidst burgeoning student interest in computer science.

Computing and linguistics joins an expanding list of joint majors that include computer science coursework. Yale College also offers degrees in computer science and economics, computer science and mathematics, computer science and psychology and computing and the arts.

Other joint majors offered to undergraduates include mathematics and philosophy, physics and philosophy and economics and mathematics.

The news comes after the University increased computer science hiring and expanded course offerings in response to recordhigh demand. Today, computer science is the second-most popular major in Yale College. Total enrollment in computer science courses reached a new record high of 3,260 students for the fall 2022 semester.

For Hannah Szabo ’25, the major offers the opportunity to pursue a more personalized program of study while also merging her interests in computer science and the humanities.

“I was planning on studying computer science, but I’ve always been especially interested in NLP [natural language processing], so this major really suits my interests well,” Szabo said. “One of the most exciting ways that computer science and humanities connect is through computational linguistics. Also, I like the idea of being in a smaller major that’s a little more personal.”

Like other joint majors, computing and linguistics will allow students to complete the core requirements of two different subjects without having to double-major, which would require roughly double the amount of courses.

Key requirements for the new major include proof-based discrete mathematics, linear algebra, probability, introduction to computer science and data structures and programming techniques. On the linguistics side, students must take courses

concerning phonology, syntax and semantics.

William Palmer ’26 explained that he is interested in using computational methods to better understand what it means to be human.

“I wasn’t really sure what to major in, but I knew I was going to take a lot of linguistics courses because linguistics is so fascinating in describing the mind and describing what it means to be human,” Palmer said. “I really liked the idea of using computational and mathematical techniques to describe the structure of language and potentially the structure of the mind.”

According to Frank, the computing and linguistics major opens up a wide range of opportunities. Students may decide to pursue anything from academia and research to tech, banking and consulting.

In addition to the courses offered, students pursuing computing and linguistics can also look for research opportunities at the Computational Linguistics at Yale lab led by Frank and the Language, Information and Learning at Yale lab led by computer science professor Drago Radev.

Frank underlined the diversity of research areas open to students in the major. A list of labs with work relevant to the major, compiled by Frank for interested students, included principal investigators with various affiliations including the School of Management, Divinity School and the School of Music.

“I’m really excited by the combination of computer science and linguistics because of my deep interest in natural language processing,” Seth Goldin ’26 said.

“It’s a field where new research is coming out constantly.”

Yale College offers 83 majors to undergraduates.

Contact ALEX YE at alex.ye@yale.edu and PRANAVA DHAR at pranava.dhar@yale.edu .

PAGE 8

YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2022 · yaledailynews.com

NEWS

“All the dreamers in all the world are dizzy in the noodle!”

EDIE ADAMS AMERICAN COMEDIAN

New YLS scholarship covers tuition for 51 students

BY INES CHOMNALEZ STAFF REPORTER Chisato Kimura LAW ’25 first interacted with the American legal system while navigating the visa process for her parents, who were recent immigrants from Japan.

Now, she is one of 51 law students to receive funding from Yale Law School to cover the full cost of tuition, fees and health insurance under the Soledad ’92 and Robert Hurst Horizon Scholarship Program.

The scholarship was conceived as a way of remedying current disparities in equity and inclusion existing across American law schools. The scholarship’s founding donors are Robert and Soledad Hurst LAW ’92, who donated $20 million, alongside Patricia and David Nirenberg ’75 LAW ’78, and Carol and Gene Ludwig LAW ’73.

Underrepresentation of marginalized groups plagues the legal profession today; a 2021 study showing that fewer than 15 percent of lawyers are people of color, a phenomenon driven by the inaccessibility of attending law school for low-income students. Yale Law’s class of 2025 enrolled 55 percent students of color and 16 percent first generation college students.

“The Hurst Horizon Scholarship program reflects the Law School’s ongoing commitment to increasing support for our highest need students,” Associate Dean of Admissions and Financial Aid Miriam Ingber wrote in an email to the News. “Our goal is to ensure that these students are empowered to take advantage of the many educational and professional opportunities available during law school and then reach for their goals after graduation.”

Law schools, and graduate schools at large, have historically focused on merit-based scholarships as opposed to need-based financial aid. Yale is one of only two law schools in the country to offer financial aid based solely on the need of admitted students.

Ingber emphasized her hope that the Horizon Scholarship would “underscore the importance of need-based aid,” considering that only need-based aid addresses “students and their families’ financial circumstances.”

Since Gerken’s unveiling of the scholarship last spring, Stanford Law School announced that it would also be covering the full cost of tuition for low-income students.

“The Hurst Horizon Scholarship is a once-in-a-generation program that builds on the Law School’s best-in-class financial aid model and has the potential to spark a fundamental change in how legal education is funded,” Gerken wrote to the News. “ I am thrilled that we already have 51 Horizon Scholars walking our halls, and I look forward to working with our alumni community to expand this program in the future.”

The scholarship is awarded to J.D. students whose family income is below the federal poverty line and whose assets are below $150,000. Recipients of the scholarship received $70,000 from the Law School in the 2022-2023 school year, with recipients distributed across their first, second and third years. The scholarship will continue to be awarded to incoming first years in the future.

Gerken announced the scholarship after incoming 1Ls had already submitted their applications. Kimura explained that after Gerken’s announcement, she was unsure of whether or not she would qualify for the scholarship, but later learned that she would be a recipient via a phone call from Miriam Ingber.

“It was probably the best phone call of my life, if I’m being honest,” Kimura said.

Hurst Horizon builds on an already robust financial aid system within Yale Law School.

YLS boasts the lowest debt load among peer institutions. In the 2021-2022 academic year, 76 percent of the student body received some form of aid from the school.

Yale Law’s emphasis on increasing accessibility has forged new standards in legal education, with recent statements from the University of Pennsylvania and Harvard Law Schools seconding Gerken’s commitment to removing financial barriers for prospective students.

“Entering law school, I grappled with the choice between going into the private sector and

TIM TAI/PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR

In its inaugural year, the Hurst Horizon Scholarship covers the full cost of tuition for 51 students at Yale Law School. helping my family financially or going into the public sector and helping families like mine through policy change,” Horizon recipient Alphonse Simon LAW ’24 wrote in an email to

the News. “The Hurst Horizon Scholarship has eliminated the distinction between these two choices, and I feel significantly more autonomous in deciding the direction of my legal career.”

In the 2020-2021 academic year, 73 percent of YLS students received scholarship grants.

Contact INES CHOMNALEZ at ines.chomnalez@yale.edu .

Af-Am House director talks new role in Trumbull College Tea

BY NATI TESFAYE CONTRIBUTING REPORTER Assistant Dean of Yale College Timeica E. Bethel-Macaire ’11 shared stories from her life and introduced the future initiatives of the Afro-American Cultural Center at a Trumbull College Tea on Nov. 1.

Bethel-Macaire, who was appointed director of the Afro-American Cultural Center earlier this year, sat with Trumbull Head of College Margaret Clark to discuss her journey to Yale. Bethel-Macaire said the Afro-American Cultural Center played a crucial role in shaping her Yale experience.

“I spent all my time at the Af-Am House,” she said at the tea. “If the building had showers and beds, I would’ve honestly lived there.”

Bethel-Macaire began her Yale journey nearly 16 years ago.

After attending the Francis W. Parker School, she came to Yale in the fall of 2007. She would go on to major in sociology and focus extensively on the United States education system. Bethel-Macaire cited her background and childhood in Chicago as inspiration for her work in education.

While at Yale, Bethel-Macaire led campus organizations like the Black Church at Yale, the Yale Black Women’s Coalition and the Urban Improvement Corps through the House.

Attendee Elisabeth Ross ’24 said she found the event and Bethel-Macaire’s time at Yale fascinating.

“The most insightful part of the tea was when Timeica was talking about her experience as an undergrad and how she spent all her time at the Af-Am House,” she said. “Everyone is an individual that has an interesting story and a set of unique experiences.”

After graduating in 2011, she returned to Chicago to teach elementary and middle school students under Teach for America, a nonprofit organization that seeks to recruit educators to work in underserved schools.

Bethel-Macaire continued working in education until she returned to Yale in the summer of 2022. Most recently, she served as Program Director at LINK Unlimited Scholars, a nonprofit that supports Black middle and high school students in the Chicago area.

In an interview with the News after the tea, Bethel-Macaire described her first three months as director of the House and her goals for the coming academic year. She said the start of the year was “extremely busy” but “exciting” at the same time.

With more than 40 organizations affiliated with the House, Bethel-Macaire has to manage the allocation of resources and space while also planning events and panels.

Connecting students with alums is one of her top priorities, Bethel-Macaire said.

She hopes to host career panels monthly and give graduates more experiences to speak with current students.

“I want current students to have access to all that knowledge, experience and wisdom from the alumni,” she said.

“After the 50th anniversary this past spring, it was very clear to me as a co-chair that there was a lot of energy in that moment and a lot of desire to give back to current students in the alumni circles.”

While connecting with alumni is important, Bethel-Macaire still wants to place emphasis on current stu dents and the events they have planned for the year.

NATI TESFAYE/CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER

The director of the Afro-American Cultural Center described her student experiences and academic-year plans.

The success of this coming academic year will solely depend on understanding the needs of the students, according to Bethel-Macaire.

“I know I was successful if the students were satisfied with the level of the programming and the events the House offered by the end of the year,” she said.

The future of the House looks bright, according to Keith Cal-

loway ’23, who cited Bethel-Macaire’s experience and “institutional memory.”

As a graduating senior, the programs and events this academic year offer Calloway an opportunity to leave a mark and engage with underclassmen.

“I’m really excited for these opportunities to be available to us,” he said.

To gauge student involvement and satisfaction, next summer, Bethel-Macaire plans on surveying leaders of multiple Black organizations on campus to improve her management and leadership of the House.

The House is located at 211 Park Street.

Contact NATI TESFAYE at nati.tesfaye@yale.edu.

PAGE 9

YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2022 · yaledailynews.com

NEWS

“Peace will come to the world when the people have enough noodles to eat.”

MOMOFUKU ANDO RAMEN GOD

New Haveners celebrate Halloween A n d re ws o n p l a n s e a c h haunted house for over a year, each boasting a different theme.

This year, he transformed his home into a cursed carnival, complete with bloody clowns, a ringmaster on stilts and a fog machine that cloaked the street in an ominous mist.

The house typically welcomes between 600 and 800 trick-or-treaters. Last night’s line extended two blocks down Whitney Avenue. Still, the guests maintained a lively energy throughout the queue.

“People come from all over New Haven County, and they’re obviously willing to stand here for a long time to see all the wonderful effort that has gone into this,” Harris said.

The haunted house has always been free of charge; This year, visitors were invited to make donations at the entrance. All proceeds went toward the nonprofit organization Big Brothers Big Sisters of Connecticut, a one-on-one youth mentorship program.

HANNAH FOLEY/CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER

From a DIY haunted house in Hamden to a family-friendly celebration at the Q-House, New Haven-area residents enjoyed another year of Halloween festivities.

BY AVA SAYLOR STAFF REPORTER Dressed in wrestling gear and minion goggles, trick-ortreaters from across New Haven County gathered in Hamden to attend the region’s most popular homemade haunted house on Halloween night.

Eric Andrewsen has hosted the haunted house for seven years at his home in the Spring Glen neighborhood of Hamden. He organizes the event with the help of his partner, Alfred Lee MED ’04, a professor of hematology at the Yale School of Medicine, as well as volunteers from the greater New Haven community.

Anne Harris, a resident of North Haven by day and a haunted house horror-actress by night, emphasized Andrewsen’s commitment to creating healthy work conditions.

“Eric has a lot of experience in this,” Harris said. “He treats his volunteers with top-notch respect. Everyone has a fun time; it’s a great, safe environment.”

Hallow’s Eve In the week preceding Halloween, families and residents of the greater New Haven community attended a variety of events hosted by local organizations.

One celebration was hosted by New Haven-based youth enrichment program LEAP. Their Oct. 28 Halloween festival was held at the Dixwell Community House — the “Q-House” — which provides resources and a gathering place for residents of New Haven’s Dixwell and Newhallville neighborhoods.

At the three-hour-long event, children were invited to make crafts, watch movies, donate books and watch performances from community groups.

The pinnacle of the night was the festival’s “Spooky Trail Trickor-Treating.” Volunteers elaborately decorated tables in the gymnasium with thousands of candies for children and families

to choose from. Upon entering the building, one child shouted that it was the “best day ever.”

“We’ve had a great turnout,” said Charles Collier, a LEAP volunteer who works with students in a weekly literacy program.

“It’s a real, safe opportunity for kids to enjoy the holiday.”

Collier sat at a pumpkin-themed table with Linda Jackson, director of the Yale School of Medicine Office of Diversity, Inclusion, Community Engagement and Equity. Donning fun masks and jewelry, they insisted that every child say “trick-ortreat” before getting candy.

As a first-time LEAP volunteer, Jackson noted that events like these are a great way to get involved in the New Haven community.

Although a tradition, the LEAP Halloween festival had not occurred for the past two years in the midst of COVID-19.

Henry Fernandez, the executive director of LEAP, underscored the importance of community events in the aftermath of the pandemic.

“There’s a lot of things that kids have lost during COVID,” Fernandez said. “This is an opportunity for them to come together, wear costumes, be kids and have fun.”

Other New Haven Halloween events included the Shubert Theater’s annual trick-or-treat theater tour, which kicked off the theater’s holiday food and toy drive, Best Video’s “Not-So-Spooky” Halloween party, Connecticut Violence Intervention Program’s trunk or treat and the second annual Wooster Square Park “Halloween Howl” dog parade.

Trick-or-treating has existed since medieval times, originating as Irish “guising” where children donned costumes and went door-to-door performing songs and poems in exchange for food or money.

Contact AVA SAYLOR at ava.saylor@yale.edu .

State awards $7.2 million to help small businesses

BY LAURA OSPINA CONTRIBUTING REPORTER The Community Foundation for Greater New Haven will pour almost $9 million into creating a more equitable small business community in the greater New Haven area.

One of the 10 nonprofit economic development organizations to receive funding, the foundation plans to use its grant to create the New Haven Equitable Entrepreneurial Ecosystem, or NHE3, a business-support network that will provide grants and other resources to local small businesses.

Connecting small businesses with technical services and resources, NHE3 plans to promote equity through opportunity, according to Arthur Thomas DIV ’19, director of mission investing and entrepreneurial ecosystems at the Community Foundation. “[NHE3] is a structural innovation to really combat some of the systems and structures that leave certain populations out of opportunity and to harness the economic markets and to harness the wealth and the assets in our communities so that we can give them more access to the resources they need to thrive,” said Thomas. “It’s more than just making sure you have the technical expertise. It’s making sure that personhood is affirmed, that you are valuable, that you belong, and that your idea has merit and you have a contribution to make.”

The funding is split between a $7.2 million grant from the Connecticut Department of Economic & Community Development and an additional $1.5 million grant from the City of New Haven.

The state grant is part of a wider $46.6 million total investment into Connecticut small businesses, especially those owned by underserved communities, announced by Governor Ned Lamont last week.

Over the next five years, NHE3 will award $4.9 million in grants ranging from $500 to $50,000 with an emphasis on BIPOC and women-owned businesses,

according to Joseph Williams, director of NHE3’s operations.

With the “evidence-based solutions” exemplified in cities with similar programs such as Baltimore and Buffalo, Thomas said that NHE3 will allow for the “wealth building” required for BIPOC entrepreneurs to achieve the “American possibility.”

Another portion of the funding will go towards a technology platform, including a website where small businesses can connect with resources and apply for NHE3 grants. A preliminary website where business owners will be able to indicate interest in receiving grants will be released in the next week or two, according to Williams.

Grant money will likely become available to businesses at the start of 2023, according to William Ginsberg, president & chief executive officer of the Community Foundation.

The $46.6 million investment is part of a broader state push for equitable business opportunities.

At a Monday morning press conference announcing the $46.6 million in grants, Lieutenant Governor Susan Bysiewicz said that out of all of Connecticut’s federal Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loans during the pandemic, 80 percent of loans went to male-owned businesses and 80 percent of them went to white-owned businesses.

In a concerted effort to promote equity, at least 50 percent of the financial assistance distributed from the new $46.6 million investment must go to minority-owned, women-owned, veteran-owned or disabled-owned businesses or businesses in “distressed municipalities.”

Additionally, the $150 million Connecticut Small Business Boost Fund announced in April has as of Monday given out $10.8 million in loans, with 61 percent of those funds going to minority or women-owned businesses, according to Alexandra Daum, deputy commissioner of the Connecticut Department of Economic & Community Development.

New Haven Mayor Justin Elicker, who spoke at Monday’s press con-

LAURA OSPINA/CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER

With the state funding and an additional $1.5 million from the city, the Community Foundation for Greater New Haven hopes to award grants and provide consulting and technical services to small businesses, particularly BIPOC and women-owned businesses. ference at Havenly Treats, praised Connecticut for its commitment to diversity in business.

“If you’re like me, you read the news, and you can be pretty disheartened at what’s going on around the nation,” Elicker said.

“Other states are actively fighting against diversity, which in my view is the foundation of our nation. It is what makes our nation truly, truly a special and unique place… And then you think about Connecticut and New Haven and what’s going on here, where we are stepping into this opportunity.”

Daum emphasized the importance of not just awarding grants to small businesses, but also teaching technical skills to their owners, so that the funding may be a tool for growth instead of a “burden.”

State Representative Robyn Porter, who also spoke at the Monday’s press conference, echoed the value of technical support, making the distinction between simply receiving funding and using that funding to make a business sustainable.

“The state of Connecticut is really [putting] the money where our mouth is to help these small businesses, which drive the economy in this state to get back on track, post pandemic,” Porter said. “Most importantly, this is going to fuel families, the community, and the business world.”

In addition to assisting small neighborhood businesses, Ginsberg said that NHE3 will work with small venture-funded businesses, such as those coming out of Yale Ventures and the emerging bioscience sector.

“The state and the city are investing in small, growing women-owned and minority-owned businesses is a great thing for our community,” Ginsberg told the News. “It’s all looking to the future.

New Haven’s going to have a very different economic base in the future. The population is changing. The economy’s changing. This is an investment in our future, our future as a community that has greater equity and greater opportunity. That’s what [the Community Foundation] is all about.”

Other nonprofits receiving funding include Black Business Alliance, Girls for Technology and Women’s Business Development Council, among others.

Contact LAURA OSPINA at laura.ospina@yale.edu.

PAGE 10

YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2022 · yaledailynews.com

SPORTS

“This is all on Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving and Ben Simmons.

Steve Nash is a scapegoat. This thing was never going to work when [Irving] said we don’t need a coach.” CHARLES BARKLEY NBA LEGEND

Bulldogs triumph over Lions fall to Bulldogs 41-16 in NYC Columbia and Cornell FOOTBALL FROM PAGE 14

ANN HUI CHENG/CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER

The next Bulldogs home game will be against Dartmouth on Nov. 11 at the John J. Lee Amphitheater in the Payne Whitney Gymnasium at 7 p.m.

VOLLEYBALL FROM PAGE 14 the Big Red remained competitive for the first half before the Bulldogs pulled away late, this time taking the set by a score of 25 to 18.

While the Bulldogs have been winning by wide margins recently, losing just five sets total across 10 conference games, members of the team noted the importance of staying locked in on each game and not getting too comfortable.

“Every single game matters when it comes to trying to win a championship and when it comes to getting better as a team,” Shultz told the News. “We can’t take anybody lightly. Correlation is not causation. The win streak is a product of how hard we’re working. The win streak isn’t causing us to work hard. It’s the other way around.”

On Saturday night, Yale swept Columbia in three relatively comfortable sets.

The Elis set the tone early, as the first set was never in doubt.

The Bulldogs jumped out to an early 14–4 lead, and never let the Lions get close after that, winning 25-10.

During the second set, Columbia surged to an early 5–1 lead.

However, after a kill by Carly

Diehl ’25, the Bulldogs rallied to win five points in a row and reclaim the lead. Neither team could gain any breathing room for most of the set, but the Bulldogs ended the period with a kill

by Yarich to win it 25–20.

The third set followed a similar manner to the first set, as the Yale squad trailed for just one point on their way to a 25–18 victory.

A service ace from Maile Somera ’24 punctuated the game, the set and the weekend.

The Bulldogs’ weekend wins improved their league record to 10–0 and secured the team a spot in the league tournament. ww“I feel really proud of this team and what we've been able to accomplish so far this season,” captain Renee Shultz ’23 said. “We're constantly raising the bar and challenging ourselves to keep getting better. We still have lots of work to do in the coming weeks, so we'll keep working hard.”

The next Bulldogs home game will be against Dartmouth on Nov. 11 at the John J. Lee Amphitheater in the Payne Whitney Gymnasium at 7 p.m.

Contact TIFFANY HU at t.hu@yale.edu and HENRY FRECH at henry.frech@yale.edu.

Jenkins, who scored another touchdown for Columbia.

Despite losing their lead, Yale remained determined.

Nenad, a wide receiver who had a total of three receptions for 117 yards, received a 19-yard pass from Grooms and scored his first touchdown of the season. This was the first time Nenad has made an appearance in the 2022 season after recovering from an injury.

“I thought this game could be a pivotal moment in our season, as it was a quick turnaround from a big loss last week,” Nenad said. “Though we still have a lot to improve on, our team showed glimpses throughout the game of how good we can be.”

With less than a minute remaining in the half, the special teams got to work. Tight end Ryan Belk ’25 broke through the line and blocked Columbia wide receiver Cameron Burt, which was the second blocked punt of the game.

“It really started at the end of the first half with the blocked punts,” Reno said. “We were able to swing the momentum of the game.”

On the first play after the

block, Grooms found tight end Jackson Hawes ’24 wide-open for a 14-yard touchdown, which closed out the half.

The score remained stagnant in the third quarter, with neither team tallying points in period. In the fourth and final frame of the game, however, the Elis saw even more success.

“It was a kind of a game of two halves,” Columbia head coach Al Bagnoli said to Columbia Athletics. “[In the] first half, we played really solid and it wasn't until the end we got into some of the kick game woes.”

With 13:34 left in the contest, Grooms threw a 10-yard pass to Lindley, for his second touchdown of the game.

Less than seven minutes later, running back Joshua Pitsenberger ’26 made a one-yard touchdown to bring the score to 38–16.

The final three points of the matchup were tallied by Bosman, who kicked a 32-yard field goal, bringing the final score to 41–16.

The Elis also had a strong defensive performance throughout the game — they had nine tackles for loss and two sacks. Defensive back Sean Guyton ’25 and defensive

lineman Reid Nickerson ’23 each tallied one sack.

“Our defense found success in the second half and was able to stop their defense,” Gargiulo said.

“On special teams we had two punt blocks that changed the momentum of the game.”

Linebacker Joseph Vaughn ’23 led the team with six tackles, and Hamilton Moore ’23 and defensive back Kyle Ellis ’23 closely followed Vaughn, each adding five.

In the third quarter of the game, the Blue and White’s defense prevented the Lions from gaining a single first down.

The Bulldogs limited the Lions to only 70 yards rushing for the game, while Yale gained 95 yards on the ground.

Following the strong performance, the Elis remain in the race for the Ivy League title as they prepare to face their next conference opponent back on their home turf.

The Bulldogs will face Brown next Saturday at noon at the Class of 1954 Field at the Yale Bowl.

Contact AMELIA LOWER at amelia.lower@yale.edu .

YALE ATHLETICS

The Bulldogs will face Brown next Saturday at noon at the Class of 1954 Field at the Yale Bowl.

Basketball season Soccer unbeaten at home starts sans key player BASKETBALL FROM PAGE 14 The team is focused on preparing for their non-conference schedule, which slates them against teams such as Army, the University Of Massachusetts and Syracuse University.

“We’re playing better [non-conference] teams this year,” Mackenzie Egger ’25 said. “This year we should do a better job of focusing on our non conference games … I think a big emphasis to prepare for the Ivy League and those postseason tournaments is to do well in non-conference games.”

Last year, the Bulldogs scored 58.5 points per game, the fifth best in the Ivy League. Captain Camilla Emsbo ’23 led the team in terms of scoring by averaging 14.1 points per game.

Clark orchestrated the offense at point guard with her team-leading 5.8 assists per game.

The Bulldogs’ strong suit was their defense. They allowed 56.8 points per game, the second best mark in the Ivy League. Emsbo led the team in blocks and rebounds.

Five players contributed over 25 minutes per game. Only one, Alex Cade ’22, graduated after the season ended, so going into the summer the Bulldogs expected to return this year with much of their core still intact.

The returning core took a major hit, however, when Emsbo suffered an ACL injury at the beginning of the summer which ruled her out for the entire season.

“Our captain Camilla tore her ACL” said Grace Thybulle ’25.

“She was our best player. She will be missed, the lack of her presence is very clear, but we’re all kind of filling in in different ways.”

Eshe noted that Emsbo’s injury forces the team to reshape their playstyle in order to make up for her absence. However, this has not discouraged the Bulldogs as they prepare for the upcoming season.

Many players now face an opportunity to fill Emsbo’s role, much of which entailed rebounding and holding down the paint. This has encouraged a healthy dose of intrasquad competition.

“It's going to be a collective effort to fill those shoes.” said Eshe at this year’s Ivy League Media Day. “We’re still not at the point where we know who’s going to fill those shoes, but having that constant question makes us come in and be more competitive in practice.”

In addition to the rest of the returning core contributors, more players will be able to see more floor time in the wake of Emsbo’s absence such as Elles van der Maas ’24, Haley Sabol ’24 and Thybulle.

At large, the Bulldogs have been practicing hard and building their team chemistry, which the players noted in interviews with the News.

“We spend far too much time together,” joked Clark.

Egger noted that the team “somehow” doesn't “get sick of each other.”

This team culture, according to the players, will play a key part in their success throughout the year. Playing under a new coach and seeking quality play from new players, the Yale women’s basketball team heads into an exciting season.

Their first game is on the road against Fordham at 5:30 PM on Nov 7.

Contact HENRY FRECH at henry.frech@yale.edu .

MUSCOSPORTSPHOTOS.COM

Yale’s last game of the season will take place at Brown University this Saturday at 4:00 p.m..

SOCCER FROM PAGE 14 twelve shots total. Marisa Shorrock ’24 did not let a single ball reach her net, with a wave of six saves that came during the second half.

Shorrock reminded the News that with this win, the women’s squad has now set the record for the most number of consecutive shutouts in Yale women’s soccer history.

The previous record was set in 2004 with four straight clean sheets. This squad one-upped that record with five consecutive shutouts.

“The constant communication, trust, and heroics of our back line have been instrumental in these shutouts,” Shorrock wrote, crediting her defense. “Whenever we end with zero on the board, it’s truly a team effort.”

The match was bound to be a tough one as both teams were battling for third place in Ivy League

rankings. The Blue and White’s win likely secured their spot as No. 3, as Columbia’s next game is against Harvard University (10–1–3, 4–0–2 Ivy) who are ranked No. 2. The Crimson have only tied with No. 1 Brown (11–2–2, 5–0–1 Ivy), the Bulldog’s next opponent.

Not only did the Bulldogs break records and bring their ranking to No. 3 in the Ivy League, but they did all that during their senior night. This is the last night that the seniors of the team get to play with the Blue and White on Reese Stadium’s turf.

“There’s some kind of magic about senior night,” Shorrock wrote. “It’s our time to go out on Reese for the last time and honor our teammates that have led us through this season (and, for many of us, our careers at Yale).

It definitely creates some extra motivation to fight out a win.”

Last year, Yale was ranked last in the Ivy League, and Columbia was ranked No. 4.

This year, with only one game to go, the Bulldogs are in the top three.

“What an awesome day,” coach Sarah Martinez told Yale Athletics after the game. “To celebrate the careers of Simone Eligon ’23, Giana Pittaro ’23, and Giovanna Dionicio ’23, while also getting another shutout win is massive for our program.

I’m so proud of each person on this team. We took incredible pride in protecting Reese this fall and to finish the year undefeated at home, only conceding one goal here, is amazing.”

Yale’s last game of the season will take place at Brown University this Saturday at 4:00 p.m.

Contact TOIA CONDE RODRIGUES DA CUNHA at toia.conderodriguesdacunha@yale.

YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2022 · yaledailynews.com

SCITECH

PAGE 11

“‘Spaghetti... I can’t eat spaghetti, there’s too many of them. No matter how hungry I am, 1,000 of something is too many. I’ll have 1,000 pieces of noodles” MITCH HEDBERG COMEDIAN

YSEC explores intersection between arts and sustainability

BY ABEL GELETA CONTRIBUTING REPORTER In the fight to preserve the environment, one Yale student group is looking at art as an avenue for climate advocacy The Yale Student Environmental Coalition is an umbrella organization for several environmental advocacy and activist groups on campus, organizing and supporting university-wide environmental efforts. This year, the organization will focus on initiating a new project utilizing the junction of the arts and sustainability to further their mission.

Project EnCOR, which stands for Environmental Culture of Responsibility, will be one of six projects housed by YSEC during the current academic year. This initiative intends to explore how environmental groups and organizations utilize art as a unique outlet for the exploration, insight and growth of environmental sustainability. EnCOR focuses on evaluating how many types of artistic expression, including performance, written work, art work and visual work, might be executed more sustainably and consciously.

“EnCOR is at the intersection of environmentalism and arts, a niche that isn’t currently being filled, addressing all the different ways campus life intersects with environmentalism,” said YSEC Co-President Madeleine Zaritsky ’25. “[It’s] important to have a positive and uplifting engagement with the environment. [There’s] so much environmental injustice, pollution and degradation worldwide. It’s a very depressing situation we’re in ... but EnCOR is an opportunity to enjoy work in the environmental space to provide meaningful and inspiring artwork.”

In addition, the initiative intends to use these many forms

“All of this relates to identifying and sourcing the numerous areas or levers necessary to identify change and implement a sustainable environment,” Hansen said.

Hansen stated that Project EnCOR is still in its infancy in terms of operational and coordination efforts, and she aims to build a devoted team that is willing to engage in the developing and evolving work of EnCOR. The project is still identifying what works and establishing its future vision and focus to continue developing communal solutions for sustainability within the environment.

“It’s a really exciting project just in the sense that when people think about an environmental project, there’s a lot of pessimism,” said YSEC Co-President Sebastian Duque ’24. “It’s really sad to conceptualize climate change or environmental crises impacting people around the world. Art can help in that as it’s a good way of conveying information and encouraging activism.”

Duque voiced support for Hansen in this project’s execution. Discussing the benefits of this project, Duque emphasized the intersection of the arts and the humanities that will provide results and benefits for the environmental challenges and conditions facing society.

“Art can help in that as it’s a good way of conveying information and encouraging activism.

It’s also a way to bring joy and TIM TAI/ PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR love to the movement the way A new project spearheaded by the Yale Student Environmental Coalition, will encourage students to incorporate environ- art does” Duque said. “That’s mental efforts into artistic expression. the beautiful thing about Project EnCOR because it allows us to do those two things.”

Meetings for Project EnCOR safeguard the environment. include the Environmentalists ment and existing challenges, will be held on Saturdays in the Zaritsky emphasized that of Color Collective, GREEN at according to Hansen. She fur- Welch B Basement from 11 a.m. the initiative is still attempt- Yale, the Yale Student Energy ther discussed the importance to 12 p.m. ing to attract more students Association, Yale Outdoors, the of viewing art organizations as with an interest in the envi- Animal Ethics Club and Stu- leaders in the community and as Contact ABEL GELETA at ronment and any form of art to dents for Carbon Dividends — “pillars of joy and celebration.” abel.geleta@yale.edu . of artistic expression to encourage more artists to address environmental challenges and problems through their work.

In turn, EnCOR would be able to use the arts to stimulate fundraising and organization for environmental concerns.

Engaging the Yale community is essential to Project EnCOR, as it seeks to harness the unique college environment to encourage ways in which the student population may be more invested in these initiatives for producing environmental-centered art, fostering dialogue and taking action to

participate with the work they are doing. These are the only requirements for participation.

Rose Hansen ‘25 is leading the project. Hansen is committed to maximizing the impact that environmental justice and sustainability can have by utilizing the Yale community’s resources. This new, unique approach aims to optimize the ways in which art may serve as a medium for activism, education and sustainability by capitalizing on a variety of artistic practices.

Members of the YSEC that are involved with the project

all working for the environment in different ways.

“There are numerous student organizations who write to the administration,” Hansen said.

“Others work to change habits at the individual level. Project EnCOR seeks to build something in the middle ground.”

Hansen emphasized the significance of revitalizing the perception of environmental advocacy and actions.

The project seeks to foster more artistic production and identify areas where leaders and individuals can take meaningful action to improve the environ-

Yale professor receives $1.5 million for high-risk virology research

BY SAMANTHA LIU CONTRIBUTING REPORTER Allison Didychuk has been investigating the biochemistry of a cancer-causing herpesvirus since she arrived at Yale in July. Now, with a grant from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Didychuk’s lab plans to make further inroads into their knowledge of this virus’ genome packaging and transcription processes.

Didychuk, an assistant professor of molecular biology and biochemistry, has centered her research upon the elusive cancer-causing Kaposi’s sarcoma-associated herpesvirus.

Currently, there exists one vaccine — but no cure — for any herpesvirus, and most antiviral treatments only target a single protein.

These large, double-stranded DNA viruses have proven historically difficult to combat due to their latency, lying hidden and replicating for decades inside the body before displaying outward signs of infection. “[These are] very clever viruses that are coevolving with us for hundreds of millions of years, and the fact that they’re able to establish latency means that they’re really hard to get rid of,” Didychuk told the News.

However, Didychuk’s lab has found a possible new avenue to target: the set of packaging machinery, which compresses the KSHV genome into a capsid — a viral protein envelope — via a powerful molecular motor. Due to the stiffness and size of the herpesvirus DNA, the resultant capsule is under immensely high pressure — ten times greater than a bottle of champagne,

according to Didycyuk.

By learning and sharing how this packaging process operates from a biochemical standpoint, Didychuk hopes to provide a basis for new drugs against herpesvirus replication.

Specifically, Didychuk’s grant proposal looked to investigate a new drug approved by the FDA,

Didychuk’s query earned the support of the NIAID, who awarded her the DP2 New Innovator’s Award grant. Providing $300,000 in funding per year, this award is given to early stage scientists who have proposed high-impact projects in areas like the biomedical field. “[It was] the most excit-

In her proposal, she pitched looking deeper into the new drug’s biochemical workings to posit new avenues for herpesvirus treatments — how to improve upon the drug’s design, or how to develop complementary drugs that target a different part of the viral machinery.

“Confidently, I can say that

COURTESY OF ALLISON DIDYCHUK

Allison Didychuk’s work studying the packaging mechanisms of herpesviruses earned her the DP2 New Innovator’s Award from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. which targets the packaging machinery of herpesvirus. She was intrigued by how this drug was only effective against one type of herpesvirus and, moreover, by the lack of biochemical studies on its function.

ing morning,” Didychuk said, about hearing news of the award.

“When you get to a place like Yale, where everyone is brilliant, … to have just a little bit of recognition … makes me feel like I can actually do this job.”

Dr. Didychuk’s laboratory will be a very successful one that will positively impact and change the scientific community,” Mayte Cerezo Matías, a postgraduate associate at the Didychuk lab, wrote to the News. “[Her award]

from the NIAID reassures this to me, and I couldn’t be more thrilled to be part of such an incredible community that Dr. Didychuk has created.”

Before coming to Yale, Didychuk served as a postdoctoral researcher in the Glaunsinger lab at the University of California, Berkeley. It was there that she fell in love with virology while learning how to apply her structural biology and biochemistry knowledge to decoding viral interactions.

Even though she had worked in an unrelated subject, yeast splicing, in graduate school, Didychuk said it was “particularly empowering” to see how she could “take risks and jump into a new field.”

Now, as a junior faculty member at the School of Medicine, Didychuk is busy setting up her new lab. She acts as a mentor to several trainees, including Sara Gelles-Watnick MED ’26, who described Didychuk as a “brilliant scientist and thoughtful mentor,” adding that she is “lucky to learn from her each day.”

Didychuk joked that she could enjoy “a little bit of breathing room” in managing her lab’s funding thanks to this grant money. The DP2 New Innovator’s award falls under the NIAID’s “high risk, high reward” programming, which alleviates the financial stress of experimenting with especially novel approaches.

“They kind of give you this money and say, like, ‘shoot for the moon’ and then see what you can do with it,” Didychuk said.

The DP2 New Innovator’s Award is sponsored by the National Institutes of Health.

Contact SAMANTHA LIU at samantha.liu.roy@yale.edu .

PAGE 12

YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2022 · yaledailynews.com

ARTS Yaledancers to perform in first full capacity performance since pandemic

BY BRI ANDERSON CONTRIBUTING REPORTER Yaledancers’ fall show, “After Dark” will debut this Thursday, marking the first time the company has performed for a full audience since before the COVID-19 pandemic began.

The oldest dance company at Yale, YD features a wide variety of dance styles, including classical and modern ballet, jazz, hip hop and modern. “After Dark” will run from Nov. 3 to Nov. 5 at the ECA Theater on Audubon Street, beginning at 8:00 p.m. and lasting approximately one and a half hours.

“We are hoping that it will be a packed house,” said YD treasurer Colby Bladow ’24. “We have six new members of the company, and they are all incredible with their own styles that they’ll be bringing. The six taps have their own piece they’ll be choreographing, so that will be fun.”

B l a d ow e m p h a s i ze d t h e diversity across styles and music featured in the show, adding that there is something for everyone — be it a slow lyrical piece, a ballet piece or a fast-paced jazz dance.

All the pieces are student choreographed, and include the music of Amber Run, Adele, Stevie Nicks and Miley Cyrus.

“At the beginning of each semester, anyone who is a member of the YD can propose a piece that they’re interested in choreographing to the entire company, and we’ll decide what they want to do,” Publicity Chair Santana Vannarath ’24 said, explain-

YALE DAILY NEWS

Yaledancers will put on their fall show ‘After Dark’ Nov. 3 through Nov. 5 at the ECA Theater on Audubon Street. ing the company’s process of choosing music and dance styles for this show. “So basically it’s a collage of different things everyone wanted to do.”

The overall tone of the pieces will tie back to the central theme of “After Dark,” in keeping with YD tradition of framing the show’s theme around the final dance in its program. Debut-

ing the weekend after Halloween, the show is “a little sexy, a little spooky, and gives this fun, youthful night time energy,” according to YD Publicity Chair Molly Smith ’25. “‘After Dark’ is about creating the aesthetic of a fun, youthful vibe,” Publicity Chair Molly Smith ’25 told the News. ”That’s the energy of our company.”

Smith described YD as the “highest caliber of dance” available at the University, emphasizing the company’s high level of athleticism and artistic ability.

Bladow, too, told the News that the show would be a tribute to the company’s appreciation for dance and art.

She wants people to come away from the show feeling inspired,

having had fun and having enjoyed seeing their performance.

“We work very, very hard and have been practicing the pieces since early September,” Smith added. “I’m really proud of what we’ve created.”

Tickets for the fall show cost $10 and are available online.

Contact BRI ANDERSON at bri.anderson@yale.edu .

School of Music hosts pianist Jan Jiracek von Arnim

BY MIA CORTÉS CASTRO CONTRIBUTING REPORTER

TIM TAI/PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR

Pianist Jan Jiracek Arnim, who Yale recently tenured, performed a piano recital at the Yale School of Music.

On Wednesday, Nov. 2, pianist Jan Jiracek von Arnim will perform a piano recital at the Yale School of Music.

Jiracek von Arnim was recently appointed visiting professor at the School of Music. The pianist is the youngest tenured professor at the University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna. He is an enthusiastic public figure and his passion for music matches his love of teaching.

Jiracek von Arnim stressed the importance of balancing performing and teaching in his career as an international pianist.

“Both are extremely interconnected,” Jiracek von Arnim said.

“It is very important for every musician to follow their heart and express something, but also to give your head a question. It is about the emotions you are transmitting but it is about your control. I want to be a storyteller as a musician, so I hope I can get my audience to forget that they live in 2022 and just connect.”

Learning new piano repertoire is a regular part of Jiracek von Armin’s artistic practice, routine and life philosophy. He believes in the power of achieving deeper meaning behind the physical action of daily instrumental practice and performance. Helping other musicians is a form of doing just that on a daily basis, he explained, because he is able to pass down knowledge to the current generation as his mentors once did for him.

This is equally inspiring for students who have the potential of both hearing and studying with him.

“To me, Jiracek’s dedication to teaching makes him a complete artist. It’s such a blessing to be in a place where we have access to

these opportunities,” said Gillian Mui ’26.

Music-loving Yalies are looking forward to Jiracek von Arnim’s performance, which is part of the Horowitz Piano Series.

“As a student who really enjoys music, it is wonderful to get an opportunity to hear excellent repertoire performed at such a high level on just a normal weeknight,” said Evan Daneker ’26.

Jiracek von Arnim’s own artistic process involves asking existential questions in relation to the music he learns and interprets. His choice of repertory for the Wednesday night concert is personal.

“I chose to play Beethoven because it is extremely connected to Vienna and my origins but also [as I am coming to Yale as a teacher], I wanted to bring Lisztto tell my students to make them look for connections,” Jiracek von Arnim said. “I want to find a way to bridge Beethoven to Liszt.”

Paul Ji ’26, a Young Steinway Artist, said that he “especially liked how at the concert in France [von Arnim] gave the audience a spoken introduction to each piece by offering background information as well as his own insights and interpretative thoughts.

“It is always a matter of trying again and getting better,” Jiracek von Arnim said. “You can’t say to an audience that you will simply repeat what you played the day before — there is no safety on the stages, never something stays the same … in music there is never an ending”.

After all his international accomplishments, Jiracek von Arnim’s goal is to “always stay open” and that is why he looks forward to continuing teaching and connecting to the new generation of musicians.

Contact MIA CORTÉS CASTRO at mia.cortescastro@yale.edu .

YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2022 · yaledailynews.com

PAGE 13

GIOVANNA TRUONG LU is a sophomore in Pauli Murray College.

Contact her at giovanna.truong@yale.edu . .

CLARISSA TAN is a first-year in Jonathan Edwards College.

Contact her at clarissa.tan@yale.edu .

FOOTBALL Princeton 35 Cornell 9

M. SOCCER Brown 2 Princeton 1

FIELD HOCKEY Columbia 2 Lehigh 1

SPORTS

YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2022 · yaledailynews.com

FIELD HOCKEY YALE TROUNCES DARTMOUTH In their penultimate game of the season, the Bulldogs overcame a sluggish start to beat the Big Green 2–1, as Lily Ramsey ’25 scored her fifth and sixth goals of the year. This is Yale's third Ivy-league win.

Volleyball extends winning streak to 16

“Last time we played together we didn’t do so well, so the invite this weekend served as a good redemption.”

RENAUD LEFEVRE ’24 MENS TENNIS

Football dominates Columbia

BY AMELIA LOWER STAFF REPORTER

YALE ATHLETICS

After facing Cornell and Columbia, Yale remains undefeated and number one in the Ivy League with a 16-game winning streak

In another weekend of Ivy League play, Yale’s volleyball team (18–1, 10–0 Ivy) swept Cornell University (4–15, 2–8) and Columbia University (4–15, 1–9).

With the two victories, they extended their win streak to 16 and overall record to 18–1, bringing their winning percentage up to .947, the third-best mark in the nation.

“This team has got to be one of my favorites of all time,” head coach Erin Appleman said about this year’s team. “Our defense this past weekend was exceptional. We have great chemistry.”

The Bulldogs’ first set — a Friday night matchup against Cornell — was competitive until the midway point of the period. Both teams battled back and forth, as the Blue and White clawed to a

M. HOCKEY Army 8 Dartmouth 3 FOR MORE SPORTS CONTENT, VISIT OUR WEB SITE goydn.com/YDNsports Twitter: @YDNSports

MEN'S HOCKEY BULLDOGS GO 1-1 AGAINST BROWN In their season opener, Yale secured a 2–0 victory in the second shutout of goalie Nate Reid ’24’s career.

However, Brown scored two early goals in their rematch the following day en route to a 2–1 victory.

BY TIFFANY HU AND HENRY FRECH CONTRIBUTING REPORTERS

VOLLEYBALL Harvard 3 Penn 1

The Yale football team (5–2, 3–1 Ivy) posted one of its most impressive victories of the season, defeating Columbia University (3–4, 0–4 Ivy) in a lopsided 41–16 score.

Despite one fewer day of preparation than ordinary weeks, the Bulldogs came out firing on all cylinders in front of a crowd of 3,551 fans on Friday night.

“Friday was a great team win,” offensive lineman and captain Nick Gargiulo ’23 said. “We were executing well in all three facets of the game.”

Just over six minutes into the first quarter, Columbia kicker Alex Felkins tallied the first three points of the game with a 17–yard field goal.

Determined to answer back, under two minutes later, quarterback Nolan Grooms ’24 connected with wide receiver Ryan Lindley ’24 on a beautiful overthe-shoulder deep ball for Yale’s first touchdown of the game.

The 83-yard touchdown pass tied the mark for the fifth longest in school history.

“The offense was able to establish success in the pass game,” Gargiulo said. “Chase Nenad [’24] and Ryan Lindley both had breakout performances.”

Over the course of the game, Grooms threw a career-high 346 yards and four touchdowns.

Lindley also had an impressive game, catching six passes for 100 yards and two touchdowns.

The Lions snapped back less than three minutes into the second frame, with a 13-yard run

into the endzone for a touchdown, although the Bulldogs’ defense stopped an attempt for the two-point conversion.

While Columbia briefly had a lead, kicker Jack Bosman ’24 booted a 41-yard field goal with 9:27 left in the half to give Yale a 10–9 advantage.

“Give Columbia credit, they have a great defense and it made for some tough sledding in the first half,” head coach Tony Reno said to Yale Athletics. “Our guys did a great job of staying the course and making some plays in the second half.”

A minute and 24 seconds after the Bulldogs scored, Columbia regained the lead again, as Lions quarterback Caden Bell threw a 64 yard pass to wide receiver JJ SEE FOOTBALL PAGE 10

14–11 lead. After a successful sixpoint streak, the Bulldogs surged to 20–11.

The Blue and White ended the set with a kill by Mila Yarich ’25 to take the period by a score of 25-17.

The Big Red, unfazed by the Bulldogs’ late first-period momentum, opened the second set with a renewed competitive spirit, fighting to stay close. With just a 16–15 lead, Cara Shultz ’25 landed a kill to shift momentum in the Bulldogs’ direction.

The Elis went on to have another six-point streak with two kills, a service ace and a block, and they cruised comfortably to a 25–20 victory in the set.

The third set followed a similar script to the first two sets, as YALE ATHLETICS

SEE VOLLEYBALL PAGE 10

The Yale football team beat Columbia on Friday night, winning 41–16 in New York City.

Basketball gears up for Soccer takes third in the Ivy League season without star player

BY TOIA CONDE RODRIGUES DA CUNHA STAFF REPORTER

The Bulldogs (7–5–3, 2–1–2 Ivy) own Reese Stadium.

With what is now a record five straight shutouts, Yale is unbeaten at home. Saturday’s match against Columbia University (7–4–3, 3–2–1) extended what is now a seven-game win streak in Blue and White territory.

In a battle for third place and also on senior night, the Bulldogs triumphed over the Lions in a match that ended 1–0. Marz Akins ’25 was the author of the goal with

an assist from Ellie Rappole ’25.

“It felt amazing to score the game-winning goal during a physical game against Columbia,” Akins wrote to the News.

“It is a testament to all the hard work put into our preparation leading up to the game and the versatility of our back line to also be dangerous in the attack.”

The goal took place in the 38th minute of the first half. Rappole had the ball on the left side of the field, and delivered a cross into the box straight to Akins, who dodged a Lions defender and brought the ball to the net.

The California native’s goal was the sole point of the match.

This was also Akins’ first career goal playing for the Bulldogs.

“I wouldn’t have been able to get the opportunity to score without Ellie’s aggression and dominance offensively,” Akins wrote. “It felt amazing getting my first career goal at Yale and I look forward to scoring more!”

The defense shined once again on Saturday night as they kept the score 1–0. Columbia had eight shots on goal and SEE SOCCER PAGE 10

YALE ATHLETICS

With Camilla Emsbo ’23 sitting out for the year, the women's basketball team looks to build on results from last season.

BY HENRY FRECH CONTRIBUTING REPORTER The Yale women’s basketball team has seen major changes since the end of last season.

While the team welcomed a new head coach — former WNBA player Dalila Eshe — leading player Camilla Emsbo ’23 was ruled out for the year due to an ACL injury. Amid the changes, the Bulldogs remain focused on one goal: improving from last year.

The Blue and White finished last season third in the Ivy League with an overall record of 16–11 and a conference record of 9–5.

“Overall [last season] was fine,” said Jenna Clark ’24. “We knew we could have done a lot better, we lost some games we shouldn’t have.”

The Bulldogs will travel near and far for their non-conference schedule this season. Most of their games will be against teams from around the Northeast, but two will take place in Denver, Colorado, where the Blue and White will compete in the University of Denver Classic from Nov 25-26.

Success in the non-conference schedule will impact the team’s overall record, which holds sway over the Bulldogs’ ultimate goal: placement into a postseason tournament at the end of the year.

“Obviously [the goal] is making the [Ivy League] tournament but then once we get there going to a postseason tournament,” Clark said.

STAT OF THE WEEK

SEE BASKETBALL PAGE 10

210

MUSCOSPORTSPHOTOS.COM

The Bulldogs will finish the season undefeated at home and with a record five straight clean sheets.

YALE FOOTBALL AVERAGES 210 RUSHING YARDS PER GAME, 42 MORE THAN ANY OTHER IVY

‘Midnights’ Review: What Keeps You Awake At Night?

// BY JANE PARK Minutes blur into each other as the clock reads 4:37 a.m. Insecurities that we put to bed years ago continue to haunt us. The silence of the world is deafening.

We’ve all been here, experiencing our own sleepless nights. And in “Midnights,” Taylor Swift encapsulates these experiences in 13 tracks, inviting us to take an inside look at the things that keep her awake.

Like her last two albums, Taylor Swift’s n ewe s t co l l e c t i o n does not necessarily follow dominant pop trends. Instead, her musical and lyrical genius is unique to the stories of her life; it references the other chapters in the Swiftmetaverse through a delicious assortment of musical genres.

Without further ado, here is a comprehensive list of the album’s sexy babies Cont. on page B2

// JESSAI FLORES

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2022

WEEKEND

PAGE B2

YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2022 · yaledailynews.com

WEEKEND HOME

TAYLOR SWIFT ALBUM REVIEW Cont. from page B1 Lavender Haze As the starting track of the album, the intro of “Lavender Haze” serves as the introduction of the entire album: “Meet me at Midnight.” The title of the song, as well as its lyrics, refers to the haziness and enthrallment of falling in love, a mood reflected in the sweet and pulsing melody. As Swift croons, “I’m damned if I do give a damn what people say,” she alludes to the media attention on her romantic history and declares that she just wants to stay in this immersive cloud of love.

Maroon This is not the first time Swift has titled her songs after a color. But unlike her single “Red,” “Maroon” bears a darker, more sensual tinge to her usual love story. Following the bridge, Swift drops an octave and huskily sings the chorus, delivering the lyrics as if they were dialogue.

Anti-Hero Beautifully described as a “guided tour” of the parts Swift hates about herself, “Anti-Hero” declares bluntly: “It’s me. Hi. I’m the problem.” Anti-Hero is arguably the most representative song

of the album, with Swift openly discussing how her personal struggles continue to bleed into her life, causing her “midnights [to] become [her] afternoons.”

It’s also the song where Swift’s lyrical prowess shows the most: “When my depression works the graveyard shift, all of the people I’ve ghosted stand there in the room.” However, the use of “sexy baby” in one line received mixed reviews. In my opinion, the line is edgy enough to get its point across: the shock factor is what ultimately grabs our attention and keeps it.

Snow On The Beach (feat.

Lana Del Rey) While not a personal favorite, “Snow On The Beach” is significant, as it contains the only feature of the album and is a meeting of two talented songwriter/musical storytellers. While Del Rey’s vocals remain almost too minimal to consider it a feature, her soft vocals are heard poignantly in the last chorus. Lyrically, the track compares the moment of falling in love with the “weird but fucking beautiful” image of snow on the beach. Its musicality echoes

haunt her: “I never think of him, except on midnights like this.”

its lyrical content, as Lana Del Rey and Swift’s layered voices create a dreamy and haunting effect.

Vigilante Shit Another kind of haunting appears at night: when Swift isn’t looking back on past romances, her regrets and hurt accumulate into a form of vengeance. “Vigilante Shit” is a revenge anthem, with heavy synths and percussion to rhythmically reflect the anger in the lyricism. Evocative of energy from her Reputation era, “Vigilante Shit” is a reminder to listeners that though Swift has risen above her histories with Scooter Braun and Kanye West, she recognizes their impact on her music and her life. While musically and contextually interesting, “Vigilante Shit”’s lyricism is not Taylor Swift’s best: “Now she gets the house, gets the kid, gets the pride. Picture me as thick as thieves with your ex-wife.” To be frank, it’s a little cheesy.

You’re On Your Own, Kid: “You’re On Your Own, Kid” is Track 5, a spot often held by the most emotionally honest and tear-jerking song of each Taylor Swift album. The song fulfills this legacy, as Swift tells her younger self: “Everything you lose is a step you take. So make the friendship bracelets, take the moment and taste it.” This lyrical introspection is a trademark asset of Swift’s, one that is afforded only by her 15-year reign in the spotlight, a weighty feat in the industry.

Midnight Rain Like her past two albums, “Midnight Rain” echoes Swift’s mixture of fictional storytelling and references to her own life in her lyricism. Characters from past songs, such as the pageant queens and hometown boys, also make cameos in this song. Lyrically reminiscent of “I Bet You Think About Me” and “The Way I Loved You,” Swift sings of a past lover and the “what-if” scenarios that

Sweet Nothing After the sequence of vengeful, bad-bitch anthems, Swift switches the atmosphere with a song dedicated to Joe Alwyn, her significant other. One can’t help

but view the placement of “Sweet Nothing” as intentional; let’s be honest, what isn’t intentional with Taylor Swift? After focusing on her enemies, Swift sings about the restful and simple nature of her romantic relationship. While the world of “industry disruptors” and “soul deconstructors” is fatiguing, Swift can lower her guard with Alwyn, who expects nothing but “sweet nothings.”

Mastermind Yes, another love song — allegedly — dedicated to Alwyn.

Through the lyrics, “What if I told you I’m a mastermind? And now you’re mine,” Swift cheekily says to Alwyn: Gotcha! You’ve now succumbed to my love!

While Swift orchestrated this romantic destiny, “Mastermind” as the final song to the album suggests that Swift is the dominant mastermind of her artistry, as well. After all, what other artist could fill up the entire Top 10 on the Hot 100?

And don’t even get me started on the “3am Edition.”

Contact JANE PARK at jane.park@yale.edu .

When Things Don’t Fall Into Place // BY PO EIC QUAH

N

Yale feels like a simulation. The tour groups always block the same paths.

The chicken in the dining hall is always the same amount of dry. The playlists at frat parties never change. I feel like I am in a version of “The Truman Show” sometimes, but instead of being advertised kitchen utensils or cocoa drinks, I get introduced to yet another online anonymous discussion space every few months. There is no room for deviation here: that misplaced sauce bottle in Commons is more likely the work of a frat pledge than the mistake of the staff.

Everything works well, sometimes too well that it scares me.

I found an increasing need to microdose chaos as the days pass to remain sane. I used to hop on the Metro-North to the City to escape Yale’s apple-pie order, but that hasn’t been so kind to my bank account. So I settled for the next best place that would supply my cravings: Hong Kong Grocery Market.

The Market, which ironically offers little from Hong Kong, is more than just another Asian grocery store to me. It has a comforting sense of chaos that no Yale-affiliated establishment embraces.

The boxes meant for the storage room greet me in between racks, down the aisles and at the checkout counter. The polka-dotted and crystal-studded flipflops are found in the same section as the meat fridge. There is a stray jar of dried shrimp nestled among fruits and butter in the refrigerated section. The hipster coffee shops around campus can only aspire to reach the forms of anarchy that the store has effortlessly mastered.

The Market feels homely to me because it does not pretend to be perfect. The canned drinks on the floor could be placed elsewhere. That hollow tile near the storage room could be fixed. But these little imperfections do not impede the Market’s operations, and quite honestly, they add some charm to the place. This is not an institution that needs flashy interiors and state-of-the-art service to divert attention away from entrenched systemic problems. This is a modest grocery store that supplies Asian goods, and I respect the great job that it does.

But much more than that, the Market is the closest thing to the grocery stores where most of my childhood in Malaysia played out. The dried shredded squid, grass jelly drinks, rice crackers and Tom Yum pastes that the store offers are goods

that no grocery store back home will be complete without. The prices are about the same too, if I pretended for a second that exchange rates were not a thing. I can almost imagine myself frantically searching for dark soy sauce and wheat noodles as the exhaust pipe of my mother’s car outside rumbles in frustration.

Being away from home for so long, I have had to look for pockets of home in places like the Market to remedy my yearning for home. I spend too many nights — more than I’d care to admit — sobbing at stock photos of Malaysian food, and though I do not have the culinary talents to remake these recipes, I find unadulterated joy in shuffling through the aisles pretending to look for ingredients for that laksa broth I cannot boil yet. I bathe myself under the faint fluorescent strip above me while taking in the somehow familiar scent of the store. I read the labels on the packaging carefully.

The flight to Kuala Lumpur takes at least a day, but the walk to this market takes only ten minutes. There, I still get to say: “I’m home.” And I’m happy with that.

Contact PO EIC QUAH at poeic.quah@yale.edu .

HOW TO DIEGO // BY DIEGO HARO Go to yalies.io. Look up your name. What do you find?

If you were born in the U.S. between 1996 and 2004, you are most likely named either Jacob or Emily. If you’re not named Jacob or Emily — celebrate, you beat the odds. If you’re named Jacob or Emily, celebrate anyway. Go back to yalies.io. Search for Jacob. See a wall of Jacobs: a toothy-smile Jacob, a toothless grin Jacob, a stoic Jacob, a smizing Jacob, a …... Look closer.

Discover an economics Jacob, a Georgia Jacob, a Gemini Jacob, a sophomore Branford Jacob from California who was born in September and doesn’t know his major yet. Wonder why most Jacobs are in Franklin. Also wonder if you should know this much personal info about Jacob and

Jacob and Jacob.

If you were born between 1996 and 2004, you are less likely, but still fairly likely, to be named Diego.

Close the tab. Check your email. If you’re named Diego, find the email to Diego, Diego, Diego, Diego, Diego, me, Diego, and Diego with the subject, “Anyone want do a group Diego dinner?”. Since you’re busy, lazy, jaded, and too cool to explore beyond your inner circle, close the email. Go about your day.

Rest and remember the Davids.

In Fall 2021, spurred by a mislabeled package to “David”, Yale’s army of Davids shamelessly united. They didn’t care. Pause.

Reflect. Recheck your email.

A bolder Diego has already replied. He’ll offer to host the Diego Dinner at his home if another Diego can spearhead

WKND RECOMMENDS Shrimp and fruits.

the cooking. Another Diego will reply. Like you, he can’t cook.

But he’ll establish the Diego Dinner Fund (DDF, much like the IMF, for short). Another another Diego will reply and agree with Diego and Diego. The Diegos are sharp, witty, everything you’d expect them to be. You, of course, must reply with an email as witty as the others. Don’t panic. If they’re anything like you, they’ll understand a witless email. Right? Think for a day. At a club meeting, talk to another Diego you know. He’ll be intimidated by the chain too. Reassure him. Go home, write the email, send. More replies will trickle in.

A date is set. Nobody will know how to cook — why?

Shower, shave, dress. Pick up the pizza you ordered and debate whether you should send a “PIZZAA INCOMING!!”

email. Decide against it, save the excitement. You still won’t know whether the other Diegos are understanding. Smile and meet a Diego at the door, then more inside. Immediately bond over the fact that you were nearly all named after Diego Rivera. Also bond over the fact that you get confused when you hear “Jacob” because it almost sounds like Diego. Jacob is a common name.

Everybody will rock different shoes: Stan Smiths, black boots, hiking Hokas, black Converse.

None of it matters. Get deeper.

Share that you cried when a girl said Go Diego Go to you in second grade. Hear and laugh at how others dealt with what was pseudo childhood trauma for you. The theme song was my cross-county anthem, one will say. I did cross-country too, another will shout. Me too,

another.

Dinner will have some awkward pauses. After all, it’s nine strangers who share a name.

Thank a Diego for bringing Tequila. It’s the good stuff, he’ll say. Together, take a shot. Salud.

Pa’ riba, Pa’bajo, Pa’centro, Pa’dentro it. When the Diegos go around and say whether they have siblings, joke that your older sister is named Dora. The Diegos will roar. They’re understanding. Take another shot.

Wait. Then another. Make sure the Diegos are also drinking water. Get rowdy to Bad Bunny and Diego by Torey Lanez. Flip cups. Ping Pong. Everybody will shout, hug and welcome the Diego who showed up late. Ah — you’ll love the Diegos.

Contact DIEGO HARO at diego.haro@yale.edu .

YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2022 · yaledailynews.com

PAGE B3

WEEKEND REJECTION

// BY JESSAI FLORES

Writing, Unconcentrated

At this point every semester, after having emerged from the perilous tides of the midterm season, Yale students find themselves watching the waves recede and reveal before them the menacing pincers of the creative writing applications hidden beneath the sand. What happens next is a mad dash to tame the beasts and scramble to get a seat in an ever-intensifying game of musical chairs. You may want to snatch an application up from the murky sand and try your luck at getting a seat in a course, but so will everybody else. It should be common knowledge now that if you want to get into a creative writing course, and perhaps later the creative writing concentration, chances are that you probably will not — and that is okay.

I speak as someone who has been rejected so many times from the creative writing courses, who never stood a chance to get into the creative writing concentration, and who gave up the fight entirely. My experience with the countless rejection emails denying me a spot in Yale’s creative writing courses has allowed me to reconsider my relationship with what it means to be a writer. There were misty-eyed moments where I once believed that perhaps I was not good enough, and that I would never have a literary career. This was of course just me being ruthless to myself and placing all my artistic value on what is practically just a lottery. Like a lottery, the results are nothing personal. I learned after my third semester applying and again getting rejected that the feeling of personal failure recedes much like floodwater after a storm. You get used to being told “no.” If anything the rejections are realistic.

The publishing industry is notorious for being ruthless with rejections. What is an author without a stack of rejected manuscripts?

// JESSAI FLORES

In fact, there are many people who have had storied literary careers and have made tremendous contributions to English literature who have never set foot in a Yale creative writing course. Phillip Larkin, Toni Morrison, Christina Rossetti, Sylvia Plath, Nathaniel Hawthorne and countless other men and women of letters never submitted applications to Advanced Poetry or Writing the Television Drama at Yale. Yet, they will spend more time in Yale classrooms than any of us, occupying permanent spots in overcrowded seminars for years to come. So if you do not get into the concentration or to any of the classes know that you will be in fantastic company. And who knows? You too might even end up on some future Yale professor’s syllabus.

Now, I am not arguing that the creative writing courses are terrible or that the instructors are heartless. I want to state, for the record

If I were a season, I’d be autumn. Just as the leaves are constantly falling from trees, I am constantly falling. I don’t mean physically –– though that happens a lot, too –– but emotionally. I get over-invested in everything I do, which works out fine when I’m actually able to do said things. But after coming to Yale, I found myself falling for activities that wouldn’t catch me.

My high school’s student body was a thirteenth of Yale’s undergraduate population, and not at all competitive.

It was very easy to get involved there. After I left Yale’s Extracurricular Bazaar, my inbox flooded with details about club applications and auditions, I began to realize involvement wouldn’t come as easily here.

My Google Calendar quickly filled with audition dates and application deadlines, and soon after, my inbox was graced by another kind of email: one of rejection. “Thank you for auditioning for our project,” they always started.

“Unfortunately, we are not able to offer you a role at this time.” It was always the same.

Yale is filled with talented, brilliant, innovative people, so I didn’t fool myself into thinking that getting involved would be as easy as it was in high school. Still, each rejection felt like rubbing salt in an already open wound. I’d fallen for each activity harder than Bella Swan fell for Edward Cullen. I’d spent an embarrassing amount of time romanticizing the people I’d meet and the things I’d do, if only I got accepted into each activity. But instead of having a super strong vampire to catch me when I fell, I had nothing but questions and a bruised ego.

All of this left me wondering: how do you recover from rejection? How do you cope when it feels like you’re not good enough to do the things you want to do?

It would’ve been all too easy to fall into a well of self-doubt and despair, and to a certain extent, I did. But somehow, I always managed to crawl my way out. I found my “lifelines” –– things that shined a light in my proverbial tunnel, and that, when woven together, created a safety net that broke my fall.

The first of these lifelines was my friends. As cheesy as it sounds, the people I’ve met here have brought more joy into

Aries It’s your favorite time of year: election season! Try to avoid picking unnecessary political fights. Or don’t. You’ve never been one to let people boss you around, so why listen to me?

Taurus This week you’ve been feeling like an extra in the movie of everyone else’s life, and it’s because you are. Stop blending into the background — go make your mark!

Gemini It’s peak yague season and you’ve been feeling under the weather. I promise that a poorly mixed drink and flashing LED lights aren’t going to cure you — put the frat shoes away and get some rest.

WKND Recommends Chapstick!

Contact JESSAI FLORES at jessai.flores@yale.edu .

Catching myself

// BY HANNAH KURCZESKI

// BY HANNAH KURCZESKI

and for posterity, that I have the utmost respect for the English and creative writing faculty. It is such an honor to have been on the same campus as a Nobel Prize winner, Pulitzer recipients, and beloved poets, critics, journalists, and writers. What I am arguing instead is that the creative writing courses are not a necessity nor a requirement to have a successful literary career or to leave an impact on literature and the arts. Do not weigh your value as a writer on the results of what will inevitably be a competitive application season. The creative writing courses are to the art of writing as Tabasco is to soup. Does it help? Sure. But a creative writing course does not on its own make a writer, much like soup cannot be just Tabasco and nothing else. Your writing, like a good soup, is made up of a vast list of ingredients: your experiences, influences, and inspirations. The creative writing courses are just one of the potential ingredients at your disposal. Whether you

find yourself in possession of this ingredient is not a reflection of your skills. Rather, it is evidence that the ingredient is scarce and in high demand. So cook with something else.

I am a writer who never got into any of the application-based creative writing courses or my dream concentration. Instead, I, like Plath, Rossetti, and perhaps you, am a writer outside of the concentration. Locked out of a selective group. So I write unconcentrated on and unconcerned about what the results of the creative writing applications say about me. You will never find my work in a creative writing seminar, but you will find my voice elsewhere.

If not here in this paper, then in other student publications and then later on bookshelves in dusty libraries. I am an unconcentrated writer bent to the will of my own ambition and paying no mind to my ever-growing and unsurprising list of rejection letters. The measure of a great writer is not whether they get accepted into programs, but instead what they do with the pile of rejected material on their desks.

What does a great writer do when they are rejected? They keep writing.

Writing is an art, and like a painting, not every gallery or classroom will want to make space for you. But, the act of writing is the act of space-making. If you do take your chance at tackling the sandy beasts of the creative writing applications, know that if you wipe out, there will still be plenty of room on the beach and lots of ocean to explore. So, lay out a towel, put paper in your typewriter, line up your margins, and carve a space for yourself in the vast inky blue wonder of the literary arts.

my life than I knew possible. Not only that, but we were all going through similar struggles. Everyone was getting the same rejection emails; Everyone was having a hard time.

Knowing that I didn’t have to navi// ARIANE DE GENNARO gate the

losses on my own made a d i f fe re n c e , because suddenly, recovery wasn’t a solitary task. Sometimes it looked like crying on the couch in my friend’s suite, and other times it looked like 1 a.m. snack runs to GHeav, but it was all recovery. It was all together.

Something else that helped? Relying on my favorite things, like Disney’s “Hercules.” “Hercules” was the only

movie I’d brought with me from home, and that was by accident. Or maybe it wasn’t; Maybe the universe knew I would need it, because when the familiar characters flashed across the screen, suddenly I was six years old again, cuddled on the couch in my mother’s arms. Oddly enough, “Hercules” also helped put things in perspective: At least I didn’t have to slay a Hydra to save a village like the titular character. If Hercules could overcome the pressure of being a hero and move on with his life, then I could certainly overcome the pressure of club application season and move on with mine.

I believe that every rope in a net is equally important.

If one were to break, the entire net could unravel, and then you’d have nothing to catch you. Still, if I had to pinpoint the thing that helped me most, it would be the fact that there is always something else out there. When I was younger, I adopted a mentality: If something that I really wanted to happen didn’t work out, then that just meant something even better must be coming. Whether or not that’s true doesn’t matter as much as the basic fact that something else is coming.

It wasn’t until one night in my friend’s suite that I realized how temporary everything is. I’d had a rough day, and she told me that the way that I was feeling wouldn’t last forever. “It’s only October,” she reminded me. “The rejection you’re facing now won’t even be on your mind three months from now.”

I didn’t realize it at the time, but she was right. I’ll keep working, I’ll keep applying, and though rejections will inevitably happen, so will successes.

I am autumn. I fall like the leaves, but harder and faster because I get so excited to do the things that I love. Clearly, those things won’t always work out, but that’s okay because I’ll have more things to look forward to. I’ll have my friends. And, if nothing else, I’ll have “Hercules.”

WKND Horoscope Cancer Answer your phone. No, seriously — right now. Clear out those 1,738 emails and please, for the love of god, text your mom back.

Leo You looked so good in your costume this Halloweekend that you picked up a new secret admirer!... kidding. The world doesn’t revolve around you the way you think it does.

Virgo You’ve got secrets you want to keep, but Yale is smaller than you think it is. Stop name dropping and start using codenames.

Contact HANNAH KURCZESKI at hannah.kurczeski@yale.edu .

Libra The semester has gone on long enough that you’ve started to sink into a steady routine. Don’t get too comfortable — the leaves are changing and you are too. You might not see it yet, but your mom will definitely make a comment about it at Thanksgiving.

Contact HANNAH KURCZESKI at hannah.kurczeski@yale.edu .

// ELIZABETH WATSON

Capricorn Your hookup is not going to text you.

It’s probably not because they think you are out of their league, but rather you have the personality of a saltine. Also: invest in some chapstick.

Scorpio I know it’s your birthday season, but you’ve been partying a little too hard recently. Do yourself (and your GPA) a favor and lock yourself in Bass for a while.

Aquarius You’re the water-bearer, and your waterworks have been working overtime. Maybe it’s the stress of midterms or the post-halloweekend blues, but stock up on kleenex, because this week you’re gonna need it.

Sagittarius You are going to have the best week ever because you are amazing and you deserve it.

This is 100 percent factual and not at all a personal manifestation from a Sag author.

Pisces Drink some water. You might be a water sign, but you’re unbelievably dehydrated.

Avoid the line at Yale Health and take care of yourself.

PAGE B4

YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2022 · YALEDAILYNEWS.COM

WEEKEND GOODBYES

// BY ANDREW CRAMER

Dear Computer Science

Dear Computer Science, What a run! Just under two years ago, while writing my Yale application, I had to list up to three potential majors I was interested in. I chose English, Classics and Statistics & Data Science.

Our entanglement came out of nowhere.

We were introduced in first-semester CS50, cliché as that may sound. I never thought it would get this serious. It was just supposed to be a one-time thing. And yet, here we are now, brought together for a third consecutive semester in CS223.

I don’t know how we made it this far.

I’m a humanities boy and you are quite definitionally a STEM gal. But I couldn’t settle for the mere tease of CS50. I loved the novelty, the difficulty and the thrill of a problem set done right. They left me yearning for more.

I thought one more class would bring me back to reality. I had heard malicious rumors about CS201, and I thought our little romance would end within the infamous walls of Dunham 220 as Professor Stephen B. Slade delivered our eulogy.

Instead, I fell head over heels. I began to feel more comfortable around you. I even went so far as to begin describing myself as an “intended CS & Econ major” after surviving that brutal three-and-a-half hour handwritten final exam in gloomy Davies Auditorium.

Sometime around then, however, it became less about my love for you and more about the love for what you represented. For some reason, our relationship provided me with an imagined aura of intrigue and power around others. It made me feel special.

Coming into this year, I dared to take our relationship to the next level, studying discrete math in CS202 and data structures in CS223.

And suddenly, far too abruptly, it all came crashing down. Like I said, I’m a humanities boy and you’re a STEM gal;

I spent hours and hours trying to revive the magic we shared, but it never came back. Thirty hours later with no fruits of my labor, I realized it wasn’t meant to be. After nights of crying on the floor to my “dont hmu” playlist, nights of tossing and turning in bed wondering why you were doing this

I’m Pyramus and you’re Thisbe; I’m Romeo and you’re Juliet. Pick an analogy about ill-fated love and it applies.

You said you wanted to make things more serious, you wanted to spend more time together. First problem set, we spent maybe 15 hours together. I could do this, I thought. And then, the second problem set hit, and I began to doubt if we were really compatible.

to me, nights full of stress and unhappiness, I knew. Whatever this thing was, it was over.

As I began to re-evaluate our relationship, I thought back to the reasons why our sneaky links even began in the first place. I never had any software engineering ambitions. I just loved the thrill and the challenge. It was manageable then.

But looking now, the thrill is gone, the challenge seemingly insurmountable.

// BY ZOË HALABAN The thirty-two minute subway ride to Washington Heights is a homecoming. I feel a breeze through the orifice in my stockings. “Orifice” is a word I learned by eavesdropping in sterile hallways connected to cardiology corridors. I’m twelve, and I seem a lot older than I am, so I no longer say tear.

My life is defined by rituals. Where I stand in the elevator once I get off 168th street, Sol LeWitt murals in the lobby, cooking Annie’s mac and cheese on my baby brother’s bedroom floor. Optimism takes the form of peach jelly rings from the gift shop — something yummier than Wonder Bread from the cafeteria — and finding hobbies.

My favorite extracurricular is going to Tower 6 of Columbia University Children’s Hospital, where my brother was a frequent resident for most of my childhood. Most would expect I was something of a vagabond. Instead, my health-shaped prosperity granted me the time and energy to construct a home and family in an objectively sullen space.

However, my outlets for this endeavor are mostly lacking. Until, one fortunate afternoon, I stumble upon a tea party in the Kosher kitchen. The smell of freshly baked goods almost masks the rubbing alcohol; this closet-like room in the corner of the hallway suddenly has royal allure. Dishes just like my grandmother’s best china are placed on every table, above a doily and a floral tablecloth.

I then realize, at the ripe age of twelve, that I am not nearly the first inpatient wing habitué with the desire to make the hospital a home. The tea ladies, women who all have children with heart defects, soon adopt me as their token member of a new generation of tea women.

I have only two facts in common with most of the women: the unique type of love I have with my brother, their children and the hospital; and the enjoyment of afternoon tea. That was evidently all that was needed to make a space that routinely takes bravery to enter suddenly feel comfortable.

Once a month, the Tower 6 kitchen would turn into a beautiful tea parlor filled with delicious treats, support, warmth and community.

My (not so) baby brother is fortunately healthy now.

This is a gift I am grateful for every day. And still, my memories of my years at the hospital are largely ones of love, my favorite cake and hot mugs of earl gray tea — like artifacts of any home.

In many ways, my college life is still defined by rituals. But I have never stopped turning to tea as a solace. My lovely suitemates engage in (very modest) tea parties in our common room, and I keep a stack of loose-leaf tea boxes on the mantle. No resolution for a tough day goes without boiling water. Though born in a dismal home, this tradition is a continuous reminder of the community and small triumphs that may be fixed by some tea.

Contact ZOË HALABAN at zoe.halaban@yale.edu .

WKND Hot Take: Cancel Harvard-Yale.

All that was tethering me to you was my sense of pride. I didn’t want to admit that I couldn’t handle the rollercoaster of a computer science life. I didn’t want to give up the superiority complex I felt over humanities kids.

But I had to. For my mental health, for my free time, for my sanity, I’m slipping off my engagement ring and dropping CS223. No longer an “intended CS & Econ major,” I’m a free agent once more.

This torrid affair of ours was something, wasn’t it? Just a year ago, I was so timid, so young and oh so naïve. And then, for that brief patch in the middle, it was glorious. When it was good, I never thought it would end. But now, I can’t stand the thought of devoting the rest of my college career to a grind just for the sake of commitment. It’s over.

Maybe I’ll play the field and come back.

Maybe I’ll realize that nobody else can make me feel the things you do. Maybe I’ll take CS223 in the spring and realize that it was just a “wrong place, wrong-time” situation. But right now, the emotions are too raw to even imagine such a possibility. Ethics, Politics & Economics has never looked so magnificent as the rays of sunshine streaming through the stained glass windows cascade over her shiny new dress.

Thanks for the memories, and thanks for taking a chance on a little boy from the humanities-side of the tracks. I’ll always remember what we had together. But it’s time to move on. It’s not you, it’s me.

Cordially, Andrew Contact ANDREW CRAMER at andrew.cramer@yale.edu .

Have a tea with me

// MADDIE SOULE