ARTS PAGE 13 UNIVERSITY

NEWS

“I’ve always envied people who sleep easily. Their brains must be cleaner, the floorboards of the skull well swept, all the little monsters closed up in a steamer trunk at the foot of the bed.” DAVID BENIOFF AMERICAN AUTHOR

Inclusionary zoning policy sparks heated debate at Alders meeting

Yale Peabody Museum switches to a “free admission” policy for all

BY SYLVAN LEBRUN STAFF REPORTER

New Haven officials are weighing a highly controversial zoning policy that would mandate that new market-rate developments in the city include a certain allocation of affordable units.

Building off of recommendations provided by the city’s Affordable Housing Task Force in 2019, this inclusionary zoning policy is one part of the Board of Alders’ legislative agenda item to address the city’s housing crisis. If the proposal is passed, city developers will be required and incentivized to have a specific percentage of their units be affordable, a figure determined by the strength of the market in the neighborhood they are building in.

At a virtual meeting of the Board of Alders’ Legislation Committee on Tuesday night, 19 New Haven residents — including local grassroots activists, lawyers, Affordable Housing Commission members, students and real estate developers — gave testimony in response to the ordinance. The Legislation Committee will debate the bill at least one more time at its next meeting before the policy is voted on, a move that Ward 9 Alder and committee chair Charles Decker GRD ’18 said is necessary in order to process public opinion and the complexities of the legislation.

“[The policy] fosters mixed-income development rather than 100 percent market-rate,” City Plan Director Aicha Woods ARC ’97 said during her team’s presentation on Tuesday night. “It importantly provides affordable housing in areas of opportunities, with greater access to jobs and services, amenities and schools… The point of it is really to reduce racial and economic segregation by providing opportunities for people to live in high quality projects in high opportunity areas.”

This legislation is the combined work of Wood’s department, the Economic Development Administration, the Livable City Initiative council and the mayor’s office, with external input from the real estate consulting group HR&A Advisors. Woods defined inclusionary zoning laws as any policies that “create affordable housing by encouraging and requiring developers to set aside a percentage of housing units at below market rates.” She also noted that “hundreds” of cities across the country have already adopted these policies.

Tiers, AMI and incentives: the details of the proposal

Woods explained that the first iteration of the ordinance was presented in an April 2020 report, which was then workshopped with developers and local officials over the following year as the market recovered from the pandemic. The proposal was then presented to the City Plan Commission in July of this year, where it was voted on favorably.

As the policy took shape, the required level of affordability was increased to make it “more progressive” than similar inclusionary zoning laws in other cities, according to Woods.

The threshold for “affordable” units in New Haven’s policy is that rent must be feasible for families making 50 percent or less of the Area Median Income, or AMI. This would mean a monthly rent of $1,090 or less for a two-bedroom apartment, according to the Connecticut Department of Housing. In typical inclusionary zoning plans from other cities, Woods said, these thresholds can be as high as 80 percent AMI, providing “workforce housing” instead of housing that is truly affordable for residents at lower income levels.

In the ordinance, the city is split into zones based upon the strength of the market, with an exception for public land, where all developments of greater than 10 units will have to have a full 20 percent of their units qualify as affordable under the AMI restriction.

The downtown area, which has experienced a recent boom in often-luxury apartment developments, is considered the “core” Tier 1 of the plan — the requirement for developments of 10 or more units will be for 10 percent of the units to be affordable, with an extra five percent of units put aside for housing voucher holders. In the “strong” Tier 2, which includes East Rock, Long Wharf, Dixwell, Dwight and Wooster Square, as well as parts of Newhallville, the Hill and Fair Haven, the requirement is lowered to five percent of units.

Lastly, in the “remainder” Tier 3, where there is less development, according to Woods, the requirement is that only the complexes with more than 75 units have to include five percent affordable units.

Woods said that this geographical designation, which puts the strongest restrictions on the downtown area, was included in order to push back against historic redlining that “concentrates affordable housing in low-income neighborhoods and excludes it from neighborhoods with a strong market and more opportunities.”

For developers unwilling to follow the set guidelines, the city has put in the option of an in-lieu fee, which will tally up to between $210,000$225,000 in the “core” markets and $168,000-$176,000 in the “remainder.” Revenue from this fee will go into an affordable housing fund, which Livable City Initiative director Arlevia Samuel said will be used to subsidize housing assistance nonprofits and smaller affordable building developments across the city. The creators of the legislation set this fee high in order to discourage such an opt-out, according to Wood, .

The proposal provides a number of incentives for participating developers, including a waiving of parking minimums and the suspension of certain zoning requirements, which will allow buildings to be both larger overall but with smaller floor space than legislation otherwise allows. A proportional 10-year tax abatement is also included.

According to Woods, if this policy had been in place since 2010, there would already be an additional 120-160 units of affordable housing in the city. The Audu-

SYLVAN LEBRUN/CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER

Alders, residents heatedly discuss new inclusionary zoning policy.

bon, a luxury complex on Orange Street, would have single-handedly contributed 40 of these.

Before the public testimonies began, Steve Fontana, deputy director of economic development, urged those on the call to believe in the proposal as a tool that will make a difference in terms of progress in addressing housing affordability and availability in the city.

“I’m sure many of you have heard this term before, but we shouldn’t allow the perfect to become the enemy of the good,” Fontana said. “This proposal relies upon the private sector to continue to make the kind of significant investment they’ve been making in New Haven over the last several years… There are people who may tell you that it’s not enough, and there are others who will be prepared to say that it’s very challenging for us to enact something like this. So I think we sort of have tried to hit the sweet spot.”

Too much or too little? Residents react

Although a few alders asked brief logistical questions to the team behind the proposal, the committee chose overall to dedicate Tuesday’s session to comments from residents, noting that another meeting in the future will allow for further debate on the bill.

One exception was Ward 22 Alder Jeanette Morrison, who voiced her concerns that the five to 10 percent requirements for affordable housing were far too modest to address the crisis in the city, emphasizing that neighborhood constituents needed to still have the power to push developers to go past this minimum and not settle for it. Her remarks were later echoed in certain public testimonies.

Later, at the end of the meeting, Ward 13 Alder Rosa Santana came out strongly against the plan, arguing that it was inherently unfeasible in terms of enforcing compliance.

“I’m going to tell you right now, it’s not going to work,” Santana said. “The city did a horrible job in the past of reviewing compliance documents to ensure that the AMIs were reached… It is very difficult to keep developers in line and to ensure that someone from the city is tracking the percentages of units that they’re giving.”

Out of the 19 public testimonies given at the meeting, about half were in complete support of the bill. Among those in favor was Jaime Myers-McPhail, an organizer with community activism group New Haven Rising and a member of the Affordable Housing Commission.

Myers-McPhail argued that the opposition to this legislation from luxury developers is evidence of the necessity for the program, which would force these individuals to include all residents in the “wave of opportunity” that has so far reinforced historic redlining. City officials “must ensure that those who profit from building in our city contribute tangible benefits to historically under-resourced communities.”

One developer was present to give testimony on the call. Darren Seid, a New York-based real estate developer who has a number of projects in New Haven, began his remarks by acknowledging that he had “a bunch of things that are very unpopular to say.” He claimed to be in support of inclusionary zoning in general, but opposed the current structure of the policy on the grounds that it would discourage new development.

“I know stories of [inclusionary zoning] policies coming out that just destroyed investment in beautiful blossoming cities,” Seid said. “And everything that’s going on in New Haven right now is just absolutely incredible. But there’s no shame in saying that the affordable units that we are all discussing do not get built if the investment stops coming into town.”

On the other end of the issue, a number of community members argued that the zoning ordinance as it stands is not enough to truly help those struggling to find housing, pointing to specific structural flaws such as the design of the “market tiers” and the AMI figures used.

Elias Estabrook, another member of the Affordable Housing Commision who said that his testimony represented only his own views, argued that the details of the “strong” Tier 2 category needed to be amended. By placing Dixwell, Dwight, the Hill, Newhallville and Fair Haven in the same group as other more affluent neighborhoods, with equal incentives for new market-rate development, the ordinance will cause “rising prices, in other words, gentrification” in these lower income areas, he said.

A number of others also emphasized that the AMI used in the calculations for the rents of these “affordable” units was for New Haven County instead of the city of New Haven. In the city itself, the median income is much lower, according to New Haven Legal Aid community organizer Caitlin Maloney, which makes the claim of affordability deceptive.

Maloney also argued that the policy had been developed without “meaningful resident feedback,” instead relying on an outside consulting firm.

Also mentioned were concerns that the incentives for developers will allow them to build cramped and tall structures without adequate parking space.

In the majority of the testimonies, however, the primary concern was that the ordinance would not truly open doors for residents with the thresholds of five to 15 percent mandated in the program.

“They say, ‘we’ll make a couple of units affordable but the rest will be out of reach,’” said Myra Smith, Neighborhood Services Advocate for Christian Community Action. “The people here are struggling. We want to stay here. We want to live here. We want to continue to raise our children here. But it has become impossible.”

Written testimonies and comments on this legislation can be submitted via email to publictestimony@newhavenct.gov.

Contact SYLVAN LEBRUN at sylvan.lebrun@yale.edu .

YALE NEWS

Following its post-renovation reopening in 2024, Peabody Museum will offer free admission to all visitors.

BY TANIA TSUNIK STAFF REPORTER

The Yale Peabody Museum will switch to a free admission policy for all visitors when it reopens its doors to the public in 2024 following a major ongoing renovation project.

After a $160 million gift from Edward P. Bass ’68 in August 2018 to renovate the Peabody— one of the most significant donations to Yale University and the largest known gift ever made to an American natural history museum—the museum was closed to the public in March 2020. The goal of the renovation is to allow for building conservation, construction of new classrooms and collection areas and the addition of 50 percent more gallery space, all while focusing on two main areas: accessibility and sustainability.

Details of the free admission policy were announced Wednesday. Previously, tickets to the museum cost $13 for adults, $9 for seniors and $6 for children ages 3-18.

“Free admission is a means, not the end,” Peabody Museum Director David Skelly told Yale News. “It’s a tool in a much larger effort toward becoming a more accessible and welcoming institution. We view the renovation and the changes in admissions and programming as an opportunity to become the Peabody Museum our community needs because that’s the museum we want to be.”

According to the Peabody’s website, the renovated museum is designed to be accessible to all, with large elevators, touchable fossils, assistive listening devices and multilingual audio programming across galleries.

In a prior interview with the News, University President Peter Salovey said that one of the goals during his tenure was to make the Peabody Museum free to all.

“The Peabody and its collections…enhance the student experience and are used extensively by faculty in their research and teaching,” Salovey said to Yale News. “Increasing access through free admission will help us to enrich the lives of individuals from our home city and state and of visitors from around the world.”

Currently, the Peabody Museum’s revamped collections facility is situated on Yale’s West Campus. It houses more than 1.5 million items from the museum’s anthropology, history of science and technology collections.

The Yale Peabody Museum is scheduled to reopen in early 2024.

SPORTS

Bulldogs successful in New York Comeback victory for Yale

MUSCOSPORTSPHOTOS.COM

The Bulldogs shut out No. 4 Colgate in a surprise victory to level their ECAC record to .500.

W. ICE HOCKEY FROM PAGE 14

The Bulldogs will look to turn this weekend into a streak of wins as they face Ivy competitors Harvard and Dartmouth. Two players will especially be looking to build upon a big weekend as they earned ECAC weekly honors.

Junior forward Claire Dalton ’23 was named the ECAC Player of the Week after posting two goals and four assists this weekend. Dalton currently leads Division I hockey with two points per game, totaling 12 points in the team’s six games.

Meloni was also honored as ECAC Goalie of the Week following her perfect weekend. The Bulldogs’ goalie leads the nation in both goals against average and save percentage, with zero and one respectively.

Meloni’s seventh and eighth career shutouts this weekend moved her into fifth place for career shutouts in Yale history.

Contact SPENCER KING at spencer.king@yale.edu. from anybody.” JOSH ALLEN BUFFALO BILLS QUARTERBACK

W. FIELD HOCKEY FROM PAGE 14

When asked about how the Bulldogs turned around the momentum to create opportunities in the second half, Davies emphasized that converting their momentum into scoring made the difference in the game.

“I think the momentum had been with us since the first quarter,” Davies wrote in an email to the News. “In the second half, we knew we just needed to find a way to turn that momentum and domination into a result and the team did a great job to generate shots and those ultimately-successful corners!”

Davies’ two goals were not the only factor in Yale’s second-half come-from-behind victory. Yale’s defense had to stop Cornell’s dangerous attack.

According to Sarah King ’22, the team specifically focused on limiting Cornell’s penalty corners.

“We really focused on identifying Cornell’s offensive threats and catered our practices during the week to shutting down those threats,” King wrote of their preparations. “We knew they had a dangerous offensive penalty corner unit so we worked on reducing the number of fouls in the circle to limit those.”

Yale’s disciplined play style was reflected in the scoreline, with the Bulldogs conceding only three penalty corners to Cornell’s eight. With all three goals in the match coming off penalty corners, it was clear that Yale’s strategy paid off.

Of course, the emotions of the Senior Day matchup were not lost on the Blue and White. For five of the players, the match against Cornell would be their last in a Yale uniform.

“It meant the world to our team, especially us seniors, to win our last game this season,” Iliana Cabral ’22 wrote. “It is worth noting that our team culture is at the best it has ever been...This team has given me the opportunity to meet some of my best friends.”

With four seniors — Davies, King, Cabral and Kelly Dolan ’22 — and one graduate student — Anissa Abboud SPH ’23 — departing the team, the field hockey roster will look a little different next year.

Still, this year’s team is confident they’ve laid the groundwork for success in future seasons.

“I think this year’s team has laid incredibly strong foundations for the future success of the program and hopefully an Ivy League title next year!” Davies wrote. “I can’t wait to follow these girls’ future successes.”

Saturday’s win marked the Bulldogs’ first regulation win against the Big Red since 2013.

Contact BILLY KLINE at william.kline@yale.edu.

COURTESY OF YALE ATHLETICS

This game secured the team an overall winning record for the season, as well as within their conference.

Elis beat Brewers 88–42

M. BASKETBALL FROM PAGE 14

“Honestly, it felt like I got transported back to 2020,” starting guard and captain Jalen Gabbidon ’22 said postgame. “Once we went out there and the tip went off, I think everyone was comfortable, and all the pregame jitters from the whole year and a half hiatus went away right away.”

Head coach James Jones started small, inserting four veteran guards in the starting five — Eze Dike ’22, Azar Swain ’22, Matthue Cotton ’23 and Gabbidon — alongside forward Isaiah Kelly ’23. The senior captain, who took a gap year and was originally a member of the class of 2021, scored Yale’s first points of the season, backing down his smaller Vassar defender before elevating for a bucket off the backboard.

Yale never trailed, jumping to a 12–6 advantage at the first media timeout before expanding its lead to 12 midway through the first half. Early reinforcements came in the form of rookie forward Yussif Basa-Ama ’24 and returning guard August Mahoney ’24, who were Jones’ first substitutions exactly five minutes into the first half. First-year forward Jack Molloy ’25 then entered the game alongside guard Michael Feinberg ’23 with just under 14 minutes to go in the first. Jones stuck to that rotation of nine in the first frame.

Forward EJ Jarvis ’23 warmed up with his teammates, but did not ultimately dress for the contest and instead sported a suit at the end of the Yale bench. In a preseason interview with the News last week, Jones said Jarvis had dealt with a “myriad of injuries” but said the forward was expected to return to playing “sooner than later.”

In Jarvis’ absence — coupled with the uncertain injury status of senior forward Jameel Alausa ’22, who underwent double hip surgery last year and made a brief appearance in the game’s final two minutes — Jones turned to rookies Basa-Ama and Molloy to complement Kelly in the post. He said the injuries to those two post players also influenced his decision to start the game with four guards, a call likely made easier by the relative lack of height across the Brewers’ lineup. BasaAma grabbed a team-high six rebounds in his college debut.

WILLIAM MCCORMACK/CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER

Men's basketball looks to continue its momentum for Friday's game versus the UMass Minutemen.

“There was a lot of emotion leading up to [the game],” Swain, who led all scorers with 16, said. “I felt nervous and anxious, [a] similar feeling [to] going into [the] Ivy League tournament almost. It was a different feeling. It’s been a long year and a half home — a lot of working out, a lot of time by myself — so it was amazing to be out there and feel that atmosphere again.”

For Yale undergraduates, the Bulldogs’ opener with Vassar also marked their first chance to pick up football tickets for the Yale–Harvard game on Nov. 20. The first 100 students to arrive also received white t-shirts with the inscription, “Beat Harvard Again.” Students filled the wooden bleachers to near capacity in the first half before trailing around the arena to line up for football tickets at halftime, at which point Yale had already built a 47–21 lead. Most returned to their seats for the second half, sticking around to see the Bulldogs open the game up even further.

As Jones turned to his entire bench in the second frame, 15 players recorded points in the final box score. Mahoney, a threepoint specialist who played important minutes off the bench during his first year in 2019–20, finished with 11 on three-of-four shooting from beyond the arc. Gabbidon, Dike and Cotton all ended the night with 10 points apiece, while first-year guard Bez Mbeng ’25 led all Bulldogs with about 10 minutes of playing time in the second half.

“My job is to figure out who gets what minutes, and that’s not an easy thing to do having the number of guys we have in this program and the number of guys that can play well,” Jones said. “I’m excited for our future and where we are … like I said, I got to figure out who to play and when.”

Starting with an undermatched DIII opponent gave coaches a chance to play nearly the team’s entire roster and experiment with lineups. In another sign of the live drilling opportunities the contest afforded, Yale also occasionally turned to a full-court press in the first half.

In his interview with the News last week, Jones said Vassar head coach Ryan Mee used to work at Yale’s basketball camps. According to its website schedule, the DIII program treated Tuesday’s game as an exhibition.

“Coming off of COVID-19, I thought it was a good idea to just have another few days of practice if we could before we actually played a Division I opponent,” Jones said.

Several of his Ivy League counterparts seemed to have the same idea. Every Ivy League men’s program except Penn started its season Tuesday night. Brown, Harvard and Princeton also began their nonconference slates against non-Division I opponents. Harvard beat Morehouse, 86–70, Brown took down Salve Regina, 89–59 and Princeton defeated Rutgers-Camden, 94–28.

Yale next hosts UMass on Friday at 8:00 p.m. in a doubleheader with the Yale women’s basketball program, who play Northeastern at Lee Amphitheater with a 5:30 p.m. tipoff.

Bulldogs win 2–1 in last home game

M. SOCCER FROM PAGE 14

Rookie of the Week honors for the fourth time this season.

“It was definitely a great feeling, working all week, getting ready for this one,” Zahiroleslam said. “We don't have mid-week games anymore, so our focus is to fine-tune for the Ivy League games at the end of the week. And it’s just the product of a lot of hard work put in honestly since the beginning of the year, back in August when we got together for the first time. So just super happy we could win our last game this year at home, and good for Enzo — he’s put in a lot of work for this program.”

Despite being down two goals, the Bears continued to create chances until the final whistle. With four seconds remaining on the clock, Brown player Charlie Adams rocketed a long-distance, right-footed shot on target. The shot, struck with power and precision, got past Elian Haddock and narrowed the margin to one. On the ensuing kickoff, the Bulldogs hit a long ball down the field to allow time to expire, sealing the 2–1 win.

Although Yale remains undefeated in Ancient Eight play, a series of ties against conference opponents such as Penn and Harvard put them out of contention for an Ivy League championship. Princeton — who the Bulldogs face this weeked in their final game — secured a 1–0 victory against Penn over the weekend, clinching the Ivy championship and a trip to the NCAA tournament. The Tigers are four points ahead of the Blue and White in the standings, so a Yale win next weekend will not be enough to catch up.

For Okpoye, the team’s only senior, the win over Brown held extra significance. Family and friends traveled long distances to watch the senior play in his final game. Okpoye, who has suffered a number of injuries throughout his career with the Blue and White, saw somewhat more limited time this season as he recovered. Nevertheless, he brought experience and knowledge from past years to the young roster. Okpoye played center back throughout the team’s 2019 championship season.

“It’s obviously my last game, so it’s really special,” Okpoye told the News postgame. “This just, like, adds that little bit of extra emotion. I don’t even know how to express it tonight. All of my friends are here, family 5000 miles away from home, so the people I call family are here tonight. That’s not every other weekend for me, so it's just that much more special.”

Yale travels to New Jersey for its final game of the season against Princeton on Saturday. The matchup kicks off at 4 p.m.

Contact DREW BECKMEN at drew.beckmen@yale.edu and SOPHIE WANG at sophie.wang@yale.edu.

NEWS

CLIFTON FADIMAN AMERICAN INTELLECTUAL

Ward 1 alder transition between Yalies begins

BY SOPHIE SONNENFELD CONTRIBUTING REPORTER

In last Tuesday night’s election, two Yalies won seats on New Haven’s Board of Alders — Alex Guzhnay ’24 in Ward 1 and Eli Sabin ’22 in Ward 7. The election saw lower turnout among Yale students than past years did.

Previously, Sabin was the alder for Ward 1, which represents eight of Yale’s 14 residential colleges as well as several hotels and apartments along Chapel Street. Sabin estimates that 65 percent of Ward 1 constituents are Yale students. Sabin was third in line to vote for his successor, Guzhnay, as New Haven’s Ward 1 Alder at 6 a.m. on Tuesday morning. Sabin is now in the process of passing the torch to Guzhnay and preparing to take over as Ward 7 Alder, which represents Downtown and the lower East Rock neighborhood. Sabin and Guzhnay both ran in uncontested races Tuesday. Just over 100 New Haveners cast ballots in Ward 1 and over 500 voted in Ward 7. In 2019, 441 voted in Ward 1 and 704 New Haveners cast ballots in Ward 7, when New Haven Mayor Justin Elicker defeated incumbent Toni Harp.

“We definitely had a lower turnout than anticipated,” Guzhnay told the News. “I think I could chalk that up to a number of different things, it’s an off-year for elections, plus just the national climate around politics.”

Guzhnay is now the sixth Yale student to serve as Ward 1 Alder since 2007 and the latest in a line of Yale-affiliated alders that, according to Sabin, have held the position for the past 40 years.

Guzhnay, who is from New Haven’s Fair Haven neighborhood and attended Achievement First Amistad High School, said a major priority for him as alder will be investing more money into cityrun youth programs such as Youth @ Work. He said he is also looking to create more infrastructure in Ward 1 based on recommendations from the Safe Streets Coalition — an organization that advocates for safer and more accessible transportation infrastructure in the Elm City — particularly creating more bike lanes. “That’s something every neighborhood should have,” he added.

He said he is in conversation with Sabin, city engineer Giovanni Zinn and Ward 22 Alder Jeanette Morrison to determine where those lanes might be placed.

“We’re going to continue having those meetings with folks and working together to make sure we’re coordinating and everybody’s up to speed,” Sabin added.

Guzhnay said he would also like to keep part of the road on College Street reserved for out-

TIM TAI/CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER

After New Haven’s elections last Tuesday, the transition from Sabin to Guzhnay for the Ward 1 alder spot begins.

door seating to boost local businesses. The initiative started during the pandemic, in part due to Sabin’s advocacy.

Sabin said the Shubert Theater and College Street Music Hall are both transitioning back to having storage and moving trucks enter and exit as shows are opening. To accommodate this, they are requesting access to College Street, which would potentially eliminate the outdoor seating area that currently takes up a portion of the street.

“I think they want a little more flexibility about the configuration of the street. I’m hoping we’re going to figure out how to make it work because I think it’s been a huge success and helped business out a lot,” Sabin said.

Guzhnay and Sabin said they have been working together closely to make their transition in the Ward 1 alder spot as smooth as possible.

All newly-elected alders will soon attend meetings at City Hall to review the ethics code, an outline of all city departments and rules of order.

For Ward 1, Sabin said he is introducing Guzhnay to Brendan Borer, New Haven Police Department downtown district manager lieutenant, and Arthur Natalino, Livable City Initiative Neighborhood specialist for Downtown New Haven, who both are in frequent communication with the Ward 1 alder.

Guzhnay said he has already met with at least one-third of the board to discuss issues and ideas for New Haven over lunches and coffees. “Folks have been really supportive,” Guzhnay said.

“I think that relationship building makes the transition to being an alder and part of the group a lot easier,” Sabin added.

Sabin has also been working with Guzhnay to fix Ward 1 specific problems such as trash bags over some pedestrian light walk signals and a United Illuminating home lighting issue on Chapel Street.

On election day, Sabin was stationed outside the Hall of Records on Orange Street from 6:15 a.m. to 8 p.m. to meet Ward 7 voters. He only left at one point to grab warmer clothes saying, “it was a long day, but a good day.” He said it was “rewarding” to speak with constituents who recognized him and voted.

As Ward 7 alder, Sabin said he plans to focus on affordable housing and transforming downtown New Haven into a neighborhood that “serves the whole city.” He said he would like to grow the downtown area and densify it though zoning changes that would allow for more housing.

Sabin said he also wants to fill vacant storefronts along Chapel Street to create more jobs and revitalize the economy.

With many of his constituents being students and young professionals who often move in and out of apartments, Guzhnay said it can be difficult to interact with voters on New Haven issues.

Guzhnay said that before the pandemic, he saw a lot of Yale students engaged in activism in the city. “I think it’s kind of slowed down thanks to the pandemic, but I think things will grow again,” he said.

To connect with voters, Guzhnay said he made phone calls and plans to attend Downtown Wooster Community Management Team meetings.

Sabin said he would like to see a tradition of Yale students who have grown up in New Haven representing Ward 1.

“I think if you grow up here you have a much better sense of what’s going on here and what people care about,” he said. “I think it’s easier to figure out what issues to prioritize, build trust with other folks on the board and the community, and bridge the divide between Yale and the city.”

Kiana Flores ’25 has been working as one of two interns for Sabin’s campaign since the start of the semester in September.

Flores helped the campaign with phone banking, calling constituents about voting plans and locations and canvassing door-todoor with registered voters. She also aided the campaign in creating social media posts and emails.

Flores is from New Haven and graduated from Cooperative Arts and Humanities High School last year. “I’m really excited to have two New Haven Yalies as alders because I feel like they give a really grounded perspective both being from New Haven born and raised,” she said.

On election day, Flores was stationed outside the Ward 7 polling place at 200 Orange St. from 2:30 p.m. to 6 p.m. interacting with voters.

“A lot of them are more incentivized to vote since they’re living in New Haven whereas a lot of Yale students don’t vote in New Haven because they’re registered somewhere else or they simply don’t know they can register here and vote in the local election,” Flore said.

Flores said she has run into more Yale students interested in New Haven politics since the start of the year.

“I hope that people do take the time and consider voting in New Haven when they can and just learn a little more about who’s representing them, especially since they’ll be here for four years,” she said.

To get more involved in New Haven, Flores said she hopes students will look more into local politics, nonprofit organizations and activist groups throughout the city.

Flores highlighted the work Sabin has done in boosting local businesses by shutting down College Street for outdoor dining during the pandemic and the strides Sabin made in promoting bike and pedestrian safety. She said she is looking forward to seeing a continuation of his efforts on bike and pedestrian safety in Ward 7, as well as on zoning reforms before the broader Board of Alders. 11,813 New Haveners voted in the polls last Tuesday, compared to 17,849 in the 2019 New Haven mayoral election between mayor re-elect Justin Elicker and former mayor Toni Harp.

Contact SOPHIE SONNENFELD at sophie.sonnenfeld@yale.edu .

Bandy Lee lawyers file counter-motion

YALE UNIVERSITY

The disagreement hinges on the scope of academic freedom, and whether it gives Yale blanket control over appointments.

BY ISAAC YU STAFF REPORTER

Lawyers for Bandy Lee MED ’94 DIV ’95, the former Yale School of Medicine psychiatrist who sued Yale for wrongful termination, have responded to the University’s motion to dismiss the case, the latest development in a monthslong saga.

In their September filing, Yale lawyers argued that Lee was a voluntary faculty member in the School of Medicine, and therefore not protected under certain provisions of the Faculty Handbook including those governing reappointment. University spokeswoman Karen Peart also said that the lawsuit had “no legal basis.” Lee’s lawyers were previously granted an extension until Monday to respond to the University’s motion.

In their newest filing on Tuesday night, Lee’s lawyers held that the psychiatrist’s role and work in the law school, when applied to several legal tests, reached beyond that of a purely voluntary faculty member. They re-asserted that the University and Dr. John Krystal, Lee’s supervisor, “kowtowed” to complaints made by Alan Dershowitz, a former Trump lawyer who accused Lee of violating ethics rules of the American Psychiatric Association after she tweeted that Dershowitz and Trump had “shared psychosis.”

The filing recounts the timeline surrounding Lee’s dismissal in March 2020, seeking to demonstrate that the removal of Lee’s teaching duties and subsequent dismissal were direct results of Dershowitz’s complaints. The filing also asserts that at the time of Lee’s dismissal, she was also in the process of planning content with law professors for a course approved by Howard Zonana, a School of Medicine psychiatrist who founded the Law and Psychiatry division Lee worked in and who is an adjunct law professor. The filing argues that Yale’s lawyers incorrectly defined academic freedom as a legal “cloak” to the University’s right to control its hiring and reappointment decisions.

Peart said that the University “does not consider the political opinions of faculty members when making appointment decisions.”

This is now the second time Lee’s legal team has responded to a motion to dismiss from Yale, the first of which failed in June. Lee said that she remains steadfast as the case drags out, and that her motivations lie beyond reinstatement.

“My goals for launching my lawsuit are simple: to protect academic freedom and to preserve societal health and safety,” Lee wrote in an email to the News. “I did not do it for myself as much as for my beloved institution and our country.”

Peart told the News that Yale’s commitments to academic freedom can be found in the Faculty Handbook and the Report of the Committee on Freedom of Expression at Yale, commonly known as the Woodward Report.

In its second dismissal filing, Yale’s lawyers described the Woodward Report as a “statement of principles,” rather than a “set of contractual promises.” The lawyers argued that principles of academic freedom were enacted through the Faculty Handbook, which excludes School of Medicine voluntary faculty from its appeals processes.

Lee said that while she was appointed in the School of Medicine, much of her work was exclusively housed in the Law School, and that she taught numerous legal courses, including the class Immigration Legal Services, which she taught continuously for 15 years. She also disputed that her appointment was purely voluntary, because she relied on the appointment to procure several sources of employment, including teaching a Yale undergraduate course.

More than a dozen universities have reached out to her with offers since her dismissal, Lee wrote. She recently agreed to co-found an institute on violence prevention at Union Theological Seminary in New York City, but will continue to seek reinstatement at Yale through the lawsuit.

“I am still holding out for Yale, however, with hope that it will choose to be a shining example, as it has been in the past, and not a leader of destructive trends,” Lee said.

Lee is being represented by the Hartford-based law firm Rose Kallor, which did not respond to requests for comment. Yale is represented by the firm Wiggin and Dana of New Haven.

THROUGH THE LENS

The “big picture” views of the grand buildings on Yale’s campus are familiar sights, but the subtler details are often more elusive.

One of the most enjoyable parts of exploring the University is returning to the same buildings again and again, noticing new features every time. Crests, shields, carvings and more seem to exist in almost limitless supply.

Each engraving contains a link to the past and a nod to the future.

Here are a few of the most beautiful, interesting and notable examples.

MICHAEL GARMAN reports.

NEWS

Protesters call on Yale to divest from fossil fuels

LUKAS FLIPPO/SENIOR PHOTOGRAPHER

At a Nov. 5 rally organized by EJC, students pushed the University to divest from fossil fuel industries.

BY LUCY HODGMAN AND ALESSIA DEGRAEVE STAFF REPORTER AND CONTRIBUTING REPORTER

Hundreds of students gathered in Beinecke Plaza on Friday at a rally organized by the Endowment Justice Coalition. There, they called on Yale to disclose and divest its holdings in the fossil fuel industry and increase its investment in the city of New Haven.

Founded in 2018, the EJC is a student organization which advocates for the ethical allocation of Yale’s endowment, demanding in particular that the University divest from the fossil fuel industry. Although universities including Brown, Columbia and Harvard have divested from the fossil fuel industry, Yale has opted to employ a set of principles to guide its continued investment in fossil-fuel-producing companies.

Friday’s protest was staged in response to the recent growth of the University’s endowment, which climbed 40.2 percent, a gain of $11.1 billion, during the 2021 fiscal year. According to a press release from the EJC, protesters take issue with the University’s allocation of its endowment, especially given the recent launch of the University’s capital campaign under the name “For Humanity.”

“We demand that Yale recognize the harm it has caused, and continues to cause,” EJC organizer Lumisa Bista ’24 told the News. “We demand that Yale end its practices of wealth hoarding. We demand that Yale divest from destructive industries, like fossil fuels. We demand that Yale reinvest their obscene wealth into New Haven. As Yale students, we must hold Yale accountable.”

Bista thanked the students who attended the protest for their “continued support as we continue to demand better from Yale.”

“We wanted to mobilize and show students’ demands for transparency, complete and total divestment from the fossil fuel industry and other divestments that actively harm our people and our planet, and redirecting those resources towards sustainable systems and community power — especially in the community of New Haven,” EJC organizer Abigail Maher ’23 wrote to the News.

University spokesperson Karen Peart emphasized the University’s commitment to addressing climate change through “research and teaching, innovative strategies to reduce emissions on campus and the constant re-examination of its investment policies.”

“On Friday, students expressed their views on a more complete divestment from the fossil fuel industry,” Peart wrote in an email to the News. “The university is committed to promoting freedom of speech and expression and recognizing students’ right to protest.”

The rally featured a series of speeches about the University and its spending policies. In addition to EJC organizers, Maher said that members of the New Haven Climate movement, Black Students for Disarmament at Yale, the Yale College Council, Yalies 4 Palestine, Disability Empowerment for Yale, Students Unite Now, and Yale Young Democratic Socialists of America all gave “powerfully moving speeches.”

The rally began with a joint speech from Bista and Garrett Frye-Mason ’23, who co-wrote a recent opinion piece in the News about the University’s endowment.

“We stand in front of the Schwarzman Center, funded by the CEO of the Blackstone Group, an investment management company,” Bista said during the speech. “[Blackstone] owns firms that have significant responsibility for the ongoing climate crisis. These firms have played a direct role in the destruction of the Amazon rainforest. They have forcefully stolen land, deforested it, and taken it for their own extraction and exploitation.”

Several speeches focused on the allocation and size of Yale’s endowment, with Maher describing the University’s investment choices as “inherently political.”

But Peart told the News in October that the endowment funds are subject to many restrictions with regard to their use.

“Yale’s endowment is restricted to support various aspects of the university’s core mission — from financial aid to faculty salaries, to research and scholarship and to student activities,” Peart wrote in October.

Organizers also called for Yale to increase its voluntary annual payment to the city of New Haven and to increase student financial aid.

University President Peter Salovey announced on Oct. 28 that the University would increase its voluntary annual payment to New Haven, but he did not provide a specific timeline. Peart told the News that Yale’s endowment supports thousands of jobs in New Haven, including “faculty and staff, union and non-union jobs.” The University also announced financial aid expansions in October, including the elimination of the student income contribution.

In addition, the organizers called for the University to defund the Yale Police Department.

“BSDY has been researching YPD for two years now,” Callie Benson-Williams ’23, executive director of Black Students for Disarmament at Yale, said at the rally. “Even in conversations with the Chief of Police himself, I have yet to get a clear answer on why YPD even exists in the first place, why a private institution is able to control a private militia with the ability to arrest public citizens they do not answer to.”

Benson-Williams argued that the existence of the YPD “draws a line” between the University and the city of New Haven, suggesting that the University reinvest the money dedicated to the YPD to “programs that are actually dedicated to New Haven’s safety.”

In October 2020, Salovey told the News that “virtually everything” about the operation of the YPD could be changed, but that abolishing the department was not an option.

“The bomb threat made against Yale on Friday reminds us that Yale Police Department officers must have the resources to be fully prepared to respond quickly to any life-threatening emergency that might arise on campus,” Peart wrote in an email to the News.

In between speeches, organizers also led the protesters in songs and chants calling for changes to Yale’s financial policies. One chant listed other universities that have committed to divest from the fossil fuel industry, including Harvard University, Brown University and Columbia University, and demanded “Hey Yale, where are you?”

Salovey announced the formation of the Committee on Fossil Fuel Investment Principles in October 2020. Intended to advise the Yale Corporation on the ethical implementation of fossil fuel investment principles, the committee assembled a set of principles for investment in fossil fuel industries which was approved by the Yale Corporation in April 2021.

Peart pointed the News to these developments, adding that the University pledged in June 2021 that Yale would “achieve zero actual carbon emissions” by 2050.

Attendee Stevan Kamatovic ’25 took issue with some of the arguments that organizers made at the rally.

“I support the students’ freedom of speech, and I think the march was powerful,” Kematovic said. “However their actual premise behind Yale’s lack of divestment of fossil fuels is false. From my perspective, Yale is actually quite divested from fossil fuels, it is just a long process. I don’t think people realize that the results won’t be immediate.”

But Carigan McGuinn ’25 said she felt “empowered” by the rally, in particular when organizers invited students to share their “endowment dreams” — hopes for how Yale could better utilize its multi-billion dollar endowment that were written on slips of paper and affixed by EJC members to the side of Sheffield-Sterling-Strathcona Hall.

“These wishes included asking Yale to pay its fair share to the city of New Haven, to divest in fossil fuels and to invest in better resources to support the wellbeing and success of students of all different backgrounds,” McGuinn said.

Yale’s endowment was most recently valued at $42.3 billion.

Contact LUCY HODGMAN at lucy.hodgman@yale.edu and ALESSIA DEGRAEVE at alessia.degraeve@yale.edu.

Dixwell’s Q-House, beloved community center, reopens after 18 years

BY BRIAN ZHANG CONTRIBUTING REPORTER

After 18 years and around $16 million of funding, more than 800 beaming children and their parents gathered at 197 Dixwell Ave. on Saturday as community members celebrated the reopening of the Q-House, Dixwell’s beloved community center.

The Dixwell Community Center, or Q-House, held its ribbon-cutting ceremony on Saturday at 11 a.m., celebrating the revival of part of New Haven’s history, present and future. Following a dynamic marching band and cheerleading performance courtesy of Southern Connecticut State University’s Blue Steel Drumline and Hillhouse High School, the event saw a series of speaker presentations from city leaders and the Q-House advisory board, including Ward 22 Alder Jeanette Morrison, former mayor Toni Harp and mayor re-elect Justin Elicker. Together, they commended the support of the many partnering organizations that made the center’s renovation and reopening possible, alongside the resilience and financial contributions of the Dixwell community as it pushed to “keep the House.” Attendees of the ceremony were then divided into small groups as they toured the two-story building.

“The concept is about empowerment of all,” said Morrison, who spearheaded the center’s reconstruction throughout the years. “[The Q-House] is a place to hope and dream and to exercise those things to make them a reality.”

Through its various accommodations, the new Q-House gives residents of all backgrounds the building blocks necessary to “navigate and innovate” these dreams, according to Morrison, who herself enrolled in a weekly gymnastics course at the center as a child. Q-House emphasizes education and recreation alike, Morrison said.

On Saturday, featured facilities include a library, elderly lounge, museum, game rooms, gymnasiums and kitchens. Though the accessibility and focus of specific areas in the Q will cater to certain age groups depending on the time of day, the services are provided for free and locals may reserve a space for themselves, family or friends.

Despite the current building being the center’s third rendition, Morrison explained that its original purpose as a 1920s settlement house has not changed. Both then and now, the center has strived to take care of those with limited access to economic and social opportunities, regardless of race and socioeconomic status. Saturday’s tour left many reminiscing of the various social activities in the Q that they or their children had once participated in.

Elsa Holahan, a junior at Hillhouse High School and a youth director on the center’s advisory board, stated that the Q’s history is based on the “stories and narratives” of community members, particularly those of Black New Haveners. Q’s new internal museum, named after Harp and her husband, captures these struggles and achievements of New Haven’s Black community through a multimedia display of historical photographs, art and documents.

Henry Fernandez, the executive director of Leadership, Education & Athletics in Partnership, a New Haven-based youth mentorship program, explained

BRIAN ZHANG/CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER

On Nov. 6, leaders and partners of Dixwell’s Q-House hosted a ribbon-cutting ceremony for the reopened community center.

that the current building’s architecture has not left out its history. It maintains the African and religious motifs characteristic of the first version of the Q in 1924, thanks to the efforts of Fernandez’s friend and fellow New Havener Regina Winters-Toussaint, who designed the building before she passed away in 2016.

“This [building] is a testament to who [Winters] was as an architect,” Fernandez said. “It is a testament to her faith, and it is a testament to her love for children as the people of New Haven.”

Saturday’s ceremony marked the beginning of the Q-House’s revived legacy. New additions, including an operational space for Cornell Scott-Hill Health, will soon be made. Event speakers frequently emphasized Q’s commitment to empowering the city’s children. The newly renovated Stetson Library, for example, caters specifically to the youth. It now features an expanded African-American literature collection from the Diaspora and a teen area with interactive technology. Similarly, young residents played a pivotal role in the preservation of the “giant big family” that is Ward 22 — where “everyone looks out for each other,” said local Valerie McKinnie.

“We now have the opportunity to create our own everlasting memories,” Holahan said. “The Dixwell Q-House that we happily stand before today will unequivocally serve to support … the future generation of New Haven throughout the conquest of time.”

Morrison was elected as chair of the advisory board in January 2020.

SPORTS

MEN’S ICE HOCKEY

ELIS IN HUNT FOR FIRST WIN In their fi rst homestand of the season, the Bulldogs falter in back-to-back defeats to conference rivals Quinnipiac and Princeton. Despite losses, team chemistry shows promise for games down the line.

FENCING

YALE TAKES FOUR TOP-10 FINISHES After over a year without play and an interim head coach, Yale Fencing returned to competition at the Penn State Garret Open with three top-10 fi nishes in women’s epee and foil and one in men’s saber.

FOR MORE SPORTS CONTENT, VISIT OUR WEB SITE

goydn.com/YDNsports Twitter: @YDNSports

YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 12, 2021 · yaledailynews.com

“The end of the year is always emotional when you have to say goodbye to members of your program.”

SARAH MARTINEZ

W. SOCCER HEAD COACH

Bulldogs blank Cornell, Colgate

WOMEN'S ICE HOCKEY

MUSCOSPORTSPHOTOS.COM

Goalie Gianna Meloni ’22 makes a return between the pipes to facilitate commanding victories against Cornell and Colgate.

BY SPENCER KING CONTRIBUTING REPORTER

The Yale women’s hockey team (4–2–0, 2–2–0 ECAC) bounced back from two conference losses last weekend with two impressive wins this Friday and Saturday against Cornell (1–4–1, 0–3–1) and Colgate (11–3–0, 3–1–0). The Bulldogs took down No. 15 Big Red 7–0 on Friday night, a team it hadn’t beaten since 2009, and then blanked the No. 4 Raiders 4–0 on Saturday.

One of the biggest changes from last weekend was in the Yale offense. After only scoring just one goal last weekend, the Bulldogs rebounded with a whopping 11 goals this weekend.

“This was a great team effort tonight, with lots of energy, hustle and crisp puck movement,” said Yale head coach Mark Bolding to Yale Athletics. “We talked about putting pucks to the net to fi nd our o ensive stride and it worked out. Nice to get the win and a complete defensive game too.”

Another headline of the weekend was the return of the Bulldogs’ fi rst-string goalie, Gianna Meloni ’22. Meloni made her return as the starting goalie in dramatic fashion, blanking both opponents with 16 saves against Cornell and then a whopping 32 saves against Colgate.

Meloni has yet to allow a goal this season after starting her senior season with a shutout against St. Anselm in the Bulldogs’ season opener. Following that fi rst game, Pia Dukaric ’25 had started the Bulldogs’ last three games in goal, leading some to question when Meloni would return to the starting job. However, this weekend certainly saw Meloni rea rm herself as the starting goalie for the team.

“Our team was really solid tonight. It's easier to play when you're scoring and your teammates are responding to communication in the D-zone,” said Meloni following her standout performance against Colgate, “Everyone stepped up and played a complete 60 minutes, so I'm excited to see where we can go from here.”

While the goalie may be quick to deflect from her own performance, Meloni’s zero goals against average may certainly do the talking for her.

While the 7–0 blowout over Cornell is impressive, the Bulldogs 4–0 win over Colgate turned heads around not just the ECAC, but also the NCAA as a whole. The Bulldogs were dominant in all aspects, hounding the Colgate skaters from the very start.

Colgate head coach Greg Fargo admitted to such in a postgame interview with Colgate Athletics. “I have to hand it to Yale as they were better than us all over the ice tonight, especially in the first two periods.”

SEE W. ICE HOCKEY PAGE 10

Elis seize Senior Day versus Cornell

BY BILLY KLINE CONTRIBUTING REPORTER

In its fi nal fi xture of the year, Yale (9–8, 4–3 Ivy) carried its recent momentum into a 2–1 victory over Cornell (7–9, 3–4). The Senior Day victory secured winning in-conference and overall records and marked the fi fth win for the Blue and White in their fi nal six games of the season.

FIELD HOCKEY

Cornell’s o ense took an early lead with a goal by Caroline Ramsey, the team’s leading goalscorer. Ramsey found the bottom of the cage o a penalty corner taken by Kate MacGillis, putting the Big Red on top.

The Bulldogs fought back throughout the remainder of the fi rst half, but were unable to convert across their nine shots. Despite leading on shots, the scoreboard saw Yale trailing 1–0 into halftime.

Cornell’s lead wouldn’t last much longer, with Yale dominating early in the third quarter. A pair of penalty corners allowed Imogen Davies ’22 to put two shots into the cage, taking a 2–1 lead the Bulldogs would hold onto for the rest of the game.

“[Davies] had one of her best games ever,” head coach Pam Stuper told Yale Athletics after the game. “She made sure we won. She played great on both sides of the ball, and she fi nished.”

Davies was named Ivy League O ensive Player of the Week for her performance against Cornell.

SEE FIELD HOCKEY PAGE 10

COURTESY OF SAM RUBIN '95

The Blue and White secured a winning record thanks to Imogen Davies’ ’22 dominant third-quarter performance against Cornell.

Yale overwhelms DIII Vassar in opener

WILLIAM MCCORMACK/CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER

Led by 16 points from guard Azar Swain ’22, all 18 Bulldogs in uniform saw the fl oor in the program’s fi rst game in 20 months.

BY WILLIAM MCCORMACK STAFF REPORTER

Playing at home for the first time since February 2020, Yale men’s basketball returned to the John J. Lee Amphitheater hardwood floor Tuesday night in its first competition since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

MEN'S BASKETBALL

Small reminders of the pandemic remained visible in the stands: blue surgical masks dotted the faces of fans in attendance and signs reminded spectators of rules requiring vaccination and prohibiting food, while kids aged 11 and younger were absent, per Yale’s current indoor sports attendance protocols. But down on the court, although coaches and players on the bench wore masks, the return of basketball was a relief — the rules and cadence of the game remained the same as they were when Yale competed 20 months ago.

Yale (1–0, 0–0 Ivy) settled in quickly against Division III opponent Vassar (0–0, 0–0 Liberty), leaning on a group of veteran guards as it opened an early lead that would only balloon as the game progressed. All 18 Bulldogs dressed for the game saw playing time in an 88–42 blowout, helping the Elis to an 11th straight win in their home opener.

SEE M. BASKETBALL PAGE 10

Bulldogs beat Brown in home fi nale

BY DREW BECKMEN AND SOPHIE WANG STAFF REPORTER AND CONTRIBUTING REPORTER

The Yale men’s soccer team claimed a 2–1 victory against Brown on Saturday. The victory marked the Bulldogs’ Senior Day — their last home game of the season. The team’s sole senior Enzo Okpoye ’22 was celebrated by teammates and fans alike during his last game at Reese Stadium.

MEN'S SOCCER

The Bulldogs (7–4–4, 4–0–2 Ivy) grabbed their fourth Ivy win with two goals from forward Kahveh Zahiroleslam ’24, who is now tied with forward Paolo Carroll ’23 for most Eli goals this season. The Yale defense stayed strong against the Bears (6–9–1, 2–3–1 Ivy) until the fi nal minute when Brown’s Charlie Adams got the ball past keeper Elian Haddock ’23 to deny Yale the shutout.

“We just want to keep it compact,” defender TJ Presthus ’25 said about the team’s defensive strategy. “Establish our line of pressure early, win the fi rst and second balls. It's huge having [Jeremy Haddock] next to me. You know your best o ense is a great defense, so we wanted to set up a counterattack and see what we could do o of that.”

The game kicked o on Saturday with high attacking energy on both sides, but the match remained scoreless in the fi rst half. Yale worked hard to create chances, setting up a few strong shots that just barely missed the mark. Elian Haddock and the Bulldog defense restricted Brown’s ability to make quality shots, with the opponent’s three shots requiring just one save from the Yale keeper.

The Elis recorded the game’s first shot on goal seven minutes into the contest as midfi elder Sigfus Arnason ’23 fi red a shot at Brown keeper Max Waldau that was ultimately saved. Minutes later, forward Eric Lagos ’24 launched a shot that went over the crossbar. Brown recorded a shot on goal with 15 minutes remaining in the half as the Bears found a shooting opportunity o of a corner kick.

When the teams returned for the second half, the Bulldogs began to take control of the game. In the 56th minute, Yale got its fi rst big chance. A fl urry of action in the box ended with the ball at the feet of Arnason, who crossed the ball in the air to fi nd Zahiroleslam. The sophomore forward headed it past the Brown keeper to complete the play and get Yale on the scoreboard.

Just seven minutes later, Zahiroleslam found the back of the net again. With the ball at his feet inside the box, Zahiroleslam tapped the ball between the defender’s legs before fi ring a shot into the top left corner. Zahiroleslam’s fancy footwork doubled Yale’s lead and provided some breathing room for the Elis in the fi nal 28 minutes of play. The goal was Zahiroleslam’s seventh of the season, matching Carroll for the most on the team. The forward’s two goals also earned him Ivy League

SEE M. SOCCER PAGE 10

MUSCOSPORTSPHOTOS.COM

The Yale men’s soccer team defeated Brown 2–1 on Saturday night in the last home game of the season.

WEEKEND

// JESSAI FLORES

YALE’S TIMMY T TAKES

It’s Timothée Chalamet’s World — And I Wish I Wasn’t Living In It

// BY AUDREY KOLKER

Maybe it’s all two minutes and thirty three seconds of the “Statistics” video, maybe it’s the fact that he does, actually, look like a pointy Italian shoe that was turned into a real boy by a witch’s curse, maybe it’s because I’m a contrarian at heart — whatever the reason, I love to hate Timothée Chalamet. His bony little body. His presence in every movie I’ve seen in theaters since 2017. The stupid accent on the stupid fi rst e in his stupid French name. (You don’t see me walking around telling people to call me Audrée.)

Tell me I don’t get it. Tell me how boys who look like they have TB are really hot. Tell me I didn’t see that one movie where he’s randomly a heroin addict and Steve Carrell is his dad — he gave a really moving performance in that one, actually. Tell me the scene in “Call Me By Your Name” where he did unmentionable things to a piece of fruit was high art. I don’t care.

As he dominates the cinemasphere, I humbly submit: We are rewarding a theatre-kid-classclown hybrid with the attention he wants more than anything else in the entire world, and we’re already paying the price. I mean, here is a man who gave like eight women at NYU chlamydia. (I have no source for that; it is a blatant rumor that all New York City kids spread ritually; I believe it with my entire heart to be true.) And since when is fragile beauty a substitute for talent? He gestured his way through “The French Dispatch,” he felt so out of place in “Little Women” and I fell asleep during “Dune,” which is probably on me, but I feel like he could have been better.

I don’t like to see Timothée win. Unfortunately for me, the universe doesn’t seem to care. Whatever. Let Timothée stare down at us from magazine covers and piles of box o ce revenue — I’ll be glaring back.

A Divide as Sharp as his Jawline: What’s Up With Timothée Chalamet?

//BY ANGELIQUE DE ROUEN

Whether you know him as Smokecheddathaassgetta or Lil Timmy Tim, it’s needless to say that Timothée Chalamet has made his mark on the industry. Film geeks and horny gen-zers laud him as the great movie star of our generation. Okay well, technically he’s not in our generation but he’s just 2 years over the deadline, so he gets a Dean’s excuse for this one. As a bilingual actor who is over 5’8”, he defi nitely has pretty much everything going for him. (Don’t worry, short kings, you still have a place in our hearts<3). However, there is still plenty of debate about whether or not Mr. Chagalamoo deserves the hype. Personally, I have heard some people say that he could make them part like the Red Sea, and others say that they have the feminine urge to snap him like a twig. All I can say for both of these awfully violent descriptions is...are y’all okay???

On a more serious note, I feel like as of right now, Chalamet deserves to enjoy his time in the spotlight. With my utter lack of research, I don’t fi nd him to be particularly cancellable. He’s just a guy who had a fun time with a peach and potential cannibal on camera, and now he’s really famous. And I love that for him! Is this a strange career path? Oh abso-fucking-lutely. But hey, he’s definitely “Dune” a lot better than me right now (buhdum-tssss), so who am I to judge? I’m hoping he continues to ride this wave for as long as he can — we have a pretty nice and healthy parasocial relationship going on right now. He makes movies, and I write about him in my college’s daily newspaper. I’m rooting for us! But no matter where you lie on the Chalamet-o-meter, one thing’s for sure, Timothée knows how to keep things nice and peachy.

Cultivating a Chalamet Cult

//BY ABIGAIL DIXON

I was fi rst introduced to Timothee Chalamet in “Lady Bird” when I was sixteen, and all I felt toward him was outrage at the apathy of his character. My infatuation bloomed only later, after meeting — and falling for — a Chalamet-esque boy in real life. From this perspective, I could suddenly appreciate the appeal of the combination of cool intelligence and boundless absurdity that had sent the internet into a craze. Now, I’ve almost watched “Dune” three times, and that’s not because of the stunning cinematography.

Because of the latency of my love, I can sympathize with those who do not understand the hype. Looking at static pictures, it is easy to passively pick apart his features, from his comically wide jaw to his overgrown eyebrows. But, on the silver screen, a clenching of the bone here or twitching of his brow there conveys the most subtle, yet crucial emo- Cont. on page B2

Yale Students love, hate and are incredibly horny for controversial superstar Timothée Chalamet

Cont. from page B1 tions that most actors fail to deliver.

The sharp accuracy of Chalamet’s acting pierces through me each time. He a ects me so thoroughly, I am often unable to watch one of his movies without pausing it an absurd amount, from when he sheepishly looks at the ground to boldly confesses his love. I still have not managed to fi nish watching “The King,” and that fi lm premiered in 2019.

Chalamet’s charm still extends beyond the screen: his hypnotizing self awareness exudes an aura of comfortability — confi dence without arrogance, self-consciousness without insecurity. This alluring balancing act is one that is only recently seen as attractive in men. People are looking less for a protector and more for a companion. The embracing of sensitivity in harmony with masculinity rather than discordant with it is what has allowed for the rise of this

// JESSAI FLORES

newly desirable archetype. Timothee Chalamet is the fi gurehead of the movement, and although it took me a while, I am following him devoutly.

Contact ABIGAIL DIXON at abigail.dixon@yale.edu .

Ten Things I Hate About Timothée Chalamet

//BY JACQUELINE KASKEL

I don’t care how you pronounce it — with a fancy French accent or a butchered American one. Timothée Chalamet is my generation’s most absurd and uncalled-for obsession. I pride myself in saying that I have never seen a Timothée Chalamet movie. And it’s not that I haven’t tried. Believe me, I have. When “Little Women” received its crap ton of accolades, I put it on my list — who didn’t? But I never got around to it. People told me to watch “Call Me by Your Name,” too, but life happened. “Lady Bird” has been on my Netflix watchlist for far too long. I’m not even ashamed to say that I bought the book Dune — not to read in preparation for the movie but to enjoy as a substitute. And I’m defi nitely not ashamed to say that I only learned he was in “Interstellar” a few days ago; though, to be fair, I’ve never actually seen the movie.

While I’m sure he’s got talent, I don’t see the need to cast him in every single new movie. He’s a twig for crying out loud. A goddamn twig. Don’t tell me that his jawline and cheekbones could cut diamonds. That boy still looks like a child. A very sharp child with the beginning of a rat mustache and too much hair product. Are you telling me that the world — most notably the female population — is swooning over a 25-year-old actor who hasn’t yet gone through puberty? And do you know what gets me the most? He’s playing Willy Wonka in the new 2023 fi lm Wonka. Think about Gene Wilder and Johnny Depp. Now think about Timothée Chalamet. Am I missing something there? Shouldn’t he be portraying Charlie? Or maybe the director cast him solely for his resemblance to the traumatized adolescent Willy Wonka in headgear from the 2005 movie.

It seems like Timothée Chalamet should be sticking with his teenage heartthrob roles for the time being — he defi nitely does not strike me as someone who could play a leading adult role. But what do I know? I severely lack both a proper Chalamet education — which I do not plan on rectifying — and the qualifi cations of a casting director. And so, to all the Chalamet fans out there that I have o ended today, you are welcome to carry on. Love him. Kneel before him. Swoon at his French. He was only ever yours to begin with.

Contact JACQUELINE KASKEL at jacqueline.kaskel@yale.edu .

Timothée Chalamet: the revival of the movie star

//BY CHRISTION ZAPPLEY

Timothée Chalamet is known for many things. Some may even say that he is a renaissance man. He is a mathematician (see his highly advanced lecture on statistics), rapper (see his Roman’s Revenge performance), and even an advanced computer scientist (see his recently discovered professional technology reviews). But, to most, Chalamet is an actor, and, an amazing one, at that.

I personally discovered him during the 2017 Academy Awards season when “Lady Bird” and “Call Me By Your Name” were up for prestigious accolades. Both films featured the legend himself. In “Lady Bird,” Greta Gerwig’s directorial debut, Chalamet played Kyle, a supporting character in the second half of the fi lm who dates the protagonist, Christine. Chalamet embodied the persona of someone who reads books at parties, studies ‘A People’s History of the United States’ (as if anyone actually read that book while they were in high school) and scoffs at capitalism while having enough money to not have to worry about it. He was uncaring, inattentive and absolutely full of himself. Yet somehow, Chalamet managed to make an entire audience still care for Kyle as a human being and the issues he faces with his terminally ill father. That same year, Chalamet was Oscar nominated for best actor for his performance in “Call Me By Your Name” where he played an artistic, sensitive and caring teenager who discovers his own sexuality and identity one summer in Italy. By the end of the fi lm, you feel the pain of Chalamet’s character, Elio, as he cries in front of a fi replace to a Sufjan Stevens song. When the credits rolled after this scene at the New York Film Festival, Chalamet’s performance inspired the longest standing ovation in festival history. At the young age of 20, Chalamet proved that he could carry a complex, emotionally-rich fi lm on his own. These were just Chalamet’s breakout roles, which only hint toward his full capabilities as an actor. He has kept up with the likes of legends such as Steve Carell, Frances McDormand, Oscar Isaac and more. He has already established himself as a dominant duo alongside Irish actress Saoirse Ronan (which needs no further elaboration if you have seen the fi eld scene at the end of ‘Little Women’). They are an onscreen couple instantly reminiscent of powerhouse predecessors such as Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet, Jake Gyllenhaal and Anne Hathaway and Viola Davis and Denzel Washington. Whether you think Chalamet is overrated, his accolades speak for him. With the simple addition of his name to a project, support is nearly guaranteed. For example, the newly-released “Dune” is based on a 1965 novel. Those who have read it famously consider the book as dense and complex, while many others have not heard of the text at all. But with Chalamet and superstar Zendaya’s faces on the poster, it was a guarantee that people were going to watch. According to Screen Rant, the fi lm took $41 million during its opening weekend in theaters and was streamed by 1.9 million households on HBO Max. Chalamet is a glimpse of what the future of cinema will hold for actors of our generation. There is lots of discourse about whether movie stars are a dying concept. Critics say individual actors no longer have the starpower to draw out audiences just for them. But from 2017’s “Lady Bird”/“Call Me By Your Name” couplet, to “Dune” and “The French Dispatch” filling current theaters, Chalamet has proven that this claim is untrue. The movie star can return home to the silver screen. “Dune” is currently streaming on HBO Max until November 21st. Both “Dune” and “The French Dispatch” are currently screening at Criterion Cinemas in New Haven.

Contact CHRISTION ZAPPLEY at christion.zappley@yale.edu .

Dear TIME Magazine, Timothée Chalamet is just a hot guy

//BY CAROLINE PARKER

Here’s my hot take: I don’t like Timothée Chalamet. I don’t like his smarmy, New York-style pretentiousness. I don’t like his faux-philosophical answers to straightforward press questions. I don’t like how the entire internet has decided that he is the second coming of Marlon Brando. He’s talented, sure, but I don’t think he’s the amazing actor we’re being led to believe he is. He always plays dark, broody intellectual types and consistently relies on more-powerful performances by his female co-stars. I didn’t like him in “Lady Bird,” I wasn’t impressed by his performance in “Little Women” and I don’t have time or energy to watch him hike through the desert for two and a half hours in “Dune.” I’ve tried to endear him to me by learning about his life. After a quick dive into the world of celebrity gossip, I learned that he’s a nepotism baby who was the Typhoid Mary of a — supposed — chlamydia outbreak at New York University.

I’m sure he works hard, and he seems to treat his fans well. I respect him for that. I just don’t think he deserves the lauding he gets. Last month, Chalamet covered TIME magazine. The publication vaunted him as a “Next Generation Leader” alongside activists, advocates and pioneers. When I saw the article, I actually laughed out loud. Even among actors of his age, I wouldn’t consider him a leader. He isn’t pushing boundaries like Zendaya or Hunter Schafer. He doesn’t do extensive charity work like Emma Watson or Selena Gomez. The article mentions his climate change activism, but the mention is in passing. There’s nothing to chronicle there. No one thinks of Timothée Chalamet fi rst when questioned about young environmental advocates. Chalamet’s brand is built on looking pretty and getting lucky in his projects — of course his powerful parents help too. Putting Chalamet on the cover above actual change-makers told me one thing: TIME magazine is desperate for readers.

Of course, if Timothée Chalamet asked me out, I wouldn’t say no. I’m principled, not blind. There is that chlamydia thing to consider though…

Contact CAROLINE PARKER at c.parker@yale.edu .

Timothée Chalamet: An Icon Growing Before Our Eyes

//BY SOPHIA GROFF

Since his leading role in the 2017 romantic drama “Call Me By Your Name,” Timothée Chalamet’s career has been set on an exponential upward trajectory. His performance in the fi lm as Elio Perlman earned him an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor. At 22 years old, he became the category’s third-youngest nominee in history, forecasting that the budding actor had a sensational career in his future. 2017 was a busy year for Chalamet; aside from starring in “Call Me By Your Name,” he also appeared in a number of other popular coming-of-age films, including “Lady Bird” and “Hot Summer Nights.” He later starred in the emotional drama “Beautiful Boy” (2018), earning a Golden Globe Award nomination, among other prestigious recognitions. 2019 was another year of success; Chalamet played Henry V of England in “The King” and joined the cast of “Little Women” to play Theodore “Laurie” Laurence, a performance that was met with widespread acclaim. These roles, among others, quickly earned him recognition as one of the youngest, most popular and most talented actors of our time.

Now in 2021, Chalamet has reached new levels of success once again. His career seems to thrive more and more every year as he continues to impress American and international audiences alike. His most recent films — “Dune” and “The French Dispatch” — have also met positive reviews. As a new take on Frank Herbert’s classic science fi ction novel from the sixties, “Dune” has appealed to readers of the book, Chalamet fans and science fi ction lovers alike. Director Denis Villenueve did make some controversial changes, including the pacing; “Dune” (2021) is only part one of the novel’s storyline. Time is split between awing the audience with impressive, high-budget visuals and tugging at their heartstrings with tense character moments fraught with danger. However, some viewers feel that the recent adaptation left out crucial elements of the novel, brushing over key political context and world building that was essential to the storyline. Still, Chalamet’s performance as Paul Atreides was stunning, and his on-screen chemistry with actors Oscar Isaac, Rebecca Furguson, Jason Momoa, and, briefl y, Zendaya is undeniable.

Regardless of your opinions on his latest films, Timothée Chalamet’s talent has become recognized worldwide. The 25-year-old has already seen levels of success of which most people can only dream, and yet it is safe to say that the young actor’s career is still only just getting started.

Contact SOPHIA GROFF at sophia.gro @yale.edu .

The Timothée Tabloid

//BY ANASTASIA IBRAHIM

In my mind, I’m already dating Timothée Chalamet. Actually, we’re married. And while I might have been a little bit apprehensive about sharing him with 50% of the female population aged 18-25, I’ve come around to it. I’m cool now.

Like a classic Scarlett Johansson/Colin Jost love story, he’s cinema’s sweetheart, and I’m the stu y Ivy league student — minus the successful career. Also like Johansson and Jost, Timmy and I met on SNL. He was the irresistible SmokeCheddathaAssGetta, and I was one of the 14.8 million views on Youtube. But I am not the 99%. I did not fall in love with him because of the elegance of his name and nothing else. I recognize his merit.

Because besides his perfect name, face, life, fashion sense, aura, heritage, hairline, (impeccably-sized) ears and the universe not only working in his favor but bowing down at his feet, he’s a humble, hard-working, talented young actor. He’s versatile. Not only on screen (the “Rap Roundtable” skit, “Little Women,” “Dune” and “The French Dispatch,” just to name a recent few), but also on my Instagram explore page. I never know which Chalamet I’m going to get. Black and white Time Magazine Chalamet? Paparazzi-photographed coy teenage sex appeal Chalamet? Ratatouille meme Chalamet? (If you haven’t seen it, it’s defi nitely worth the Google search). Another tool in his toolbox — no — he is the tool in his toolbox. Pedestrian TV called him the “internet’s boyfriend,” and well, yeah. He’s the standard, the prototype now. Whenever my friends ask me what I’m looking for in a man, I respond ‘Chalamet’, and just like Jennifer Lawrence reacting to Lady Gaga at the Golden Globes, they respond “Oh. Oooooh.” It’s immediately understood; no questions asked. When it comes to Timothée, there’s no room for taste disputes. He’s a universal actor, a global citizen, and everybody’s type.

Not to mention, his appeal and remarkable talent is underscored by his meekness and charisma. He’s witty, kind, and never acts ostentatiously. He blushes with an awkward smile whenever he’s complimented in an interview and gives o the impression that he has no idea how famous he is. In fact, he’s so unaware of his fame that despite a powerful celebrity fanbase (among them are Zendaya, Emma Chamberlain, Kendall Jenner, and Jimmy Fallon), he doesn’t follow any of them back on Instagram. And the reason is crystal clear-- he feels unworthy.

Oh yeah-- he also fucked John Mulaney’s ex-wife-- right after Mulaney made jokes about her being in love with him in Seth Rogan’s 2018 “Hilarity for Charity’’ special. Chalamet’s a Pete-Davidson-level romantic power player. Honestly, what’s there not to love about him?

Contact ANASTASIA IBRAHIM at anastasia.ibrahim@yale.edu .

HOT TAKES

See the story above^

Sex on the WKND: Waiting for Sex

Welcome back to Sex on the WKND! We’re an anonymous YDN column dedicated to answering your burning questions about sex, love and anything in between. Last year, we had one writer, but now we are a collective of students, each with our own unique sexual and romantic experiences. We’ve had straight sex, queer sex and long, long periods without sex. We’ve been in long-term relationships, we’ve walked twenty minutes to avoid former hookups on Cross Campus and we’ve done the whole FroCo-group-cest thing. We may be different this year, but we’re still sex-positive, we’re still anti-capitalist, and we sure as hell still support the Green New Deal.

Obsessing over sex is a Yale tradition as old as the Oldest College Daily itself. Whether you’re fucking your roommate, still yearning for your first kiss, or dealing with an unsettling skin rash, Sex on the WKND is here for you. Nothing is too personal or silly. Ask us anything ;)

Submit your anonymous question here: https://bit.ly/sexonthewknd

Does anyone wait until marriage on campus?

I don’t personally know anyone on campus who is planning on it, but I’m going to go out on a limb and say that yes, some of the 6,200 undergraduates at Yale will wait until marriage before they have sex. Most of us probably won’t, but some of us will. And there are a ton of reasons to wait. Maybe you’re particularly religious. Maybe you think waiting will make your eventual marriage stronger. Or maybe sex, to you, is so vulnerable and sacred that it should only be shared with a life-long partner, a spouse. Whatever works for you, works for you.

I’m sure you know that some people on campus will wait until marriage, but I get why you would ask the question. At Yale, it can seem like sex is everywhere. Our laundry rooms have more condoms, lube packets and dental dams than working dryers. In between learning the campus WiFi passwords and how to bluebook, part of first-year orientation involves watching CHEs slide a condom onto a wooden phallus. The school newspaper even has an entire column dedicated to sex!

Yale’s open culture about sex can be really great. For the most part (or at least in my experience), people can talk about their sexual experiences without feeling shame. We have the freedom to seek intimacy and explore our sexualities without public judgement. As a queer person who spent most of my life in the closet, Yale’s sexual climate has empowered me to accept and celebrate my sexuality. This campus has been an environment for me to explore sexual relationships I have not been able to explore in other spaces. Talking about sex is also necessary to forge a healthy sexual culture — we need CHE and CCE workshops and other public discussions about sex to prevent sexual violence and build better understandings of consent and physical intimacy.

But this culture can still be toxic in some ways, particularly when it begins to equate sexual freedom with sexual indulgence. Looking around, it sometimes seems like the only way to liberate our sexualities is to have a lot of sex with a lot of people. For some people, frequent sex genuinely is a freeing experience. But I know people on campus who have felt pressured to have sex to meet this singular definition of sexual liberation. In reality, sexual liberation means something different to everyone.

It might mean completely rejecting marriage as a restrictive heteronormative institution designed for men to control women. Like I said, whatever works for you, works for you. And marriage doesn’t work for everyone. The first time I had queer sex, I definitely wasn’t thinking about waiting until marriage. I was thinking of my unrealized desires I had been harboring for years, my longing for a union I had been deprived of for far too long. I was thinking of the guy in front of me. I was thinking of the space between us. I was done waiting.

But for other people, sexual liberation can definitely mean waiting for sex. Waiting might be a way to claim control over your body. Maybe you prefer other forms of physical intimacy. Maybe it’s important for you to build an emotional connection with your partner before you have sex. (But if this is the case for you, please keep in mind that your partner might not actually want that emotional connection. I was once in the middle of hooking up with a girl I really liked when she told me, and I quote, “Wait, don’t catch feelings.”). We should all have the freedom to define sexual liberation for ourselves. For you, that might mean waiting until marriage.

Strangers: Dancing with Molly Smith ‘25

// BY IRIS TSOURIS

Molly Smith was going to find the Grand Theft Auto V strip club at any cost. It did not matter that she had a slew of in-game cops trailing her or a seven-hour dance rehearsal the following day. Our suite’s newly-acquired Xbox was hers for the night and hers alone. As her roommate, I watched, transfixed.

Even now, Molly plays GTA V, crashing cars into buildings and reveling in violent chaos, with surprising elegance. While I spoke to her, she unfolded one leg and stretched it forward, as if en pointe. It just makes sense — she’s danced since childhood, a fact that extends to her extracurriculars on campus, where she is a part of both Yale Dancers and Rhythmic Blue.

“It’s like a form of therapy,” she told me. “Every day when I’m running around, doing all the crazy things that a Yale student does, I can go to dance for an hour or two or three… or seven, on Sundays, and I feel peaceful again.”

Molly hails from Clermont, a city right outside of Orlando. She is also what I would call aggressively Floridian, but not at all in the bizarre, upside down Florida-man-goes-downright-insane kind of way. No, Molly is Floridian in that she wears her hair in beachy waves, dons star-shaped earrings and believes, ardently, in ghosts.

Not malicious ghosts, she clarified, but “comforting spirits.” Divine intervention, if you will.

In Clermont, Molly was a child-model-turned-actressturned-filmmaker. You may recognize her, if you regularly browse 2013 Justice catalogs. Her recent films, social commentaries focusing on memory and perception, have racked up two Student Emmys, seven nominations and a YoungArts award. Her most famous, Dear America, a film about gun violence, prods the audience with the question, “Why must we sit and wait to be shot?”

I asked her about her start in filmmaking.

“I was at an acting workshop as a 12-year-old, and this casting director was going to come and watch us perform scenes,” she replied. “She was notoriously mean… and I was so scared. And I told the acting coach like, ‘I don’t want to do it. I’m scared of this lady.’ And he was like, ‘No. Go write a scene about someone telling you you’re not good enough and perform that for her.’”

It was at this moment that Molly discovered that the storytelling behind the camera would enrapture her more than acting ever could. Today, she remains captivated, not only contributing to but also judging in film festivals, as well as furthering her own personal projects.

“Now, I’m working with an editor and a post-production coordinator to finish up a documentary that’s very personal to me, about my life. About my relationship with my father. It’s called ‘Bridge for the Ocean.’”

“Bridge for the Ocean” is, at its core, a film about a daughter’s struggle to reconcile with her father’s conservatism. “We butt heads a lot, which is kind of what the film is about,” she said, “and so after [my gap year], I saw kind of the value of the things that he grew up on.”

At the same time, it conveys the story of Molly’s gap year in Green Turtle Cay, an island in the Bahamas and a place she has had ties to for her entire life. Her father, who first chartered boats through the Bahamas in college, began visiting the cay routinely in adulthood. Eventually, he started bringing Molly with him.

The people there, she said, are like her family. From them, she learned how to live on her own for the first time, how to cultivate family dynamics and honor the day of rest. Bahamian life was, in many ways, significantly more traditional and religiously oriented than what she was accustomed to. It was also much more languid, undisturbed by the reaches and over-saturation of flashy American materialism. During the day, Molly and her friends would take a boat out on the ocean and spear fish for their dinner. At night, the sky was unclouded by light pollution. She could see the stars.

“In the Bahamas, you could finally see what the sky really looked like,” she frowned, wistfully. “You weren’t clouded by… this fast-paced life and all these choices. It’s kind of like a step back in time for a moment.”

After three months in the Bahamas, she came back to Florida, a return that was, unfortunately, not as pleasant.

“There were a lot of times where I sort of felt like a failure,” Molly admitted, quietly. Like many Yale students, she is plagued by the immense pressure to reach perfection. And she felt she had made it when she was admitted from a high school that didn’t regularly see Ivy League acceptances. Her community, too, had erupted with reverence.

“But when I decided to take a gap year, a lot of people thought I dropped out. And I hated that,” she grimaced in recollection. “I was working at the mall, and I saw a lot of students from my high school, and they would be like, ‘Oh, Molly dropped out, and now she’s working at the mall!’ And, you know, obviously, that wasn’t true, but I felt like a dropout.”

And while she would constitute working at American Eagle as a valuable experience, it was also, like most retail jobs, indubitably distressing.

“There was actually a time where, like, a customer yelled at me and told me I was never gonna go anywhere in life and that I was a horrible associate because I messed up something on the register,” she said. “The general public is so mean. That’s kind of what I take away from it, but it was good for me to do that. I worked there for a year and a half, and I have a new appreciation for service workers now.”

Whenever Molly enters our room, she’ll either greet me with a nonchalant “Hey,” a cheerful “Eeeris!” or, my favorite — “Hello, baby bird!” More often than not, she’ll report the latest on Librex.

“I just, there’s something so honest about it,” she explained, giggling. “It’s people trolling each other and horny people on the same app, and I think there’s just something so lovely about that.”

I also cannot write about Molly without mentioning this: she has an astounding ability to replicate the exact inflection and strange, gravelly timbre of Lin Manuel Miranda’s voice. Ask her about her impression, and she’ll burst into song — “LIGHTS UP on Washington HEIGHTS UP at the break of day...”

If you ask Molly for genuine song recommendations, though, she’ll immediately resort to “Potato Salad,” written by her friend, Elise, whom she met at a music camp. It was actually Molly’s goal, for a while, to make “Potato Salad” reach viral status on campus, just by virtue of playing it for every Yalie that stepped foot into our suite. “The lyrics are crazy. It’s great!” she exclaimed. “What does she say, ‘Let’s drop some acid and eat potato salad?’ I think that’s fucking awesome.”

In the corner of Molly’s room lies a wooden shank, a gift from her FOOT leader. It’s only fitting that Molly owns this — like her

// MOLLY SMITH

shank, she is beautiful and terrifyingly sharp, an ultra-capable warrior princess. Our suite jokes, she could take the remaining seven of us in a fight and still emerge victorious. There is a highly-disciplined, but similarly unquelled ferocity to her.

Molly possesses sensitivity and softness just the same. She perceives, with staggering clarity, very slight changes in atmosphere and emotion. Out of the entire suite, she gives the most hugs, especially when she notices a suitemate in low spirits. And she is blatantly unafraid, as she puts it, to express herself. Maybe that is why we have such spectacular drunk girl moments: on one fateful Friday night out, following the momentous birth of our Snackpass chicken, Molly grabbed my face and crooned into my ear: “I’d go to war for you, queen!!!” This particular instance has stayed with me to this day.

Sober moments with Molly are equally as precious, including, but not limited to: Molly carrying me down a mountain after I had sustained an injury; curling up in our Target-kids-section bean bag chairs during a collective all-nighter; picking out sundried tomatoes, together, from our GHeav breakfast sandwiches; listening to Molly playing her original song, “Adults Are All Children,” on the Davenport piano. While I reminisced over these instances, Molly was cackling gleefully, as the purple glow of the GTA strip club finally saturated our common room — a shared moment of respite after a long, harrowing week.

It occurred to me, as I watched her fi ddling with the Xbox controller, that our quiet coexistence as roommates, stripped of the overt displays of friendship, is likely what sisterhood is. To trust without experiencing inhibition, to give without demanding reciprocation. How can I look at Molly — incisive, arresting, precocious Molly — how can I look at her and not realize, I’d go to war for her, too?

Contact IRIS TSOURIS at iris.tsouris@yale.edu .

WKND Recommends

This video: https://youtu.be/1Ck8fv6iW3E

WHY ARE WE HERE?

The purpose of a Yale education and the threat to it

// BY ETHAN DODD

Made to choose between Zoom University or taking time o last year, many Yale students rightfully questioned what a Yale education is for. Campus is still dealing with the disruption of the pandemic. Many extracurriculars are struggling to cement commitment in leadership and rank and fi le alike as students of all ages seek a better work-life balance and underclassmen especially have replaced the typical extracurricular regime with internships. Unsurprisingly, a year of isolation has made Yalies more reticent to commit to others, even if it might be for their own good. In this fl ux, it is no worse a time than ever to ask the perennial question: Why are we here?

Excellence to Every End

Many Yalies choose to come here for what stu y intellectuals call the life of the mind. Claudia Meng ’23 explains that she has wanted to attend Yale since coming to New Haven at age 14 for a debate competition.

“I loved Yale,” Meng said. “I thought it was artsy. It was intellectual. Where can I go where people think reading is really cool?”

Loving the curiosity of Yalies, she marveled over her classmates’ ability to switch from philosophical discussion about the meaning of Hegel to debates about the economic crisis.

Meng chose to attend the elite boarding school Phillips Academy Andover for the same reason she came to Yale. “I wanted to be in an academic environment where everyone cared about what they were learning,” she said.

However, “caring” means much more than just emotion to Yalies like Meng. In debate, dance and Model U.N. at Andover, Meng said her relationship with extracurriculars “was defi ned by being good at them.” She internalized the Andover ethos: “You never did something casually. We were implicitly expected to be excellent at everything.”

Seeking to excel at one’s interests sounds self-centered, but it is arguably what a Yale education provides.

“Yes, my purpose here is very focused on myself. That is the purpose of education: learning for the sake of learning,” Meng said. Jason Altshuler ’23 wishes to learn and grow from his education. Peter Bowman-Davis ’25 plans to major in physics and philosophy to build the foundations for a lifetime of learning.

Excelling, growing, learning and building: these verbs imply a progressive development in what it means to live a better life. Altshuler says Yale o ers “a bu et of personal experiences.” Each of us is free to choose which parts of life to enjoy. But if we are to truly learn and excel, Bowman-Davis says it must come from developing an intuitive mode about how to approach life. According to him, at a place like Yale we are expected to step back and think: “What is the significance of what I’m doing?”

Community and the Good Life

Learning to enjoy life is crucial to why Yalies come here, but Altshuler noted that “a lot of people come to college without a clear sense of why they’re here.” Perhaps that is the point.

“Music does not accomplish anything. It is just beautiful and expressive and meaningful,” Altshuler, a musician of many stripes, asserted. Akin to music, a liberal arts education lacks a clear, instrumental purpose. It does not teach skills directly applicable to many career paths. As a philosophy major, Altshuler probably knows this quite well.

Nonetheless, “everything shapes you,” he said. “Every semester, classes speak to each other.” Altshuler called this alchemy. The word is apt. Only the superstitious human psyche can seem to construct the meaning of life. A Yale education o ers this opportunity, and we seek it unwittingly.

Of course, living and learning for their own sake do not occur in a solipsistic vacuum. They require a community. An o ensive lineman on Yale’s football team, Bennie Anderson ’24 chose Yale not because it would necessarily land his dream of playing in the NFL, but because of “having the opportunity to interact with all the guys on the team.”

“We are all different. I like to read comic books, cook and listen to jazz. But we’re all brothers. I would do anything for any of the guys on the team. And they would do the same for me,” Anderson said. Seeking a community that supports each player’s full potential for the sake of the team resembles Meng’s desire to surround herself with people who care about what they are learning. Similarly, Altshuler loves singing lead vocals and playing bass in the background of his band because both mean “being part of a whole.” Tellingly, he said, “Playing with other people ... just feels like life.”

Means to an End or to No End

No matter their passion, many fl ock to Yale for the learning community that makes accessing the good life possible. But such high-minded pursuits are truly a privilege. For many, perhaps even most Yalies, a Yale education represents something far more mundane, but fundamentally important: economic opportunity.

Yale attracts and inculcates professional ambition in many of its students. To them, Yale is a means to ascending into the elite or securing employment after graduation. A first-generation, low-income student from the United Kingdom, Joe Peck ’22 remembers sitting on the stairs as a child, wondering, “What if I’m not successful?”

For students like Zachary Zabib ’22, his ambitions for success and economic security mean recognizing the sacrifi ces his mother made to send him to a private Jewish day school and now Yale. Zach has majored in global a airs in part to learn from professors who have real world experience rather than political science professors who “write books for a living.” After Directed Studies, Zach deprioritized the intellectual part of Yale. “I didn’t come here to be the smartest person. I came here to have the tools for success,” he said.

The fact is pre-professionalism pervades Yale. “When I applied, I thought there was no pre-professionalism at Yale, that there was a distinct absence,” Meng said. “Since being here, there are signifi cant pockets of Yale that do fi xate on what job they are taking after college, but it is segmented out of the academic experience.”

To say her initial perception does not match the reality would be an understatement. Finance and consulting absorbed over 30 percent of the class of 2020 in their fi rst year after graduation.

While the potential for professional success can relieve stress for the disempowered and less fi nancially stable, the same opportunity of a Yale education can steer students away from finding purpose, generating an unhealthy status hierarchy in its place. Meng explained that people who are unsure of what they want to do choose professions that close the fewest doors, pay exorbitant salaries and confer institutional validation.

“The timeline distorts the way in which people understand opportunities available to them,” Meng continued. Coincidentally, the gilded doors of fi nance and consulting recruiting start to close as the leaves fall o the trees in New Haven.

According to Jeremy Haddock ’23, these times and socioeconomic pressures determine that many Yalies value what they should be instead of what they want to be. Haddock, who identifi es as someone who fi nds purpose in the world of startups, said, “I know a lot of people don’t even really try to fi gure it out, which makes for a culture ever so slightly less innovative, creative, risk-taking, novel and growth-oriented.”

Alec Chai ’22 said this issue is particularly pronounced in the pre-med community.

“There are a lot of people who could fi nd better fi ts in other things that they haven’t explored much because outside of medicine, jobs are much more confusing,” Chai, a reluctant pre-med himself, explained.

According to Chai, pre-med is “a linear progression to this prestigious job that is well-paying. An easy option to put yourself on. It’s also a very pure profession.” The path also provides certain success based on working hard, which Yalies have internalized to get here.

Chai sighed, “As a whole, [pre-med students] are overly concerned about their GPA’s. They miss a lot of the social life meeting interesting people from the school.” Chai went so far as to say without the community, Yale is not di erent from a state school for STEM students given the course content is the same.

Competition without purpose breeds an unhealthy and unproductive culture that assigns inferiority to certain groups and individuals. “I do feel like there is a lot of constant comparison towards other groups of people, whether it be athletes or humanities majors or STEM majors,” Chai said.

Juma Sei ’22 who runs track said, “The fact that I’m a black male athlete — people expect less of me.” This is in spite of the fact that during his o cial visit, Sei asked to see the African American Cultural Center before the running track. It mattered to Sei that Yale had a space where he could be “understood without qualifi cation or expectation” because, after all, “Eli Yale never intended for me to come here.”

In a di erent vein, Anderson understands “everything I do here will be a reflection on the Yale football team.” Exhausted from practice, Anderson still feels the need to participate in his 8:00 PM history section in part to demonstrate that “there are no dumb jocks.” Outside of these group-based comparisons, status competition surely would seem to be the cause for at least some of the increasing anxiety and depression that students have seen in recent years.

Everyone for Themselves

Those who seem to be winning the status competition suffer, too. Peck believes that this competition produces an unethical sense of desert. He emphasized the advantages that students from privileged backgrounds have.

“There are so many people here who believe they don’t owe anyone anything,” Peck said. “Those people who come to earn money don’t have any purpose.”

Peck continued to say that students like these have a “moral hole.” They fill this void with a belief in their superior intelligence “like they have a natural gift from God,” forgetting the advantages they had all along the way.

After his gap year interning in a public defender’s office, Altshuler realized the privilege he has at Yale to focus on his higher-order betterment. On the one hand, this means not taking this education for granted and making the most of it. On the other hand, it means doing more than that.

“Because I have the privilege to be a little more picky and intentional with my work, I intend to find a job that aligns with public service and helping people,” Altshuler said.

But status competition has narrowed, if not eroded, the meaning of public service by repackaging it as influence. Elizabeth Hopkinson ’22, a former WKND editor for the News, said, “Yale can steer you away from public service. … There are really easy pathways that feel externally validating.”

Though denying competition as the cause, Jay Gitlin ’71, a professor of cultural and social history at Yale, finds that for today’s Yalies, public service “means being in a position to affect a lot of people.” In the policy world, this means living in a Washington, D.C. suburb among other policy wonks “removed from real people.” Lost is the sense of leadership and public service extolled by former Yale President Kingman Brewster whose speeches Gitlin fondly remembers.

Brewster spoke of Yale’s mission to produce leaders in the “Yale democracy.” Gitlin explained. “By democracy, he meant: it’s a scramble. Go out there and do your best. When he said be a leader, he wasn’t saying be a leader politically or be a leader in foreign policy. Be an architect! Draw cartoons! Be a musician. Be a lawyer. Do your best and be good at what you do. Applied to that was a sense of social responsibility. And that’s the message we all took from him.”

Status competition threatens the vitality of the Yale community that makes living and learning personally valuable and public service altruistic. Status competition is different from having a family and building a career, both of which contribute to a meaningful life. Status competition is devoid of purpose.

Fortunately, the lack of purpose does not have to do with Yalies themselves. “We are all here basically for the same reasons, but you are a little bit more surrounded by that competition bubble,” Gitlin said, comparing his class to today’s class. “We’re here to learn, have fun, and make friends.”

Nourishing Community

To correct the environmental pressures that breed status competition, Yale should focus on what it does best: facilitating self-sustaining communities. Zabib explains that because he internalized Tikkun Olam — repairing the world — growing up in his Jewish neighborhood in Queens, he said, “Everything I do is in some way service to people.”

Though Hopkinson doesn’t remember there being an explicitly religious element, she worked soup kitchens and delivered meals to the elderly with her Catholic church community growing up. However, she explained that generating such community support at a university “is really hard to do without a religious tradition.”

These religious bases for community and giving to others already have secular analogues at Yale. “Throughout all the athletics teams, if you have a culture of putting the team before yourself, that is so easy to translate over to your everyday life,” Anderson said. “ If you can be a really genuine person, it is a great reflection of me, but it’s more a reflection of my team, my family back home and my city.”

The key to protecting and revitalizing community life at Yale is enabling students to do the work. Bowman-Davis explained that through FroCo groups and FOOT, a wilderness program run by older students, Yale tries “to create a process for socialization when that process needs to happen naturally, and it’s just not happening.”

Rather than having shaped her in any meaningful way, Hopkinson finds that Yale has “nourished” her through giving her access to the things she needed. Yale is at its best when it allocates resources to the groups and leaders that foster community — not when it creates communities for Yalies and tries to shape them from above.

Administrative action is slow, but Yalies can defend the purpose of Yale today: to learn from and contribute to the life of the community. “The biggest part of Yale is getting to meet all these other people you can assume to be successful later, but are all very different, study different things, have different ways of thinking,” Chai said. “You just don’t get that from your classes.”

Contact ETHAN DODD at ethan.dodd@yale.edu .

// SOPHIE HENRY

College St. Cherry Cocktail:

1/2 of a lemon, cut into wedges 5 cherries, pitted and cut in half or quarters (I like mine cut into smaller pieces) 2 1/2 ounces of bourbon 1 tablespoon of maple syrup ice for serving In the bottom of a shaker or directly in the cup, add the lemon wedges and cherries. Muddle together until you’ve released nearly all of the juice from the lemon and the cherries are broken up until much smaller pieces. Add in the bourbon and maple syrup. If making the cocktail directly in your glass, add ice and stir to combine. If making it in a shaker, add ice to the shaker and shake about 30 times. Strain into a glass filled with ice (or you can pour it unstrained so that you get all of the chunks of cherry in your drink!) ENJOY!