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

NEW HAVEN, CONNECTICUT · WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 23, 2013 · VOL. CXXXV, NO. 73 · yaledailynews.com

INSIDE THE NEWS MORNING EVENING

SUNNY CLOUDY

26 16

CROSS CAMPUS

MUSIC SCHOOL TOKYO STRING QUARTET RETIRES

STATE ECONOMY

IPADS

WOMEN’S SQUASH

Connecticut loses 1,800 jobs but sees decline in unemployment rate

PROFESSORS USE TECHNOLOGY IN CLASSES

Bulldogs sweep four ranked opponents over the weekend

PAGE 6–7 CULTURE

PAGE 3 CITY

PAGE 5 NEWS

PAGE 12 SPORTS

Moving into Warner House

NELC work environment criticized

Brace yourselves. Hell hath frozen over. Temperatures are expected to be in the mid-20s all week, so take this time to stock up on hot chocolate and invest in scarves. You’ll need ’em.

BY NICOLE NAREA AND JULIA ZORTHIAN STAFF REPORTERS

For juniors out there, the Junior Class Council is selling class of 2014 apparel, which includes — thankfully — fleece jackets, striped scarves, hats and tube socks. Yes, tube socks.

the Yale presidency on June 30, has been present at most meetings so far. Polak has been “more or less shadowing” the former provost and meeting one-on-one with University President Richard Levin over the past few days. Taking over as Yale’s second-incommand has presented smaller challenges, too. Polak, a native of England, said he does not look forward to changing his habit for having his writing sound “English English rather than American English” — a predilection he will have to give up because others will now write memos on his behalf. Though Polak’s new office cur-

Two sources close to the Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations Department said they approached administrators about a “hostile work environment” in the department as early as 2010, two years before John Darnell resigned as chair of the department and was suspended from the faculty on Jan. 8. Four sources said Darnell and Colleen Manassa ’01 GRD ’05, a former graduate student and current associate professor who is alleged to have maintained an intimate relationship with Darnell since at least 2000, exhibited psychologically damaging behavior toward students and professors in the department in recent years, such as threatening to revoke funding for individual academic projects. Two individuals with close ties to the department said that when they approached senior University administrators with their concerns beginning in 2010, they were told the University could only launch an investigation if the individuals filed formal complaints before the administration. The sources said they decided not to pursue a formal complaint — which cannot be filed anonymously — because they feared retaliation from Manassa or Darnell, who held administrative leadership positions in the NELC department and its Egyptology subdivision. One source said the complaint system engenders “a common culture of fear among the grad students.” Pamela Schirmeister, associate dean of the Graduate School, confirmed that she met with NELC graduate students who raised concerns over a hostile work environment in the department around 2010. A graduate student who approached Schirmeister said the dean informed the student that the school could launch an investigation against Manassa and Darnell if the students filed a formal complaint but could not take any action otherwise. Graduate School Dean Thomas Pollard said that, to his knowledge, no student has filed a formal complaint against Darnell.

SEE POLAK PAGE 4

SEE DARNELL PAGE 8

Calling all Silicon Valley wannabes. The Yale College

Council has launched its first-ever YCC Tech Month, a 28-day event that will include an inaugural Hackathon, the YCC App Challenge and joint events with Yale BootUp and ITS. Let your inner Mark Zuckerberg out.

Or don’t, if you want to distance yourself from Harvard and its crop of cheaters. Harvard announced yesterday that it has delivered verdicts to all of the roughly 125 students involved in the “Introduction to Congress” cheating scandal that exploded last year. Administrators said they completed their investigation in December and will make an announcement near the beginning of this semester about the results. We the People. The Davenport

College Council is in the process of revising its constitution and is seeking input from Davenport students about the changes. All members of the gnome college are invited to attend a DCC meeting and vote on the proposal.

After returning from a trip to the Middle East, Sen. Richard

Blumenthal LAW ’73 is calling for the U.S. to increase its humanitarian aid to Syria. The Yale Law alumnus said the country has a “historic obligation and opportunity” to contribute to the war-torn country.

A Kodak moment. The New Haven School District announced yesterday that the Elm City’s high school graduation rate has increased to 70.5 percent this year. The dropout rate has also decreased by 4.2 percent, bringing the current rate down to 21 percent. Still in the red. Connecticut

is still $64.4 million in the red despite legislators’ attempts last year to eliminate the state budget deficit. The deficit is due in part to decreased tax revenues, which dropped $33.9 million since last month, according to the state’s Office of Policy and Management.

THIS DAY IN YALE HISTORY

1977 Donald Ogilvie ’65 is appointed associate dean for operations and finance at the School of Management. Submit tips to Cross Campus

crosscampus@yaledailynews.com

ONLINE y MORE cc.yaledailynews.com

MARIA ZEPEDA/PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR

Provost Benjamin Polak has begun settling into his new office in Warner House on 1 Hillhouse Ave. BY SOPHIE GOULD STAFF REPORTER For the past week, Benjamin Polak, who was named provost last Monday, has been running back and forth between his new office on 1 Hillhouse Ave. and his old “nook” in the economics building up the street. Complete with a fireplace, a crimson oriental rug, a large, shiny conference table and several paintings in ornate gold frames, Polak’s new office in Warner House was missing one crucial component when he stepped in last week: a computer. Though the new PC and its two monitors arrived on Friday, Polak said he has not yet had a

chance to make the place his own. “I’m feeling agoraphobic,” said Polak, sitting down on a blue upholstered chair after testing out the matching chaise and finding it too uncomfortable. “I’ve never had an office that’s half as big as this, and it’s going to take me a while to feel comfortable in it.” Polak, who served as chair of the Economics Department until last week, said his new position has made him feel like a college freshman because he has been introduced to so many people and aspects of the University with which he was previously unfamiliar. But the University cannot wait for him to learn the ropes, he added, so Peter Salovey, his predecessor who will assume

E D U CAT I O N

State may get new charter schools BY ISAAC STANLEY-BECKER STAFF REPORTER Charter schools may soon be on the rise in New Haven and statewide. Twenty-four groups across the state interested in opening new charter schools sent letters of intent to the Connecticut Board of Education in advance of the Board’s formal request for proposals scheduled for later this month. Of the 24 letters, four concern plans for schools in New Haven. Though charter school enrollment in Connecticut has increased steadily since the first charter schools opened in 1997, less than 2 percent of all public school students in the state are currently enrolled in charter schools. The number of students on waitlists has consistently outstripped enrollment increases, a pattern illustrated by figures released from New Haven’s enrollment lottery. Last year, 528 families vied for 80 kindergarten spots at Amistad Academy, while Elm City College Prep saw 307 students competing for 57 spots. Both

are charter schools that accept only New Haven residents. Leaders of the four New Haven charter initiatives emphasized the flexibility and increased parental choice afforded by charter schools. But before the proposals can become reality, they must first be approved by the state Board of Education, a hurdle complicated by uncertain funding and resistance from teachers unions.

BEATING THE ACHIEVEMENT GAP

The four charter schools proposed for New Haven spawn a range of grades and focuses, but all seek to provide new options for parents who Eldren D. Morrison, the pastor at Varick Memorial A.ME. Zion Church, said currently lack quality school choices for their children. Morrison’s brainchild, the Booker T. Washington Academy, will serve pre-K to fourth-grade students primarily in the Dixwell neighborhood, which Morrison described as the “crime quarSEE CHARTER PAGE 4

Graduation rates jump GRAPH NEW HAVEN PUBLIC HIGH SCHOOL GRADUATION RATES 100%

2011

90%

2012

80% 70% 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0%

Wilbur Cross

Co-op High School

BY MONICA DISARE STAFF REPORTER On Tuesday, New Haven Public Schools announced one of its most tangible signs of improvement since its School Change initiative began about three years ago.

Riverside Academy

Sound School

Hill Regional Career

The high school graduation rate in the Elm City’s school district increased six percentage points to 70.5 percent in 2012 while the dropout rate decreased by 4.2 percentage points to 21 percent. This is the most substantial rise in graduation rates in New

Hyde School

Overall NHPS

Haven Public Schools since the city’s School Change initiative — which seeks to promote a college-going culture— was launched in 2009. These numbers bring the district closer to two of the initiative’s goals: to SEE GRADUATION PAGE 8

PAGE 2

YALE DAILY NEWS · WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 23, 2013 · yaledailynews.com

OPINION

.COMMENT "TFA is touted as a path for Yalies … while the continual attempt to eduyaledailynews.com/opinion

cate teachers in methodology and theory has been stifled"

Inaugural flaws W

e tend to romanticize things we don’t see often or don’t see in person. For me, I usually create an image of people that transcends life and reality, and they become almost more than human. At Monday’s inauguration, my illusion crumbled. For when the President raised his right hand and swore the oath of office, he didn’t look as tall, as iconic as I’d imagined. He was just there — a man with graying hair, with human flaws: one who felt a little wistful as he exited the stage for the last time, asking for a last look at the crowds; one whose daughter yawned during his swearing-in; one who lingered a little too long while kissing Beyoncé on the cheek. Preparing to attend an inauguration invokes a special blend of emotions: patriotism, hope, the expectation of pomp and circumstance. But now, having attended, I look back and I realize that inaugurations aren’t the prettiest of occasions. They’re not grandiose moments of national vision. It is cold, the chairs are small and the program is not without its flaws.

WE CAN SHAPE OUR NATIONAL DESTINY This year, headlining the flaws department was the crazy man on the tree. For those of you unfamiliar, on early Monday morning, a man named Rives Grogan climbed up on a tree in front of the Capitol and refused to leave. He had a circular shield that read, “Pray to End Abortion.” I arrived at the ceremony around 9:30 a.m., and he had already been perched on the tallest branch for quite a while. The fire department and the Capitol Police tried to reach him but couldn’t reasonably do so, and they let him be. And so throughout the ceremony, from the benediction to the address itself, he loudly espoused his anti-abortion rhetoric, angering the spectators below him. Now, Grogan is someone who has rejected civil dialogue. To be completely honest, I think he’s obnoxious, and pretty silly — I wish for the sake of everyone near him that the police had successfully dragged him down. I could still hear him clearly, and I was more than halfway between him and the President. In fact, I’m quite certain that his words reached the politicians on the inaugural platform itself. The man had a penetrating voice. But if you ask me whether I would want to redo the inau-

GENG NGARMBOONANANT Imaginary Crosswalk

guration without its imperfections — without Grogan’s little tree shenanigan and without Obama’s h u m a n flaws — I don’t think I would say yes. In a way, it really co m p l e te s

the ceremony. Because in a sense, these imperfections underscore what the relationship between Citizen and President should be. Grogan may have been obscenely rude, but he is part of this country. The mere fact that the words of a regular protestor could reach the nation’s assembled leaders on the inaugural platform — that is astounding to me. In most other countries, he would have been immediately tazed or beaten right away. The fact that citizens can come together to watch their leader swear an oath to them, a leader crowned for only four years by none other than the citizens themselves — that limit on power too, is remarkable. That citizens can consider their own leader as human, as their equal, and physically see that he’s not so different from the rest of us — that is a phenomenon that very few countries can claim. Even today many peoples around the world consider their leader semidivine, godlike, and that makes them passive objects, not creators of their own national destiny. After all, I can hardly imagine a more humbling moment for the President than having to endure attacks on his abortion policies from a man in a tree during his inauguration. That people even care enough to drop what they are doing in order to join their fellow citizens on a freezing Monday morning to celebrate and contribute to their democracy — that too is very special. Perhaps the best part of the inauguration was when Obama was forced to take one last glance at the National Mall, and said, “I am not going to see this again.” Indeed, he will not — and that is a beautiful thing. The inauguration is the ultimate exercise in humility — for we break free of the glamorized version of the president and see him for who he is: merely a man, constrained by the wishes of his citizens. GENG NGARMBOONANANT is a sophomore in Silliman College. Contact him at wishcha.ngarmboonanant @yale.edu .

GUE ST COLUMNIST DIANA ENRIQUE Z

Finding grace T

he sickeningly sweet and earthy smell of marijuana smoke is probably my least favorite scent in the world. For so many Yalies it’s something casual. We joke about what people did when they were high or how often people smoke, and then we forget about it, right? It’s funny how memory works: the smell is so deeply attached to images in my head and memories I would pay to forget. But here on campus, in the safety of your dorm room or apartment, it means nothing more than a burning plant and a chemical reaction in your brain. I see the endless deserts of Northern Mexico. I see the border. I remember the phone call one evening in March a few years ago when we were told that my cousins, living somewhere along the border at the time, had been killed. They had been shot in the chest, while their baby was left crying in the back seat of their car until someone found him. I see the health centers that women run into and are later dragged out of, dead or alive, when they run away from local gang leaders and “narcos” who want them for

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All letters submitted for publication must include the author’s name, phone number and description of Yale University affiliation. Please limit letters to 250 words and guest columns to 750. The Yale Daily News reserves the right to edit letters and columns before publication. E-mail is the preferred method of submission. Direct all letters, columns, artwork and inquiries to: Marissa Medansky and Dan Stein Opinion Editors Yale Daily News opinion@yaledailynews.com

their own. My options always seemed so limited. I wasn’t a voice people were excited to hear at a party. Friends stared at me blankly when I told them I hated the smell of marijuana. All I saw were burning dollar signs going straight into the hands of local dealers, and then into the pockets of men working a system that leaves blood on the hands of every individual from here to Mexico to Colombia. What stays behind, in the residual cloud of smoke, is the collateral damage. I wanted some cold, calculated way that I could present a case against drug use, separating me from it entirely. Somehow quoting statistics and death tolls and reading my news alerts gave me credibility and people listened. I made it part of my thesis. I wanted to ask my friends to stop smoking. No matter how good I became at paralyzing my face when people talked about their drug use, it will always be a reality for me. My cousin died when she was 22, the same age I am today. But it’s never been easy to be an activist in any field: it’s difficult to know what I could or

should say, how to package it or what would make any sort of difference. And so I have sought a quiet, internal grace — as I tell you why I don’t smoke without causing you to turn away from my words. This is my cause. So many of us are looking for missions to push us through life, and to give meaning to our daily toil. Sometimes we take them on; sometimes they fall into our laps and inspire us through the rest of our days. When that day comes, how do you put yourself outside of the issue, so you know how to approach it in a broad discussion? When you really care about something, how do you learn to talk about it outside of the language you grew up with, outside of your memories and experiences and hopes for change? Maybe the most important piece of this search for a “life mission” is an understanding that no part of it will be easy. It’s a journey often filled with uncertainty. Some of my friends have left these difficult conversations with me feeling attacked — like I paint myself the victim

and they the villains. Some are left speechless. It’s almost like a wall comes up between us, where their use becomes an even more private feature of their lives — as if they are protecting me. As I ask my friends to reject what has become normal, I have to be prepared for however they react. And so if you give yourself to a mission, make a promise that you’ll keep something for yourself. Spending day after day worrying about your work and how people respond to your words is draining. You may believe wholeheartedly in what you are doing and where you are going, but that will not give you the balance and strength you need to keep fighting in the long run. Appreciate the opinions of those around you, but also carve out some space in your head where you can take a step back and consider your case. Balance your mission with space for reflection. This is where I find grace. No one can ever take it away from you. DIANA ENRIQUEZ is a senior in Saybrook College. Contact her at diana.enriquez@yale.edu .

G U E S T C O L U M N I S T NATA L I E WO L F F

Flirting with STEM improvements Y

ale’s undergraduate science program is like a guy who shows up on a first date wearing a bowtie and carrying flowers and who six months later has stopped showering or texting you back. Sure, there’s the honeymoon period of Yale Engineering and Science Weekend, and yes, it’s nice that Yale has a huge particle accelerator, but as everyone in a long-term relationship knows, it’s the day-today that counts. When it comes to STEM majors, Yale has a real problem getting them to commit. Many administrators concerned with this issue miss its nuances. I, a former STEM major and current pre-med, feel I can address the problems from a student’s perspective. The low STEM retention rate is not because the classes are hard and time consuming, since welltaught humanities and social science classes are also both of those things. The primary problem is that there are few incentives for STEM professors to teach well and to mentor students. As one MCDB professor bluntly put it, “Science profes-

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sors at Yale are not here to teach. We are here to pull in millions of dollars of research grants.” For every science professor who’s inviting his students to lunch after class, there are ten more that disappear after lecture to make sure that mold isn’t growing on their agar plates. I once asked an organic chemistry professor how to better grasp the material, only to have him plunk down a 1000-page textbook and tell me to read it. I doubt an English professor who, when asked about interpreting Joyce, would chuck Finnegans Wake at you. Yale claims that our small science departments mean that students get more individual attention, but with a few wonderful exceptions in higher level classes, I have not found that to be the case. Yale has an obligation to convince professors that inspiring the next generation of researchers and scientists is at least as important as carrying out their own work. If Yale science classes incorporated more reading and writing, for instance, professors and students could have an open dia-

Don’t blame Directed Studies Yesterday’s guest column by Courtney Hodrick (“Rejecting the DS culture,” Jan. 22) is yet another installment in an annual tradition of disgruntled freshmen taking to the News and seeking to justify publicly their dislike of Yale’s highly successful Directed Studies program. In this latest iteration, Ms. Hodrick argues that Directed Studies’ image of exclusivity and difficulty actually does the program harm by attracting students drawn in for the wrong reasons who spend their semester complaining. Like these students, Ms. Hodrick now regrets her decision to participate in D.S., and she seems to think that this provides grounds for criticizing Directed Studies as a whole. But the vast majority of DSers spend far more time discussing free-will and justice than they do complaining. And attacking the program for one’s own poor judgement is simply unfair. Directed Studies, more than any other program of study, is entirely transparent about its content. You can talk to generations of former students, and there are absolutely no surprises. If you really weren’t interested in writing papers, but took D.S. because you thought it was prestigious, you have no one to blame but yourself. And surely you ought be even more supportive of a D.S. admissions process that seeks to reach out and identify those most likely to be interested, and thrive, in the program. Not every moment of every course in enjoyable, but claiming that those less happy moments define Directed Studies is a petulant assertion that runs counter to the experience of the great majority of former students. Directed Studies created an incredible community that has

logue about primary literature. Every principal investigator I’ve ever met has had to spend substantial time doing both, and it’s difficult to come up with new scientific ideas without a base of knowledge to work from. To improve, STEM classes also need to become more transparent. I once asked a lab professor about reports and was told that a rubric existed, but he did not want to make it available to his students. I have been frustrated many times by my TA’s inability to explain where I went wrong on a problem or what a question was asking. STEM majors’ main interactions are with TAs, many of whom are hired for their awards and honors in their field, not for their ability to lead a discussion. Furthermore, TAs are often unaware of what content will be on exams or what concepts students are struggling with. This ultimately points to a lack of communication between professors and their TAs. Since science faculty can plan decades-long research projects, I am certain that they can organize a semester course that won’t leave students

wondering whether they understood the material or if the curve merely worked out in their favor. Finally, STEM classes need to grant students freedom and responsibility, including the opportunity to design experiments that will keep them involved and engaged. The concept of a “weed-out” class should not exist; professors should be trying to make students love science, not discourage them from it. Every professor needs to teach with the goal that his class be the best one offered at Yale. In my favorite C.P. Snow quote, he compares being able to state the Second Law of Thermodynamics with having read a work of Shakespeare. Imagine if everyone viewed these two goals as equally important in a liberal arts education. Not every student will become a STEM major (nor should they) but the divide between the sciences and the humanities can and should be bridged.

carried me through four years at Yale, introduced me to professors who have served as mentors ever since and given me an unparalleled opportunity to explore a phenomenal intellectual tradition. It has done the same for countless others. Ms. Hodrick was “free to fall,” and

that she did so is no indictment of the program that gave her the opportunity.

The real mission of D.S.

cal dialogue. Its mission is not, as Hodrick writes, “providing a place in which the humanities can flourish,” but rather to contextualize all of our other studies before starting on them in earnest. Why else would the program be offered only to freshmen? Because the program is so general in its scope, students see big ideas that reverberate through history and across disciplines. In an era in which the sheer volume of knowledge available to us in any university strains comprehension, DS offers a fresh breeze from a time in which philosophy and natural philosophy had but a hairbreadth between them. And for daring to return to that time in which education meant finding one’s own ideas within the great story of human history, the freshmen of every year’s D.S. class deserve great praise.

Every January, the pages of the News and other publications are awash with indictments of Directed Studies, accusing the program of being too elitist, too out-of-touch, too white, too male and so on. Yesterday, first semester DS alum Courtney Hodrick (“Rejecting the DS culture,” Jan. 22) impugned the aura surrounding the D.S. student’s feat of academic endurance and the false feeling of superiority it fosters. It is easy to pass D.S. off as a simple Great Books course that makes its devotees feel far more special than they deserve to feel. To make this claim is, in my view, to misunderstand the purpose of the D.S. reading list. In fact, many of the works D.S. students read are, to our modern sensibilities, not filled with “great” ideas. Several have been repudiated, at times with disastrous results, by history. It is not exposure to intellectual greatness that makes D.S. so important, but rather its illumination of a vast histori-

NATALIE WOLFF is a junior in Morse College. Contact her at natalie.wolff@yale.edu .

YISHAI SCHWARTZ JAN. 22 The writer is a senior in branford and a staff columnist for the news.

JOHN MASKO JAN. 22 The writer is a junior in saybrook and a staff blogger for the news.

YALE DAILY NEWS · WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 23, 2013 · yaledailynews.com

PAGE 3

NEWS

310

CORRECTION TUESDAY, JAN. 23

The article “Obama sworn in for second term” mistakenly stated that Rev. Louie Giglio delivered a prayer during the inaugural ceremonies. In fact, Rev. Luis Leon, an Episcopal priest, delivered the benediction.

SHARE to offer support groups BY CYNTHIA HUA STAFF REPORTERS The Sexual Harassment and Assault Response & Education Center will offer a six-week support group for undergraduate victims of sexual assault later this month. The group, intended for students who have had personal experiences with sexual assault, will meet weekly in the SHARE offices for six 75-minute sessions beginning at the end of January. SHARE’s support groups, which have previously been held only at student request, have received positive feedback in previous years, said SHARE Director Carole Goldberg. The new undergraduate support group, which will be held annually, is the first attempt to provide a regularly scheduled program open to all undergraduate students, she said. “These groups are meant to provide a confidential and supportive setting for students to process their experiences,” Goldberg said.

These groups are meant to provide a confidential and supportive setting for students. CAROLE GOLDBERG Director, SHARE Jennifer Czincz, assistant director of the SHARE Center, said the support groups will be led by herself and Goldberg, who are both licensed psychologists. The meetings will not have a set agenda or format, and the main goal will be providing a safe space for victims to share their experiences, Goldberg said. Like all SHARE programs, group meetings will be confidential, Goldberg said, and all sexual assault information disclosed will not be reported to any outside party. Assistant Dean of Student Affairs Melanie Boyd ’90 said the new support group program is intended to be part of a larger effort by SHARE to become a more visible pres-

ence on campus. “Survivor support groups are very valuable because being sexually assaulted can often be a very isolating experience,” Boyd said. “Being able to come together and explore both the commonalities and differences of their experiences is an incredibly powerful thing.” A similar support group for graduate and professional students was started last spring and will be held again this year, Goldberg said. Last year, the SHARE center received a greater number of calls and visits from graduate and professional school students than undergraduates — 24 of the calls and visits were from undergraduate students, while 32 were from graduate and professional school students, according to the SHARE Center’s 2011–’12 annual report. Alysha Warren, the sexual violence resource coordinator at Wesleyan University, said Wesleyan started a sexual assault support group in 2011 that received positive feedback through informal surveys. Peer support groups offer an ongoing connection that cannot be found with other sexual assault resources, she said. Sexual violence most often occurs in secrecy, leading victims to disengage themselves from their community, said Joan Tabachnick SOM ’86, author of “Engaging Bystanders in Sexual Violence Prevention.” But research has shown that group meetings can help victims of sexual assault move past the solitude they experience afterwards, she said. Tabachnick said she thinks the SHARE Center will find it challenging to ensure anonymity for participants in the support groups because of Yale’s small student body and limited number of meeting spaces. “People might be embarrassed about whether they are seen walking into this office or this group,” Tabachnick said. “Even though Yale is a large university, it’s still kind of a small community.” A starting date for the support groups has not yet been set. Contact CYNTHIA HUA at cynthia.hua@yale.edu .

GRAPH SHARE CENTER CALLS AND VISITS, 2011-’12 Intimate Partner Stalking Violence 2 3 Sexual assault 18

Sexual harassment 35

Millions of nonmilitary firearms.

As of 2009, the Congressional Research Service estimated that there were 310 million nonmilitary firearms in the United States. That same year, the Census bureau reported that the country’s population was at 305 million people.

State unemployment rate falls BY LORENZO LIGATO STAFF REPORTER Connecticut’s unemployment rate declined by three-tenths of a percentage point to 8.6 percent in December, even though the state lost 1,800 nonfarm jobs last month. Employment conditions in Connecticut remained unsteady at the end of last year, with the rate of job growth slowing significantly in the final months of 2012, according to preliminary employment estimates produced by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and released by the Connecticut Department of Labor on Jan. 17. But despite fewer Connecticut residents working, the unemployment rate fell because the number of laborers looking for work also dropped. The estimates indicate that the state’s private sector employed 1,623,400 in December, down from an employment base of 1,625,200 in the previous month. Last month’s job figure is slightly below the numbers from Dec. 2011, when private sector jobs totaled 1,623,500. December was the sixth month in a row that the state experi-

enced a decline in the labor force, after a positive first half of the year with five months of growth. Non-farm employment peaked at 1,634,900 in February, the highest since March 2009, but then experienced a downward trend in the following months. While the state’s unemployment rate reached a low of 7.7 percent in March and April of 2012, it later rose to 9 percent in August. Andy Condon, director of research at the state’s Department of Labor, said in a statement that the state’s trend of a declining labor force was the “primary factor” behind December’s declining unemployment rate. “With the arrival of the December preliminary jobs report it is apparent that the rate of job growth slowed considerably in the last half of the year,” Andy Condon said. “However, we expect the level of jobs in the state to be revised upward when the benchmark is complete in March.” According to the Department of Labor, the essentially flat job growth in 2012 is well behind 2011’s total of 7,800 jobs added. Still, Connecticut is recovering from the 2008 economic down-

turn, with estimates showing that the state has regained 28,700, or 24.4 percent, of the 117,500 total non-farm jobs lost during the recession. Leading the recovery have been the education and health services sectors, which added 1,600 jobs last year and have accumulated 25,000 jobs since February 2010. But four major sectors of the economy — government, financial activities, manufacturing and mining — have continued to lose jobs. Three of Connecticut’s major labor market areas exhibited employment declines in Dec. 2012, including the Waterbury area, the New Haven area and the Norwich area. In particular, the estimates released last week show that New Haven experienced a loss of 500 jobs between November and December 2012. But the Elm City has maintained an upward employment trend in the past three years, said Mark Abraham ’04, executive director of DataHaven, a nonprofit organization that compiles and shares public information for the New Haven Greater Area. In 2011, the city employed 78,640, up from 77,080 jobs in 2010 and

76,686 in 2009. During the same time period, New Haven’s suburbs, as well as most Connecticut cities, were suffering from severe job losses. “This is a phenomenon seen in some other urban centers,” Abraham said. “It may be a sign that jobs are moving back to the city from the suburbs, as employers realize the value of having a younger work force and transportation access.” But while New Haven is the physical home to many jobs, Abraham said, most of these jobs are held by residents who live outside the city, which explains the high unemployment rates in New Haven. “While many residents in areas like East Rock or Westville work in downtown New Haven, residents of lower-income neighborhoods like the Hill are much more likely to have to leave the city to find work,” Abraham said. New Haven’s unemployment rate was 12 percent in Nov. 2012, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Contact LORENZO LIGATO at lorenzo.ligato@yale.edu .

GRAPH UNEMPLOYMENT RATE 2007–’12 15 12 9 6 New Haven Connecticut

3 0

Dec. 2007 Dec. 2008 Dec. 2009 Dec. 2010 Dec. 2011 Nov. 2012

Municipal leaders propose gun laws BY MATTHEW LLOYD-THOMAS STAFF REPORTER On Jan. 16, one day before President Barack Obama announced a series of federal proposals intended to curb gun violence, the Connecticut Conference of Municipalities introduced its own ideas. The conference’s 13 initiatives, which largely mirror the policy proposals set forth by the president but at a state level, include expanding the definition of assault weapons to match that of California and limiting magazines to no more than 10 bullets. The CCM also recommended requiring background checks to purchase ammunition and more carefully enforcing existing gun laws. These suggestions, which would be passed and signed into law at a state level, came in addition to the support of the conference for a federal ban on assault weapons. “The CCM membership recognizes that the reduction of gun violence in our country requires a federal-state-local partnership that addresses firearm regulation, mental health and school security issues,” the introduction to the initiatives read. “Many of the proposals offered by the CCM are very much worth considering,” said Connecticut Senate Majority Leader Martin Looney, who noted that some of the ideas have already been proposed in the legislature. “Many of those ideas will get active con-

sideration in this session.” Other initiatives proposed by the conference include requiring a rifle permit — rather than a hunting license — for the purchase of a long gun, prohibiting bulk purchases of firearms by establishing a limit of one gun purchase per person every thirty days and requiring trigger locks to be provided with every firearm purchased. The conference also suggested that the state outlaw civilian possession and purchasing of body armor.

Legislators should be nurturing our rights, not looking for ways to curtail them. SCOTT WILSON President, Connecticut Citizens Defense League The CCM’s proposals, however, have come up against criticism from gun rights groups. Scott Wilson, president of the Connecticut Citizens Defense League, a statewide pro-gun advocacy group with roughly 2,000 members, said that new laws would not have stopped “what happened in Sandy Hook,” adding that further gun control is “antithetical” to Article 1 Section 15 of the Connecticut Constitution, which reads, “Every

citizen has a right to bear arms in defense of himself and the state.” “Legislators should be nurturing our rights, not looking for ways to curtail them,” Wilson said. Wilson added that he and other members plan to attend several hearings regarding gun violence in Hartford and throughout the state in the coming weeks, where he said they would stress mental health reform and school security as alternatives to tighter gun laws. When asked what specific proposals for mental health and school security the CCDL would support instead of added gun regulation, Wilson responded that he was “not at liberty to say.” Representatives of the CCM did not respond to repeated requests for comment Tuesday. Founded in 1966, the CCM is Connecticut’s statewide association of towns and cities, and includes 144 member municipalities representing 90 percent of Connecticut’s population. The CCM’s role is to represent Connecticut municipalities before the state executive and legislative branches, regulatory agencies and courts. “This is a collaborative effort,” Mayor John DeStefano Jr., who previously served as the conference’s president, said in a Tuesday email to the News. “I am thankful to the CCM to have this discussion among all the communities of Connecticut.” DeStefano, who is also a mem-

ber of the national organization Mayors Against Illegal Guns, has called for the creation of a Gun Offender Registry as well as stricter licensing requirements. DeStefano, who called reducing gun violence “New Haven’s number one safety goal,” has spoken with Vice President Joseph Biden, who is leading the Obama Administration’s push for tighter gun regulations, in addition to working with the National League of Cities and U.S. Conference of Mayors. The proposals come shortly before a meeting of the Sandy Hook Advisory Commission, which was convened by Connecticut Gov. Dannel Malloy and will meet for the first time on Thursday. Malloy spokesman Andrew Doba said that the commission will seek to address a wide array of issues related to the Dec. 14 mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., in which 20 children and six adults were killed, and general public safety. The 16-member commission hopes to have a set of specific policy proposals by March 15, Doba said. According to a Slate project on gun violence, 1,142 people have died due to gun violence across the nation since the Sandy Hook massacre. Contact MATTHEW LLOYD-THOMAS at matthew.lloyd-thomas@yale.edu .

PAGE 4

YALE DAILY NEWS · WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 23, 2013 · yaledailynews.com

FROM THE FRONT

“Is it really worth it? I wonder. I mean, I almost let a man die today … and for what? For a bigger office?” JACK DONAGHY “30 ROCK” CHARACTER

Polak moves into provost’s office POLAK FROM PAGE 1 rently bears few personal touches — there are not yet any photos of his children, aged 9, 7 and 1 — the office still holds vestiges of its previous occupant. Polak inherited one fun decoration from Salovey: a large, green plastic dinosaur perched on the mantlepiece in the Provost’s Office with its jaws clamped fast around a small plush person.

I think someone brought it to [Salovey] as a gift. … It’s motorized — it walks and roars. JOY MCGRATH Special assistant, Provost Peter Salovey

MARIA ZEPEDA/PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR

President-elect Peter Salovey has returned to his old office in the psychology building on 2 Hillhouse Ave.

“I think someone brought it to [Salovey] as a gift,” said Joy McGrath, Salovey’s special assistant. “He left that for the new provost. It’s motorized — it walks and roars.” When asked whether the dinosaur will remain in its current habitat, Polak said he intends to keep the plastic toy for his kids. Meanwhile, Salovey, who was named Yale’s 23rd president on Nov. 8, has returned to his old office in the psychology building on 2 Hillhouse Ave. Accord-

ing to McGrath, Salovey began planning the logistics of moving offices well before he announced the identity of the new provost. The process of clearing out the old office in the psychology building began over winter break, she said. Reminiscent of his days as a full-time psychology professor, the old office’s crammed bookshelves display yellow Kodak boxes full of old lecture slides, and a framed T-shirt depicting three mustached Saloveys hangs on the wall, proclaiming “It’s not a gut … It’s not a circus … But it’s the largest class in the history of Yale University.” Students in Salovey’s “Psychology and Law” class — which was so popular it had to be moved to Battell Chapel — made the shirts back in 1992. McGrath said there is still a lot of organizing left to do in the wake of Salovey’s return to the psychology building, adding that she is alternating her time between unpacking boxes and doing her administrative work. Nevertheless, Sarah Skubas, executive assistant to the provost, said that the physical transition between provosts, which largely took place in the day following Polak’s appointment, has been “a very smooth process.” Contact SOPHIE GOULD at sophie.gould@yale.edu .

Four charter schools proposed for New Haven CHARTERS FROM PAGE 1 ter” of the city. He said his proposal is a response to his neighborhood’s critical need for early childhood education and will act as an anchor in a community that’s being torn apart by violence. As achievement gaps can be traced back to the third and fourth grades, Morrison said better school choice should start with young children. He added that smaller class sizes — in conjunction with family support services — will help raise expectations for the city’s youth. The Whitney Young Leadership Academy for Boys — another New Haven charter school proposal — aims to tackle the problem of violence and the widening achievement gap by focusing on an older age group, said Valerie Shultz-Wilson, president and CEO of the Urban League of Southern Connecticut. ULSC began devising the plan for a new urban charter school after a 2007 black male achievement summit in Stamford, Conn., heightened concerns about the high incarceration rate among black boys.

The proposed all-boys school would serve grades nine through 12. “[The] dropout rate needs to be reversed for boys of color in this city.” Schultz-Wilson said. “We’re looking at a group of high-school-age boys who are either dying or being locked up because they’ve been failed by the system. Put simply, we don’t have the capacity to incarcerate them all.”

Time is the biggest factor in math and science education, and New Haven kids are really lagging behind. FATIH MERCAN GRD ’11 The third proposal, for a math and science academy, is the work of Ismail Agirman and Fatih Mercan GRD ’11 and boasts an advisory board that includes Deputy Connecticut House Speaker

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Kevin Ryan and Yale Police Department Chief Ronnell Higgins. Tentatively titled Connecticut Academy of Math and Sciences, or CAMS, the school would serve grades seven to 12 and emphasize science and engineering skills. “CAMS would have longer school days and a longer school year,” Mercan said. “Time is the biggest factor in math and science education, and New Haven kids are really lagging behind.” With a range of education resources already in place, New Haven-based SmartStart Education LLC is well-situated to spearhead the charter school initiative, said SmartStart president Isaak Aronson. A private education consulting group that runs its own online high school, SmartStart has had plans for a local charter school promoting empowerment, self-efficacy and college readiness for a number of years, said Aronson. Aronson said the charter school model allows for greater flexibility in curriculum and hiring practices than that of the traditional public school. “The public school system

works for a lot of kids, but it’s monolithic in the sense that the New Haven Public Schools standardizes the curriculum across the whole school district,” Aronson said. “A charter school can offer parents more specific choices and also adapt more quickly to children’s specific needs without getting everything sanctioned by the school district.”

AN UPHILL BATTLE

Charter schools, which receive less state funding than traditional public schools, face an uphill battle procuring funds, particularly from cash-strapped state legislatures. Jo Lutz, the director of the Connecticut Charter School Network, said charter schools receive around 25 percent less funding from the state than other schools receive. The state Board of Education’s current budget proposal includes funding for at least two new charter schools, estimating that each will seat around 850 students at a cost of $11,500 per person. But charter schools — which have their own line item in the state budget, recently cut

to $10,200 per student — do not benefit from the education cost sharing formula that allocates money to other public schools, Lutz said. “Funding is the biggest thing that has held charters back, and that’s why we’ve been a historically slow-growing charter state,” Lutz said. “But I’m optimistic because when you want to find funding for something in the state budget, you usually can.” Schultz-Wilson said the Whitney Young Leadership Academy for Boys aims to draw on the resources of ULSC’s corporate partners and philanthropists in addition to state funding. ULSC’s proposal draws on the example of similar same-sex schools in Baltimore and Chicago, she added. Though charters are granted by the state Board of Education, the schools operate independently of both local and state boards. While charters are public and receive public money, they are not subject to school district statutes and regulations. New charter schools would also circumvent the need to hire unionized teachers, Aronson said. But according to New Haven

Federation of Teachers President Dave Cicarella, NHPS teachers are not forced to belong to the union. “Union membership is optional,” he said. “But the service fee to the union is mandatory because we still provide services to teachers who don’t wish to belong like negotiating their contracts.” Cicarella said he was “very worried” about the prospect of new charter schools in the city. “Charter schools say to their teachers, ‘Here’s the contract and here’s what we’re going to pay you,’ and we have a concern about that,” Cicarella said. But Aronson said that a teachers union would prevent a charter school’s administration from making flexible curriculum and staff changes. If an individual charter school had to negotiate with a union, he said, the union would certainly win. According to Lutz, teachers in three of the state’s 17 charter schools are unionized. Contact ISAAC STANLEY-BECKER at isaac.stanley-becker@yale.edu .

TGIWEEKEND YOU LIVE FIVE DAYS FOR TWO.

Email ydnweekendedz@panlists.yale.edu and write about it.

YALE DAILY NEWS · WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 23, 2013 · yaledailynews.com

PAGE 5

NEWS

“It feels great to have the iPad launched into the world — it’s going to be a game changer.” STEVE JOBS AMERICAN ENTREPRENEUR

LED panel draws broad interest BY DAN WEINER STAFF REPORTER The hottest new performance venue and art gallery on campus may be the new café in the Becton Center. While the café just opened Tuesday, the 23,000-node LED panel that covers one wall and ceiling of the space has already attracted interest from disciplines are as broad as theater studies and visual art, said School of Engineering Deputy Dean Vincent Wilczynski. An interdisciplinary working group of students and faculty in art, computer science, engineering and theater has already met multiple times to discuss potential uses for the panel and café. “I am so psyched about the space,” said English Department postdoctoral associate Elise Morrison. “It’s an incredible resource for people at Yale — it’s state of the art.”

It’s creating a forum for people to share and make connections that they otherwise might not. JOHANNES DEYOUNG Lead administrator of digital technology, School of Art Morrison said she plans to use the space both for teaching and for showcasing her own work. She added that she plans to teach students in her theater studies class “Digital Media in Performance” how to use the panel and then stage student work in the café later in the semester. Morrison, whose work often incorporates elements of surveillance footage, said she plans to hold two or three of her own performances pieces in the new café using the LED panel to display the video. The panel supports a range of visuals, from prepackaged videos to unique programs that students design down to the individual node. A thin layer of diffuser glass covers the LED nodes, attaining a “cartoon resolution” that Wilcyznski said will have broad appeal. The flexibility of the panel will attract a range of students who want to engage in multimedia performance, said Theater Studies production coordinator Nathan Roberts DRA ’10 in an email to

the News. This spring, the School of Art is opening a moving image computer lab that will feature software capable of programming the panel, said lead administrator of digital technology Johannes DeYoung. In DeYoung’s “Digital Animation” course at the School of Art, students this semester will have the opportunity to use the software to develop programs for the LED panel. DeYoung said he himself hopes to design a visual specifically for the panel this semester. “What’s exciting about the space is that it is bringing together these different voices from different communities,” DeYoung said. “It’s creating a forum for people to share and make connections that they otherwise might not.” Yale did not propose an LED panel when planning the space with architecture firm Bentel & Bentel, partner Peter Bentel said. But in conceptualizing the café, Bentel said the firm discovered that the School of Engineering has a long history of developing LED technology. Beyond using LEDs to provide most of the interior illumination, the firm saw the opportunity to create a “canvas” that professors and students could use to display content produced within the school. Bentel said he was thrilled when he heard that departments beyond Engineering planned to use the space, as he sees such an exchange of ideas as a hallmark of the undergraduate experience. “This [panel] was meant to give the engineers a place to have a great cup of coffee and talk about things,” Bentel said. “But the idea that other departments or schools within Yale are going to participate in this forum, that really excites us.” Though he said he enjoys the new café, Tim Westcott ’14 found the bright light pulsing from the panel distracting when trying to do work there. Jan Kolmas ’14 did not share Westcott’s experience. “I find it a great piece of engineering,” he said. “I don’t find it distracting at all.” While the café serves beverages and snacks from 8 a.m. to 2:30 p.m., the space remains open to the Yale community 24-hours a day. Contact DAN WEINER at daniel.weiner@yale.edu .

ANNA-SOPHIE HARLING/CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER

The new LED panel has sparked interest and discussion, with professors planning on using the space as a pedagogical tool.

Professors experiment with iPads in the classroom BY EMMA GOLDBERG STAFF REPORTER English professor Barbara Stuart once asked students in her food writing class to compare recipes in different cookbooks — now, there’s an app for that. Through a grant from Information Technology Services, Stuart and several other Yale professors have loaned iPads to students in their classes for the semester as part of a larger effort by ITS to integrate more technology into the classroom experience. The professors said they think the iPads, which are used for homework assignments as well as lab experiments, have been successful, and they plan to continue incorporating technology into their curricula. “The introduction of the iPad

technology in the laboratory classroom is just the tip of the iceberg on the current revolution of teaching methodologies and tools we are experiencing,” biology lecturer Maria Moreno GRD ’93 said. ITS Strategic Business Analyst Susan West said the grants are part of a three-year plan to bring a range of new technologies to campus — an initiative that began when Chief Information Officer Len Peters was appointed in May 2011. “We are connecting with people across campus who are leaders in technology to determine what direction Yale should go in and how we can use technology in more innovative ways,” West said. Biology professors said they were particularly excited about

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using iPads in their classroom. Last fall, Moreno said she linked the iPads of students in her “Principles of Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology” class to small cameras inside her microscope so the entire class could view the image under a microscope while annotating it in real time. “The main revolution is the ability to be able to demonstrate a biological phenomenon to all the students in the classroom simultaneously,” Moreno said. Moreno said she thinks the technology is particularly useful because it also allowed students to capture the images they saw and to review them when completing laboratory reports. Stuart said humanities professors have “a harder job” devising ways to take advantage of iPad

technology than science professors using iPads, because the science classes all use the iPad image technology. In her English class called “Writing about Food,” Stuart asked students to use their iPads to download a variety of apps, such as “Epicurious” and “How to Cook Everything,” to help them conduct food research. She also required her students to download “GoodReader,” an app that allowed them to annotate PDFs on their iPads. “I think we have to figure out a way to use the apps so that they enhance critical thinking,” Stuart said. “Otherwise it’s just going to be a fun toy.” The benefits of iPads outweigh the difficulties they pose, Stuart said, because unmotivated students will distract themselves with or without an iPad. She said

she believes that as iPads become increasingly popular among consumers, professors must find a means to use them productively in an academic setting.

You can touch a textbook, or write on it, but a tablet doesn’t have that same tactile sense. JAMES ROSENBERG Founder, Adopt-a-Classroom Political science professor Greg Huber, chair of the ITS Advisory Committee, said he thinks technology should be integrated cautiously because of the potential distractions that

devices such as iPads pose in classroom environments. James Rosenberg, the founder of the education-focused nonprofit Adopt-a-Classroom, said he thinks educators should proceed with caution when experimenting with new technologies because students do not learn as effectively when looking at a screen. “You can touch a textbook, or write on it, but a tablet doesn’t have that same tactile sense,” he said. “I’ve observed students having a lot more difficulty absorbing information from a tablet.” The cost of an iPad starts at $399. Contact EMMA GOLDBERG at emma.goldberg@yale.edu .

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YALE DAILY NEWS · WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 23, 2013 · yaledailynews.com

PAGE 7

ARTS & CULTURE

“We shape our buildings; thereafter they shape us.” WINSTON CHURCHILL FORMER PRIME MINISTER OF THE UK

Tokyo Quartet leaves behind legacy

Irish play blends humor and history BY ANYA GRENIER STAFF REPORTER

MARCO BORGGREVE

The Tokyo String Quartet has spent the last 37 years in residence at the School of Music, training graduate students and fledgling ensembles alike. BY SARAH SWONG STAFF REPORTER On Tuesday night, the legendary Tokyo String Quartet gave its final New Haven performance after 37 years at the School of Music before the group disbands in July.

TOKYO STRING QUARTET EARLY RISE Early in its career, the Quartet won the Coleman Competition, the Munich Competition and the Young Concert Artists International Auditions. Soon after, they received an exclusive contract with Deutsche Grammophon, the oldest established record company, which most recently signed superstar conductor Gustavo Dudamel.

per Quartet, two of the foremost quartets today — who came as postgraduate fellows to study specifically with the Tokyo String Quartet, Director of Chamber Music Wendy Sharp ’82 said. She added that by visiting eight to 10 times per semester, the ensemble has demonstrated an unusu-

As the school’s artist-in-residence, the ensemble has mentored generations of music students in addition to performing internationally, School of Music Dean Robert Blocker said. The group has also taught talented young ensembles — including the Linden Quartet and the Jas-

RECORDING MACHINES The Quartet has recorded the complete quartet cycles of Beethoven, Schubert and Bartók, and has released more than 40 recordings on various record labels.

YALE MEN Peter Oundjian, who guest conducts the Yale Philharmonia and teaches violin at the School of Music, was the group’s First Violinist from 1981 to 1995.

ALL-STAR INSTRUMENTS Since 1995, the ensemble has played on “The Paganini Quartet,” a group of Stradivarius instruments named after violin virtuoso Niccolò Paganini, who played them in the 19th century.

HIGH HONORS The Quartet and Oundjian each received the Sanford Medal, the highest honor given by the school, on Tuesday night. Other recipients include Aaron Copland, Pierre Boulez, Mstislav Rostropovich and Emanuel Ax.

ally high level of dedication to its students. Violin student Hye Jin Koh MUS ’13, who studied with First Violinist Martin Beaver and Cellist Clive Greensmith, said the Quartet focused entirely on their students while in New Haven and prioritized attending their students’ concerts. Christian Kim Sitzmann MUS ’13, another violin student, said Second Violinist Kikuei Ikeda demonstrated the power of actively listening to other musicians in an ensemble and knowing musical scores by heart. The quartet emphasized behaviors that are vital to all types of classical music, including the sensitivity to a group necessary for solo, orchestral and chamber performance, violin student HenShuo Chang MUS ’13 said. The Quartet’s members have served as career role models for their Yale students, Koh said. For

example, Beaver’s love for his family showed Koh that professional musicians can also have family lives, providing a muchneeded example of work-life balance in the music industry, she said. In coaching sessions, the members imparted real-life perspective about the challenges of stage performance, and told students about tactics and techniques that worked or failed on the job. The group’s residency has also led to connections and networking opportunities: Beaver connected Koh and Chang’s quartet to summer music festivals. Yet the Quartet urges students to develop their musicality on their own, five students, faculty members and administrators said. Ikeda never commanded his students to adopt a specific style, Kim said, and helped them develop interpretations on their own.

“Tokyo makes it emotionally safe for a young quartet to walk in and be vulnerable to develop their own musical voice,” Blocker said. Being in-residence at Yale has allowed the Quartet to think of New Haven as its professional home. Although the members live separately throughout the tri-state area, Yale brings them together for teaching, Ikeda said. The School of Music and the Norfolk Chamber Music Festival — a music and arts summer program affiliated with Yale — have been the only places where the quartet has coached on a regular basis, he said. “Yale has been our home, and having a home gives us the feeling that our life evolved with Yale,” Ikeda said. Yale provides the quartet with health insurance and a steady income, though financial stability is rare for artists-in-residence,

Ikeda added. The School of Music has not yet begun a search for another artist-in-residence, Blocker said. Blocker and Dana Astmann, the School of Music’s manager of public relations, said the school will likely search for another one of the world’s greatest quartets but has not made any definite plans or assessed the school’s programmatic needs. After the Quartet disbands in July, Beaver and Greensmith will lead a new chamber music program at the Colburn School of Music in California, where they will also be violin and cello professors. Ikeda said he and Violist Kazuhide Isomura will serve as visiting professors at universities. The quartet announced its retirement last April.

In “Stones in His Pockets,” the newest play at the Yale Repertory Theatre, only two actors portray a whirlwind of characters. Opening Friday, “Stones in His Pockets” tells the story of a rural Irish town transformed by the arrival of a Hollywood film crew searching for a rustic backdrop. The play, written by the Irish playwright Marie Jones, centers around two Irish locals who become extras in the cast, following their encounters with a variety of personalities. The show’s two actors — Fred Arsenault and Euan Morton — play 15 different characters, from a 20-something Hollywood starlet to a villager in his 70s. Dramaturg Sarah Krasnow DRA ’14 said the show’s storyline explores themes relevant to Ireland’s history, such as the identity struggles postcolonial nations face. Director Evan Yionoulis ’82 DRA ’85 said that by using only two actors to portray such a wide range of characters, the play showcases the transformational nature of acting and theater itself. “It makes the audience part of the making of the imaginative

world,” Yionoulis said. “If you had 15 actors instead, it would be quite different.” Yionoulis said the play also shows how some members of the film crew romanticize Ireland, while highlighting the nation’s long history of dispossession. He said one of the most challenging parts of staging the play has been to keep the two main characters’ relationship at its core.

You take a deep emotion, have it, drop it and go on to the next. You can’t sit and wallow in it. FRED ARSENAULT Actor, ‘Stones in His Pockets’ “The idea is that they go from being extras in their own story to being initiators and in control,” Yionoulis said. “That transformation is the hallmark of the whole piece.” The humor of the play is based largely on puns, misunderstandings and other verbal gymnastics between the two actors, Morton explained. The pair worked with a coach to develop

a plethora of accents, including separate ones for characters from Northern Ireland, Dublin and County Kerry, where the play is set. Arsenault said performing with a cast of only two makes the show significantly more “actor-driven” than many plays, since he and Morton control the pace and need to “click”

for the play to go on smoothly. Morton added that being onstage for almost the entire duration of the performance makes the show an exhausting experience. The play requires great elasticity from the actors by having them constantly jump from one character to the next with very little break, Arsenault

Contact SARAH SWONG at sarah.swong@yale.edu .

Morse and Stiles honored for renovation BY YANAN WANG STAFF REPORTER Last Monday, the American Institute of Architects honored Ezra Stiles College and Morse College with an award of excellence, drawing attention to the modernist architecture of two residential colleges that have historically been overlooked in favor of their gothic

counterparts. Awarded in recognition of works that “exemplify excellence in architecture, interior architecture and urban design,” the AIA’s 2013 Institute Honor Awards were given to 11 candidates from over 700 total submissions located around the world. Morse and Stiles were recognized for the recent renovation project undertaken by architectural

firm KieranTimberlake, which was responsible for six of the residential college renovations.Stephen Kieran ’73, a partner at the firm, noted that the honor is rarely given to renovations as opposed to entirely new designs. Kieran said that while his team made extensive changes to the interior and underground spaces of the colleges, the aim of the project was not to undo Eero Saarinen ’34’s original plans but rather to adapt them for modern use. “We worked very much within the envelope of the old bones and the structure of the building,” Kieran said. “The best part of renovating the colleges was the opportunity to engage with architects from another era — we didn’t try to work against Saarinen and what he did.” Designed originally by Saarinen, one of the most renowned architects of the 20th century, Morse and Stiles opened in 1962 as the only residential colleges to be built in the modernist style. School of Architecture Dean Robert A.M. Stern, whose firm designed the planned 13th and 14th residential colleges, said that despite of Morse’s and Stiles’ modernist slant, Saarinen intended his designs to reflect the gothic feel of the rest of Yale’s campus. After consulting with the Yale Corporation, faculty and student groups, Stern said his architectural team decided the two new colleges should mirror the traditionalism that dominates campus. “Styles should not be picked on the basis of an historical moment,” Stern said. “Styles are languages, and they should be spoken when appropriate. When you’re at Yale, it’s good to speak Gothic.” Prior to the 2011 renovations on Morse and Stiles, many students had expressed discontent with the colleges’ facilities and architectural style, Kieran said. He recalled that when they first began working on designs, they “felt the obligation to transform Morse and Stiles into places of real desire.” All four students in Morse and Stiles interviewed admitted to feeling disappointment when they first learned of their college placement,

as they had initially been attracted to Yale’s neo-Gothic architecture. Jason Kuo ’13, a Stiles freshman counselor, said he has since become attached to the buildings. The facilities were greatly improved during the renovations that took place his sophomore year, he said. Another Stiles student, Christine Mi ’15, also said she has come to admire the college’s “quirky” interiors. “When I first searched up Ezra Stiles, I saw this brown tower sort of deal,” Mi observed. “I wondered, is there another Ezra Stiles out there? Is there a city called Ezra Stiles? I didn’t think it could be a part of Yale.”

MARIA ZEPEDA/PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR

Actors Fred Arsenault and Euan Morton play all 15 characters in “Stones in His Pockets,” a play by Irish playwright Marie Jones.

Contact ANYA GRENIER at anna.grenier@yale.edu .

‘Cloud Nine’ brings sex and sexuality to the stage BY JESSICA HALLAM STAFF REPORTER

Styles should not be picked on the basis of an historical moment. Styles are languages, and they should be spoken when appropriate. When you’re at Yale, it’s good to speak Gothic.” ROBERT A.M. STERN Dean, School of Architecture

Kieran said the major changes in the renovations included transforming stand-alone rooms into suites, adding basement recreational spaces and improving the landscaping around the courtyards. At the rededication ceremony in November of 2010, thenMorse College Master Frank Keil called the newly renovated college the “West Coast” of Yale, making reference to the fountain and outdoor dining deck. Construction work on Stiles was completed in November 2011 as the final step in the University’s 13-year residential college renovation project. Contact YANAN WANG at yanan.wang@yale.edu .

said. “You take a deep emotion, have it, drop it and go on to the next. You can’t sit and wallow in it,” Arsenault said. “In a weird way, it’s how things happen. I feel like I’m living up there.” Arsenault said that with the play’s many colorful personalities, it would have been easy to turn the show into “an SNL skit.” But despite the play’s comedic elements, “Stones in His Pockets” turns darker in its second half, and the team worked to move beyond the stereotypes in each character to reveal both the truth and the humor found in human struggle, Yionoulis said. “Like any good comedy it’s based on tragedy. … You can’t help but see the humor in death, in failure,” Morton said. Scenic and Production Designer Edward Morris DRA ’13 said the production team realized early on that they couldn’t “put picturesque Ireland onstage.” Because “Stones in His Pockets” is such a fast-paced play, the team strove to minimize scene changes by creating just a single set, Morris said. The stage is draped with artificial rolls of grass to create the effect of the rolling green hills most associate with Ireland. A muslin backdrop with a blue gradient serves as a projection surface for moving images and lighting effects, indicating mood and time of day throughout the show, Morris said. “Stones in His Pockets” runs at the Rep through Feb. 16.

JACOB GEIGER/PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR

Designed by Eero Saarinen ’34, Ezra Stiles and Morse colleges are symbolic of the modernist style.

Mitt Romney can’t keep women in binders forever. “Cloud Nine” hopes to challenge the status quo and social norms of sex and sexuality through theater. The show, which opened Tuesday at the Iseman Theater, juxtaposes England in the Victorian age and the 20th century Thatcher era, portraying a family as it struggles with defining the “traditional” family in both ages — a definition that inhibits selfacceptance and independence, said Margot Bordelon DRA ’13, who is directing the show as her School of Drama thesis project. “Men should behave like men, and women should behave like women, and there isn’t very much gray area,” said Gabriel Levey DRA ’14, who plays Clive and Cathy in the show. In Victorian England, Levey explained, the audience finds the embodiment of a traditional, white, Christian, patriarchal family in which the father is second only to God and the queen — a convention that does not allow for exploration of any gray area. Levey added that American society still values these traits today, as evidenced by the stress Romney placed on the sanctity of marriage during his presidential campaign. In the first act, Betty, wife and mother, faces oppression at the hands of her husband,

who constantly instructs her to behave within the bounds of society’s rules. But when the play fast forwards in its second act, Betty leaves her husband, finding independence and beginning to define herself as more than a wife and mother, Bordelon said.

All these feminine gestures — that actually isn’t inherent in the female species. We were taught to behave this way. MARGOT BORDELON DRA ’13 Director, ‘Cloud Nine’ “All these feminine gestures — that actually isn’t inherent in the female species,” Bordelon said. “We were taught to behave this way. It doesn’t have anything to do with who we are as human beings.” The play questions the meaning of gender with men playing the roles of women, and women the roles of men. Bordelon explained that the play represents femininity as a learned social behavior — a performance — by highlighting the ability of a male actor to effectively impersonate a woman. Femininity, Boredelon said, is not an innate female trait.

“What [the play] is pointing to is how much a performance this is,” said Emily Reilly DRA ’13, one of the show’s dramaturgs. “What [it’s] doing is lifting gender off the body and placing it in these other signifiers.” The degeneration of the traditional nuclear family includes more than Betty’s separation from her husband. Victoria and Edward, Betty and Clive’s children, live together with their gay lovers. Reilly said the rigid sexual ideas present in the first act are challenged when orgies, incest and homosexuality enter this communal living situation. “It’s free love and they’re all having sex with each other and it’s liberating and it’s wonderful,” Reilly said. The characters in the play learn to come to terms with sexual liberality. In the second act, Edward struggles to accept his sexuality in public and must face the daunting task of coming out to Betty. In time, both accept that sexual desires can exist outside of condoned social norms, Levey explained. “Life is different,” Levey said. “There are homosexual relationships. Lesbians and gay men exist and live together.” “Cloud Nine” will be performed at the Iseman Theater until its finale Jan. 26. Contact JESSICA HALLAM at jessica.hallam@yale.edu .

T. CHARLES ERICKSON/CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER

Gabe Levey and Timothy Hassler in Cloud Nine, playing at the Iseman Theater until Jan. 26.