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, FEBRUARY 6, 2013 · VOL. CXXXV, NO. 83 · yaledailynews.com
INSIDE THE NEWS MORNING EVENING
CLOUDY CLOUDY
32 29
CROSS CAMPUS A balanced diet. Newark
Mayor Cory Booker LAW ’97 may one day join the legendary ranks of Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Fallon and Phish. After the vegetarian politician expressed his love for Ben & Jerry’s ice cream, the company’s public relations director suggested possible names for a Booker-inspired flavor, including “Smart Cookie” — a nod at Booker’s days as a Rhodes scholar — and “Mayor’s 7-Layer Cake.” Who knows, maybe we’ll start seeing Booker’s face in the dining halls soon.
A sticky situation. A three-
year study led by Yale psychiatry professor Bruce Wexler that examined Israeli and Palestinian textbooks has received vehement criticism from the Israeli government. The study — which was titled “Victims of Our Own Narratives?” — praised both Israel and the Palestinian Authority for avoiding “extreme dehumanizing characterizations” of each other, but added that both the Israeli and Palestinian books lacked sufficient information about the other’s religions, culture, beliefs and activities.
All dogs go to heaven. Or, at
least, let’s hope George W. Bush’s ’68 Scottish terrier will. Barney, the former First Dog of the United States of America, passed away earlier this week from lymphoma. The furry retired presidential pet was 12 years old. Check your allergies. Dean
of Student Affairs Marichal Gentry wants to make sure you’ve kept your allergies in check. In a Tuesday afternoon email to the Yale community, Gentry reminded Yalies that they can find food allergy awareness information in all of the University’s dining facilities. In addition, students can fill out a “food allergy self-identification form” to notify Yale Dining and relevant administrators of dietary restrictions.
The Edmonton Oilers have announced that forward
Mark Arcobello ’10 has been called up from the Oklahoma City Barons. Arcobello played center for the Yale men’s hockey team and appeared in a record 131 games for the Bulldogs. In memory. A group of Newtown students will sing “Over the Rainbow” at the 55th Annual Grammy Awards this Sunday. The children, who recorded their version of the song with the help of singer Ingrid Michaelson, will donate proceeds from the song to the Newtown Youth Academy. THIS DAY IN YALE HISTORY
1998 Freshman counselor applications drop 13 percent this year, going from 254 applications to 220. The fall is even more significant for Ezra Stiles and Timothy Dwight colleges, which both see a 40 percent fall in application numbers. Submit tips to Cross Campus
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MAKING HISTORY INAUGURAL POETS SHARE STAGE
COMMAND COLLEGE
ADMISSIONS
SWIMMING
New police sergeants are headed back to school to learn about leadership
YALE PLACES NINTH IN YIELD, BESTED BY BRIGHAM YOUNG
Men’s and women’s teams both fall to Harvard, Princeton
PAGE 6-7 CULTURE
PAGE 3 CITY
PAGE 3 NEWS
PAGE 12 SPORTS
COMMUNITY WELLBEING
City youth face uphill battle GRAPH SATISFACTION WITH NEW HAVEN PARKS, SCHOOLS AND CHILD-RAISING
13% 21%
9%
their neighbors wake up to a vastly different New Haven, one of youth violence and structural poverty. On Jan. 18, DataHaven released the results of the largest community well-being survey of its kind for New Haven and its surrounding suburbs, conducted in fall 2012 by SEE NEW HAVEN YOUTH PAGE 4
SEE FAS MEETING PAGE 5
16%
24% 46%
Fair
12% 16% 23%
Poor Excellent Good
32% COMMUNITY WELLBEING SURVEY
BY MONICA DISARE AND MICHELLE HACKMAN STAFF REPORTERS Every Saturday, a group of New Haven parents and their children arrives at an old church at 111 Whalley Ave. There, they are greeted by members of PALS, a Yale studentrun tutoring service for New Haven
elementary school children. Over the course of the day, young students — “tiny and adorable” and often quite enthusiastic, Yumiko Nakamura ’15 said — participate in writing activities, math tutoring and even games of UNO. While PALS students are tucked away in a comfortable church surrounded by Ivy League mentors,
Students push for Korean Studies BY JOSEPH TISCH STAFF REPORTER A group of students has been working since September 2012 to raise awareness of the lack of a major in Korean studies at Yale — but students have undertaken similar efforts for at least the last decade. The Council on East Asian Studies currently allows undergraduate EAS majors to concentrate in Chinese or Japanese studies but offers no concentration in Korean studies. Though former CEAS chair Mimi Yiengpruksawan told the News in 2002 that the council hoped to set up the Korean studies track by the fall of 2003, the council has struggled to establish the concentration for at least the past decade due to insufficient resources. A newly formed student group, called the Korean Studies Initiative at Yale, has gathered over 200 signatures on a petition released to students online Jan. 29 to urge the University to invest the teaching resources necessary for the program’s establishment. “In order for the teaching of and study of East Asia as a culture to be complete, we should at the very least add two ladder faculty positions … that would focus on Korea,” said Edward Kamens, chair of the Department of East Asian Languages and Literatures. “We currently have none.” Kamens added that the University is not currently creating new faculty positions while the Faculty of Arts and Sciences undergoes an academic review that will evaluate the size of individual departments this academic year. SEE KOREAN STUDIES PAGE 4
BY SOPHIE GOULD STAFF REPORTER After drawing crowds of faculty earlier this academic year, the most recent meeting of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences forum on Monday evening saw only a handful of professors in attendance. The faculty forum meetings, which were launched in the fall and are held twice per semester, are designed to provide a venue for professors to discuss University issues and policies, and the October and November meetings drew respective crowds of 100 professors and 40 professors. But only about 10 faculty members other than administrators attended the meeting on Monday evening. Attendees interviewed said discussions focused on the rising number of prospective science majors applying to Yale and the changing roles of Yale administrators, though four professors added that the declining attendance numbers may not bode well for the future of the faculty forum. “I think the forum has been proving an interesting experiment,” said Lawrence Manley, an English professor who attended Monday’s meeting. “On the other hand, it’s true that attendance has been declining, and it may be a conclusion of the experiment that a forum on this model will not hold the interest of faculty.” Shelly Kagan, a philosophy professor who attended the meeting, said he thinks the forum is a useful structure because it gives the faculty face-to-face time with administrators. If the meetings “end up being put on extended hibernation” due to ebbing faculty interest, they could always be resuscitated if controversial issues arise that faculty members want to address, he said. Newly appointed Provost Benjamin Polak said the forum was more a discussion of facts than any sort of debate. “There was not even really an issue about which one could have consensus or division,” Polak said. “It was more a discussion
21% 37%
Faculty forum draws few profs
Frats see rush classes grow BY KIRSTEN SCHNACKENBERG STAFF REPORTER Fraternities are rushing significantly larger spring classes than in previous years due to a ban on fall freshman recruitment for Greek organizations that pushed freshmen to rush in the spring. Three of five fraternity leaders interviewed said their spring rush classes have grown dramatically compared to previous years’ classes.
Two fraternities will increase the number of bids they plan to give out this spring, and fraternity leaders said they have encouraged freshmen who do not receive a bid to consider rushing again in the fall as sophomores when rush classes are smaller. “Our chapter has encouraged several of the guys to stay in contact with Zeta Psi and to stay tuned about a fall rush,” Zeta Psi President Cameron Sandquist ’14 said. “Although Zeta Psi on campus has not typically
rushed biannually, with such a large draw this spring, we have thought about readdressing that idea and running a fall campaign.” Zeta — which will hold its first spring rush period this year — has about 45 students rushing this semester, a number nearly double that on their fall 2011 rush list, Sandquist said. Sigma Phi Epsilon has a rush class of over 60 students, SEE SPRING RUSH PAGE 5
Malloy boosts school funding BY NICOLE NAREA STAFF REPORTER Amid a state fiscal crisis and advocacy groups’ cries for education reform, Gov. Dannel Malloy announced a $152 million increase in state aid to Connecticut public schools at a Tuesday press conference. The money, which will come in the form of state Education Cost Sharing, or ECS, grants, will bolster teaching programs in New Haven and 29 other underperforming Alliance Districts, with smaller funding increases for other municipalities. Malloy’s announcement preceded today’s unveiling of his proposal for the state’s next two-year budget that will address what the Office SEE SCHOOL FUNDING PAGE 4
JENNIFER CHEUNG/PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR
Gov. Dannel Malloy has announced a $152 million increase in education funding.
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YALE DAILY NEWS · WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 2013 · yaledailynews.com
OPINION
.COMMENT “Yale should be looking for and hiring the best individuals, regardless of skin yaledailynews.com/opinion
The city and us I
write to you from Chipotle with a half-finished burrito on my tray. With the line to order almost reaching the door, I am reminded of the passion with which many people regard this place — in the days before the restaurant opened, its fans saw it as a culinary city on a hill, a promised land of gastronomic delights. The line features an assortment of people. There is the New Haven professional in pea coat and tie, the New Haven teenager in a Pats sweatshirt and finally, the Yale student. He comes in a gang of four or five, huddles around friends while eating and when done, quickly scuttles off in the direction of Old Campus. During my three visits here, I’ve noticed something peculiar: When Yale students head to Chipotle, they do it in packs of four or more. But why? No, it is not because the walk across the Green is so cold it requires extensive company. Perhaps it is the novelty of the place. But it’s more likely that we walk in groups because we see Chipotle as being located too far outside the Yale bubble — in a location that justifies the company, and social protection, of at least a few friends for the trek. There is no problem with walking in a large group around New Haven, except that it reflects our underlying sentiments toward the city. We see ourselves as the outsiders in the town, and every time we pass crowds gathered at the bus stop, we find ourselves speeding up and avoiding eye contact. In light of Mayor DeStefano and President Levin’s near-simultaneous retirement and Monday’s State of the City address, it is time to rethink whether we want this to be the legacy of our ties to New Haven. Yale, as an institution, has done its part over Levin’s tenure. Levin has helped revive Broadway and transformed Chapel Street. Levin and DeStefano have become close partners in the revitalization of New Haven, and Presidentelect Salovey will most certainly attempt to continue his predecessor's work. But Yale, as a community, is not there yet. The State of the Yale-New Haven Relationship is not strong. Many of us came here because we knew that New Haven was a real city with real problems, and we wanted to do our part to help fix things. In many ways, we do that: We tutor in prisons, offer help to small businesses, participate in and cover city politics. We pour our hearts and souls into the work that we do. And we, in our determination to effect change, walk to City Hall, the court and the public library alone without a problem. But when it comes to spend-
ing our free time, we shirk any casual contact with New Haven. Isn’t it a little strange GENG we NGARMBOON- that come to college ANANT e n e rge t i c and eager Imaginary discover, Crosswalk to yet draw a f e n c e around College Street — and vow to only leap over it for commercialized Mexican food with friends, or as knights in shining armor, to rescue it from destruction? We’ve come to perceive New Haven as a permanently damaged place. But that caricature can’t color our interactions with the city.
NEXT TIME, TRY WALKING TO CHIPOTLE WITHOUT YOUR GROUP OF FRIENDS Just as we have come to love Yale with its flaws, big and small — from Title IX complaints to scalding plates in the dining hall — we must also come to love New Haven in the same way. Yes, New Haven has a crime problem; yes, parts of New Haven are impoverished; yes, the school system needs much improvement. But these flaws shouldn’t detract from the love and admiration that the city deserves. We cannot embody a “white man’s burden” mindset toward New Haven. It isn’t just a place desperately pleading for our help. It is just as important to love the city with its defects as it is to want to help it. We must be regular citizens, too, as well as advocates. So, next time, try walking to Chipotle alone. After you’ve finished your steak burrito, try exploring the city by yourself, and take in all that it offers — its culture, its history, its people. The grand opening has come and gone, and Chipotle is no longer a distant city upon a hill, a fragment of our idealized imagination. Neither is the city. New Haven is real and flawed. But it is also home; it is here, and this is now. GENG NGARMBOONANANT is a sophomore in Silliman College. His column runs on alternate Wednesdays. Contact him at wishcha. ngarmboonanant@yale.edu .
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COPYRIGHT 2013 — VOL. CXXXV, NO. 83
color or national origin.”
'ROGERCLEGG' ON 'PANEL ADDRESSES LACK OF FACULTY
Why we cannot stand by Y
general — has died down. Probably not unrelatedly, I heard a huge number of people whining about the bystander SCOTT intervenSTERN tion workshops they A Stern would have attend. Perspective to People I respected felt they were a waste of time. But some people thought they were the most useful thing Yale could be doing. I was initially skeptical (and kicking myself for having signed up for the 11:00 a.m. Saturday slot) — could yet another hourlong workshop really do the trick? Could one meeting solve problems that are so much larger than Yale? Jane O’Bryan ’15, one of the communication and consent educators who ran the meetings, recalled, “I had so many people come up to me beforehand and say, ‘What is this rape workshop we have to do?’” Forty Yalies reported sexual assaults in the last half of 2012; there were 49 such complaints in the first half of the year, 52 in the six months before. Nationally, one in four college-aged women are sexually assaulted. According to statistics compiled by the NYU Student Health Center, one in 12 college men have admitted in surveys to committing rape. This is an epi-
ou probably saw it on Facebook. The article instantly went viral — something read and reread and commented upon from dining halls to common rooms. “An Account of Sexual Assault at Amherst College,” written by Angie Epifano, a former Amherst student, was disturbing. It vividly recounted an instance of rape on a college campus and the subsequent intransigence of college authorities. “Some nights I can still hear the sounds of his roommates on the other side of the door,” Epifano wrote in the article, “unknowingly talking and joking as I was held down.” Later, she wrote about being pressured by a campus official against pressing charges — “Are you SURE it was rape?” Epifano left Amherst. Colleges around the country — most vocally Amherst — vowed to respond. “Student’s Account Has Rape in Spotlight,” blared the headline in The New York Times. The publicity meant something had to be done. Months after the account was published, Yale sent an email to every sophomore, announcing new “bystander intervention workshops” to give students the skills to intervene and prevent sexual assault. The workshops ended their four-day run last weekend. By this point, the discussion of Epifano’s article — and of assault on college campuses in
demic. But this is not what disturbs me the most. Studies suggest that more than 80 percent of sexual assaults on college campuses are never reported to the police; 80 to 90 percent of sexual assaults are committed by someone the victim knows. Which brings us back to the bystander intervention wor kshops. And Angie Epifano. Epifano was assaulted in her boyfriend’s bedroom, within earshot of his roommates. One imagines there were signs they could have seen that should have brought them to stop the assault.
WITH ANGIE'S STORY IN MIND, OUR BYSTANDER INTERVENTION IS NECESSARY In our bystander intervention meetings, other sophomores and I watched a video in which we saw a sexual assault take place — from too many drinks, to sloppy dancing, to the perhaps overly sociopathic-looking man shutting the bedroom door and removing his shirt. Then the video rewound and highlighted all the points at which people could have intervened
— tactfully — and prevented the assault. We discussed hypotheticals. How would we respond to a rape joke from a peer? From a professor? The discussion was lively and, at least in appearance, productive. O’Bryan noted how afterward, “Students said to me they were glad the workshops were mandatory,” acknowledging that they probably wouldn’t have bothered to show up otherwise. Students repeatedly told her they felt a greater sense of community as a result of the workshops. They also said they felt safer. The bystander intervention workshops were no magic bullet. Yet they were a start. And I suspect they will help prevent assault. Every effort at awareness helps. CCEs (and other students) whom I spoke to for this column expressed a sense of frustration. How do we get victims to report their assaults? How do we get people to stop assaulting? Yelling at freshmen isn’t going to work, and it hasn’t worked. So we should make the SHARE Center more accessible and ubiquitous. We must further our study of crime on campus. We can continue and increase dialogues about violence on campus. And it shouldn’t take a viral article about a gruesome crime to make us do so. SCOTT STERN is a sophomore in Branford College. Contact him at scott.stern@yale.edu .
G U E S T C O L U M N I S T NATA L I A E M A N U E L
In defense of confusion T
hese weeks are a time of confusion. Juniors’ interviews for summer banking positions are ongoing. Sophomores are weighing which major to declare. Those seeking college funding for the summer just had to submit their potential plans. Many seniors are still applying to or negotiating with prospective jobs, or scrambling for backup plans in case graduate school decisions are unfavorable. There is a nervous, frenetic uncertainty in the air. It seems to go hand in hand with the tiny voice in our heads that critiques our choices, whispering: “If only you’d studied for that test in ECON 225, you would have gotten that interview with Bain. You know that, don’t you?” Screeching on repeat: “If you had written for The Politic, you’d have a better writing sample for the Urban Institute!” “Are you sure you want to make films?” It is moments like these when the self-doubt begins swirling within the already simmering slop of uncertainty. We are left taking refuge in our routines — the classes we have to go to, the problem set we must turn in — as if they can stem the overwhelming rush of anxiety. Am I good enough? Where will I live next year? What do I want to do with my life? But the truth is, there is some-
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thing very special about this confusion. Now, don’t bother saying so when I’m in the clutches of the terror that my life will be a’shambles. But in my calmer moments, I can admit it: I’ll probably look back on this period with some appreciation. What I’ll swear I always loved about confusion is that I am forced to look inward, examine my values and inquire why my work matters. It is unnerving and valuable precisely because it is a lens through which I clarify my priorities.
WITH A SCIENTIFIC METHOD APPROACH TO OUR LIVES, WE CAN CONFRONT CONFUSION AND FIND OUR PATHS “Ask what makes you come alive and then go do it because what the world needs is people who have come alive.” That is Howard Thurman, educator, minister and mentor to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Confusion is what makes us ask ourselves, “So what really makes me come alive?” The danger about confusion is that we get lost in it. Because we don’t know the next step, we take a predefined path that is convenient, but not our own. We decide to go to law school or get an MBA because that is what people do when they don’t know what to do, right? Or, we do something we’re good at, but which sends us home at the end of the day hating ourselves. We wonder as we brush our teeth who ever came up with such prestigious ways to torture ourselves. Or, we pick a top rung of a ladder only to discover midway we don’t actually care very much about what’s at the top. We’ll justify it, saying once we’ve made it, we’ll pursue the dream we’re quelling now. Once we’ve made partner, we’ll start the restaurant in the Twin Cities. But we’re in such a special place right now. Right here, in college, we’re allowed to try on different hats. We’re allowed to walk two yards in one set of shoes and chuck them at the next intersection if they pinch the toes. After we’ve had those midnight conversations, after we have a hypothesis about which communities and causes we care about, we can test it, amend it, test again. This is the moment
Student center won’t Bring Buckley solve for protectionism online I was bemused by yesterday’s article regarding the possibility of a campuswide student center (“University-wide student center considered,” Feb. 5). While a student center could certainly be a useful resource, the notion that residential colleges are unable to “accommodate” student demand for space is simply false. Rooms like the Saybrook Athenaeum, the Calhoun Parlor, the Berkeley Swiss Room and the ironically named Silliman Meeting Room cannot be booked for student meetings. As a consequence, they sit empty while the Yale College Council tells us that the problem is space. Residential college protectionism is the real source of the problem here; student groups have space enough, if only they were allowed to use it. JAKE ROMANOW Feb. 5 The author is a junior in Silliman College.
I trawled your website today in search of Yale Daily News editions dating from the period 1948 to 1950. I had hoped to read the columns of a young William F. Buckley Jr. ’50, who served as chairman of the paper during his time at Yale. The historical archive that I found on the Yale University Library website could scarcely be called an archive at all: It included a modest collection of papers from periods it deemed “important,” but there were gaping lacunae throughout. Not a single paper from the Buckley era could be found. This shoddy arrangement does a disservice to a paper like the Yale Daily News, which has a long tradition. Student journalists today could learn much from past figures as wide-ranging as
for implementing the scientific method. Here, we can take a class in biological anthropology or join the student free-trade group or try one of the myriad jobs not listed by Undergraduate Career Services and see if it is right. If not, well, at least we have more clarity. But this type of introspection — indeed most forms of searching self-reflection — requires real fortitude. We have to be willing to risk a miserable summer or even year so that we don’t have a miserable life. Sometimes it takes that conversation in which you admit to your roommate that you are not actually happy — in fact, you’re completely despondent — about how you spend your time. Harnessing confusion to gain such clarity demands courage. The fact is that our very presence here, in this milieu of options, means we cannot use confusion as an excuse to take a predefined path — unless it actually is perfect. Instead, we must search our souls, grit our teeth and take baby steps in our best guess of a direction. And the struggle is worth it. For in the end, we will have come alive. NATALIA EMANUEL is a senior in Branford College. Contact her at natalia.emanuel@yale.edu .
Buckley on the right and Sargent Shriver on the left. As a fellow Bulldog (although of a different variety) and newspaper editor, I felt obligated to bring this to your pages. YDN deserves a better archive, and you should press the library to get it. BLAKE SEITZ Feb. 4 The author is a junior at the University of Georgia, where he is the opinions editor at the Red & Black student newspaper.
YALE DAILY NEWS · WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 2013 · yaledailynews.com
PAGE 3
NEWS
“The sergeant is the Army.”
DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER
34TH PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES AND FIVE-STAR ARMY GENERAL
CORRECTIONS FRIDAY, FEB. 1
The article “Hack to the Future” mistakenly stated that Rafi Khan ’15 and his app Screw Me Yale won the 2012 YCC App Challenge. In fact, Travelogue, an app by Jared Shenson ’12, Charlie Croom ’12 and Bay Gross ’13, took first place in the challenge. Khan’s entry placed third.
New sergeants appointed
TUESDAY, FEB. 5
The article “Panel tackles faculty diversity” misidentified School Of Management Professor Connie Bagley as an author of the Women’s Faculty Forum report “The View from 2012.” In fact, Bagley co-chaired the WFF Working Group on Sexual Misconduct.
Public discusses city charter BY PATRICK CASEY STAFF REPORTER New Haven’s Charter Revision Commission held a public hearing on Tuesday to give citizens a chance to voice their opinions about how the city’s charter should be revised. Roughly 20 people testified at Tuesday’s meeting, which was held at the Benjamin Jepson School. Although a wide range of issues was discussed, much of the testimony focused on the structure of the Board of Education and the powers of the Civilian Review Board, which reviews reports of police misconduct. New Haven is required by law to review its charter and consider changes to the document every 10 years. The Charter Revision Commission, whose 15 members were selected by the Board of Aldermen late last year, has convened to discuss and draft changes before submitting a proposal to the Board of Aldermen by May 13. At that time, the board will review and potentially alter the proposal, then approve a final version to be voted on as a referendum item in citywide elections in the fall. The Board of Education is currently comprised of seven mayoral appointees and the mayor himself. The Board of Aldermen, however, has tasked the Charter Revision Commission to consider how the Board of Education should be selected, whether by election, mayoral or aldermanic appointment or a combination of all three. The makeup of the Board of Education was the most discussed issue at Tuesday night’s meeting, with most of those who spoke about the board favoring the current process of mayoral appointment or a hybrid system made up of elected officials and appointees. A few attendees, however, spoke in favor of a wholly elected board. Tomi Veale, the head coordinator of Youth@Work, a program that provides New Haven students with work exposure and summer employment opportunities, attended the hearing to speak out against an elected school board. In her testimony, she expressed concern that fundraising and elections would distract board members and inhibit their ability to work solely on behalf of students. “The students matter most, and I don’t want what people are fighting for in terms of their education to become a political platform,” Veale told the News. Many of those who spoke feared that an elected school board would halt or reverse many of the reforms enacted by the current leadership, which began an intensive school change initiative in 2009. “Right now, things are going well. We’re on an upswing. There’s a lot of really important reforms that are happening, and if we try to switch things midstream, it’s not going to be helpful,” Arlene DePino, a mother of two New Haven public school students, told the News. DePino, who has organized for unions before, said that she worries about the effects that elections will have on the quality and intentions of board members. John Cirello, a local attorney who is the father of two New Haven public school students, testified that he was worried that were the Board of Education elected, unions could elect candidates who would give them overly favorable contracts,
which he feared could hurt the city. “Because education is one of the biggest expenditures of any town budget, it could really run us into ruin because there would be no one kind of watching the henhouse,” Cirello told the News. But other residents that testified were in favor of a change. Bret Bissell said he is “ambivalent” about whether the Board of Education is directly elected or appointed by the Board of Aldermen, but he thinks the current system of pure mayoral appointment allows the mayor too much power. Others who support direct election or aldermanic appointment cited similar concerns about mayoral power. Some also said that they want part of the board to be made up of students, parents and teachers. Several people also testified about enshrining the Civilian Review Board — which was created in 2001 to review reports of police misconduct — in the city’s charter. All who spoke on the matter supported giving the board more powers to investigate misconduct and punish offenses. “What we need is an organization of and by the people of New Haven that can resist this pandemic of police brutality,” said New Haven resident Ina Staklo, who argued for a more powerful Civilian Review Board. A wide range of other topics was raised as well, although fewer testified on such matters. Imposing term limits on the mayor was discussed, as was giving the Board of Aldermen more power to make or review appointments to boards and commissions that are currently handled by the mayor. A few people expressed support for discarding the term “alderman” in exchange for a genderneutral term. The commission has worked to be “inclusive,” said Ward 8 Alderman and Commission Chair Michael Smart. “We really want to engage the public and get as much information as we can get because it’s important,” Smart said. “We’ve got to get it on the ballot and we have to sell it to the public, that’s the next challenge.” The fourth and final public hearing on charter revision will be at 7 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 7 at Conte/West Hills School at 511 Chapel St. Contact PATRICK CASEY at patrick.casey@yale.edu .
CHARTER REVISION WHAT’S HAPPENING
New Haven is required by law to review its charter and consider changes every 10 years. Last time changes were proposed was 2002, but the suggested package was defeated in a referendum by a margin of less than 2 percent. POSSIBLE CHANGES
Changing the selection process of the Board of Education, empowering the Civilian Review Board and reducing the total number of aldermen are three of the most hotly debated issues.
JENNIFER CHEUNG/PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR
Nineteen newly promoted New Haven police sergeants will be the first to attend “Command College,” a leadership and crime-fighting training program. BY LORENZO LIGATO STAFF REPORTER Starting this week, 19 newly promoted New Haven police sergeants will go back to school to learn about leadership and department command structure. At a Feb. 1 promotional ceremony, hundreds of relatives, colleagues and friends gathered in the auditorium of the Career High School at 140 Legion Ave. as the New Haven Police Department swore in these 19 officers and detectives to the rank of sergeant. The promotions represent the first step toward what Esserman defined as “the rebuilding of the NHPD’s leadership team.” The 19 sergeants appointed last Friday will be the first to attend the department’s “Command College,” a new leadership and crime-fighting training program for police supervisors which was developed in partnership with the University of New Haven and the assistance of Yale University. “The department has been running a strong recruitment effort,” NHPD Chief Dean Esserman said in a statement. “Equally important to recruiting more officers is promoting those who will lead them.” The 19 new sergeants come from a variety of previous positions in areas such as the Narcotics and Major Crimes Division,
the Investigative Services Unit and the School Resource Officer Program. In order to qualify for promotion, the sergeants had to fulfill the Civil Service requirements and pass several rounds of interviews with the Board of Police Commissioners in January. All of the newly appointed sergeants have served in the NHPD for at least five years, with the most senior officer having spent 24 years in the city’s Police Department. “With great authority comes great responsibility,” said Sgt. Anthony Campbell ’95 DIV ’09, who runs the New Haven Police Academy, as the newly appointed sergeants lined up under the stage to receive their brand-new badges. As Campbell called their names one by one, the 19 sergeants ascended the stage steps and shook hands with Esserman, as well as with Mayor John DeStefano Jr. and members of the Board of Aldermen who were presiding over the ceremony. “The rank does not make us believe in the officers, but rather it’s the officer that makes us believe in the rank,” Esserman told the group of sergeants. As he congratulated the newest sergeants, DeStefano recalled his first time attending a NHPD ceremony in 1962 when his father
was sworn in. “I grew up in a police family,” DeStefano said. “I know what these men and women do is extraordinary and incredibly important to the people who live in this community.”
The rank does not make us believe in the officers, but rather it’s the officer that makes us believe in the rank. DEAN ESSERMAN Chief, New Haven Police Department Announced last December, the Command College program these sergeants will attend is designed to train future police chiefs “on ways to get the community engaged as partners in the policing process, which helps reduce crime rates,” according to a statement released by the University of New Haven. One primary goal of the program will be to help police executives partner with research organizations and apply policing research to issues seen in the field. “The evolution of policing in the United States has histori-
cally been of a noncentralized and largely unplanned nature,” said program head John DeCarlo, an associate professor of criminal justice at University of New Haven who served as the chief of the Branford Police Department until 2011. “The situation often leads to excellent investigators being elevated to management roles with incomplete skill sets.” While enrollment in the program will officially begin next May, the Command College already opened its doors to the newest NHPD sergeants this Monday. For the next two weeks, the group of 19 sergeants will take classes in leadership and community policing. The NHPD plans to hire about 100 officers over the next two years, Esserman said. In addition, 40 new police officers will soon be assigned to walking beats around New Haven. “What you do, what you are part of will shape this department and this city for years to come,” DeStefano told the newest sergeants at Friday’s promotional ceremony. The Command College program is funded by a two-year, $350,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Justice. Contact LORENZO LIGATO at lorenzo.ligato@yale.edu .
Yale’s admission yield rate ranked 9th BY KRISTEN LEE CONTRIBUTING REPORTER Though the U.S. News & World Report ranks Yale the No. 3 university in the nation, Yale’s 2011 admission yield placed ninth overall — below Harvard and the University of Alaska, Fairbanks. The Jan. 28 report ranks national universities by percent yield, the percentage of accepted students who choose to enroll at a given college. According to the report, Yale had a yield rate of 64.1 percent during the 2011 admissions cycle, while Brigham Young University, which came in at No. 1, had a yield rate of 79.7 percent. Dean of Undergraduate Admissions Jeffrey Brenzel said in an email to the News that yield rates can vary from year to year, and the University’s yield rates jumped by nearly 5 percentage points in the past year. “Yield rates bounce around from year to year,” Brenzel said. “Our yield this past year of 68.4 percent would have put us fifth on this [report].” He said only two of the four schools with 2011 percent yields higher than 68.4 percent — Harvard and Stanford — are peer institutions, or schools to which Yale compares itself. As the University has offered admission to more applicants interested in the science, technology, engineering and math fields, Brenzel said, the school’s yield rate has declined by “a percentage point or two.” He added that the Admissions Office does not favor students who seem more likely to enroll and never turns down deserving applicants in order to optimize yield.
Admission yield rates say more about students’ personal tastes than a university’s quality, said Julia Husen, a counseling coordinator at the Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy. Students are often admitted to two top-tier schools but must end up choosing one, which accounts for lower yield rates. Jerome Lucido, director of the USC Center for Enrollment Research, Policy and Practice, said Yale risks having a lower yield because the Admissions Office recruits students from a broad range of disciplines so applicants may end up choosing more specialized universities. In addition, the University targets students from countries around the world who may apply to a greater num-
ber of international institutions, he added. Lloyd Thacker, director of The Education Conservancy, an organization that combats commercial interference in college admissions, said he thinks ranking universities numerically is “silly” because the aim of publications such as U.S. News & World Report is not to identify the best school but to make money. “Rankings say more about the need for a news magazine to generate revenue than anything else,” Thacker said. Tiffany Truong, a high school senior from New York who applied to Yale, said she thinks students may decline to matriculate to Yale because they hope to pursue a certain subject that has a stronger
department at another school. She added that some students “don’t think Yale is as science-focused,” so students particularly interested in the sciences may choose to attend another university with a reputation for better science departments, such as MIT. Another high school student from New York, Daniela Czemerinski, said the yield rate rankings do not affect her perception of Yale. “They’re just about students who apply to every Ivy and choose Harvard just because it’s Harvard,” she said. The most recent overall college rankings by U.S. News came out on Sept. 12, 2012. Contact KRISTEN LEE at kristen.lee@yale.edu .
GRAPH TOP YIELD RATES AT UNIVERSITIES, 2011 80
79.7% 75.9% 70.0%
70
68.9%
67.8%
66.6%
64.9%
64.6%
64.1%
60 50 0
BYU
Harvard
Stanford
Nebraska — Lincoln
Yeshiva
Alaska — Fairbanks
Georgia Southern
MIT
Yale
US NEWS & WORLD REPORT
PAGE 4
YALE DAILY NEWS · WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 2013 · yaledailynews.com
FROM THE FRONT Still, he said contributing to the establishment of Korean studies is among his department’s “highest priorities” for the future, adding that creating Korean studies would also involve several other departments, such as the History Department. “My department is very interested in seeing the growth of Korean studies within the larger context of the study of East Asia. We would very much like to have the resources,” Kamens said.
We don’t want Yale to not see Korea as an important international independent entity. MIRIAM CHO ’14 Founding member, Korea Studies Initiative Seungja Kim Choi, associate director of undergraduate studies for East Asian Languages and Literatures, said in an email Tuesday that a perceived lack of books on Korea at Yale libraries has been a factor that administrators discussed whenever the topic of Korean studies came up, but she added that technology and online resources have eliminated this problem in recent years. Provost Benjamin Polak, who was appointed in mid-January, said he is too new to his job to “have an informed opinion” about the Korean studies concentration. Miriam Cho ’14, one of the Korea
PSY
STAR OF THE HIT K-POP MUSIC VIDEO “GANGNAM STYLE”
NHPS funding to increase
Korean Studies stunted by budget KOREAN STUDIES FROM PAGE 1
“I try to dress classy and dance cheesy.”
SCHOOL FUNDING FROM PAGE 1 Fiscal Analysis has described as over $2 billion in projected deficits. State House Republicans questioned the fiscal expediency of increasing education funding as Connecticut attempts to recover from a bond rating downgrade and the largest single tax increase in state history that began this fiscal year, said Republicans’ spokesman Patrick O’Neill. “This funding structure will ensure that we continue to pursue our goal of helping turn around struggling schools, allowing successful ones to keep thriving and better preparing students to move onto high school, college and the workforce,” Lt. Gov. Nancy Wyman said in a Tuesday press release. Dianne Kaplan deVries, project director of the Connecticut Coalition for Justice in Education Funding, said her advocacy group regarded the funding increases as a “very small amount of money in the scheme of school district budgets,” with only a few districts seeing funding percentage increases in the double digits. According to a summary of Malloy’s proposed changes in ECS funding, New Haven Public Schools will receive a 2.26 percent increase in funding in the next fiscal year and a 4.52 percent increase in the following year, with total additional aid amounting to just under $10 million. New Haven mayoral candidate Gary Holder-Winfield, who currently represents the Elm City as a Democratic state representative, said he supports Malloy’s proposal as a “move in the right direction,” but expressed concern about its implementation given Connecticut’s budget shortfalls. Malloy’s proposal aims to bolster teacher evaluation and support, expand implementation of the Common Core State Standards and assist
Studies Initiative’s founding members, said the group would like to see Yale take Korea seriously as an academic discipline. Working toward this goal, the group seeks a tenure-track professor specializing in Korea and more classes on Korea to be offered across various departments. Cho added that she finds Yale’s academic climate to be “Eurocentric,” even though Korean studies is becoming increasingly important to the national academic community. “We don’t want Yale to not see Korea as an important international independent entity,” Cho said, adding that she believes the University will need to establish a Korean studies concentration in order to remain competitive. Harvard, Columbia, the University of Chicago and the University of California, Los Angeles each have programs focusing on Korea. Yong Cho ’13, another leader of the group, said he would have majored in Korean studies but had to settle for art history because Yale did not offer enough classes to sustain his interest. Despite the importance of these academic concerns, Kamens said budgetary issues will ultimately determine whether Yale creates a Korean studies concentration in the near future. “We … have a new provost who says we are going to have to make hard choices,” Kamens said. Yale first taught Korean as a language in 1946 to a group of Protestant missionaries preparing for work in Korea, and has been teaching the language continuously since 1990. Contact JOSEPH TISCH at joseph.tisch@yale.edu .
the turnaround of underperforming schools, building on a landmark education reform package the state signed into law in May 2012 that will increase preschool funding, evaluate schools based on standardized testing, implement teacher preparation programs, scale back controversial teacher evaluations and boost funding for charter schools. Indeed, Malloy identified education as a top budget priority in addition to workforce development and job attraction during Tuesday’s press conference, following up on rhetoric from his January State of the State address. “When it comes to public education, we can’t keep doing what we’ve always done and hope for better results,” Malloy said in his January address. While Malloy dubbed 2012 the year of education reform, he cut education funding by $19.9 million in December to eliminate a midyear budget deficit, halting the implementation of reforms. Zak Newman ’12, former president of the Yale Democrats, said Malloy’s move to restore education funds after cuts he described as contentious represents a “showing of good faith” that will bring “education back to the forefront of the conversation.”
Kaplan deVries said she was similarly pleased to see education funding prioritized. “For five years, we have been levelfunded,” Kaplan deVries said. “We cannot continue this way.” ECS funding increases were unveiled on the heels of two other major proposals for state education reform last month. The Connecticut General Assembly established a bipartisan task force on gun violence prevention and children’s safety, which will address security and mental health in public schools in response to last December’s shootings at Newtown’s Sandy Hook Elementary. Malloy also announced a $1.5 billion investment in the University of Connecticut to support its expansion, particularly in research programs. O’Neill, however, said he questioned whether these costly measures could fit into a larger budget scheme. Malloy proposed school funding increases to 117 municipalities, while maintaining level funding for remaining cities and towns. Contact NICOLE NAREA at nicole.narea@yale.edu .
BY THE NUMBERS CONN. SCHOOL FUNDING $19.9m 2.26 $152m $2b
Cuts to Connecticut education funding in December Percent increase in funding for New Haven Public Schools in the next fiscal year Value of proposed Education Cost Sharing grants Projected state deficits
Yale, city volunteering efforts aid students YOUTH FROM PAGE 1 DataHaven and other city philanthropic organizations. The survey, which addressed city issues including community satisfaction, employment, education and health, uncovered unsettling statistics about New Haven youth. In some areas, the situation looked grim: Few New Haven residents consider the city a good place to raise children. But some bright spots in the survey results, such as a high rate of city volunteerism, point to the city’s potential for growth and better youth support.
YOUTH CHALLENGES
The survey found significant geographic stratification in how New Haven residents view the city as an environment to raise children. Within the inner city, 31 percent of survey respondents said that New Haven was not a good environment to raise children. By contrast, only 3 percent of people in the outer ring of suburbs, which includes towns such as North Haven, Woodbridge and Orange, said their area was a poor environment for raising children. Elijah Anderson, a sociology professor at Yale and the author of “Code of the Street,” said that many of the issues plaguing New Haven residents are tied to ripples in the job market across the country: The national workforce has been transitioning from a manufacturing economy to a service economy, and many jobs that were once located at the heart of the city are being outsourced abroad. The resulting unemployment has far-reaching consequences for city culture, Anderson said, as individuals without meaningful work more often turn to crime. “The violence and the crime is to an extent a function of structural poverty. The poverty is caused by the absence of jobs, of course,” Anderson said. “Indirectly, good people go wrong when they have nothing to eat and nothing to look forward to. And then they can make life difficult for those around them.“ Youth violence has become a particular problem for New Haven, Ward 10 Alderman and mayoral candidate Justin Elicker FES ’10 SOM ’10 said, because there are too few programs to occupy children and teens during after-school hours. Elicker said that existing programming, including activities run through Yale, cannot accommodate the sheer number of students who require its services. Ward 1 Alderman Sarah Eidelson ’12, who sits
on the Board of Aldermen’s Youth Committee, said that creating more youth jobs — one of her main goals on the board so far — will go a long way in keeping kids off the streets. “What I have heard most frequently in my conversations with young people in the city include a lack of opportunity in general for youth,” Eidelson said. “There are a lot of fantastic programs in the city addressing these things already, but they’re so stretched — we need more of them, and we need them in more neighborhoods.” Elicker added that the city does a poor job of coordinating its ongoing youth services initiatives. The Board of Aldermen has a youth services committee, and the mayor created a “youth commission” and a separate “youth violence task force.” “There are a lot of qualified experts, but they’re not talking to each other,” Elicker said. The survey found that one of the most striking differences between the city and the suburbs lay in parents’ perceptions of their children’s role models: 76 percent of parents in outer-ring suburbs said that their children
had enough positive role models, while 26 percent of New Haven residents said the same. Anderson considered why New Haven children have so few role models. He said that, one of the most “peculiar” aspects of New Haven’s demographics was its conspicuous lack of a black middle class — African-American doctors, lawyers and businessmen. He added that as more black professionals trickle into other cities, they raise the specter of opportunity for those cities’ youth. “When a black person walks down the street in New Haven, you can make the assumption that he’s from the ghetto and he’s poor,” said Anderson, the sociology professor. “That has a profound effect on the perception of black people in the city — but it also makes a difference in what black people aspire to.”
CITY POTENTIAL
Despite these hurdles, New Haven has gained some momentum toward finding solutions. One of the most promising statistics the community well-being survey displayed was the rate of volunteerism across New Haven, which is estimated to be about 58
percent. Many volunteering programs across the city attempt to address the range of education and mental health issues within the Elm City community.
schools and seven elementary schools in the district. The foundation runs short, stress-relieving play sessions for elementary school students. For high schoolers, there is a class that teaches students to relate social and historical issues to their own experiences, as well as counseling services designed to give students a chance to relieve personal stress and return to class focused on academics. Even kindergartners are in need of mental health relief, according to David Johnson, the co-director of the post-traumatic stress center in New Haven. He said that a needs assessment conducted at Strong Elementary School last fall found that approximately a third of the students showed signs of behavioral problems, while many of these students were doing well in school and exhibited no signs of psychiatric illness. Because they are exhibiting high levels of stress at an early age “these are the kids who, come later grades, are going to break down,” Johnson said. Such youth stress is why Boost! and the Foundation for the Arts and Trauma have settled on a preventative strategy for mental health.
There are a lot of qualified experts [on youth services], but they’re not talking to each other. JUSTIN ELICKER FES ’10 SOM ’10 Alderman, Ward 10 Boost!, a New Haven public school program that works to partner nonprofits in the community with New Haven’s schools, found an outpouring of community support when it began. Boost! Director Beth Pellegrino said that when the program was launched, there were about 75 requests for information from community organizations. One successful Boost! initiative is a partnership with the Foundation for the Arts and Trauma, which provides preventative mental health services in two high
MAP GREATER NEW HAVEN AREA Bethany Hamden
North Haven North Branford
Woodbridge City of New Haven New Haven
Inner Ring Outer Ring
Orange
Milford
East Haven
Guilford Branford
West Haven
Madison
“After [mental] damage has been done, it takes a lot of effort to put things back together again,” Johnson said, but working in schools is a tactic to “put some effort up front.” The results seem to be working. At Barnard Environmental Studies School, the number of disciplinary referrals dropped from 750 when the program began two years ago to 70 so far this year. At Metropolitan Business Academy, the number of referrals has dropped from approximately 13 or 14 a month to two or three a month. New Haven youth also have the advantage of Yale volunteer outreach efforts like PALS and other programs run by Dwight Hall. Jangai Jap ’14, a coordinator for PALS, said that Yale students can always interact more with the New Haven community. The survey found that 81 percent of Greater New Haven residents are satisfied with the city or area where they live. Contact MONICA DISARE at monica.disare@yale.edu . Contact MICHELLE HACKMAN at michelle.hackman@yale.edu .
YALE DAILY NEWS · WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 2013 · yaledailynews.com
PAGE 5
FROM THE FRONT
“The saddest aspect of life right now is that science gathers knowledge faster than society gathers wisdom.” ISAAC ASIMOV AMERICAN AUTHOR OF SCIENCE FICTION
Fall ban leads to expansive spring rush SPRING RUSH FROM PAGE 1 compared with 40 students last spring, Rush Chair Jack Schlossberg ’15 said. Roughly 100 students are rushing Sigma Alpha Epsilon this semester, double the number that rushed last spring, said Samir Sama ’15, the SAE fall 2011 rush chair. Delta Kappa Epsilon and Sigma Chi are rushing approximately the same numbers of students they have in previous semesters, said DKE President Nick Daffin ’13 and Sig Chi Recruitment Chair John Harringa ’14. In response to the larger rush classes, Sig Ep and Zeta will increase the number of bids they give out this semester. Schlossberg said last spring Sig Ep gave out 14 bids, and this year they will give out 25. Zeta will give out 30 bids, “higher than our normal 20,” Sandquist said.
Taking any more students than [20] has the potential to weaken the close bonds they will form with one another. SAMIR SAMA ’15 Fall 2011 rush chair, Sigma Alpha Epsilon
ANNA-SOPHIE HARLING/CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER
Due to the ban on freshman fall recruitment, fraternities have seen significantly larger spring rush classes than in previous years.
SAE will not increase the number of bids they give out, Sama said, because fraternity members decided that expanding the pledge class would prevent the new members from forming close relationships with one another and the other members. “We will not be giving out bids to any more than 20 rushes this semester. This is consistent with our policy from previous semesters,” Sama said. “Taking any more students than that has the potential to weaken the close bonds they will form with one another.” Sama added that SAE members will encourage those who do not receive a bid this semester to rush again next semester.
He said this spring is an “anomaly in that we have excesses,” and he thinks that the number of students rushing will return to previous numbers in the fall, when the students who were turned away in the spring rush again. Two fraternity leaders said larger spring rush classes have made the rush process more difficult. Schlossberg said Sig Ep had to change its rush procedure to accommodate such a large group. Daffin said the ban affected dynamics among the students rushing because the spring rush class is composed of all freshmen, so students in separate class years are more segregated than in years past. “When I was rushing, a great part of the process was hanging out with and really getting to know the sophomores rushing with the freshmen,” Daffin said. “Now, [with] the ban and the new spring rush we’ve had to institute, there is a more clearly defined separation between freshmen and sophomores.” Daffin added that it has been difficult to coordinate spring rush for baseball players interested in DKE because of the players’ practice schedules this spring. Students rushing said the larger rush classes have not had noticeable impact on the rush process. “I think the rush class is a good one — well-sized,” said Josh Marx ’16, a freshman rushing SAE. “Small enough that I can make close friends, but also large enough that we can operate as a full-fledged fraternity.” Rafi Bildner ’16 added he “loves” the size of AEPi’s rush class. “I had never met a lot of the other people rushing before, and it’s been a great experience so far in terms of getting to know people I would have perhaps never previously met,” he said. “It’s just large enough where it definitely feels like a big group.” The ban on fall freshman rush for Greek organizations was announced in March 2012. Contact KIRSTEN SCHNACKENBERG at kirsten.schnackenberg@yale.edu .
Admissions discussed at third FAS meeting FAS MEETING FROM PAGE 1 about the facts and what they might mean.” President-elect and former Provost Peter Salovey said in a Tuesday email that he found Monday’s meeting “substantive and informative,” adding that the small group in attendance was able to have a detailed discussion about undergraduate admissions policies and practices. Salovey established the forum last fall as provost to allow professors an opportunity to share ideas about University policy. A group of faculty members expressed concerns last spring that administrators were pursuing an increasingly top-down approach to decision-making with regard to issues such as Yale’s partnership with the National University of Singapore and restructuring of departmen-
tal staff. Music Department Chair Daniel Harrison, who attended Monday’s meeting, said the past two faculty forums have been hampered by the fact that professors propose agenda items anonymously. If the faculty member who proposed the topic is not there to clarify his or her exact question at the meeting, the discussion will be less productive, he said, adding that this procedural flaw was an issue on Monday with the topic of University deans and officers. Levin ended up speaking extemporaneously about the evolution of his administration because no professors at the meeting identified themselves as having proposed the agenda item, Harrison said. The forum is intended to be less formal and more flexible than the monthly Yale College and Graduate School fac-
ulty meetings, which have strict, predetermined agendas focused on the curriculum and student life and cannot accommodate extended dialogue on broader issues of concern to the faculty, according to a September report by a three-person faculty committee tasked with proposing rules for the forums. Faculty members propose and vote on agenda items for the forum, which is chaired by the directors of the four academic divisions — physical sciences and engineering, biological sciences, social sciences and humanities — on a rotating basis. Previous issues raised at faculty forum meetings have included the presidential search process, the University’s science and technology resources and the possibility of founding a faculty senate. Monday’s meeting followed an agenda established by faculty last week, beginning with a dis-
500,000
cussion led by Dean of Undergraduate Admissions Jeffrey Brenzel on increases in applicants from science-oriented students. Brenzel said he provided information to attendees about how many students enter Yale with the intention of majoring in one subject and maintain that focus versus how many students change their minds after they enroll. He said the statistics led to a conversation that was “both interesting and productive.” Though Brenzel had already given a similar presentation at a recent Yale College faculty meeting, Manley said he appreciated the opportunity to talk more in-depth about admissions. “This was the fullest discussion [about admissions] I’ve been exposed to, and it seems like it could be a good thing if faculty were thinking and talk-
ing more about how our teaching can be adapted to the current student body,” he said.
It may be … that a forum on this model will not hold the interest of faculty. LAWRENCE MANLEY Professor, English Department Joel Rosenbaum, a biology professor, said Monday’s meeting was disappointing because of “relatively uninteresting” agenda items, adding that the small turnout made it difficult to build an interesting discussion. Rosenbaum, who has advocated in the past for the creation of a faculty senate with formal deliberative power, said professors may have to reconsider
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whether the forum is the best structure for promoting shared governance between the University and the faculty. Salovey told the News last fall that there are many possible “mechanisms” to increase faculty input in University decision-making, adding that the faculty forum is a work in progress. “I’d like to run the experiment we are conducting now that involves clarifying the procedures of the Yale College and the Graduate School faculty meetings while adding the faculty forum, and then assess at the end of the academic year whether this has been an effective approach,” he said in December. The final faculty forum of the year will take place on April 4 in Connecticut Hall.
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PAGE 7
ARTS & CULTURE
“Building a better you is the first step to building a better America.” ZIG ZIGLAR AMERICAN AUTHOR, SALESMAN AND MOTIVATIONAL SPEAKER
Inaugural poet talks ‘One Today’ BY CAROLINE PRINGLE CONTRIBUTING REPORTER Two inaugural poets shared one stage for the first time in history at the Ezra Stiles Master’s House Tuesday afternoon. Students, alumni, professors and the media packed the Stiles Master’s House to see Richard Blanco’s first public appearance since his recitation of “One Today” at President Barack Obama’s second inauguration on Jan. 21. The nation’s fifth and youngest inaugural poet is also the first Latino and openly gay poet to receive the honor. Elizabeth Alexander, chair of Yale’s African American Studies Department and the inaugural poet at Obama’s 2009 inauguration, joined Blanco. Following a reading of “One Today” and other selected poems, Blanco described his role as an “emotional historian” and the task of encapsulating the national condition in poetry. Alexander led the discussion with questions of immigration, nostalgia, patriotism and Beyoncé. Blanco said he was shocked to receive the honor of crafting the inaugural poem. “I had to pull over and sit on
the side of the road and basically weep,” he recalled. According to Blanco, the process of writing the inaugural poem began in some sense during his time at college. His first assignment in a creative writing course was to answer the question: What is America? Blanco read the resulting poem, which is titled “América” and describes his Cuban family’s celebration of Thanksgiving, for Tuesday’s audience.
[The inaugural poem is an] assertion that poetry has a place in political and civil discourse. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER Inaugural poet, Obama’s 2009 inauguration “It really was almost fate that that very first poem started me writing on that theme of cultural identity, cultural negotiation and really asking what is America,” he said. “Though that didn’t make
the inaugural poem much easier to write.” Blanco said the White House gave him two to three weeks to write three different poems for the inauguration. He began writing at his kitchen table. Drawing from inaugural poets who came before him, including Maya Angelou and Alexander, Blanco said he included imagery related to nature and the common American people. He added that including autobiographical elements was intimidating due to the public nature of the address, yet necessary in order to take an emotional “snapshot” of the country. In his inaugural address, President Obama referred to contentious national issues like immigration reform and made a historic mention of gay rights. When asked how the president’s words affected Blanco as an openly gay immigrant, he said the speech made him feel welcome and gave him “the chutzpah to go on stage.” Blanco said he had never completely embraced being American until that day. Following his recitation of “One Today” at the inauguration, Blanco turned to his mother and said, “Well, Mom, I think we’re finally American.”
Exhibit unites Himalayan artifacts
At the end of the Tea, Alexander expressed her pride in Blanco as a representation of American poets. She added that she hopes the inaugural poem can serve as an “assertion that poetry has a place in political and civil discourse.” Blanco also discussed his method for writing poetry, explaining that his training in civil engineering at Florida International University helped his editing process by allowing him to look at a poem analytically with a keen eye for structure, pattern and logic. He advised students interested in poetry to write about subjects they really care about. Three students interviewed said the two poets renewed their interest in poetry. Katherine Barnes ’16 said she appreciated the sense of family and community Blanco fostered in the inaugural poem. Blanco said he plans to publish a memoir and a book including the three poems he wrote for the 57th presidential inauguration. Robert Frost served as the first inaugural poet at President John F. Kennedy’s 1961 inauguration. Contact CAROLINE PRINGLE at caroline.pringle@yale.edu .
JOYCE XI/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER
Richard Blanco, who recited his poem “One Today” at President Barack Obama’s second inauguration on Jan. 21, discussed the process of composing the inaugural poem in a Master’s Tea on Tuesday.
Pianist Emanuel Ax returns to Yale BY ANYA GRENIER STAFF REPORTER
While many singers and musicians from around the world are dreaming of winning their first Grammy Award this Sunday, such an achievement is but a memory for Emanuel Ax. Ax, an internationally renowned pianist who has won seven Grammy Awards, will perform a recital tonight in Sprague Hall as part of the School of Music’s Horowitz Piano Series. Following performances in previous seasons of the series, Ax will return to play works by Beethoven, Chopin and Schoenberg. Ax said he usually prepares for all his performances in the same way: by remaining true to the composers’ intentions. “What all performers try to do is get the composer’s message across to the audience in a way that is exciting and illuminating,” he said. Boris Berman, the piano series’ artistic director, said Ax’s musical style is unique because of his incredible dedication to pieces’ true meanings. “There are so many able performers who dazzle with their technique, but there is not much beyond the technique,” Berman said. “For Emanuel Ax, the music and the pursuit of its innermost essence is what comes first.” Ax will devote the entire second half of his recital to two pieces by Frédéric Chopin, “Nocturne No. 1 in F minor” and “Sonata No. 3 in B minor.” Berman and School of Music professor Wei-Yi Yang GRD ’04 both called Chopin’s “Sonata No. 3” one of his greatest, most significant works. Berman said the piece is extremely rich in its technical aspects, and Yang explained how the sonata explores the evolu-
Taps, Yale’s only all-tap dancing group, will highlight the dance form through the ages in its annual showcase this week, which is the group’s only performance of the year. The group’s graduate and undergraduate dancers have been preparing the show, called “Tap to the Future,” since the beginning of fall semester, Taps president Ruth Lovejoy ’13 said. The performance will include an extremely diverse collection of entirely student-choreographed pieces, as well as a storyline that will unfold during the interludes between dances, she said. This skit will involve “Back to the Future” protagonist Marty McFly accidentally traveling back to the 18th century and meeting George Washington, followed by the two of them time-traveling through various decades of music and tap-dancing together. “Tap to the Future” will include a series of dances with fewer members and a group finale to a mash-up of songs from the 1990s, Taps member Holly Hajare ’15 explained. Lovejoy said the group’s smaller size and many students’ relative lack of experience with choreography have sometimes made it a challenge to develop enough original material for past showcases. But this year, she explained, the group did not face similar difficulties, in part due to an influx of freshman dancers willing to try new things. The pieces in the show span a variety of styles, from dances done in an earlier, more traditional “swing” style tap to faster modern pieces done to pop music, Taps member Julia Hosch ’14 said. The group will also perform to songs from musicals, she said, adding that tap was first made famous by its appearance in Broadway shows. “I choreograph to songs I listen to generally that already have interesting rhythms in them or would be conducive to having interesting rhythms put on top
LISA MARIE MAZZUCCO/CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER
Grammy Award-winning pianist Emanuel Ax will perform in a recital in Sprague Hall tonight, showcasing pieces by Beethoven, Chopin and Schoenberg. tion of musical themes and motifs throughout a piece. Yang added that Chopin is also well-known for his nocturnes. “In terms of the atmosphere and the fantasy involved in writing a nocturne, Chopin is unparalleled,” Yang said. Ax’s repertoire will also include Beethoven’s “Pathétique” sonata, which School of Music Dean Robert Blocker called an interesting program choice. The piece is accessible to younger students in terms of
technique, but holds much deeper meaning for the mature artist, he explained in an email. Yang said the piece is generally considered one of Beethoven’s more well-known works due to its broad appeal. “It is something that a lot of people can relate to — it can be interpreted many ways depending on what people associate with it,” Yang said. Although the three composers featured in the recital are representative of three successive
musical periods, Yang said Ax’s performance is not merely a history lesson but rather a display of opposite extremes in musical form, comparing the lengthy Beethoven and Chopin sonatas to the compressed Schoenberg piece. But Yang also noted the similarities that exist between these vastly different works. Each movement of a sonata needs the context of the entire piece to be fully understood, he explained, as do Schoenberg’s “Six Little Piano Pieces,” which Ax
will also play tonight. “There is continuity in the sense that I think all of the great composers are forward-looking and revolutionary, and that’s certainly true for Beethoven, Chopin and Schoenberg,” Ax said. Ax was awarded an honorary doctorate of music from Yale in 2007. Contact ERIC XIAO at eric.xiao@yale.edu .
Lighthanded and heavyhearted JENNIFER GERSTEN/CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER
The new Himalayans Collection exhibit in Sterling Memorial Library is a sign of growing interest in the region over the past few years at BY JESSICA HALLAM STAFF REPORTER There’s a revolution brewing beneath the Stacks. The Sterling Memorial Library Memorabilia Room opened its “Himalayans Collection at Yale” exhibit Feb. 4, displaying samples of Himalayan collections from across the University. The exhibit brings together artifacts and manuscripts acquired by the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, the Yale Center for British Art, the Yale Divinity School and Sterling Library throughout Yale’s long relationship with the region. The exhibit was created in the hopes of bridging the gap between departments studying the Himalayas separately. “Yale often feels very segmented and fragmented,” said Andrew Quintman, a religious studies professor, co-curator of the exhibit and member of the Yale Himalaya Initiative. “The study of the Himalayas is a wonderful means to bringing people from various backgrounds unified together in a common cause.” Quintman said the Himalayan region serves well as a unifying topic since it lies, geographically and intellectually, at the juncture of traditional areas of study. The Himalayas sit at the meeting place of East, South and Southeast Asia, and are an important region in fields ranging from religious studies to art and at schools like the School of Forestry & Environmental Studies and the School of Public Health, among others. But the Himalayas’ position at the
intersection of disciplines and countries has kept the area in the academic shadows for years, Quintman said. Its location between India and China, two of the fastest-growing countries in the world, caused the area to be overlooked and understudied. Quintman explained that only during the past eight or nine years has Yale seen a resurgence in interest in the area. “It’s a part of the world which is often seen as peripheral — the Himalayan region is anything but,” said Sara Shneiderman, a professor of anthropology and South Asian studies who is a member of the Yale Himalaya Initiative. The Himalayas are a center of environmental transformation, climate change and ecological transitions, making it a target area for environmental studies, Shneiderman said. She added that studying the region’s history and contemporary politics can enrich scholars’ understanding of global alignment and realignment due to its location between politically powerful countries. By bringing together artifacts from different parts of the University, the exhibit highlights these important qualities of the area. “We have all of these bits and pieces,” said Mark Turin, director of the Yale Himalaya Initiative. “Our exhibit is the first to try to integrate them and put them in conversation and see what interests emerge.” Turin said that since the collections have been scattered throughout the University for decades, it has not been possi-
ble to display the diversity and interconnectedness of individual departments’ holdings. Visitors to various exhibits throughout campus have always gotten a disjointed view of what the University has to offer, causing students and scholars alike to dismiss the region’s prominence in the academic realm. That the exhibit was co-curated by two professors from different departments and a curator at Sterling — Sarah Calhoun — demonstrates its interdisciplinary focus, Turin explained. “By putting [the pieces] together in one case, we hope that connectivity will grow,” Turin said. The exhibit also highlights Yale’s historically close relationship with the Himalayas through artifacts like the first volume of the 100-volume Lhasa Kangyur, which is part of the Tibetan Buddhist canon. The collection was acquired by Wesley Needham, a self-taught expert on Tibet who worked unofficially at the Beinecke in 1950, through connections he forged with the 14th Dalai Lama of Tibet. Interest in the Himalayan region is crescendoing among Yale students, Turin said, pointing to the rich course selection on the region’s history, culture and languages. Turin said he hopes that by bringing the University’s Himalayan holdings to the forefront, international scholars will be drawn to Yale to work on the collection as residents and fellows. The exhibit will be open until March 31. Contact JESSICA HALLAM at jessica.hallam@yale.edu .
Taps dance through history
BY ERIC XIAO STAFF REPORTER
JESSE SCHRECK
of them,” Lovejoy said. Lovejoy said she has personally choreographed pieces to artists like Maroon 5 and Adele. The show will also include examples of modern “stomp” tap, which is done a cappella, Hosch said. Hosch explained that the comedic, time-travel-themed interludes align with the show’s spirit, because the purpose of tap has always been first and foremost to entertain.
It’s free, it’s very high energy. … It’s fun percussion with your feet. JULIA HOSCH ‘14 Member, Taps dance group “It’s free, it’s very high energy. … It’s fun percussion with your feet,” Hosch said, adding that the style was born out of a mix between Irish step dancing and African-American dance. “It’s a very American form of dance.” Hosch said that because tap is such a niche style, the group manages to bring together people on campus from many backgrounds, including Yale College, the Law School and the School of Medicine. Isabella More ’10 LAW ’13, who has been dancing with Taps since she came to Yale College as a freshman, said she has witnessed the group shift from an almost entirely undergraduate membership to one with a significantly higher concentration of graduate students. She explained that the flexibility and laidback nature of the group have made it easier to continue being a part of it for the past seven years, despite other commitments. “Tap to the Future” will run from Feb. 7–9 at the Off-Broadway Theater. SAMANTHA GARDNER/CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER
Contact ANYA GRENIER at anna.grenier@yale.edu .
“Tap to the Future,” the upcoming show of the Taps dance group, will feature a diverse collection of student-choreographed pieces.
The American dream has taken hold of a sleepy Irish town in Marie Jones’ 1996 play “Stones in His Pockets,” currently staged at the Yale Repertory Theatre by director Evan Yionoulis ’82 DRA ’85. A Hollywood film crew has come to shoot on location, upending the townspeople’s lives and infecting everyone with the desire to be rich and famous. Two of these people are Charlie Conlon (Euan Morton) and Jake Quinn (Fred Arsenault). Cast as extras in the film, they “dig turf,” “look dispossessed” and, between takes, talk about their aspirations to be Somebodies. After all, the Somebodies very clearly have the power. There’s Simon, the first assistant director who constantly relays his orders through Aisling, his faithful and bossy subordinate. Then there is Clem, the anxious, flamboyant director, and Kurt Steiner, the hunky American actor. Above all, there is Caroline Giovanni, the narcissistic American starlet with sultry eyes and swaying hips. She is the queen bee on this set, engaging with the locals reluctantly, as if she belonged to a higher breed of human. In reality, of course, she is just as human as everyone else. This is made clear by the fact that she — like Simon, Aisling, Clem, Kurt and every townsperson — is played by either Morton or Arsenault. In this respect, the play is a joy to watch: As the action moves from the cafeteria to Caroline’s dressing room, from the movie set to the local pub and back again, the two actors engage in impressive shape-shifting acrobatics. Their characters are diverse in speech and physicality, yet the movement between them is elegant and precise — never do we wonder who is speaking, or to whom. This ability to conjure up an entire world is almost magical; sometimes, in moments of rapid character changes, it is easy to forget that there are only two actors on stage. Through it all, Charlie and Jake are our unambiguous protagonists. Though the play takes comic detours into other lives, our focus is on this pair of extras. Starryeyed Charlie is the optimist of the two — he has a film script that is bound to get him noticed. “Doesn’t matter if you’re nobody,” he tells a skeptical Jake. “Talent is talent, and that wins out in the end.” But Jake isn’t so easily convinced. He has seen the inner workings of the Hollywood machine, and he knows that the path to the top is more nepotistic than meritocratic. Jake is also principled; he refuses to sacrifice his culture on the altar of fame. He will not be complicit in romanticizing Irish peasanthood to advance his own career, even when Caroline gives him the opportunity to do just that. By the play’s conclusion, Charlie and Jake have decided to break from selfish, soulless Hollywood. They’ll make their own film! As the lights fade to black, they breathlessly plan its opening moments. The vision is uplifting, but pause to think about it, and you realize they are doomed to fail. Yet here we are not supposed to think. After dedicating nearly two hours to exposing the evils of our fame-driven capitalism, “Stones in His Pockets” neuters its own criticism, claiming implicitly that an evil system is no match for personal integrity. But that is wrong. The system has money, power and status. It is hegemonic. To pretend otherwise is to falsely assuage. “Stones in His Pockets” should conclude with a vision of how to move forward; instead, Yionoulis’ production acts in service of the very evil it seems to diagnose. The worst part is that it is so entertaining in the process. Contact JESSE SCHRECK at jesse.schreck@yale.edu .
PAGE 6
YALE DAILY NEWS · WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 2013 · yaledailynews.com
YALE DAILY NEWS · WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 2013 · yaledailynews.com
PAGE 7
ARTS & CULTURE
“Building a better you is the first step to building a better America.” ZIG ZIGLAR AMERICAN AUTHOR, SALESMAN AND MOTIVATIONAL SPEAKER
Inaugural poet talks ‘One Today’ BY CAROLINE PRINGLE CONTRIBUTING REPORTER Two inaugural poets shared one stage for the first time in history at the Ezra Stiles Master’s House Tuesday afternoon. Students, alumni, professors and the media packed the Stiles Master’s House to see Richard Blanco’s first public appearance since his recitation of “One Today” at President Barack Obama’s second inauguration on Jan. 21. The nation’s fifth and youngest inaugural poet is also the first Latino and openly gay poet to receive the honor. Elizabeth Alexander, chair of Yale’s African American Studies Department and the inaugural poet at Obama’s 2009 inauguration, joined Blanco. Following a reading of “One Today” and other selected poems, Blanco described his role as an “emotional historian” and the task of encapsulating the national condition in poetry. Alexander led the discussion with questions of immigration, nostalgia, patriotism and Beyoncé. Blanco said he was shocked to receive the honor of crafting the inaugural poem. “I had to pull over and sit on
the side of the road and basically weep,” he recalled. According to Blanco, the process of writing the inaugural poem began in some sense during his time at college. His first assignment in a creative writing course was to answer the question: What is America? Blanco read the resulting poem, which is titled “América” and describes his Cuban family’s celebration of Thanksgiving, for Tuesday’s audience.
[The inaugural poem is an] assertion that poetry has a place in political and civil discourse. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER Inaugural poet, Obama’s 2009 inauguration “It really was almost fate that that very first poem started me writing on that theme of cultural identity, cultural negotiation and really asking what is America,” he said. “Though that didn’t make
the inaugural poem much easier to write.” Blanco said the White House gave him two to three weeks to write three different poems for the inauguration. He began writing at his kitchen table. Drawing from inaugural poets who came before him, including Maya Angelou and Alexander, Blanco said he included imagery related to nature and the common American people. He added that including autobiographical elements was intimidating due to the public nature of the address, yet necessary in order to take an emotional “snapshot” of the country. In his inaugural address, President Obama referred to contentious national issues like immigration reform and made a historic mention of gay rights. When asked how the president’s words affected Blanco as an openly gay immigrant, he said the speech made him feel welcome and gave him “the chutzpah to go on stage.” Blanco said he had never completely embraced being American until that day. Following his recitation of “One Today” at the inauguration, Blanco turned to his mother and said, “Well, Mom, I think we’re finally American.”
Exhibit unites Himalayan artifacts
At the end of the Tea, Alexander expressed her pride in Blanco as a representation of American poets. She added that she hopes the inaugural poem can serve as an “assertion that poetry has a place in political and civil discourse.” Blanco also discussed his method for writing poetry, explaining that his training in civil engineering at Florida International University helped his editing process by allowing him to look at a poem analytically with a keen eye for structure, pattern and logic. He advised students interested in poetry to write about subjects they really care about. Three students interviewed said the two poets renewed their interest in poetry. Katherine Barnes ’16 said she appreciated the sense of family and community Blanco fostered in the inaugural poem. Blanco said he plans to publish a memoir and a book including the three poems he wrote for the 57th presidential inauguration. Robert Frost served as the first inaugural poet at President John F. Kennedy’s 1961 inauguration. Contact CAROLINE PRINGLE at caroline.pringle@yale.edu .
JOYCE XI/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER
Richard Blanco, who recited his poem “One Today” at President Barack Obama’s second inauguration on Jan. 21, discussed the process of composing the inaugural poem in a Master’s Tea on Tuesday.
Pianist Emanuel Ax returns to Yale BY ANYA GRENIER STAFF REPORTER
While many singers and musicians from around the world are dreaming of winning their first Grammy Award this Sunday, such an achievement is but a memory for Emanuel Ax. Ax, an internationally renowned pianist who has won seven Grammy Awards, will perform a recital tonight in Sprague Hall as part of the School of Music’s Horowitz Piano Series. Following performances in previous seasons of the series, Ax will return to play works by Beethoven, Chopin and Schoenberg. Ax said he usually prepares for all his performances in the same way: by remaining true to the composers’ intentions. “What all performers try to do is get the composer’s message across to the audience in a way that is exciting and illuminating,” he said. Boris Berman, the piano series’ artistic director, said Ax’s musical style is unique because of his incredible dedication to pieces’ true meanings. “There are so many able performers who dazzle with their technique, but there is not much beyond the technique,” Berman said. “For Emanuel Ax, the music and the pursuit of its innermost essence is what comes first.” Ax will devote the entire second half of his recital to two pieces by Frédéric Chopin, “Nocturne No. 1 in F minor” and “Sonata No. 3 in B minor.” Berman and School of Music professor Wei-Yi Yang GRD ’04 both called Chopin’s “Sonata No. 3” one of his greatest, most significant works. Berman said the piece is extremely rich in its technical aspects, and Yang explained how the sonata explores the evolu-
Taps, Yale’s only all-tap dancing group, will highlight the dance form through the ages in its annual showcase this week, which is the group’s only performance of the year. The group’s graduate and undergraduate dancers have been preparing the show, called “Tap to the Future,” since the beginning of fall semester, Taps president Ruth Lovejoy ’13 said. The performance will include an extremely diverse collection of entirely student-choreographed pieces, as well as a storyline that will unfold during the interludes between dances, she said. This skit will involve “Back to the Future” protagonist Marty McFly accidentally traveling back to the 18th century and meeting George Washington, followed by the two of them time-traveling through various decades of music and tap-dancing together. “Tap to the Future” will include a series of dances with fewer members and a group finale to a mash-up of songs from the 1990s, Taps member Holly Hajare ’15 explained. Lovejoy said the group’s smaller size and many students’ relative lack of experience with choreography have sometimes made it a challenge to develop enough original material for past showcases. But this year, she explained, the group did not face similar difficulties, in part due to an influx of freshman dancers willing to try new things. The pieces in the show span a variety of styles, from dances done in an earlier, more traditional “swing” style tap to faster modern pieces done to pop music, Taps member Julia Hosch ’14 said. The group will also perform to songs from musicals, she said, adding that tap was first made famous by its appearance in Broadway shows. “I choreograph to songs I listen to generally that already have interesting rhythms in them or would be conducive to having interesting rhythms put on top
LISA MARIE MAZZUCCO/CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER
Grammy Award-winning pianist Emanuel Ax will perform in a recital in Sprague Hall tonight, showcasing pieces by Beethoven, Chopin and Schoenberg. tion of musical themes and motifs throughout a piece. Yang added that Chopin is also well-known for his nocturnes. “In terms of the atmosphere and the fantasy involved in writing a nocturne, Chopin is unparalleled,” Yang said. Ax’s repertoire will also include Beethoven’s “Pathétique” sonata, which School of Music Dean Robert Blocker called an interesting program choice. The piece is accessible to younger students in terms of
technique, but holds much deeper meaning for the mature artist, he explained in an email. Yang said the piece is generally considered one of Beethoven’s more well-known works due to its broad appeal. “It is something that a lot of people can relate to — it can be interpreted many ways depending on what people associate with it,” Yang said. Although the three composers featured in the recital are representative of three successive
musical periods, Yang said Ax’s performance is not merely a history lesson but rather a display of opposite extremes in musical form, comparing the lengthy Beethoven and Chopin sonatas to the compressed Schoenberg piece. But Yang also noted the similarities that exist between these vastly different works. Each movement of a sonata needs the context of the entire piece to be fully understood, he explained, as do Schoenberg’s “Six Little Piano Pieces,” which Ax
will also play tonight. “There is continuity in the sense that I think all of the great composers are forward-looking and revolutionary, and that’s certainly true for Beethoven, Chopin and Schoenberg,” Ax said. Ax was awarded an honorary doctorate of music from Yale in 2007. Contact ERIC XIAO at eric.xiao@yale.edu .
Lighthanded and heavyhearted JENNIFER GERSTEN/CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER
The new Himalayans Collection exhibit in Sterling Memorial Library is a sign of growing interest in the region over the past few years at BY JESSICA HALLAM STAFF REPORTER There’s a revolution brewing beneath the Stacks. The Sterling Memorial Library Memorabilia Room opened its “Himalayans Collection at Yale” exhibit Feb. 4, displaying samples of Himalayan collections from across the University. The exhibit brings together artifacts and manuscripts acquired by the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, the Yale Center for British Art, the Yale Divinity School and Sterling Library throughout Yale’s long relationship with the region. The exhibit was created in the hopes of bridging the gap between departments studying the Himalayas separately. “Yale often feels very segmented and fragmented,” said Andrew Quintman, a religious studies professor, co-curator of the exhibit and member of the Yale Himalaya Initiative. “The study of the Himalayas is a wonderful means to bringing people from various backgrounds unified together in a common cause.” Quintman said the Himalayan region serves well as a unifying topic since it lies, geographically and intellectually, at the juncture of traditional areas of study. The Himalayas sit at the meeting place of East, South and Southeast Asia, and are an important region in fields ranging from religious studies to art and at schools like the School of Forestry & Environmental Studies and the School of Public Health, among others. But the Himalayas’ position at the
intersection of disciplines and countries has kept the area in the academic shadows for years, Quintman said. Its location between India and China, two of the fastest-growing countries in the world, caused the area to be overlooked and understudied. Quintman explained that only during the past eight or nine years has Yale seen a resurgence in interest in the area. “It’s a part of the world which is often seen as peripheral — the Himalayan region is anything but,” said Sara Shneiderman, a professor of anthropology and South Asian studies who is a member of the Yale Himalaya Initiative. The Himalayas are a center of environmental transformation, climate change and ecological transitions, making it a target area for environmental studies, Shneiderman said. She added that studying the region’s history and contemporary politics can enrich scholars’ understanding of global alignment and realignment due to its location between politically powerful countries. By bringing together artifacts from different parts of the University, the exhibit highlights these important qualities of the area. “We have all of these bits and pieces,” said Mark Turin, director of the Yale Himalaya Initiative. “Our exhibit is the first to try to integrate them and put them in conversation and see what interests emerge.” Turin said that since the collections have been scattered throughout the University for decades, it has not been possi-
ble to display the diversity and interconnectedness of individual departments’ holdings. Visitors to various exhibits throughout campus have always gotten a disjointed view of what the University has to offer, causing students and scholars alike to dismiss the region’s prominence in the academic realm. That the exhibit was co-curated by two professors from different departments and a curator at Sterling — Sarah Calhoun — demonstrates its interdisciplinary focus, Turin explained. “By putting [the pieces] together in one case, we hope that connectivity will grow,” Turin said. The exhibit also highlights Yale’s historically close relationship with the Himalayas through artifacts like the first volume of the 100-volume Lhasa Kangyur, which is part of the Tibetan Buddhist canon. The collection was acquired by Wesley Needham, a self-taught expert on Tibet who worked unofficially at the Beinecke in 1950, through connections he forged with the 14th Dalai Lama of Tibet. Interest in the Himalayan region is crescendoing among Yale students, Turin said, pointing to the rich course selection on the region’s history, culture and languages. Turin said he hopes that by bringing the University’s Himalayan holdings to the forefront, international scholars will be drawn to Yale to work on the collection as residents and fellows. The exhibit will be open until March 31. Contact JESSICA HALLAM at jessica.hallam@yale.edu .
Taps dance through history
BY ERIC XIAO STAFF REPORTER
JESSE SCHRECK
of them,” Lovejoy said. Lovejoy said she has personally choreographed pieces to artists like Maroon 5 and Adele. The show will also include examples of modern “stomp” tap, which is done a cappella, Hosch said. Hosch explained that the comedic, time-travel-themed interludes align with the show’s spirit, because the purpose of tap has always been first and foremost to entertain.
It’s free, it’s very high energy. … It’s fun percussion with your feet. JULIA HOSCH ‘14 Member, Taps dance group “It’s free, it’s very high energy. … It’s fun percussion with your feet,” Hosch said, adding that the style was born out of a mix between Irish step dancing and African-American dance. “It’s a very American form of dance.” Hosch said that because tap is such a niche style, the group manages to bring together people on campus from many backgrounds, including Yale College, the Law School and the School of Medicine. Isabella More ’10 LAW ’13, who has been dancing with Taps since she came to Yale College as a freshman, said she has witnessed the group shift from an almost entirely undergraduate membership to one with a significantly higher concentration of graduate students. She explained that the flexibility and laidback nature of the group have made it easier to continue being a part of it for the past seven years, despite other commitments. “Tap to the Future” will run from Feb. 7–9 at the Off-Broadway Theater. SAMANTHA GARDNER/CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER
Contact ANYA GRENIER at anna.grenier@yale.edu .
“Tap to the Future,” the upcoming show of the Taps dance group, will feature a diverse collection of student-choreographed pieces.
The American dream has taken hold of a sleepy Irish town in Marie Jones’ 1996 play “Stones in His Pockets,” currently staged at the Yale Repertory Theatre by director Evan Yionoulis ’82 DRA ’85. A Hollywood film crew has come to shoot on location, upending the townspeople’s lives and infecting everyone with the desire to be rich and famous. Two of these people are Charlie Conlon (Euan Morton) and Jake Quinn (Fred Arsenault). Cast as extras in the film, they “dig turf,” “look dispossessed” and, between takes, talk about their aspirations to be Somebodies. After all, the Somebodies very clearly have the power. There’s Simon, the first assistant director who constantly relays his orders through Aisling, his faithful and bossy subordinate. Then there is Clem, the anxious, flamboyant director, and Kurt Steiner, the hunky American actor. Above all, there is Caroline Giovanni, the narcissistic American starlet with sultry eyes and swaying hips. She is the queen bee on this set, engaging with the locals reluctantly, as if she belonged to a higher breed of human. In reality, of course, she is just as human as everyone else. This is made clear by the fact that she — like Simon, Aisling, Clem, Kurt and every townsperson — is played by either Morton or Arsenault. In this respect, the play is a joy to watch: As the action moves from the cafeteria to Caroline’s dressing room, from the movie set to the local pub and back again, the two actors engage in impressive shape-shifting acrobatics. Their characters are diverse in speech and physicality, yet the movement between them is elegant and precise — never do we wonder who is speaking, or to whom. This ability to conjure up an entire world is almost magical; sometimes, in moments of rapid character changes, it is easy to forget that there are only two actors on stage. Through it all, Charlie and Jake are our unambiguous protagonists. Though the play takes comic detours into other lives, our focus is on this pair of extras. Starryeyed Charlie is the optimist of the two — he has a film script that is bound to get him noticed. “Doesn’t matter if you’re nobody,” he tells a skeptical Jake. “Talent is talent, and that wins out in the end.” But Jake isn’t so easily convinced. He has seen the inner workings of the Hollywood machine, and he knows that the path to the top is more nepotistic than meritocratic. Jake is also principled; he refuses to sacrifice his culture on the altar of fame. He will not be complicit in romanticizing Irish peasanthood to advance his own career, even when Caroline gives him the opportunity to do just that. By the play’s conclusion, Charlie and Jake have decided to break from selfish, soulless Hollywood. They’ll make their own film! As the lights fade to black, they breathlessly plan its opening moments. The vision is uplifting, but pause to think about it, and you realize they are doomed to fail. Yet here we are not supposed to think. After dedicating nearly two hours to exposing the evils of our fame-driven capitalism, “Stones in His Pockets” neuters its own criticism, claiming implicitly that an evil system is no match for personal integrity. But that is wrong. The system has money, power and status. It is hegemonic. To pretend otherwise is to falsely assuage. “Stones in His Pockets” should conclude with a vision of how to move forward; instead, Yionoulis’ production acts in service of the very evil it seems to diagnose. The worst part is that it is so entertaining in the process. Contact JESSE SCHRECK at jesse.schreck@yale.edu .
PAGE 8
YALE DAILY NEWS · WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 2013 · yaledailynews.com
WORLD
“The year was 2081, and everyone was finally equal.” KURT VONNEGUT OPENING LINE OF VONNEGUT’S SHORT STORY “HARRISON BERGERON”
Iranian leader visits Egypt
Britain votes in favor of gay marriage
BY MAGGIE MICHAEL ASSOCIATED PRESS CAIRO — President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s visit to Cairo on Tuesday, the first by an Iranian leader in more than three decades, highlights efforts by Egypt’s Islamist leader to thaw long frigid ties between the two regional heavyweights. Although the official welcome was warm, there was unscripted discord from Sunni protesters angry over Iran’s support for the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad, as well as decades of sectarian animosity between Shiite-led Iran and the region’s Sunni majority. At one point, Ahmadinejad was forced to flee an ancient mosque in downtown Cairo after a Syrian protester took off his shoes and threw them at him. Later, anti-Iranian protesters raised their shoes up while blocking the main gates to Al-Azhar, the Sunni world’s most prestigious religious institution, where Egypt’s most prominent cleric chided Ahmadinejad for interfering in the affairs of Sunni nations. The protests illustrate the limits to how far and how quickly Egypt’s Islamist President Mohammed Morsi can go in reaching out to Iran: His Sunni allies at home view mainly Shiite Iran as a bitter rival, and Cairo can’t afford to alienate Washington and Gulf Arab states who seek to isolate Tehran. The three-day visit, centered around an Islamic summit, was an attempt by Morsi to strike an independent foreign policy and reassert Egypt’s historic regional leadership role following the ouster of Hosni Mubarak, a close U.S. ally who shared Washington’s deep suspicions of Tehran. Such a visit by an Iranian leader would have been unthinkable under Mubarak. Morsi gave Ahmadinejad a redcarpet welcome on the tarmac at Cairo airport, shaking his hand, hugging and exchanging a kiss on each check. The two leaders then sat down for a 20-minute talk that focused on the civil war in Syria, security
BY SYLVIA HUI ASSOCATED PRESS
AMR NABIL/ASSOCIATED PRESS
Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad waved to Egyptian worshippers in Cairo on Tuesday. officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief the media. Iran is Damascus’ closest regional ally, while Egypt is among those that have called on Assad to step down. Still, the chasm inherited from 34 years of bitter relations and the rift between overwhelmingly Sunni Egypt and Iran’s Shiite leadership were on display. Sunni-Shiite tensions dominated talks between Ahmadinejad and Egypt’s most prominent cleric, Sheik Ahmed el-Tayeb, who upbraided the Iranian leader
on a string of issues and warned against Iranian interference in Gulf nations, particularly Bahrain, where the ruling Sunni minority has faced protests by the Shiite majority. El-Tayeb said attempts to spread Shiite Islam in mainly Sunni Arab nations were unacceptable and called for a halt to bloodshed in Syria, where Tehran’s ally Assad has been battling rebels, according to a statement by Al-Azhar about the meeting. The Sunni cleric also demanded that Ahmadinejad speak out against insults hurled at the first
caliphs who succeeded the Prophet Muhammad and other figures close to the prophet in the 7th century. Those figures are widely resented among Shiites because they are seen as having pushed aside Ali, the prophet’s son-in-law, who Shiites consider his rightful successor. The dispute over succession is at the root of the centuries-old split between Islam’s Shiite and Sunni sects. The meeting was “tense,” acknowledged an aide to the sheik, Hussein al-Shafie, speaking at a news conference with Ahmadinejad that el-Tayeb did not attend.
LONDON — A bill to legalize same-sex marriage in Britain cleared a major hurdle Tuesday, as lawmakers voted overwhelmingly in favor of the proposals championed by Prime Minister David Cameron. The vote in the House of Commons — 400 to 175 in support of the proposed legislation — will be followed by more detailed parliamentary debates. The proposals also require the approval of the House of Lords before they become law. The process could take months, but if approved, the bill is expected to take effect in 2015 and enable same-sex couples to get married in both civil and religious ceremonies, provided the religious institution consents. The bill also lets couples who had previously entered into civil partnerships convert their relationship into a marriage. “Tonight’s vote shows Parliament is very strongly in favor of equal marriage,” Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg said. “I genuinely believe that we will look back on today as a landmark for equality in Britain.” The lopsided vote was a qualified victory for Cameron, with around half of his party’s lawmakers rejecting the proposals or abstaining. Nonetheless, strong support from the leftleaning Labour Party and Liberal Democrats party ensured the Commons approval. After the ballots were counted, Cameron acknowledged that “strong views exist on both sides,” but said the result was a “step forward for our country.” Officials have stressed that all religious organizations can decide for themselves if they want to “opt in” to holding gay weddings. However, the Church of England, the country’s official faith, is barred from performing such ceremonies. That provision aims to ensure that the Church, which opposes gay marriage, is protected from legal claims that as the official state religion it must marry anyone who requests it. Currently, same-sex couples only have the option of a civil partnership, which offers the same legal rights and protections on issues such as inheritance, pensions and child maintenance.
Bulgaria links Hezbollah to attack on Israelis BY VESELIN TOSHKOV AND PAISLEY DODDS ASSOCIATED PRESS SOFIA, Bulgaria — Hezbollah was behind a bus attack that killed five Israeli tourists in Bulgaria last year, investigators said Tuesday, describing a sophisticated bombing carried out by a terrorist cell that included Canadian and Australian citizens. The announcement brought renewed pressure on the European Union from the U.S., Israel and Canada to designate the group a terrorist organization and to crack down on its fundraising operations across Europe. The EU, which regards Hezbollah as a legitimate political organization, has resisted such a move. Interior Minister Tsvetan Tsvetanov said two of the suspects in the July 2012 attack had
been living in Lebanon for years — one with a Canadian passport and the other with an Australian one. He said investigators had traced their activities back to their home countries. “We have well-grounded reasons to suggest that the two were members of the militant wing of Hezbollah,” Tsvetanov said. A third suspect entered Bulgaria with them on June 28, he said, without giving details. Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati condemned the attack and said his country would cooperate fully. Hezbollah, a Shiite militant group and political party in Lebanon that emerged in response to Israel’s 1982 invasion, has been linked to attacks and kidnappings on Israeli and Jewish interests around the world.
The group has denied involvement in the Bulgaria bombing, and Hezbollah officials in Beirut declined comment Tuesday.
We have well-grounded reasons to suggest that the two were members of the militant wing of Hezbollah. TSVETAN TSVETANOV Interior minister, Bulgaria The bomb exploded as the Israeli tourists were on their way from the airport to their hotel in the Black Sea resort of Burgas. The blast also killed a Bulgarian bus driver and the suspected bomber,
a tall and lanky pale-skinned man wearing a baseball cap and dressed like a tourist. Although it was initially believed to be a suicide bombing, Europol Director Rob Wainwright told The Associated Press that investigators now believe the bomber never intended to die. He said a Europol expert who analyzed a fragment of a circuit board determined that the bomb was detonated remotely. He said investigators were still looking into who detonated it and how one of the suspected bombers was killed. Bulgarian investigators found no links to Iran, which Israel had accused of playing a role in the attack. The findings increased pressure on Europe to declare Hezbollah a terrorist organization.
HUSSEIN MALLA/ASSOCIATED PRESS
Hezbollah fighters hold their party flags as they attend a rally to commemorate slain commander Imad Mughniyeh and two other leaders.
YALE DAILY NEWS · WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 2012 · yaledailynews.com
PAGE 9
BULLETIN BOARD
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SCIENCE HILL BY SPENCER KATZ
ON CAMPUS WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 6 5:15 PM “The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down” Talk by English professor Anne Fadiman on her book “The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down,” 15 years after it was first published. Free and open to the general public. Sponsored by the Program for Humanities in Medicine. Anlyan Center (300 Cedar St.), Auditorium.
THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 7 4:30 PM Jackson Town Hall Meeting with Kofi Annan The meeting will feature Kofi Annan, the seventh secretary-general of the United Nations. Yale Law School (127 Wall St.), Levinson Auditorium.
ANTIMALS BY ALEX SODI
7:30 PM Connecticut Poetry Circuit Prize Reading Undergraduate poetry prize-winner, Amelia Urry ’13, and co-winners from other Connecticut colleges and universities will read from their verse. Timothy Dwight College (63 Wall St.), Master’s House.
FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 8 12:00 PM “New Trends in Contemporary Iranian Literature: 1953 to 1989” Reza Baraheni, an Iranian poet, novelist, literary critic and human rights activist, will give the Iran Colloquium talk. Sponsored by the American Institute for Iranian Studies, the Iranian Studies Initiative at Yale and the Council on Middle East Studies. Open to the general public. Luce Hall (34 Hillhouse Ave.), Room 202. 12:30 PM “Male Infertility: The Hidden Reproductive Health Problem” Eat lunch with Marcia Inhorn, professor of anthropology and international affairs, who will be discussing “Male Infertility: The Hidden Reproductive Health Problem.” Inhorn served as chair of the Council on Middle East Studies from 2008 to 2011, and was also president of the Society for Medical Anthropology of the American Anthropological Association. Sponsored by the Public Health Coalition. Silliman College (505 College St.), Dining Annex.
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YALE DAILY NEWS · WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 2013 · yaledailynews.com
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Congress challenges drone strikes BY LARA JAKES ASSOCIATED PRESS WASHINGTON — Uncomfortable with the Obama administration’s use of deadly drones, a growing number in Congress is looking to limit America’s authority to kill suspected terrorists, even U.S. citizens. The Democratic-led outcry was emboldened by the revelation in a newly surfaced Justice Department memo that shows drones can strike against a wider range of threats, with less evidence, than previously believed. The drone program, which has been used from Pakistan across the Middle East and into North Africa to find and kill an unknown number of suspected terrorists, is expected to be a top topic of debate when the Senate Intelligence Committee grills John Brennan, the White House’s pick for CIA chief, at a hearing Thursday. The White House on Tuesday defended its lethal drone program by
citing the very laws that some in Congress once believed were appropriate in the years immediately after the Sept. 11 attacks but now think may be too broad.
It has to be in the agenda of this Congress to reconsider the scope of action of drones. CHRIS COONS Democratic senator, Delaware “It has to be in the agenda of this Congress to reconsider the scope of action of drones and use of deadly force by the United States around the world because the original authorization of use of force, I think, is being strained to its limits,” Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., said in a recent interview.
Rep. Steny Hoyer of Maryland, the No. 2 Democrat in the House, said Tuesday that “it deserves a serious look at how we make the decisions in government to take out, kill, eliminate, whatever word you want to use, not just American citizens but other citizens as well.” Hoyer added: “We ought to carefully review our policies as a country.” The Senate Foreign Relations Committee likely will hold hearings on U.S. drone policy, an aide said Tuesday, and Chairman Robert Menendez, D-N.J., and the panel’s top Republican, Sen. Bob Corker of Tennessee, both have quietly expressed concerns about the deadly operations. And earlier this week, a group of 11 Democratic and Republican senators urged President Barack Obama to release a classified Justice Department legal opinion justifying when U.S. counterterror missions, including drone strikes, can be used to kill American citizens abroad.
CHARLES DHARAPAK/ASSOCIATED PRESS
President Barack Obama will ask Congress to come up with tens of billions of dollars to put off the automatic across the board cuts that are scheduled to kick in on March 1. BY JIM KUHNHENN AND ANDREW TAYLOR ASSOCIATED PRESS WASHINGTON — Eager to buy time and avoid economic pain, President Barack Obama urged Congress on Tuesday to pass targeted shortterm spending cuts and higher taxes as a way to put off sweeping, automatic cuts that would slice deeply into military and domestic programs starting March 1. Obama’s appeal came as Congress’ budget office projected a yearly federal deficit under $1 trillion for the first time in his presidency and as Republicans applied political pressure on the president to submit balanced budgets, pushing fiscal issues back to the forefront in Washington after weeks devoted to immigration and guns. A short-term deficit-trimming measure would once again delay the broad and onerous spending cuts that
are unpopular with both political parties, underscoring the government’s difficulty adopting long-term budget policies. Obama conceded the problem, even though he has previously scoffed at temporary budget reprieves. “Let’s keep on chipping away at this problem together, as Democrats and Republicans, to give our workers and our businesses the support that they need to thrive in the weeks and months ahead,” Obama said in a short statement in the White House briefing room. Illustrating the challenge for the government, the Congressional Budget Office said the government will run a $845 billion deficit this year. That’s down from last year’s $1.1 trillion but still high enough to require the government to borrow 24 cents of every dollar it spends. The report predicted the deficit would decline to $430 billion by 2015, the lowest since President George W. Bush’s last year in office.
KIRSTY WIGGLESWORTH/ASSOCIATED PRESS
An unmanned U.S. Predator drone flies over Kandahar Air Field in southern Afghanistan.
YALE DAILY NEWS · WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 2013 · yaledailynews.com
PAGE 11
SPORTS
“Everyting negative - pressure, challenges - is all an opportunity for me to rise.” KOBE BRYANT, AMERICAN PROFESSIONAL BASKETBALL PLAYER
Yale falls at HYP meets
Trouble in soccer paradise COLUMN FROM PAGE 12
Nov. 30 to Dec. 2. “Brown is the last dual meet of the season and personally, this is the last time for me to race at the exhibition pool,” Lovett said. “We are going to win, and we want to end the season with a record of 8–2.” The Bulldogs will take on the Bears on Saturday at 1 p.m. at the Robert J.H. Kiphuth Exhibition Pool at Payne Whitney Gymnasium.
I recently met a young woman from Moscow, who told me that hooliganism was so bad there that on the mornings of days when Spartak Moscow played, local news stations advise people not to go near the stadiums or on public transportation towards them. In some cases, these hooligans have quite a bit of political importance. Serbia’s Red Star Belgrade has perhaps world soccer’s bestknown hooligans, the Delije. In the early 1990s, the Delije formed the core of Arkan’s Tigers, a paramilitary group responsible for horrific war crimes in the Yugoslav Wars. Hooliganism is not the only way in which soccer is betraying its purpose as a unifying force. On Jan. 30, Beitar Jerusalem signed two Muslim players from Chechnya. The two players have not yet played a game for their new club, but have already been abused by 150 fans of the club who came to a practice to spit at the new players and to insult them. Beitar is the only team in Israel never to have had an Arab player. Their racism extends beyond Arabs, apparently, and is already welldocumented. In 2005, Beitar signed a Nigerian player, but he lasted less than a season due to the abuse he faced. So now you see that soccer is not as pure as it seems. And it gets even worse. On Monday, Europol (a European police intelligence agency) released the findings of a 19-month investigation: 680 matches from roughly 2008–’11, in countries all over the globe, have been implicated in a match-fixing scandal orchestrated by a Singaporean crime syndicate. Almost no country was untouched by Europol’s findings. Soccer certainly has its stories of great harmony: The Ivorian Chelsea striker Didier Drogba called for peace in his native country, and civil war halted. South Africa showed how far it has come since apartheid by hosting the 2010 World Cup. And I have seen with my own eyes several players who have risen up from the favelas of Brazil to earn large professional contracts. But that harmony is not the whole story with soccer today. When a sport further antagonizes rival groups and negatively affects larger geopolitical schema, it has a major problem. Not to mention that when people get killed simply for attending a game, something is out of control.
Contact GRANT BRONSDON at grant.bronsdon@yale.edu .
Contact JOSEPH ROSENBERG at joseph.rosenberg@yale.edu .
BRIANNE BOWEN/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER
This tri-meet constituted the first losses of the seasons for the men’s team, which is now 7–2 after losses to Harvard and Princeton. SWIMMING FROM PAGE 12 seven-tenths of a second. Forrester is last year’s Ivy League champion in the event. When asked if Forrester can surpass her feats from last year, Randolph said she believes she can. “She’s really taken our coach’s advice to heart. … I definitely see her improving on last year’s results,” Randolph said. Another standout group for the Bulldogs was the freshman class. Eva Fabian ’16, Casey Lincoln ’16
and Emma Smith ’16 all finished in the top seven of the 1,000-yard freestyle, and Olivia Grinker ’16 finished fourth in the 3-meter dive. “[Our freshmen] bring so much energy to our team which translates directly into their performances in the pool,” women’s team captain Joan Weaver ’13 said. “They’re inspiring.” Though the team lost 209–89 to Harvard and 197–103 to Princeton, one reason for the losses is the different approaches the teams take to the meet. Randolph said that while
the Bulldogs treat it like any other meet, both Harvard and Princeton are more concerned with winning the dual meet season. Now that the HYP meet is over, the team turns its focus to this Saturday’s home meet against Brown. “As with any dual meet, HYP was an opportunity to get a feel for what we need to work on in our training,” Weaver said. “[Our] attitude coming out is not of defeat; it is of motivation, eagerness and fire.” The Bulldogs beat Brown in their last competition against them on
Hoffman leads the Elis
Bulldogs fall short GYMNASTICS FROM PAGE 12
MARIA ZEPEDA/PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR
Senior duo Daniel Hoffman ’13 and Marc Powers ’13 have risen to become the Intercollegiate Tennis Association’s No. 19 ranked doubles pair. MEN’S TENNIS FROM PAGE 12 Hoffman’s favorites, the more competitive wins are some of his most memorable. In last year’s matchup against Columbia, Hoffman underwent a grueling four-hour match in which the momentum of the game swayed back and forth between him and his opponent. Finally, after going up 5–4 in the third set, Hoffman had worn his opponent down to the point where he could no longer continue playing due to leg cramps. Yale upset Columbia 4–3. “It was a huge upset and one of my highlights here at Yale,” Hoffman said. Developing the determination and skill to win a match that close took Hoffman a lifetime of tennis playing. Under the guidance and support of his coach, Nial Brash, at Menlo Circus Club, Hoffman was able to learn from Brash and improve his game consistently. “He has not only been a great
coach, but a fantastic mentor and role model,” Hoffman said. “He has been one of the biggest influences in my life.” In addition to playing tournaments in his home state of California, Hoffman traveled to New York, Texas, Florida, Hawaii and many other locations to compete. While it may seem mentally and physically taxing to travel and compete so regularly, it always gave Hoffman an opportunity to experience his favorite part of the game — putting together an opponents’ strengths and weaknesses like a puzzle. “There are a lot of subtle complexities that keep that game interesting for me,” Hoffman said. “My favorite part of the game is figuring out different strategies to use against different players.” Improving his own game has also been a rewarding process for Hoffman, Dorato said. Hoffman has been able to make an impact in doubles matchups due to his much improved volleying ability. As a result, the duo
route to fifth place. The meet was won by New Hampshire’s Austyn Fobes, who scored 39.275 points. “We’re really not competitive with each other at all because it’s all about the team,” Traina said about Li. “She definitely pushes me to work harder.” Although neither Li nor Traina placed higher than seventh in any of the individual events — the uneven parallel bars, the vault, the balance beam and the floor exercise — their overall efforts were still enough to capture the fourth and fifth spots in the all-around competition. Goldstein noted that the team performed well in the floor and beam routines. She also said that Lindsay Andsager ’13, the Elis’ specialist on the uneven bars, completed an especially impressive routine on the apparatus.
Andsager scored 9.750 points, good for fourth in the meet on the uneven bars. Two other Yale athletes finished in the top 10 in the all-around. Goldstein placed eighth with 37.350 points, and her senior teammate Tara Feld ’13 scored 37.625 points en route to a seventhplace finish. No other Bulldog athlete competed in all four events. “It was a big step up over our past meets,” Goldstein said. “I’m just hoping that as we continue going forward in season, we’ll keep doing that, keeping the focus and enthusiasm all meet and then I think we’ll be in really good shape for Ivies.” The gymnastics team will continue its season next weekend at the Big Red Invitational at Cornell. Contact ALEX EPPLER at alexander.eppler@yale.edu .
of Hoffman and partner Marc Powers ’13 has risen to become the Intercollegiate Tennis Association’s No. 19 ranked doubles pairing. But the success of the Yale tennis program extends far beyond Yale’s top doubles pair, Hoffman said. “We have a good mix of older and younger players contributing to our team,” Hoffman said. “I think this is the strongest team I have been on during my time at Yale.” While Hoffman has no plans to continue playing competitively after graduation, he knows he will not be able to let go of such an integral part of his life. “I hope to get the opportunity to join a club team in the area so that I can continue to play as I work,” Hoffman said. In addition to a 12–8 singles record, Hoffman defeated 14 out of 18 doubles pairs in the fall alongside Powers. Contact ASHTON WACKYM at ashton.wackym@yale.edu .
KATHRYN CRANDALL/CONTRBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER
Morgan Traina ’15 finished in fifth in the individual all-around with a score of 38.275, one spot behind teammate Joyce Li ’15.
IF YOU MISSED IT SCORES
NBA L.A. Lakers 92 Brooklyn 83
NBA Houston 140 Golden State 109
SPORTS QUICK HITS
NCAAM Arkansas 80 No. 2 Florida 69
NHL New Jersey 3 N.Y. Rangers 1
y
NIVEEN RASHEED, PRINCETON BASKETBALL TIGER NAMED TO WADE WATCH LIST The senior guard, who is averaging 16.6 points and 9.1 rebounds this season, was named to the midseason watch list for the Wade Trophy, an annual award given to the best women’s basketball player in Division I. Rasheed and the Tigers will visit Yale this Saturday.
MARK ARCOBELLO ’10 FORMER ELI PROMOTED TO NHL The former Yale All-American was called up to the NHL by the Edmonton Oilers from the Oklahoma City Barons of the American Hockey League. Arcobello starred on the Yale team that knocked off heavily favored North Dakota in the 2010 NCAA tournament.
NHL Toronto 3 Washington 2
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“We are going to win, and we want to end the season with a record of 8–2.” JARED LOVETT ’13 MEN’S SWIMMING TEAM YALE DAILY NEWS · WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 2013 · yaledailynews.com
HYP meets get the best of Elis
JOSEPH ROSENBERG
Soccer’s modern problem
SWIMMING
From a cursory glance, one would think we’re in a golden age of soccer. Lionel Messi is undoubtedly one of the greatest ever to lace up boots, Spain plays the beautiful game more beautifully than anyone else and the World Cup is being hosted by Brazil in just over a year’s time. But sport, and soccer in general (since it is the world’s game), is meant to unify people on a macro-scale. While Messi’s goals, Spain’s tikitaka and Brazil’s joga bonito leave us all in awe, there is still an awful lot that troubles me, most of it having to do with off-the-field issues that undermine what we see on it. Quite often, people die at soccer games. If you are American (like I am), you would probably be surprised at just how many. Almost exactly one year ago, 74 people were killed in a single riot after an Egyptian soccer game in Port Said. Fans rushed the field, the opposing team’s players were literally chased back into their locker room and absolute mayhem ensued. As punishment, an Egyptian court last week issued death sentences for 21 who were instrumental in the riot. Soccer hooliganism is a major problem all over the globe. In Argentina, when the two biggest teams, Boca Juniors and River Plate, play, it is almost expected that someone will die. This past year’s superclásico thankfully witnessed no fatalities, but there was still a scene of terror. The game was hosted at River Plate’s stadium, and when a security guard stationed in the Boca supporters’ section made a modest celebration after River Plate scored, he got the living daylights beat out of him. He was punched and kicked by about five or six males and thrown down the stairs of the upper deck of the stadium. SEE COLUMN PAGE 11
BRIANNE BOWEN/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER
The men’s swimming team was led by standout Andrew Heymann ’15, who broke his own school record in the 200-yard breaststroke. BY GRANT BRONSDON CONTRIBUTING REPORTER Neither the Yale men’s nor women’s swimming teams could come away with victories at their annual Harvard-Yale-Princeton meets, both finishing third in this past weekend’s competitions. The men’s team was led by standout Andrew Heymann ’15, who broke his own school record in the
200-yard breaststroke. But consistent with the outcome of the meet for the Bulldogs, that record was only good enough for fifth place. “Despite the loss, we swam well comparatively,” men’s team captain Jared Lovett ’13 said. Outside of Heymann, the only other Eli to finish in the top five of an individual event was Rob Harder ’15, who turned in a fifth-place performance in the 1,650-yard free-
Hoffman ’13 a ‘magician’ on the court It is easy to spot a gifted athlete from an early age. They dominate youth games on the basketball court, baseball field or tennis court. Determining whether or not that competitor has leadership abilities takes longer, however.
BY ALEX EPPLER STAFF REPORTER Coming off a defeat against defending Ivy League champion Penn last weekend, the gymnastics team looked to rebound in a tri-meet against New Hampshire and George Washington at New Hampshire on Sunday. Although the Elis fell to both squads, the team posted impressive improvements over its performance against Penn.
MEN’S TENNIS
SEE MEN’S TENNIS PAGE 11
GYMNASTICS
MARIA ZEPEDA/PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR
Captain Daniel Hoffman ’13 defeated 14 out of 18 doubles pairs in the fall alongside Marc Powers ’13.
TOP ’DOG DANIEL HOFFMAN ’13
in the 1-meter event. “Paige was the bright light for us at the meet,” Courtney Randolph ’14 said. “All year, she’s been very solid in her performance and very consistent. … It’s great to see her in her senior season winning events.” The other individual champion for Yale was Alex Forrester ’13, who won the 100-yard butterfly by SEE SWIMMING PAGE 11
Gymnastics takes big step forward
BY ASHTON WACKYM STAFF REPORTER
Men’s tennis captain Daniel Hoffman ’13 picked up a tennis racket, slid on a baseball glove and put on basketball shoes from an early age and “always loved sports,” but it was tennis that quickly became Hoffman’s passion. It took less than a year from when he first picked up a tennis racket at age 7 that he began playing in the United States Tennis Association (USTA) tournaments in his hometown of Menlo Park, Calif. — and winning them. An affinity for competing and defeating his opponents has left just as much of an impression on Yale tennis head coach Alex Dorato as it has on his competitors and teammates. “He finds ways to win matches when it doesn’t seem possible,” Dorato said. “He’s like a magician!” But Hoffman’s work on the court is not just magic. It takes hard work and determination to accumulate a team-leading 30 wins in the past two years. And while some of the more enigmatic wins are
style. This meet constituted the first losses of the seasons for the Bulldogs, who are now 7–2 after the 292–61 and 290–63 losses to Harvard and Princeton, respectively. On the women’s side, two Bulldogs were able to win individual races. Paige Meneses ’13 won both the 3-meter diving and the 1-meter diving events, narrowly outscoring Harvard’s Emily Bonfig 258.40–258
The Bulldogs’ score of 191.225 was not enough to top New Hampshire, which won the meet with 195.425 points, or George Washington, which finished with 194.750 points. Yet the score did best the Elis’ previous season high, 187.900, by over three points, a massive improvement in gymnastics. Joyce Li ’15, the Bulldogs’ top finisher in the individual all-around, scored 38.500 points to place fourth. “We had a little bit of a slow start where we would go to the meet and do the first two events really well, and then kind of not
do as well on the last two,” captain Stephanie Goldstein ’13 said. “We’ve really turned that around in the meet this past weekend.”
It was a big step up over our past meets. … I think we’ll be in really good shape for Ivies. STEPHANIE GOLDSTEIN ’13 Captain, gymnastics While Morgan Traina ’15 said the team still made a few mistakes, a hard week of practice spurred the Elis’ improvement. Goldstein said that she counted only one fall in the team’s scoring routines, a much lower total than in prior weeks. The sophomore duo of Li and Traina have been standouts for the Bulldogs all season and led the team in the all-around. Traina finished just behind Li in the allaround, scoring 38.275 points en SEE GYMNASTICS PAGE 11
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