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

NEW HAVEN, CONNECTICUT · WEDNESDAY, APRIL 24, 2013 · VOL. CXXXV, NO. 128 · yaledailynews.com

INSIDE THE NEWS MORNING EVENING

CLOUDY SUNNY

52 62

CROSS CAMPUS

ART SHOW SENIORS PRESENT FINAL PROJECTS

SOM

EDUCATION

LIGHTWEIGHT CREW

Admins plan Immersion Week, two online courses for fall semester

CITY CONTINUES SEARCH FOR NEXT SUPERINTENDENT

No. 2 Bulldogs sweep Dartmouth in all races to claim Durand Cup

PAGES 6–7 CULTURE

PAGE 3 NEWS

PAGE 3 CITY

PAGE 12 SPORTS

Commons alters layout

Run, Kate, run! Yale alum

Kate Grace ’11 won the USA women’s 1-mile road championship yesterday, clocking in at an impressive 4:43.02 to claim the race, which was held Tuesday in Des Moines, Iowa.

TWO NEW ENTRANTS OPT OUT OF CAMPAIGN PUBLIC FINANCING

Real life Yaliens? The Peabody Museum has identified a rock that crashed into a Wolcott, Conn., house last Saturday as part of a meteorite that burned through the atmosphere before tearing through the house’s roof. Initially thought to be a block of concrete falling from a passing plane, this mysterious space rock is also thought to have caused an explosionlike boom heard throughout the state on Friday. As of press time, no extraterrestrial sightings had been reported.

BY DIANA LI STAFF REPORTER

on one swipe and then use their lunch swipe at a retail station such as Durfees. “The change will accomplish two things,” Van Dyke said. “It will allow students to access Commons to meet friends or to study without using a meal swipe, and it will allow Yale Dining to make sure that students who are eating both

With the entry of two more candidates into New Haven’s mayoral race over the past week, the debate over the role of public financing has intensified. Three of the six declared candidates for the city’s highest office are participating in the Democracy Fund, New Haven’s public campaign finance program for mayoral candidates. On Monday, Ken Krayeske, the Fund’s administrator, approved a third check of $8,600 for Ward 10 Alderman and mayoral candidate Justin Elicker FES ’10 SOM ’10, bringing his total to $37,440 this year — the most money the Democracy Fund has given to a candidate since its inception in 2006. Along with Elicker, State Rep. Gary HolderWinfield and plumber Sundiata Keitazulu have committed to using the system. Meanwhile, former city economic development director Henry Fernandez LAW ’94, president and CEO of Connecticut Technology Council Matthew Nemerson and State Sen. Toni Harp — who announced her intention to enter the race on Monday — have chosen to opt out of the Fund. Harp explained her decision to opt out by saying that she entered the race “too late” to use the Fund effectively, but she added that if she were to win the race, she might choose to use the Fund at a later date. Harp said that she thinks regardless of whether candidates opt into the Democracy Fund, there will be “vigorous public discussion about [the Fund’s] future.” “The Democracy Fund anticipates in the

SEE COMMONS PAGE 4

SEE FUNDRAISING PAGE 4

Homecoming tour. Three

bands headed by Yale alumni are returning to the Elm City to perform at BAR pizza later tonight. San Fermin, Magic Man, and Great Caesar — which are led by Ellis LudwigLeone ’11, Sam Lee ’12, and John Michael Parker ’10, respectively — are all set to release new albums within the next year.

Let them go home. Just

a few days after Yalies go thrift shopping and party with Macklemore, indie rock band Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeroes will perform at Princeton’s spring concert, “Lawnparties,” on May 5. According to The Daily Princetonian, the band — best known for its singles “Home” and “Man on Fire” — will perform at Princeton’s Quadrangle Club.

Bathroom break. Land is

valuable, and it appears that toilets are too. That’s why a Friday email sent to architecture students seemingly at the request of the History of Art Department reminded Yalies that the toilet rooms on the Loria side of the fourth, fifth and sixth floors “are for the exclusive use of [History of Art] faculty members.”

Getting a facelift. The University of Connecticut may get a new $100 million recreation and wellness center complete with a 50-meter pool, climbing wall, synthetic turf field, yoga and spin cycle room and possibly a juice bar. But the project will not come cheap: If approved, the center would be financed by a $500 increase in student fees for undergraduates and $400 increase for graduate students. THIS DAY IN YALE HISTORY

1968 A group of roughly 300 student protesters led by the makeshift “Committee to Save the Cross Campus” successfully prevent bulldozers from uprooting trees on the west end of the square. Their efforts lead University President Kingman Brewster to meet with architects and other officials to discuss student resistance to the project. Submit tips to the Cross Campus

crosscampus@yaledailynews.com

ONLINE y MORE cc.yaledailynews.com

Democracy Fund debate heats up

MARIA ZEPEDA/PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR

Under the new system, students need to swipe into the food serving area each time they wish to collect food. BY JANE DARBY MENTON STAFF REPORTER Students entering Commons Monday morning were confronted with a new layout — a rope now blocks students’ access to the food stations. Yale Dining moved the cardswipe check-in stations from the front door to directly in front of the food serving area, opening the

seating area to free access. Each time students now collect food in Commons, they must swipe in at the desk, though they can swipe multiple times over the course of a meal. Director of Residential Dining Cathy Van Dyke SOM ’86 said the rearrangement is designed to stop students from taking advantage of the previous swipe station placement, through which students could eat breakfast and lunch

Superintendent forum exposes parent concerns

Leaving legacy, Starolis to exit

BY MONICA DISARE STAFF REPORTER A small but energized group of parents voiced concerns with the superintendent search process at the first of three forums Tuesday night at Career Regional High School. Only eight parents, three school administrators and three members of the Board of Education attended the event, resulting in a fairly empty meeting that was still filled with debate about the superintendent search process and the direction of the district as a whole. Board members responded to concerns about the speed of the process and called for increased parental engagement in the search, adding that they hope to choose a superintendent by June 30. “What the board has put out in terms of opportunities [for parental engagement] may have given people the sense that public engagement was window dressing,” said Samuel RossLee, the parent of a New Haven Public Schools student. One of the most contentious issues discussed at the forum was the superintendent search process itself. Several parents said the process is moving too quickly and that finishing the search before July is unrealistic. Ward 8 Alderman Michael Smart said he attended the forum specifically to discuss this issue and suggested that since Assistant Superintendent Garth Harries ’95 is a candidate in the search, appointing him as interim superintendent may have the dual benefit of allowing search committee members to observe how he adjusts to the role while allowing for a longer, more thorough process. Part of the parents’ frustration stemmed from how they were informed about the comSEE SUPERINTENDENT PAGE 4

YDN

Regina Starolis, executive assistant to six Yale presidents, will step down at the end of June with President Richard Levin. BY JULIA ZORTHIAN STAFF REPORTER In Woodbridge Hall, six Yale presidents have come and gone in the past 40 years but one thing has remained constant: the red leather books in which Regina Starolis has painstakingly written every presidential appointment since 1973. When University President Richard Levin steps down from the presidency at the end of June, so will Starolis, his executive assistant, and so will her characteristic scheduling books. In the age of iPhones and GCals, Starolis’ hand-

written calendars have been a point of light-hearted contention in the president’s office. Ever since Levin started using his first Blackberry, Starolis said he has pleaded with her to switch to digital. But Starolis prefers the control of a pencil and eraser. “Anything you say about the red books versus the computer, [Levin] just won’t buy, period,” Starolis said. Around 30 volumes sit next to a window in her Woodbridge Hall Office, each with a gold embossed year on the front, and a name, like Richard Levin or Benno Schmidt,

written on the first page. Starolis said she will give the books to the University archives before she leaves. Scheduling years and years of presidential appointments has brought Starolis into contact with “everyone,” Levin said: She has met presidents like George W. Bush, rock stars like Paul McCartney and big-name donors like William Beinecke ’36. Through her window, which overlooks Beinecke Plaza, and which she called the “greatest window in the entire world,” SEE STAROLIS PAGE 5

PAGE 2

YALE DAILY NEWS · WEDNESDAY, APRIL 24, 2013 · yaledailynews.com

OPINION

.COMMENT “After four years wasted at Yale, I'm just happy to be done” yaledailynews.com/opinion

So long, Thrasybulus C

ornelius Nepos, a Roman historian from early antiquity, wrote fondly of an Athenian general named Thrasybulus: “If excellence were to be weighed by itself, apart from luck, I believe I would rank this man first of all. This much is certain, I put no one ahead of him in sense of honor, steadfastness, greatness of soul and love of country.” Despite repeatedly rising to save Athenian democracy from the clutches of oligarchy, Thrasybulus, unlike some of his more outspoken and demagogic contemporaries, has largely been lost to the annals of history. Nevertheless, with high and fitting praise, his memory has been kept alive by Professor Donald Kagan, who has placed the overlooked general in a prominent position within his renowned course, “Introduction to Ancient Greek History.” After forty-four years at this University, though, Professor Kagan is set to retire, giving his last classes to undergraduates this week. And while Thrasybulus may be losing his finest champion, we are losing our Thrasybulus. To Yale, Professor Kagan has given an almost indescribable tenure — one defined as much by his character as his mind. Much like Thrasybulus, Professor Kagan’s defining contributions came not from great moments of stability or from the comfortable place of the majority, but rather from hard moments in the service of principle. As the Spartans bore down on the Athenian democracy, so did numerous academics on the Liberal Arts. His career embodies not just a defense of the art of history, but more importantly, the heart of the academy. Looking first at his contributions to the study of history, it is implausible for any thoughtful observer to place Kagan anywhere but in a class of his own. Simply put, he very well may be the greatest modern historian of the Ancient Greek world. Speaking of the National Humanities Medal recipient’s work, the New Yorker wrote: “The temptation to acclaim Kagan’s four volumes [on the Peloponnesian War] as the foremost work of history produced in North America in this century is vivid.” When a relatively new professor, Kagan was one of the few to hold class during the savagely intimidating Vietnam protests. In positions of leadership, from Chairman of the Classics Department to the head of Directed Studies, Kagan stood up for meritocratic hiring processes and guided, structured curricula, in spite of the surrounding

consensus to the contrary. Even in some of his defeats, from championing the attempted Bass-sponHARRY sored proGRAVER gram on We s t e r n Gravely Civilization to the Mistaken state of free speech at Yale, Kagan’s bravery often spoke larger than the causes themselves. This summary, though, is overwhelmingly insufficient — and not simply because of its concision. It is missing an intangible quality that every student of Professor Kagan’s seminars knows incredibly well; a quality that you could hear about from a student of ’82 as much as ’12. Professor Kagan’s history seminars are unlike many at Yale. He reveres intellectual debate, but is unflinching in the assertion that there are such things as right answers and necessarily important facts. Yet, amazingly, the most striking quality of his class is the deep-rooted humility that a mind of his stature exhibits. He is quick to make a selfdeprecating joke (“Don’t trust a word that guy says,” when a student quotes one of his books back to him) or to jab at the lofty latitude academia often allows itself (“That’s over my head. You sound too much like a professor.”). In the end, his intellectual ferocity is balanced by a profound kindness, compassion and care for his students. After so long here, it’s difficult to think he hasn’t heard every answer before. But you’d never know it. Even as the most prominent man of his field, he can make any undergraduate feel like he is hanging on their every word. At the end of the term, while a student can be overpowered by the amount he has learned, he is all the more affected by the amount he has grown; forged in the loving cerebral crucible that is Donald Kagan’s classroom. At the end of this term, Yale is saying farewell not only to one of its greatest minds, but greatest souls; someone who not simply added to the laurels of this University, but personified its spirit. He has been our Thrasybulus, someone with no superior in sense of “honor, steadfastness, greatness of soul and love (of God), of country (and of Yale).”

ON 'THE LESSONS WE'LL LEARN'

GUEST COLUMNIST JOHN AROUTIOUNIAN

Will we remember? M

y grandmother once observed that my birthday, April 23rd, is wedged every year between two rather unfortunate dates — Vladimir Lenin’s birthday, and today, Armenian Genocide Remembrance Day. For me, the latter has made for a sobering change of tone each year from the happy day that came before it, but — like a death in the family — it doesn’t hit you right away. Of course, every year I’d sign petitions demanding that the President issue a statement joining a wide swath of nations and 43 American states in recognizing the Armenian Genocide. At home, we’d watch an old PBS documentary about the genocide. But how does one wrap his head around 1.5 million people having been murdered? What kind of a framework can a person — a child, no less — apply to make sense of it? How can a kid realize that, were he alive in what is now eastern Turkey in 1917, he’d likely be an orphan, his mother raped and murdered? It is not very different from trying, in vain, to make sense of the Holocaust. Theodore Adorno might have put it best when he remarked that to try “to write a poem after Auschwitz is barbaric.” How can one live after the Shoah? How can one make sense

MANAGING EDITORS Gavan Gideon Mason Kroll

SPORTS Eugena Jung John Sullivan

ONLINE EDITOR Caroline Tan OPINION Marissa Medansky Dan Stein NEWS Madeline McMahon Daniel Sisgoreo CITY Nick Defiesta Ben Prawdzik CULTURE Natasha Thondavadi

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THIS ISSUE COPY STAFF: Ellie Malchione, Douglas Plume

The News’ View represents the opinion of the majority of the members of the Yale Daily News Managing Board of 2014. Other content on this page with bylines represents the opinions of those authors and not necessarily those of the Managing Board. Opinions set forth in ads do not necessarily reflect the views of the Managing Board. We reserve the right to refuse any ad for any reason and to delete or change any copy we consider objectionable, false or in poor taste. We do not verify the contents of any ad. The Yale Daily News Publishing Co., Inc. and its officers, employees and agents disclaim any responsibility for all liabilities, injuries or damages arising from any ad. The Yale Daily News Publishing Co. ISSN 0890-2240

NEW HAVEN, CONNECTICUT

The theologian Reinhold Niebuhr DIV 1914 once published a book called “The Irony of American History,” but the book is really littered with ironies of every kind. One particularly poignant one is that of Christ himself — that a man utterly mocked, condemned and crucified next to two lowly prisoners is resurrected, and that in doing so he pays for the mistakes of a world that doesn’t even acknowledge its sin. For the past hundred years, the Armenian people have been living this irony: trying to look the unrepentant in the eye and forgive. But it is hard, and the wound is not nearly closed. Whether we will remember is an open question. I will, haunted by the faces of the genocides of the twentieth century. And tonight, I’ll accompany my friends to the Women’s Table, where we’ll remember together. We will forget politics, and we will remember the child marched into the desert by the Ottomans, stripped of a family and a home, crying out for his mother. And we will try — we will try our very hardest — to forgive. JOHN AROUTIOUNIAN is a sophomore in Jonathan Edwards College. Contact him at john.aroutiounian@yale.edu .

S

everal columnists have written their final goodbyes to the News this week. This is not one of those columns; I have another three years of Yale left to explore. But there is one thing to which I will be saying my final goodbye at the end of this semester: Lanman-Wright Hall. I hated L-Dub immediately, when filthy upon my return from FOOT, I took my first shower in four days. The water became scalding hot whenever a toilet flushed, and by the time the dirt was scrubbed out from under my fingernails, it had gone cold. Welcome to Yale. The next weeks were filled with L-Dub surprises. Small centipedes crawled out of our sinks, and we heard disgusting stories about the yellow stains on the walls of the entryways. Several toilets began perpetually flushing. I avoided my building at all costs. Trying to fall asleep to the sounds of belligerent drunk screaming in the courtyard and people hooking up on the other side of your paper-thin wall was near impossible. I would visit my friends and stare with envy at their unbunked beds and functional pipes. “Get ready for L-Dub winter!” my froco laughed in early October as the freezing temperatures

approached. We desperately lined our windows with sweaters in an attempt to keep up a semblance of warmth in our DIANA bedrooms. ROSEN Then Sandy came. Looking Left My Facebook filled with pictures of L-Dub residents double-fisting handles of Dubra and their Yale Dining-provided bags of rationed food as the storm approached. I knew that spending the next couple of days in such close quarters would inevitably lead to us all developing serious cases of claustrophobia and going insane. But something strange happened during those three days of constant L-Dub — it became my favorite place on campus. I returned to the building to discover that close to half of my class was cramped into a fifth floor bedroom drinking way too much, screaming Ke$ha lyrics and laughing at the sound of howling wind outside. The party moved from suite to suite as our frocos frantically emailed us that it was a particularly bad night to get

transported to DUH. Unable to sit in our own tiny rooms for too long, we wandered through the open doors of others. The fifth floor began a game that consisted of racing around the hallway in rolling chairs at dangerously high speeds. We learned that we could hold entire conversations from floor-to-floor through the vents in our bathrooms, a strategy that would prove useful later. After the hurricane, we began spending more and more time in L-Dub. We learned that you could slide silly notes under the fire doors to other suites. We figured out that we could disable the fire alarms that separated our suites with just a few pieces of Scotch tape. I realized that I could check if my friend was in her room by listening for the sound of her phone vibrating through the ceiling. L-Dub finally became a place that we loved. Recently, an upperclassman warned me of the dangers of moving out of L-Dub. You get lonely once you’re no longer totally on top of one another, she said. As structurally flawed as L-Dub is, the sense of community it creates can’t be found anywhere else. Living in L-Dub has been like going to year-round summer camp. While friends in other col-

leges struggle to name more than half of their class, most of us know almost everyone. We’ve taken on every plumbing problem as a team game. We’ve held our heads high as our privileged friends in Farnam joked that we lived in “the projects” and that they planned on organizing a canned food drive for us. Now, with the warm weather returning, we’ve sprawled ourselves across the courtyard, pretending to study while reminiscing about our favorite L-Dub memories. Next year’s freshmen might not believe me on move-in day, but I’m going to miss L-Dub. Sure, it’ll be nice to have good plumbing and space to breathe. But I’ll miss the consoling happy voices drifting up from the courtyard after Woad’s and the boy singing next door without a clue that we can hear him perfectly. I’ll miss the doors that can’t close without being slammed shut and the nights when we cuddled on our futon under blankets trying to stay warm. When I say goodbye to L-Dub two weeks from today, I’ll be saying goodbye to, without a doubt, the best freshman home. DIANA ROSEN is a freshman in Pierson College. She is a staff blogger for the News. Contact her at diana.rosen@yale.edu .

GUEST COLUMNIST SHIRA TELUSHKIN

COPY Stephanie Heung Emily Klopfer Isaac Park Flannery Sockwell

EDITORIALS & ADS

Obviously, these sentiments don’t express the sentiments of nearly all Turkish people. But a strong, anti-Armenian cultural strain, buttressed by resurgent Turkish nationalism, definitely thrives in modern Turkey. And it makes days like today all the more painful, because it begs the question of how to heal an open wound that will not close. How do we remember the dead when few others will — in fact, when some will actually falsify history, directly opposing most historians of the period, to claim that the names of the dead are mere fiction. But the primary source documents are all there for people to see. The late ambassador Henry Morgenthau Sr. called the Armenian Genocide a “campaign of race extermination.” In justifying the beginning of the Holocaust, Hitler asked a group of Nazis whether anyone remembered the Armenians. But in the end, this is much more than a historical dispute — because it’s not really a dispute at all, except for those on the radical fringe. It’s a cultural struggle to forgive the crimes of those who didn’t acknowledge (and whose descendants still don’t) that they have anything for which to be forgiven.

HARRY GRAVER is a junior in Davenport College. Contact him at harry.graver@yale.edu .

Editorial: (203) 432-2418 editor@yaledailynews.com Business: (203) 432-2424 business@yaledailynews.com

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY Liliana Varman

of existence? But I am, perhaps frightfully, beginning to comprehend what it was. This year, when I attended a commemoration ceremony at an Armenian church in Trumbull, Conn., I heard a rendition of poet Paruyr Sevak’s “The Unsilenceable Belfry.” Wheelbarrows became caskets, he wrote. In the evening, I heard an old Armenian church hymn for the first time: “Mother, where are you?” The beautiful, haunting chorus sang of Christ pleading for his mother during the crucifixion. That Sunday night, for the first time, I could cry about the genocide. When German statesman Willy Brandt went to Warsaw in 1970, he visited a memorial marking the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising to lay a wreath. Then, suddenly, he knelt. He didn’t have to, but he did, and the entire world saw. Here, the Armenian Genocide is different, because no Turkish head of state has ever knelt at a monument of the genocide. The Turkish government denies that an event amounting to anything close to genocide took place. AntiArmenian sentiment extends to the present day, as well. Documentary clips about the Armenian Genocide on YouTube are often followed by all kinds of comments with ethnic slurs.

A goodbye to L-Dub

Consider the ring

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EDITOR IN CHIEF Tapley Stephenson

'NEWCAMPUS'

SUBMISSIONS

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

W

hen I first heard my mother say she was told to go to college to get her MRS, I didn’t ask. I was eight, and an MRS sounded like a perfectly legitimate educational degree. Only years later did I make the connection between MRS and Mrs. — between marriage and worth. Many of us still associate early marriage with the belief that a woman should put marriage before college or career. This lasting legacy, along with the political battles fought over marriage today, makes it a fraught and distant concept to college students. That is a problem. We should take marriage at least as seriously as we take our career considerations. Before I proceed, let me clarify that by discussing marriage I do not mean to enter debates over who in this country can or cannot get married. I mean to critique the reality that, despite being young adults, the idea that we would consider such a serious relationship commitment at this time in our lives is seen as backwards, dangerous and absurd. Maybe you think I cannot use the word marriage without dragging in its political associations. Okay. That cer-

tainly has merit. I still think it is the most convenient word to use in this context. But back to why we should totally talk and think about marriage in college. If we don’t think proactively about what is important to us, we might drift into relationships we never really wanted. Guys, we’re adults. Or at least we want people to treat us like adults. And despite living in dorms and eating in dining halls, we are making some very important decisions about our futures, our education and our career interests. So why are we so terrified of thinking about marriage? Who you decide to spend your life with, or whether you even want that type of relationship in your life, is the most important decision you will ever make. The people we choose to spend time with are the people who form us. Consider the significance of your friend group in dictating your values, life choices, even your personality. But bring the consideration of marriage into a college conversation about dating and hooking up and the response will be confu-

sion, laughter or outright disdain. Our dismissal of those who think about marriage suggests that we want this monumentally significant issue to take care of itself, one way or another, and hopefully when we are more grown-up. But this future self-reflection may never happen. An April 2012 New York Times article (“The Downside of Cohabitating Before Marriage”) discusses some reasons why the divorce rate is higher among couples who live together before marrying. One theory is that couples who move in together without a clear commitment, like an engagement, sort of evolve into marriage without ever deciding, actively, that this is the person they want to spend their life with. A couple may move in together without articulating what this step means for their future, and then after seven years of living together, a wedding sort of happens. This is not a shocking possibility. Marriage is not like college. There is no marriage application deadline, no marriage tours or giant single festivals where future spouses court us with pizza and organized lectures featur-

ing famous people. As a result, it is possible to push off facing this very important decision. My friends are, I think, typical in their indifference: Fate, love, whatever — it all works out. This is a dangerous attitude. We accept that talking about career options and leading meaningful lives is an important conversation. How we want marriage to factor into our lives is equally important. Our years in college are when we do a really important chunk of thinking and forming. College seniors are vastly different from high school seniors (as if the prefrosh last week weren’t enough of a reminder). Over these four years we assess our values, try out our passions, consider our futures. Ideas abound. Marriage is not an issue to make absent from these formative years of personal thought and growth. The future is scary, but not knowing what values you want to guide you is even scarier. Who, were, what, if, when and how we get married should be a serious question. SHIRA TELUSHKIN is a junior in Pierson College. Contact her at shira.telushkin@yale.edu .

YALE DAILY NEWS · WEDNESDAY, APRIL 24, 2013 · yaledailynews.com

PAGE 3

NEWS

“You are kidding me. I went to Harvard Business School. I’m the reason the microwave tray rotates.” JACK DONAGHY “30 ROCK” CHARACTER

CORRECTIONS MONDAY, APRIL 22

The article “All College Storage partners with Yale” mistakenly stated that Danny Avraham ’15 instructed other members of the council not to comment further on the council’s storage offerings. While he declined to comment on the story as a whole, he instructed other members of the council not to comment on All College Storage.

SOM expands global initiatives

TUESDAY, APRIL 23

The article “NAACP leader discusses city inequality” misspelled the name of Jamil Jivani LAW ’13.

Undergrads study antifreeze BY CLINTON WANG STAFF REPORTER A team of Yale undergraduates has discovered the structure of of the most powerful known antifreeze to date. The researchers investigated an antifreeze protein found in Siberian beetles, which survive winters with temperatures dipping as low as -40 degrees Fahrenheit. They found that the protein’s flat molecular structure allows it to bind to ice crystals in a way that prevents their growth hundreds of times more effectively than can salt and other common de-icers. Originally published online by the Journal of Biological Chemistry in March, the study will make the cover of the journal’s April 26 issue. The findings stemmed from a research project the team submitted to the 2011 International Genetically Engineered Machines (iGEM) Competition, in which teams of synthetic biology undergraduate researchers worldwide manipulate genetically engineered E. coli bacteria to construct new biological systems. Earlier that year, Aaron Hakim ’13, a co-lead author of the study, had read about prior research describing the highly potent antifreeze in the Siberian beetle — known as Rhagium inquisitor or the ribbed pine borer. “It’s one of the most active antifreeze proteins, if not the most. And it has the largest icebinding site currently known,” said co-lead author Jennifer Nguyen GRD ’14. “We were able to determine its 3-D structure.” The undergraduates copied the gene that corresponds to the antifreeze protein in the beetle and expressed it in E. coli bacteria, which produced large

quantities of the protein. Senior author Wuyi Meng, a research support specialist at Yale in the Chemical and Biophysical Instrumentation Center, then helped the team visualize and analyze the protein structure, revealing an unusually flat surface that allows it to inhibit ice formation. Nguyen said the team could see water molecules perfectly lodged in the grooves of the protein, and observed how the layers of water molecules interacted with ice crystals to prevent their growth. Meng added that the precise mechanism by which the protein binds to the ice is still unclear.

It’s one of the most active antifreeze proteins, if not the most. JENNIFER NGUYEN GRD ’14 Co-lead author Meng and Nguyen said these antifreeze proteins could potentially be used to improve the consistency of ice cream, to preserve transplant organs or embryos stored at fertility clinics, and to engineer frost resistance in crops, among other applications. The study made the Yale team a regional finalist for the Americas in the 2011 iGEM competition. Now, Nguyen said Hakim is trying to engineer the structure of the protein to see if they can improve its efficiency. The undergraduates were supervised by Farren Isaacs, an assistant professor of molecular, cellular and developmental biology. Contact CLINTON WANG at clinton.wang@yale.edu .

DAVID BACH/YALE

SOM has decided to partner with five new schools to organize Immersion Week in October after hosting students as part of the program in March. BY ALEKSANDRA GJORGIEVSKA STAFF REPORTER Two new initiatives in the School of Management’s Global Network for Advanced Management aim to strengthen the bonds between SOM and the international business community. Representatives from 20 schools in the Global Network, a group of 23 international business schools that SOM Dean Edward Snyder created last year, met last week in Beijing to discuss the network’s progress since its founding. At the meeting, SOM decided to partner with five new business schools along with one of its initial partners to organize an additional Immersion Week in October, in which students from schools in the Global Network can take classes at peer institutions. The school will also launch two for-credit online courses — one on mobile banking and one on competition policy — that will virtually convene students from Global Network schools this fall in its effort to expand its international presence. “Giving students the option to work the way they might one day work in multinational corporations is in itself an impor-

tant pedagogical objective,” said Senior Associate Dean for the full-time MBA program Anjani Jain. “We want to see how technology can enable learning across different communities.” Immersion Week — an initiative that allows second-year MBA students at SOM and at schools in the Global Network to take intensive weeklong courses on one of the participant schools’ campuses — took place for the first time this March between SOM and four other business schools, and 90 percent of SOM students said they would like the school to organize an Immersion Week each semester, according to a survey taken after the initial Immersion Week. The school will still organize Immersion Week as planned in spring 2014 with its four original partners, universities located in Brazil, China, Turkey and Spain, said Senior Associate Dean for Executive MBA and Global Programs David Bach ’98. Bach praised Immersion Week for helping SOM forge connections with new institutions in different regions of the world, adding that the school hopes to partner with up to five new Global Network schools over the next three years. The program’s growth is financially sustain-

able because SOM has received several gifts to host Immersion Week, said Joel Getz, SOM senior associate dean for development and alumni relations. Bach said the additional Immersion Week and the two online courses SOM will pilot in the fall both aim to enable SOM students to “work across time zones, language barriers and business perspectives.” “Imagine the National University of Singapore offering a course on family business in Southeast Asia — that’s something we might not offer, and through these courses, students will be able to take it,” Bach said. “These are student exchanges, even though people don’t physically move off campus.” All SOM administrators interviewed said Snyder has “tangibly” used the Global Network to increase the school’s international presence. Snyder could not be reached for comment Tuesday. The additional Immersion Week will involve business schools in Costa Rica, Ireland, Spain, Japan, Israel and Mexico. Contact ALEKSANDRA GJORGIEVSKA at aleksandra.gjorgievska@yale.edu .

BUSINESS SCHOOLS PARTICIPATING IN OCTOBER IMMERSION WEEK YALE SOM (USA) EGADE BUSINESS SCHOOL, TECNOLÓGICO DE MONTERREY (Mexico) IE BUSINESS SCHOOL (Spain) INCAE BUSINESS SCHOOL (Costa Rica, Nicaragua) UCD MICHAEL SMURFIT GRADUATE BUSINESS SCHOOL (Ireland) TECHNION-ISRAEL INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY (Israel) GRADUATE SCHOOL OF INTERNATIONAL CORPORATE STRATEGY, HITOTSUBASHI UNIVERSITY (Japan)

Ed. board to continue superintendent search BY JIWON LEE STAFF REPORTER The New Haven Board of Education decided on Tuesday to continue its ongoing selection process for a new city superintendent rather than wait for New Haven’s future mayor to participate in the decision. At their meeting on Tuesday, board members agreed that though the mayor is still a member of the Board of Education, they cannot wait until the new mayor is elected in November to choose who will replace outgoing Superintendent Reginald Mayo, who will retire at the end of the school year. Instead, the board will ask each mayoral candidate his or her criteria for the new superintendent and consider those views in its selection. “To slow down the [selection] process would be killing the momentum that we have right now,” the Board of Education Curriculum Committee President Carlos Torre said. Torre explained that since New Haven’s education system is going through a period of significant growth and reform, having an interim superintendent will hinder the city’s public schools from ongoing improvement. Mayo, who was elected to the position in 1992, has been working with outgoing Mayor John DeStefano Jr. for almost all of his two decades of service. The smooth collaboration of the two in the education sector has “made [New Haven] unique,” according to the Board of Educa-

JIWON LEE/CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER

At their Tuesday meeting, New Haven Board of Education members decided they will ask all of the mayoral candidates the criteria they consider important in a new superintendent. tion curriculum committee chair Susan Samuels. The mayor has always been present at the board meetings, she said. The city began its search for superintendent last month by hiring search firm PROACT to screen potential candidates. The

Board of Education will select the new leader according to a participatory search process involving three open forums — the second of which is taking place today — and 17 focus groups to hear from the community’s stakeholders, including students, parents,

teachers and community organizations. “There is so much at stake,” said Alex Johnston, a member of the Board of Education. “But at the end of the day we need a leader who can make informed, good decisions.”

Torre said that the superintendent’s leadership is critical to maintaining the level of achievement that New Haven public schools have been showing for the past few years. There is no other school district where “students are dying to get into public

schools,” he said. The New Haven Public Schools has 20,759 enrolled students and 45 schools. Contact JIWON LEE at jiwon.lee@yale.edu .

PAGE 4

YALE DAILY NEWS · WEDNESDAY, APRIL 24, 2013 · yaledailynews.com

FROM THE FRONT

“OK. … We don’t do this a lot, so this is, like, a really huge deal. We wanna invite you to have lunch with us every day for the rest of the week.” GRETCHEN WEINERS “MEAN GIRLS” CHARACTER

Nemerson, Harp opt out of Democracy Fund FUNDRAISING FROM PAGE 1 future that all candidates will participate, because there is a public desire and demand, especially in the city of New Haven, for people to participate in public campaign financing,” Krayeske said. He added that he will not comment on specific candidates’ decisions to opt out of the system.

Public financing is about voices that can’t normally get into the system being able to get into the system. GARY HOLDER-WINFIELD Connecticut State Representative

KATHRYN CRANDALL/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

The two new entrants into the mayoral race, including Matthew Nemerson, above, have decided against public financing.

Parents criticize speed of search SUPERINTENDENT FROM PAGE 1 munity forum — a Sunday robo-call. As one mother pointed out, the lack of advance notice made the process feel rushed, adding that it was far less notification than parents received during the February snowstorm or following Newtown.

We keep putting these reform bandages on things. SAMUEL ROSS-LEE Parent, New Haven student Approximately halfway through the meeting, Board of Education members Carlos Antonio Torre and Alex Johnston arrived and began to respond to the community members’ concerns. Johnston explained that the Board’s reasoning behind the speedy search process was to allow the school district to keep moving forward with school reform. “If you press pause those things lose

Nemerson told the News prior to Harp’s announcment that he would potentially agree to use the Democracy Fund if Fernandez also decided to use the system. But as Fernandez is not doing so, Nemerson has instead hired an impartial ombudsman to disclose his donations online within 48 hours of the campaign receiving them. “In this campaign, I’m going to try to raise as much money as I can to get my message out, and so I’m going to show my credibility by having full disclosure so people will know who has given me money,” Nemerson said. “People will know almost as soon as I get the donations and put them in the bank, and they can make their judgments. At this point, transparency is the most important

thing, and we know there is less and less transparency at the federal level, which is what’s really driving a lot of the frustration.” Holder-Winfield, however, argued that transparency is not the primary problem in campaign finance and that the type of disclosure Nemerson advocates still fails to create an even playing field, which he sees as one of the main benefits of the Democracy Fund. “Public financing is about voices that can’t normally get into the system being able to get into the system. I could’ve gone outside the system and it would’ve been easier for me to raise money, but I put myself inside so a candidate like [Keitazulu] would have a chance to participate,” Holder-Winfield said. “Public financing isn’t about whether Nemerson is a good or bad guy: Public financing is about whether our politics is controlled by money. If I show that I’m controlled by money [by disclosure], how does that make the system clean?” While Nemerson said that his decision to opt out of the Democracy Fund partially depended upon Fernandez’s similar choice, Elicker and Holder-Winfield both said that they would have participated in the Fund even if they had known when they declared that other candidates would not participate. Hillhouse High School Principal Kermit Carolina, who formed an exploratory committee but has not yet declared his candidacy, said he will use the Democracy Fund if he decides to join the race. The Democratic Primary will be held on Sept. 10. Contact DIANA LI at diana.li@yale.edu .

Swipe station moved

momentum. If you stop moving forward, things start to fall by the wayside,” Johnston said. But he added that if the board fails to garner enough community support, the district would be open to extending the search process. Board members also took suggestions for how to better inform parents of the remaining forums, which will take place today and Saturday. Ross-Lee said he would like to see what he called an “honest” superintendent, who would focus on broader education culture beyond the classroom. He explained that students need to be academically engaged at home and receive support from their parents, something that a lot of school reform measures fail to take into account. “We keep putting these reform bandages on things,” Ross-Lee said. The next forum will be held tonight at Fair Haven Middle School. Contact MONICA DISARE at monica.disare@yale.edu .

JENNIFER CHEUNG/PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR

The new swipe system in Commons will be facilitated by technology to be installed this summer. COMMONS FROM PAGE 1

JOY CHEN/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

New Haven Superintendent Reginald Mayo announced in February that he will step down at the end of the school year.

breakfast and lunch in Commons swipe for both meals and not just for breakfast.” Through conversations with students and the Yale College Council, Van Dyke said, Yale Dining realized that many students avoided paying for two meals in Commons and used their lunch swipes after they had already eaten. She said Yale Dining determined that Commons loses money for up to 400 meals a week based on data from the card readers. This summer, Van Dyke said Yale Dining will install new technology to facilitate the swipe process in Commons. In the meantime, dining administrators are using the end of the year as a trial period for the planned arrangement, she said. “Making the change now will identify any issues that need to be resolved so that Yale Dining can optimize the layout during the summer and place the new technology where it best supports customer

flow through Commons,” Van Dyke said. Staff members from Commons, who asked to remain anonymous because they were not authorized to speak about the changes, said while the new system poses difficulties for them, they felt something should be done to address students not paying for their food.

It bottlenecks everything and incentivizes people to take as much food as they can. JAKE SEMONES ’14 “We can’t keep losing money or we’ll lose our jobs,” one staff member said. All 10 students interviewed said they think the new arrangement is inconvenient. “It bottlenecks everything and

incentivizes people to take as much food as they can,” Jake Semones ’14 said. “We are going to end up wasting more food.” Semones said the new swipe arrangement was especially inefficient when tour groups came through Commons since the new system made it difficult to accommodate a large number of people. Though several students said they acknowledge that students not swiping in for all the meals they ate was a problem, they said they think the change in structure would not effectively address this issue. “It does seem like this is not a very foolproof plan,” Devin Race ’13 said. “In fact, it seems like this is worse because you could just get a friend to get you food.” Van Dyke became director of residential dining in August 2012. Contact JANE DARBY MENTON at jane.menton@yale.edu .

YALE DAILY NEWS · WEDNESDAY, APRIL 24, 2013 · yaledailynews.com

PAGE 5

FROM THE FRONT

“Hi, Principal Skinner! Hi, Super Nintendo Chalmers!” RALPH WIGGUM “THE SIMPSONS” CHARACTER

After six presidents, Starolis leaves with Levin STAROLIS FROM PAGE 1 Starolis has watched many important events in University history, including a variety of protests and annual Commencement processions. She has also watched 40 classes of undergraduates pass her window daily, and she said she can recognize some students based on their more distinctive attributes, such as purple or orange hair. Though she gives Levin the chance to choose his appointments himself, she always knows which people or events he may or may not want to make time for, a mental connection the two have forged over his 20 years as president. “My life without her?” Levin said. “That will be a challenge.” Assistant to the President and Advisor on Student Affairs Nina Glickson said Starolis has had an immense impact on both the productivity and the atmosphere of the President’s Office. She added that she and the rest of the Woodbridge Hall staff will miss Starolis’ guidance and ability to make anybody who walks into the stately office feel comfortable. President-elect Peter Salovey, who has known Starolis since he was a graduate student in the 1980s, said he would have been Starolis’ seventh president, but he added that she deserves the chance to govern her own time. “Regina and I frequently reminisce about times I would come to visit a Yale president, in particular President [Bartlett] Giamatti, in the year 1983-’84 when I was president of the [Graduate and Professional Student Senate],” Salovey said. “Those meetings usually involved kibitzing with Ms. Starolis before a meeting with the

president.” When she departs her office in June, Starolis will take with her the framed pictures and Yale memorabilia she has colleceted and placed on her shelves, including dozens of photographs of past presidents and administrators, like one of Levin and his wife, Jane Levin, posing with Hilary Clinton LAW ’73 and Bill Clinton LAW ’73 at a Law School Reunion. She also has a picture of a younger Salovey, posing for his Psychology Department photo as an assistant professor, and a bobble-head resembling professor and former Law School Dean Harold Koh.

My life without [Regina Starolis]? That will be a challenge. RICHARD LEVIN President, Yale University Starolis has already started gathering her belongings, evidenced by a box at the foot of her bookshelf, in which she placed a vintage stuffed bulldog and a piece of stone from the construction of the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library. Rifling through the box, she called herself an “armchair archeologist and crazy historian.” Though she will no longer work as an assistant, Starolis said she hopes to stay at the University after taking the summer off, preferably working at the Yale University Art Gallery. Contact JULIA ZORTHIAN at julia.zorthian@yale.edu .

YDN

In the red leather books kept in her office, Regina Starolis has recorded the daily appointments of Yale’s past six presidents..

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YALE DAILY NEWS · WEDNESDAY, APRIL 24, 2013 · yaledailynews.com

PAGE 7

ARTS & CULTURE

“With the a cappella groups, every voice is like one string on a guitar, one note on the piano or one cymbal, and you don’t have the luxury of falling back on anything.” BEN FOLDS

A^2 to remix a cappella

Senior art show highlights diversity of media

BY SARAH SWONG STAFF REPORTER

BY HELEN ROUNER STAFF REPORTER

CARLY LOVEJOY/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

“Practice: Yale Undergraduate Senior Projects in Art 2013,” which closed Tuesday, presented the senior theses of the 23 graduating art majors.

To most students, a senior thesis means writing dozens of pages in the library. But to Yale’s senior art majors, a thesis takes the form of an embryoshaped chair next to a bookshelf filled with pink objects representing flesh, or of an animated film featuring talking animals accompanied by audio clips taken from YouTube videos of people narrating their trips to the zoo. “Practice: Yale Undergraduate Senior Projects in Art 2013” presents the senior theses of the 23 art majors graduating this year. The exhibit, which spans three levels of the Green Hall Art Gallery, features a variety of media including painting, photography, illustration, video, animation, sculpture and typography. Within the art major at Yale, students choose to concentrate in one of four areas of study: graphic design, painting and printmaking, photography or sculpture. Ilana Harris-Babou ’13, an art major in the painting and printmaking concentration, made a video with an audio track comprised of instrumental versions of rap songs as her senior project. Harris-Babou explained that she is one of a number of seniors whose final project explores a medium other than the one in which she concentrates. She added that the wide range of media in “Practice” illustrates a broader trend in Yale’s art major toward a more interdisciplinary process. “The distinctions of media are becoming decreasingly relevant to how people form their own artistic practices,” Harris-Babou said. Hana Omiya ’13, an art major concentrating in painting and printmaking, said her real interest lies in illustration and drawing. Her senior project involved illustrating autobiographical children’s books about growing up

with parents who own a sushi restaurant. Omiya described the four areas of study in Yale’s art major as traditional, adding that illustration and animation are often considered commercial and are not given the same attention as a more traditional medium like painting. Autumn Von Plinsky ’13, an art major in the painting and printmaking concentration whose senior project consisted of traditional landscape paintings, said Yale’s art major focuses on pushing students conceptually without emphasizing how their work might lead to a career. “It’s art for the sake of art,” Von Plinsky said of the school’s approach to the major. Similarly, Austin Lan ’13, who is double majoring in computer science and art, with a concentration in graphic design, said Yale’s art major is much less preprofessional than comparable programs. She noted that many of Yale’s art students double major in other more traditionally academic fields. “A lot of Yalies come from very geeky backgrounds where our parents want us to pursue profitable jobs, ones that are more intellectually than creatively stimulating,” Omiya said. “It’s a lot of expectations to battle against.” Lan said the conceptual focus of the Art Department is evident in its course offerings, which do not include more practical, preprofessional courses such as furniture design. Omiya attributed the limitations of the Art Department’s course offerings to its being a department in a primarily academic university rather than in an arts school. Harris-Babou said she has found pursuing art at a large university to be more enriching than it would be at an arts school. “I knew I didn’t know enough about the world to know what I wanted to make art about,” Harris-Babou said. Aaron Seriff-Cullick ’13, an art

major in the photography concentration, said Yale’s undergraduate Art Department also benefits from its ties to the School of Art, with which it shares a building. He added that he has been attending guest lectures and critiques hosted by the School of Art since his freshman year. Seriff-Cullick, whose thesis is an autobiographical video, said students were given the freedom to pursue almost whatever project they liked for their senior thesis. He explained that in addition to participating in a weekly senior seminar, students were assigned individual advisers with whom they met every week of the semester. Before unveiling “Practice,” the students presented their work to a panel of critics consisting of a professor from each of the major’s four concentrations, as well as one additional art expert, Omiya explained. The evaluations of the panel of critics, the students’ advisers and the director of undergraduate studies in the Art Department, Lisa Kereszi, together determined what grade each project received, Seriff-Cullick said. Seriff-Cullick added that his class considered giving its show a specific title that might tie the projects together thematically, but that he thinks this kind of imposition would have proven more destructive than unifying. Von Plinsky said that although students’ projects were conceived independently and without an overarching idea, many students happened to produce work that involved humor. She said she has noticed a tendency towards satire among her class. “It’s the humor of intense people who realize that they’re intense and that not everyone understands them,” Von Plinsky said. “Practice” closed Tuesday.

For nearly an hour on Tuesday evening, a roomful of roughly 20 students and faculty members found themselves whisked into the politically charged literary scene of modern Moscow. The young Russian poet Kirill Medvedev, accompanied by editor and translator Keith Gessen, gave a reading from “It’s No Good: poems / essays / actions,” a recent collection of Medvedev’s poems, manifestos and personal writings. The two delivered Medvedev’s colloquial, often tongue-in-cheek, poems in both English and Russian — Gessen reading the translations at a careful, even pace and Medvedev following with a rapid rush of words. While most of Medvedev’s works are blatantly political, filled with references to Berlin, Tiergarten, the Bolsheviks and the Russian intelligentsia, they also incorporate short narratives that describe taking the Moscow metro or browsing bookshops. Medvedev’s poems are particularly concerned with the state of literature in contemporary Russia. His work is partly a record of the back-and-forth dialogue between Russian writers, who call each other “spoiled little Socialist[s]” and deliver

vodka toasts. In one poem, Medvedev eavesdrops on an argument in which one poet asks another — “Are you a subculture or political party? Make up your minds.” Medvedev himself publicly announced his exit from Russia’s literary world in 2003. He made the decision to free himself from literary politics and allowed himself time to decide his political stance, he said. “He felt he had a choice between remaining an exclusively literary figure or entering political life,” Gessen said. The Russian literary scene remains filled with outdated authors of the Soviet era, who interpret the current Russian government under Vladimir Putin as communism’s second coming, Medvedev said. “In order to understand [the Putin regime], we need to free ourselves of the old Soviet discourse,” Medvedev said, adding that he thinks the Putin regime is not a restoration of socialism but of capitalism. Medvedev said he feels that it is beneficial to keep a high profile in Russia’s current political climate. The new regime, unlike the Soviet Union, will consider the West’s possible reactions when responding to political activists such as himself, he explained.

“Right now … it is important not be silent,” Medvedev said. “The more visible you are, the more likely it is you will be allowed to continue speaking.” Medvedev is distinct among Russian poets for his willingness to participate in a conversation that extends beyond Russia, said Slavic Language and Literature professor Molly Brunson. By taking part in public readings and bringing his work to American universities, Medvedev is contributing to the globalization of contemporary, activist culture in Russia, she said. “His commitment to being one of the mouthpieces for this new leftist, activist movement is apparent in his decision not only to have his work translated into English, but also in giving public performances,” Brunson said. Medvedev’s poetry is also radical in that it breaks from the traditional forms that are still highly important in Russia, said attendee Roman Utkin GRD ’15, adding that both Medvedev’s political beliefs and his poetic style can be seen as expressions of the left. Gessen is co-editor of n+1, a literary and political magazine based in New York City. Contact CYNTHIA HUA at cynthia.hua@yale.edu .

[A^2] is a small step towards the spirit of the [new technoand synthesizer-influenced] genre. JACOB RESKE ’14 Music director, A^2 Singer Keren Abreu ’15 said Ableton-enabled a cappella allows human voices to create unnatural sound effects and can amplify the sound of five singers to emulate 15. At a Monday night rehearsal, Abreu sang a low note that she instantly transformed into a high-pitched, whirring, mechanized

noise. Reske said A^2 does not want audiences to think of it as “cheating” by using the software, making live performance a crucial element of the group’s identity. A video recording of Ableton-enabled a cappella performance would not make clear that the singers were performing live, leading viewers to think the song may have been prerecorded or manipulated in a studio by a sound engineer, Reske explained. If audiences see that the singers are creating the music with their voices in real time, they are more likely to appreciate Ableton as a musical instrument for the performers rather than a replacement for singers, he said. In most live concert performances, Reske added, sound engineers backstage manipulate the live singing to create the sounds audiences hear through speakers. Ableton lets performers take on the role of sound engineers themselves, giving them more control over the final product, he explained. Singers Nimal Eames-Scott ’14 and Paul Holmes ’14 said that A^2 has started working on improvisation and original songwriting. Although the group initially planned to perform arrangements of popular songs like many a cappella groups, the Able-

ton technology allows for a feeling of limitless experimentation on which the group wants to capitalize, Reske explained. As a group without stylistic constraints, A^2 has the ability to experiment with sound technology and the potential of live performance, providing the singers more compositional opportunity than traditional a cappella groups, Eames-Scott said. Eames-Scott, Jackson Thea ’15 and DJ Stanfill ’15 are also current members of the Duke’s Men of Yale, which is wedded to a more specific musical style due to its long tradition. “Improvising is easier than doing an arrangement,” Holmes said. “You’re listening instead of reading off a page — it’s a lot more intuitive.” The group is currently working on “Retrograde” by James Blake, “She Wolf” by David Guetta and “Lost in the World” by Kanye West, Abreu said, of which the Blake and Guetta songs will be on YouTube. Over the summer, Reske said he plans to write original songs and hopes to organize an A^2 performance in the fall. The latest version of the Ableton Live software was released in March 2013. Contact SARAH SWONG at sarah.swong@yale.edu .

Contact HELEN ROUNER at helen.rouner@yale.edu .

Russian activist Medvedev links poetry to politics BY CYNTHIA HUA STAFF REPORTER

With two videos scheduled to hit YouTube in two weeks and a performance slated for next fall, a group of musicians plans to reinvent live a cappella performance with the help of sound manipulation software. Using Ableton Live, a computer program that allows singers to layer and manipulate their voices using sound effects, A^2 — or “A squared” for a cappella and Ableton — aims to experiment with sound effects that can alter performers’ voices during a live show, said Jacob Reske ’14, the music director for the group, which consists of six singers and an electronic musician. Performers using the software sing onstage into microphones plugged into iPads, on which each singer can choose various sound effects for his or her voice. The iPads are wirelessly connected to a master computer that electronic musician Hanoi Hantrakul ’15 uses to remix the songs. While artists like Skrillex use the Ableton Live software to produce albums in the studio and live performers have begun using analog foot pedals to create musical phrases to loop into their songs, Hantrakul said A^2 seeks to integrate digital, multi-layered sound manipulation

into live performance with five singers, which could expand creative potential but also poses coordination difficulties. “We’re a branch on an evolutionary tree in a cappella,” said Reske, who added that a cappella has tended to evolve with larger musical trends, though at a slower rate. “It’s a small step towards the spirit of the [new techno- and synthesizer-influenced] genre.”

JACOB RESKE

A^2 — named for the use of both a cappella and computer program Ableton Live — aims to experiment with sound effects that can alter performers’ voices in a live show.

‘A Year with 13 Moons’ explores identity in flux BY ANYA GRENIER STAFF REPORTER The Yale Repertory Theatre’s final production of the season, “In a Year with 13 Moons,” begins on Friday. Director Robert Woodruff and actor Bill Camp collaborated on adapting the script from the original German film by Rainer Werner Fassbinder, which tells the story of a transgender woman’s search for love and identity. Woodruff will direct the show, and Camp will star as “Elvira.” “In a Year with 13 Moons” will be Woodruff and Camp’s second collaboration to be commissioned by the Rep, in conjunction with support from Yale’s Binger Center for New Theatre and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. Their first was a 2009 world premiere adaptation of Fyodor Dostoevsky’s “Notes from the Underground,” which Woodruff directed with Camp as the “Underground Man.”

Q

What about the original Fassbinder film “In a Year with 13 Moons” inspired you to bring it to the stage?

JENNIFER CHEUNG/PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR

The School of Drama sponsored readings from “It’s No Good: poems / essays / actions” by Russian poet Kirill Medvedev.

RW

Just the story of this woman, this man, that journey. I felt that could be shared through live performance … I think the element of

time is interesting. [Transgender people’s] reception in the world [and] their difficulties have altered slightly. Fassbinder was so ahead of his time at the moment he was working. I don’t see these stories often.

Q

How would you reconcile the show’s depiction of one woman’s search for love with its political implications?

BC

Every time I do it, it’s different. There are things that unfold — every time I do it, I pull a layer out of Elvira. Certain times I do it, different things land harder than others. There are certain ways the story has political relevance, [and] I couldn’t really pinpoint when which is stronger. They’re all strong all the time … I have to be open to all those things, [and] they’re all part of the story. Hopefully they’re always working on me.

RW

I think Fassbinder didn’t isolate love from its economic and social context. The interchange of all those things is primary to his work. I don’t think he would separate them.

there special challenges to playQAre ing a transgender character?

BC

It’s a great challenge — I’ve never done anything like this before. She sort of starts off in one place: dressed as a man, physically a woman, psychically starting to move into a place of wanting to be a man again. A certain chapter of her life is slipping away. She is never in one gender identity — at times she’s sort of desperately trying to find who she is. [Playing Elvira] is a process, it’s so much about my body, [and] about how I use the things I have available to me as a 50-year-old man, even the things I can do with my voice. I know my limitations, and I try to push my limitations … I’ve never walked in heels as much as I am now. The language of my body has to change, that’s just my job as an actor, to do that, to investigate that.

did you collaborate in creating QHow this show?

RW

We worked together with a translator to get the text from the original German. It’s been kind of a dialogue that’s been ongoing about what might be possible. The journey gets reshaped, re-framed, recontextualized. Bill learns a lot on his feet when working through something

— it’s something that evolves a lot through movement. That’s just barely begun. do you feel the use of live QWhat video and projections brings to the production?

RW

We try to use video both as paint and to see deeper into [Elvira’s] life. It’s also a tool for the audience. Live video is just that: live. You really get to capture a lot of emotion. It accents the movement on stage, both physical and emotional.

does having a live camera on QHow you affect your onstage performance?

BC

It depends on the context in which that camera is being used. There are times in which Elvira is aware of the camera on her. When it’s focused on her, she changes. There are times when she’s lost, and so into where she is at the moment that awareness of [the camera] is secondary. It’s also possible to respond or react to the image being projected in live time. Contact ANYA GRENIER at anna.grenier@yale.edu .