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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 · TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2014 · VOL. CXXXVI, NO. 89 · yaledailynews.com

INSIDE THE NEWS MORNING EVENING

SNOW RAIN

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CROSS CAMPUS Ghosts of Presidents Past.

To celebrate President’s Day at Yale, the University put up an online album of five old photos of alumni who went on to occupy the highest seat in the nation. Highlights include George H. W. Bush ’48 hanging out with Babe Ruth on the baseball field, a head shot of George W. Bush ’68 that looks like the blackand-white equivalent of an awkward Yale ID photo and a picture of William Howard Taft 1878 when he returned to give a commencement speech in 1905, sporting a moustache to rival any facial hair of Salovey’s.

NEUROSCIENCE STUDY EXAMINES WELL-WISHING

DEMS

PAGES 10-11 SCITECH

PAGE 3 CITY

Yale College Democrats revive community service efforts

The new resident at 345 Temple St. Since the recent

death of Timothy Dwight’s best golden retriever, Dixie McCormick, the courtyard has felt a bit empty. But now there’s a new furry face around the residential college, a fluffy white puppy by the name of Sasha McCormick. Sasha the Samoyed already has an active social media presence thanks to all the Yalies welcoming her to campus life.

End Days. Invitations to

commencement were sent out

by University Vice President Kimberly Goff-Crews today, eliciting reactions ranging from “No, please no!” to “Thank God at last!” among the Class of 2014. From now until May, the entire senior class is essentially walking one long commencement procession.

The solution to all your problems. Your problem

sets, that is. Two Columbia sophomores invented an app called “The Homework Machine” at the Spring 2014 PennApps Hackathon this weekend. The robotic app scans problem set worksheets and writes out the answers in the student’s handwriting.

Don’t tell Harvard.

Eating your way to artistic enlightenment. Ezra Stiles

College is holding a series of special events for Art Week this week. Activities include sushi making and cake decorating, since food definitely qualifies as the highest form of art, along with more traditional art activities like a poetry reading, dance performances, and crafts.

THIS DAY IN YALE HISTORY

1960 The Trumbull College Marble Club, dedicated to playing marbles, holds a blacktie banquet. The Captain leads his teammates through the dining hall in a snake dance in a highlight of the affair, before giving a speech on the psychology of marbles.

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“Reliable tension” pays tribute to American artist Jasper Johns PAGE 5 CULTURE

STEM RECRUITMENT

Evaluating STEM at Yale

Corp ‘teas’ garner little interest

BY MATTHEW LLOYD-THOMAS STAFF REPORTER

education, said this perception has since been eradicated.

Over the past eight years, the undergraduate admissions office has played a central role in changing the public perception of Yale’s STEM programs by explicitly recruiting highly qualified STEM high school seniors and advertising the ongoing

Last week, the University announced a significant effort to connect the Yale Corporation to students by setting up small forums for discussion between the two parties — but student interest in the events appears to be lacking.

Beginning Wednesday, the University will pilot a series of “University Teas” that will offer students a chance to speak candidly with select members of the Yale Corporation, the University’s highest governing body. However, only one of 45 students interviewed said they planned to attend one of the teas.

Students said they did not sign up because of a combination of apathy and full schedules.

“I had class or work or something at all those times,” Esther Portyansky ’16 said. “If I wasn’t busy, I would have signed up.”

University President Peter Salovey, University Secretary and Vice President Kimberly Goff-Crews and Yale Corporation Senior Fellow Margaret Marshall have characterized the teas as a major effort to increase connections between the University’s governors and current students. For many years, the Corporation’s only institutionalized interaction with students came in the form of a yearly meeting with the Yale College Council.

Goff-Crews said students she has spoken with are curious about what the Corporation does. The teas — which will include a small number of students in order to facilitate discussion — will likely be oversubscribed, Goff-Crews said.

“Over time, we should be able to accommodate students who want to meet Cor-

SEE STEM PAGE 4

SEE YALE CORP PAGE 6

Gourmet eating at dining hall prices. Feel like an alum, pay

like a student! Mory’s may now be within your price range. The tables down at Mory’s are now serving options ranging from $5 to $7, including a salad, a cheeseburger and fettuccine Bolognese. For comparison, lunch swipes to your regular dining hall are $8 in cash.

MODERN ART

S

tudents arriving at Yale today are seeing more institutional emphasis on STEM than ever before. In the second of a three-part series, Rishabh Bhandari and Jennifer Gersten investigate how the University’s new STEM initiatives have impacted students.

When James Lockman ’89 was a student, Yale was known for football stars and a cappella crooners — not science and engineering.

But Lockman, who now serves as the president of the Yale Science and Engineering Association, said the University has made major strides over the past ten years in expanding the scope and visibility of its STEM programs and resources. The

strength of Yale STEM, he said, is no longer a secret.

“There was a perception among people that the [Massachusetts Institute of Technology] had stronger STEM facilities than Yale. Even I thought that [as a high school senior],” said Gregg Favalora ’96, vice-president of the YSEA. Favalora, who chose Yale over MIT because of its broader liberal arts

Yalies push broccoli

Staff braves bad weather

BY J.R. REED AND HANNAH SCHWARZ STAFF REPORTERS This March, the Elm City is turning a new shade of green.

At Elm City Market this President’s Day, three Yale undergraduates officially launched a campaign to make broccoli cool.

It started with a New York Times magazine cover, “Broccoli’s Extreme Makeover.”

Last year, author Michael Moss challenged Victors & Spoils, an ad agency that has created campaigns for Coke, Quizno’s and General Mills, to make broccoli as appealing as its less healthy counterparts. Victors & Spoils came up with a slew of posters and slogans, but the campaign was never launched. A few months later, Drew Morrison ’14, Monica DiLeo ’16 and Adam Goff ’15 decided to organize the campaign as a project for their Urbanization, Food Systems and Environment class. New Haven will be the first city to turn the mock-up into a reality.

The effort is being advertised throughout the city, with a digital billboard on Interstate 91, two CT Transit buses sporting broccoli posters, signs and events at Elm City Market and other stores. Broccoli specials will be served at Claire’s Corner Copia and Atticus Café & Bookstore.

To attract Yale students, they will also be putting up posters throughout dining halls on campus. So far, the team has raised $2,000, and their kickstarter has obtained 430 pledges. “[The campaign] is supposed to be a hipper version of the typical PSA you get,” said Morrison, one of the students organizing the campaign. In their “hip” approach, the team will be designSEE BROCCOLI PAGE 6

KAMARIA GREENFIELD/SENIOR PHOTOGRAPHER

Yale employees in “critical positions” such as public safety, acute care and food service must work despite bad weather.

BY POOJA SALHOTRA STAFF REPORTER What is usually a 20-minute drive to campus took Yale Dining employee Keshia Sullins three hours on Thursday’s snow-covered morning.

Sullins was one of the many Yale employees who struggled to make it to campus last week after a snowstorm brought nearly a foot of snow to the Elm City and surrounding

suburbs. Although New Haven Public Schools, Quinnipiac University and other nearby institutions closed down, giving many of their employees the day off, Yale decided to continue operating after closely monitoring the forecast the day before.

While professors had the option of canceling classes, employees in “critical positions” – including public safety, acute care and food service – were expected to show up for their

shifts.

“This is a condition of their employment and made clear at time of hire,” Vice President for Human Resources and Administration Mike Peel said in an email. “Typically, that means living closer to campus and/or having transportation arrangements fully equipped for road conditions in a broad range of snow and ice condiSEE BAD WEATHER PAGE 4

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YALE DAILY NEWS · TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2014 · yaledailynews.com

OPINION

.COMMENT “Yale's policy seems unnecessarily punitive.” yaledailynews.com/opinion

Beyond the paper A

take-home final I took last semester was prefaced with this statement: “Thinking a bit about all of these questions … will help you in the long run, by further allowing this exam to serve some proper pedagogical function and be something more than a mere diagnostic tool for establishing grade.”

The question of who makes a good and effective teacher tends to spark one of those vexingly endless debates that plays out like a Rorschach test, telling you more about people’s own priorities than any objective reality.

The Yale version of this debate typically centers around a purported trade-off between professors’ research credentials and their teaching skills. This issue has lately been given particular attention with regard to some of our largest introductory lectures.

New findings on precisely this question from the National Bureau of Economic Research — that show students in intro courses apparently learn more from non-tenure-track professors than tenure-track ones — notwithstanding, I’ve found in my three-and-a-half years at Yale that we have plenty of good and bad teachers. Many in both categories come from the ranks of our most famous scholars, our tenure-track professors, our lecturers and even our grad students.

Selecting “good” teachers is complicated by the fact that one student’s best professor is often another’s worst. Lecture or discussion-style, attention to detail and focus on the bigger picture — these are all prerogatives different professors will handle differently, to the satisfaction of some and the dismay of others.

But in spite of this frustrating lack of universal rules for good teaching, that sentence from my take-home exam stood out to me when I first read it. It continues to stand out to me today.

I’ve generally based my feelings about professors on how they conduct themselves in class.

Do they help me to understand things I don’t? Do they make me think of new things? Can they lead a discussion? Are they interesting and charismatic?

These are important questions, and yet they relate only to one part of most classes. The other, arguably more important part of classes, involves the work we do on our own.

For the most part, I’ve taken this part of any class for granted.

For my humanities classes, I will write papers; for other classes, I will complete problem sets and take tests. Some classes will mix and match between these approaches, but for the most part, any work I produce — and am evaluated on — will tend to fall into a relatively small number of established categories.

There are plenty of good reasons for some of our most common diagnostic tools. Problem

sets force you to keep up with difficult material; tests, by limiting your time and access m a te r i a l s, HARRY are a great LARSON way of showing how well Nothing in you’ve actually mastered Particular material.

Papers demonstrate an understanding of a subject and an ability to formulate a written argument about it.

For the most part, however, these reasons are all diagnostic.

Most of our assignments force us to learn, so that we can show we have learned. But actually completing them does not usually teach us anything new, beyond the context of the specific material covered.

Many of my classes this year haven’t fit into this paradigm.

Sometimes, I resented this — after all, shouldn’t a class about Shakespeare allow me to produce a paper with my own (very sophisticated and original) thoughts on Hamlet? But instead of getting those familiar lists of thematic prompts that most professors provide, I was being asked, surprisingly, to compare often minor differences between versions of texts or to do wordby-word autopsies of particular speeches (these are not the same things as close readings). In my economics senior seminar, I was asked to formulate my own economic model and devise a way of testing it that would work in the real world, challenging me theoretically and empirically in ways few undergraduate economics classes do.

These assignments were more than "a mere diagnostic tool." In completing them, I was not only asked to consider new material. Indeed, the specific material being considered wasn’t always particularly new or interesting, but in being instructed to approach it in original ways, I learned far more than I would have from just another paper or problem set.

Papers, problem sets and exams are very good diagnostic tools; sometimes, especially the first few times you’re faced with them, they are also more than that. But professors often seem to consider this limited repertoire as exhaustive.

My advice to those seeking to improve their teaching is to look beyond the classroom. What are you asking your students to do on their own? Is your primary purpose in assigning work to see who deserves a good grade? What will students learn from doing the work you assign?

Cultivating gratitude D

onations to the Senior Class Gift close tomorrow. The class of 2014 hit 75 percent participation, as of yesterday. Every year since we arrived at Yale, the senior class has broken 96 percent participation. In other words, we’re not doing too great.

As students, we’re not typically called on to donate. We’re just not in that phase of life.

Instead, we’re usually supported by others. We go about our activities with backing from fellowships and grants and stipends and donations and the help of parents or relatives. For many of us, not yet in a position to give substantial sums, the question of organized charity is pushed off to some future time, perhaps when we’re grown up.

And then, every year, the Senior Class Gift rolls around and everybody starts talking about what it means to give back.

For me, it is simple. Every single one of us here has benefitted from Yale College, and donating to the Senior Class Gift is a gesture of gratitude. A thank you. A moment to stop and think about all the people making this place run who care about us and our education and opportunities. Students can designate where they want their donation to go, and many earmark it towards financial aid. Like writing a birthday card to a parent, the donation is more about the sentiment conveyed than the cumulative sum ultimately raised.

And yet, the gift is not without controversy. Does Yale really need our money? Unaccustomed to giving charity as a show of support, the small sums requested rouse suspicion. Even resistance. Why would Yale, with its $20.8 billion endowment, want my $20?

As critical thinkers, we are trained to look for problems.

Innovative academic work or penetrating analysis often originates with the identification of an overlooked error, the discovery of a flaw. We take what seems good and ask what’s wrong. This mindset guides us as students, as well it should. Every day the News is filled with thoughts and suggestions and insights on problems with Yale and proposed solutions. We look at Yale and ask: How can this be better?

But that should not be our only mindset. Yes, there are problems at Yale, and for this reason alone, a number of seniors every year decide not to give. Some people take offense at the request, feeling that in one way or another Yale has failed them. Recognizing those failures and thinking about how they can be avoided in the future is important work, and should never stop. But I challenge any senior to argue that Yale has not done him or her at least $5 worth of good.

Being badgered for money is

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not fun. No one enjoys badgering friends for money either.

But there is a time to argue and a time to show appreciSHIRA The two TELUSHKIN ation. can be separated.

The Behind Senior Class Gift is an Blue Eyes o p p o r t u n i ty to thank Yale, and remind ourselves — when

it is cold and dreary outside — how awesome it is to be here.

Because ultimately, the cultivation of gratitude doesn’t just make us a few dollars poorer, it allows us to recognize how much we have for which to be thankful.

Even if you’re not a senior, why not spend a few minutes right now and think of one thing at Yale for which you are grateful?

It’s OK to acknowledge the good even as we identify challenges — the problems aren’t going anywhere, and neither, I hope, are the people fixing them.

The question was once asked

of Maimonides, the 12th century Jewish philosopher, about a man with a 1,000 coins: Is it better to donate all 1,000 coins at once, thus doing the most good for one person, or to donate one coin 1,000 times? Maimonides answered that one should donate a single coin 1,000 times, and in that way he will train his hand to give. We have one day left, 2014.

Let’s train our hands.

SHIRA TELUSHKIN is a senior in Pierson College. Her column runs on alternate Thursdays. Contact her at shira.telushkin@yale.edu .

G U E ST C O LU M N I ST CA R O L I N E S M I T H

Becoming a Yeti

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HARRY LARSON is a senior in Jonathan Edwards College. His columns run on alternate Tuesdays. Contact him at harry.larson@yale.edu .

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'BRIGHTEFFLUENCE' ON 'FOR A

L

ast week, my friend Ellie and I got ready to go out for the evening.

With coats zipped and hoods up, we just needed one more thing — a shovel.

We are Yetis — volunteers for Snowcrew.org, a mobile web-optimized app that connects New Haven residents who need help shoveling with people who want to volunteer. For some individuals in New Haven, snowstorms can mean being trapped inside their homes unable to travel to work, to the pharmacy or to the supermarket.

They may remain isolated for days, compromising their health and safety. Snowcrew.org helps those who are not physically able to shovel or can’t afford to hire a service to dig them out, allowing them to request assistance. The app was developed a year ago, and only expanded to New Haven this winter.

But Snowcrew.org isn’t just about the hour or so spent shoveling — it’s about weaving together streets and homes and residents, making this large city into a neighborhood.

For a Yeti, procuring a shovel

can often be the first battle. Last week, Ellie and I needed to hunt one down before we could get to work. We started at GHeav.

Walking in, we shook the manager’s hand and asked if we could borrow the store’s shovel for the next couple hours. He handed us his own personal shovel, which he had just bought that same morning. When we asked if we could leave a phone or ID as collateral, he shook his head: “I trust you.”

On our way to Dwight Street, we passed by a group of New Haven residents taking a break from shoveling to get warm.

After exchanging a couple of shoveling jokes, we asked if they had any old shovels they could let us keep. Immediately, one handed us a shovel with no questions asked.

Having lived in New Haven for over three years, I’ve seen how generosity like this on the part of this city’s residents is a common occurrence. It’s not just about shovel sharing: Every day, whether I’m getting a free bike tuneup at College Street Cycles or an extra splash of honey in my tea at Green Well,

I reap the benefits of living in a city whose residents care about each other. Just this Valentine’s Day, I ventured to my favorite New Haven shops asking for oddities for a unique Valentine’s Day gift. Stores like the Devil’s Gear and Artspace gave me a medley of items, either free or for a reduced price, making for an interesting bouquet of treasures and a truly unique community experience.

I’m grateful for an app like Snowcrew.org that affords me the opportunity to give a bit back to my city in the form of early mornings and sore shoulders. Throughout the years, I’ve been able to shovel out military veterans, a security officer after a long day of work, grandparents and lifelong New Haven families. Some of my most rewarding and heartfelt moments have come from conversations with these individuals that I’m proud to call my neighbors. As Yale students, we wake up in the morning and our streets have been cleared from snowfall, allowing us to move around with comfort and ease. Cleared sidewalks are such a simple privi-

lege, one easily forgotten. Shoveling a driveway isn’t a glorified or intellectual task, yet the service is so essential.

Yalies and New Haven residents have lived next door to each other for a long time, but sometimes it’s difficult for students to fulfill that neighborly role. Snowcrew.org is grounded in the firm belief that people want to and will help out their fellow neighbors if given the tools to communicate and connect. The app gives us the chance to bring ourselves a little closer in a tangible way during the times when our neighbors need us most.

New Haven will most likely experience a few more snowstorms this winter. It may be tempting to lock ourselves indoors and avoid the cold — but this time of year gives us a unique opportunity to connect with this city and feel its warmth. So grab a shovel, and meet the neighbors as the snow is swept away.

CAROLINE SMITH is a senior in Davenport College. Contact her at caroline.smith@yale.edu .

YALE DAILY NEWS · TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2014 · yaledailynews.com

PAGE 3

NEWS

“The most sincere form of love is love for food.” GEORGE BERNARD SHAW IRISH PLAYWRIGHT

C L A R I F I CAT I O N FRIDAY, FEB. 14

In the article “Murphy urges colleges to go smoke-free,” Haley McCarthy said cigarette smoking is more prevalent amongst college students than any other age group. But according to Dr. Lisa Fucito, the most recent Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) report on smoking prevalence showed that 25-44 year olds have the highest smoking rate, and rates among college students have seen one of the largest declines in recent years.

Food writer charms students with her journey

Dems revive commmunity service efforts

BY SARAH BRULEY STAFF REPORTER Starting this semester, the Yale College Democrats are extending their influence in New Haven through community service.

For the past few years, the Dems have focused primarily on political organizing and legislative activities. But at the start of this semester, the political group has renewed its interest in community service activities through a variety of New Haven-based organizations.

The group’s first activity, a volunteer effort with New Haven Reads, was cancelled last week due to inclement weather, but the organization plans to begin regularly partnering with other Dwight Hall Member and independent organizations.

“We see our larger goal as being involved in the community, and as an organization that tries to work for progress, we see community service as

part of that,” said Becca Ellison ’15, president of the Yale College Democrats. “I do see political activism and community service as the same thing.

It’s all part of a larger goal.”

We see our larger goal as being involved in the community … to work for progress.

BECCA ELLISON ‘15 President of Yale College Democrats While the Dems are not seeking to politicize their volunteer work, Ellison said the organization’s community service and political activism are not mutually exclusive. Since most of the Dems’ work has been legislative, volunteer work will give members more opportunities to continue public service, she said.

Discussions about incor-

porating volunteer work into the Dems’ activities began at the end of last semester after the 2013 elections, when several members expressed interest in community service, said Ray Noonan ’15, vice president of the Yale College Democrats.

The Dems conducted a survey earlier this month to gauge broader interest, and the results indicated members were eager to increase their involvement with community service activities, said Lily Sawyer-Kaplan ’17, communications director for the Dems.

Years ago, community service played a more prominent role in the Dems’ weekly activities. The political group worked with students at Wilbur Cross High School to engage students in local politics. But the program, called YPEP, left the Dems’ hands when it became a Dwight Hall member organization in the late 2000s, Noonan said.

After nearly a six-year hiatus from service activity, members of the Dems would like to make

community service a permanent part of the organization, Noonan said. Because their last effort at organizing a service project with New Haven Reads was limited to only five members, those spearheading the community service efforts are trying to organize service projects that are available to a larger portion of the Dems’ members.

It is not uncommon for student political organizations to engage in social work, especially after an election cycle, said Tyler Carlisle ’15, vice president of communications for the Yale Political Union.

“There are a lot of different social groups on campus, and it’s important for the various political groups to remain relevant even when there aren’t political elections happening,” Carlisle said.

The Yale College Democrats comprises over 150 active members.

Contact SARAH BRULEY at sarah.bruley@yale.edu .

ALEXANDRA SCHMELING/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

Samin Nosrat’s upcoming book “Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat: The Four Elements of Good Cooking” aims to teach readers the four basic principles of cooking.

BY JILLIAN KRAVATZ CONTRIBUTING REPORTER Fifteen years ago, Samin Nosrat snatched a job sweeping the floors of the famous Californian restaurant Chez Panisse. Now she is trying to change the way people cook.

On Monday afternoon, Nosrat — a cook, writer and teacher — addressed a group of roughly 40 students and faculty at a Morse College Master’s Tea. Between hearty chuckles, Nosrat shared details of her personal passion for food, her unconventional and fortuitous education, and her goals for her upcoming book “Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat: The Four Elements of Good Cooking.” Following the tea, Nosrat shared dinner with a group of Yale undergraduates after working with students to prepare the meal using local ingredients.

“Cookbooks don’t actually teach you how to cook,” Nosrat said. “There are so many problems with recipes. A lot of times they’re not tested right and I think a lot of people don’t understand that just because it is published doesn’t mean it works.”

The goal of her upcoming book is to teach people the four basic principles of cooking. With personal anecdotes, science experiments and illustration, Nosrat hopes to reach a wide variety of people with all levels of cooking experience and help reveal the taste possibilities for cooking with simple ingredients, she said.

Nosrat’s method centers on decision-making and discovery, and the book aims to help cooks make thoughtful decisions in their cooking process so that they know what they are going to get in the end.

“I love taking the simplest things and heightening them to the maximum tastiness,” Nosrat said, adding that limitations fuel exciting creativity in the kitchen.

The inspiration for Nosrat’s book comes directly from what Nosrat calls her “sensory education.” While working as an inexperienced intern at Chez Panisse, Nosrat was enamored with the kitchen. As she began learning more about cooking, she noticed a disparity between the ways the chefs in the restaurant cooked and the way she and her friends cooked at home. Nosrat was astonished with chefs’ ability to create innumerable dishes from a wide range of ingredients, all without a recipe for guidance.

But soon, she said, she caught on.

As she learned more, Nosrat began to notice fundamental pat-

terns in all cooking. The chefs at the restaurant were always tasting for salt, acid and fat, she said, explaining that “it was always sensory clues” that led them to make culinary decisions.

“I was immersed in this sensory education and I realized that [this] ultimately is what is at the heart of cooking,” she said.

No one ever laid anything out for her, Nosrat explains. While an undergraduate studying English at the University of California, Berkeley, Nosrat started busing at Chez Panisse before working in its kitchen. She traveled to Italy to study with local butchers and cooks, and also petitioned for a spot in the class of Michael Pollan, a journalism professor at UC Berkeley.

Just like preparing a soufflé, she said, her journey has been filled with ups and downs. Nosrat attributed much of her success to her willingness to work her way up from the bottom and the guidance of her excellent mentors.

Among these mentors are Benedetta Vitali, Christopher Lee and Alice Walters — all chefs from whom Nosrat learned.

Students at the talk appreciated Nosrat’s approach. Ashley Wu ’15 said Nosrat’s method is “wonderfully basic and beautiful,” adding that she thinks Nosrat is “very smart about the way she cooks.”

McLane Ritzel ’14 said Nosrat’s story of hard work and ambition is very inspiring.

“She has this incredibly beautiful energy that gets me excited for my own post graduate life,” Ritzel said.

Nosrat was astonished with the number of people who came to hear her speak — a testament to the increasing passion for food among today’s students, she suggested. But she also said that more must be done — and she plans to continue cooking, writing, teaching and traveling after the publication of her book. She hopes to explore ways of teaching culinary skills to portions of the population such as younger generations and low-income families.

“She’s just an enthusiast, and that goes so far,” said Barbara Stuart, a Yale English lecturer who teaches the courses “Food Policy” and “Writing About Food.” Stuart added: “Plus, she knows what she’s talking about.”

Nosrat’s book “Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat: The Four Elements of Good Cooking” will be published in spring 2015.

Contact JILLIAN KRAVATZ at jillian.kravatz@yale.edu .

DIANA LI/CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER

The Yale College Democrats seek to increase community service efforts after a nearly six-year hiatus from service activity.

2014 WALLACE PRIZE Yale’s Most Prestigious Independent Writing Award Submit your unpublished fiction and nonfiction to the Yale Daily News Building, 202 York St., by 5 PM on Monday, March 3.

Pick up applications in the English department office or at the YDN. Winning entries are selected by a panel of professional judges and published in the Yale Daily News Magazine

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YALE DAILY NEWS · TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2014 · yaledailynews.com

FROM THE FRONT

“Science never solves a problem without creating ten more.” GEORGE BERNARD SHAW IRISH PLAYWRIGHT

Students feel impact of STEM initiatives

KATHRYN CRANDALL/PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR

The University aims for prospective STEM majors to make up 40 percent of each incoming freshman class.

STEM FROM PAGE 1 research and accomplishments of the University’s faculty.

Both Dean of Undergraduate Admissions Jeremiah Quinlan and Ayaska Fernando ’08 GRD ’14, senior assistant director at the admissions office and the director of STEM recruitment, said the office aims to let prospective applicants know that Yale offers a world-class STEM undergraduate education.

Students will not miss out on opportunities for cutting-edge research or funding by coming to Yale, Quinlan said.

According to 42 students interviewed who are currently majoring in a STEM subject at Yale, these claims have largely proved true.

Still, many of the students who arrived at Yale intending to major in STEM fields have ended up changing their minds. Though the University aims for prospective STEM majors to make up 40 percent of the incoming freshman class, only about a quarter of students in the class of 2014 were STEM majors by the time they were seniors.

LIVING UP TO EXPECTATIONS

“I’ve absolutely loved my STEM experience here at Yale,” said Spencer Alexander ’14, an electrical engineering major.

When Alexander submitted applications to colleges, he said Yale was initially lower on his list than other Ivy League schools with more well-known engineering programs, including Princeton and Cornell. It was not until he visited campus during Bulldog Days and saw the opportunities available for future students that he was persuaded to come to Yale, he said.

Alexander said Yale’s STEM resources are often underrated because of their small size. Sam Faucher ’16, a chemical engineering major who chose Yale over schools with more established STEM programs such as Harvard and Stanford, said college rankings tend to favor schools with bigger STEM programs because the ranking systems use metrics such as the aggregate research output at each school or the number of professors in each

department.

Most students interviewed said the small size of Yale’s STEM program is actually one of its strengths. They cited easier access for students to labs and professors, a collaborative environment and readily available funding as hallmarks of a Yale STEM education.

Fernando said Yale’s facultyto-student ratio is one of the lowest in the University’s peer group, adding that this more intimate learning environment gives Yale undergraduates an advantage when applying to competitive graduate schools.

“Because each faculty member is writing only one or two recommendation letters each year, our students’ graduate school applications tend to be supported by very meaty, very substantive and thorough recommendation letters,” he said.

Fernando, a graduate student studying mechanical engineering, said several of his classmates matriculated to some of the top graduate schools in the country — a testament, he said, to the caliber of the STEM students Yale both attracts and produces.

Alexander said he has found Yale professors to be willing and helpful mentors.

In addition, he said the University offers generous funding for students to conduct summer research. Programs such as Perspectives on Science and Engineering provide funding even for freshmen, Alexander said.

Nimisha Ganesh ’15 said her freshman year faculty advisor funded her entire freshman summer research project and was responsive throughout the summer whenever she needed help.

Still, students interviewed said the strength of Yale’s STEM programs was not the only factor that influenced them to choose Yale over schools known to have a more technical focus. They said they were also attracted to Yale’s liberal arts curriculum and culture of extracurricular activities.

Jon Dorsch ’16, who turned down the California Institute of Technology and MIT once he was taken off Yale’s waitlist, said he wanted to attend a school where intellectual diversity flourished.

“If you don’t do STEM at a

school like Caltech, you don’t do anything. You drop out or you transfer,” he said.

Though he majors in mechanical engineering at Yale, Dorsch said he has also taken classes that he could not imagine taking at any other school, such as “Listening to Music.”

Faucher said Yale’s emphasis on the liberal arts separates the University from even its Ivy League peers. He added that it is not uncommon for STEM students at Yale to pursue widely different extracurricular pursuits, such as improvisational comedy and drama, or to write for a literary publication.

All 42 students interviewed said they were attracted to the University because of the significant investments Yale has made in renovating and expanding STEM facilities available to undergraduates.

“The entire STEM community is growing,” Russ Egly ’16 said.

“They’ve been pumping tremendous amounts of money in the last decade and that’s going to start showing in the next few years.”

Several students and alumni interviewed mentioned the Center for Engineering, Innovation, and Design (CEID), which opened in 2012, as an example of the kind of facility that has helped Yale recruit top young scientists and engineers. Alexander, who is a science and engineering tour guide for the admissions office, said prospective applicants are frequently impressed by the CEID, as well as by the University’s purchase of West Campus — which includes more than 500,000 square feet of research laboratories. Alexander said these facilities may explain why top STEM students are increasingly choosing Yale over traditional STEM powerhouses.

Since the CEID’s opening, the center’s glass walls on Prospect Street have given Yale’s engineering department unprecedented visibility. Lockman, the engineering alumnus, said the CEID has helped make the “little secret” of Yale’s engineering program public. Student extracurricular groups and academic classes related to design and product development have made

use of the center’s resources, which include study spaces, 3-D printers, laser cutters and wet labs. Swipe access to these facilities is available to any student who completes the requisite online quiz and training.

RETENTION, NOT JUST ACCEPTANCE

When University President Peter Salovey first stepped onto the Yale campus as a graduate student in 1981, roughly 20 percent of all degrees awarded to Yale College graduates were in the STEM fields. But despite a significant rise over the past few decades in the number of freshmen who arrive at Yale intending to pursue STEM fields, the number of students who end up majoring in STEM has barely changed: only 23 percent of the class of 2014 is currently majoring in a STEM field, according to the Office of Institutional Research.

Fernando said one of the University’s goals is to raise the retention rate of incoming STEM students. But he added that high attrition rates in the STEM fields are a national problem and not just specific to Yale.

“There are a number of reasons inherent in a STEM education that explain why so many incoming STEM students change course,” Egly said, citing the difficulty of the majors as one primary explanation. “These courses aren’t just very timeconsuming and difficult but the majors also require a lot of credits.”

Egly added that the relative grade inflation of the social sciences could also make a STEM major less appealing to students.

Alexander said many students who enter as prospective chemistry or biology majors are considering medical school. If they discard this option once in college, many will also discard the STEM path at large, he said. Dorsch added that many students start as STEM majors without being very committed because it is easier to start in STEM and then move out than it is to move into STEM from a non-quantitative major.

But students interviewed also said the University’s introduc-

tory courses leave much to be desired and often turn students away from STEM majors.

Austin Haynesworth ’15 said that while students in the humanities can usually drop or replace badly taught courses, STEM students often have no choice but to take a course with a poorly reviewed professor if the course is a prerequisite for their major.

“The [teaching assistants] for the introductory science classes are horrible,” Egly said, adding that many of his friends left the STEM fields after having poor experiences with introductory classes. But Egly said his classes were much better taught at the advanced levels, a sentiment shared by other students interviewed.

He also said the University’s small science departments grant students less flexibility in selecting courses than they would at larger schools such as Stanford or MIT. As someone interested in energy engineering, Egly said he is disappointed Yale is only beginning to develop a certificate in the discipline, while schools such as MIT allow students to minor in the field. Dorsch echoed Egly’s complaint, adding that the University does not have a good course on rockets.

Harry Larson ’14, a columnist for the News and former STEM major who now double majors in economics and English, said many students may leave the STEM majors for less time-consuming majors that enable them to participate in Yale’s vibrant extracurricular and social scene.

Larson added that he thinks more students would stay STEM majors if Yale’s culture prioritized academics over extracurriculars.

Still, Larson said the University could take a number of relatively small steps to retain STEM students, such as moving more large introductory lectures to central locations on campus like Woolsey Hall and Linsly-Chittenden Hall.

Students i n te rv i ewe d expressed different views on whether Yale has the faculty resources to continue expanding its STEM programs.

University restrictions on hir-

ing have hit the Computer Science Department particularly hard, and the department has strained to accommodate a surge in student interest in its introductory courses.

Computer science major Moriah Rahamim ’15 said her classes have remained large even as she has progressed to higher levels. While humanities courses, she said, commonly have one teaching fellow per ten students, computer science courses may have two teaching fellows for an entire 100-person lecture. She cited long lines for office hours and limited one-onone time with professors as evidence that the department is too small to handle student demand.

“It’s been a huge problem,” Rahamim said. “You feel like you’re not really getting the resources and available support that you were promised.”

Most computer science majors interviewed said they chose Yale specifically for the department’s emphasis on theoretical concepts over practical applications.

Others, however, expressed concern that Yale does not offer a single course in web development or app design, both of which are increasingly desirable skills for STEM employers.

Taylor McHugh ’16 said she was also skeptical about STEM expansion because the qualities that make Yale a unique place to practice science could be diluted if many more students joined the STEM community.

Fernando disagreed with these concerns, saying that the University’s low faculty-to-student ratio and extensive resources per student make Yale well poised to accommodate an increase in the number of undergraduates who choose to study STEM. He added that the University has over 800 laboratories and that there are no signs that students are struggling to find research opportunities.

In the 2012-’13 academic year, 333 students at Yale were majoring in biology and physical sciences.

Contact RISHABH BHANDARI at rishabh.bhandari@yale.edu and JENNIFER GERSTEN at jennifer.gersten@yale.edu .

Despite bad weather, no respite for staff BAD WEATHER FROM PAGE 1 tions.”

Peel added staff in non-critical positions, such as those in administrative jobs where the work is deferrable, could elect to use paid time off last week when inclement weather posed a safety hazard to their commute. Staff members are allotted 10 to 25 days of paid time off per year, and unused time off accumulates over the years. The average Yale employee has accumulated more than 25 days in their paid time off bank, Peel said.

Yale employees in critical ser-

vices said they understand that coming to work despite difficult road conditions is part of their job.

Still, Sullins said she was frustrated that she had to risk her own safety to come to work.

“We care about the kids, but we have to jeopardize ourselves to get here,” Sullins said. “Regardless of the weather, we have to provide the service.”

Instead of requiring staff to brave the storm, Sullins suggested that a student executive board should organize and take care of food service when dining hall workers cannot easily commute to

work. She explained that students could be assigned to a particular residential college to ensure that students got food during inclement weather.

Although the exact numbers are not available, Director of Residential Dining Cathy Van Dyke SOM ’86 said in an email that many dining staff could not make it to work on Thursday both because they were taking care of children whose schools were closed and because they could not safely commute to campus. Due to the staff shortage, some employees worked from the breakfast

shift through the dinner shift for overtime pay.

“The sense of ownership and pride is very high in Yale Dining, and their resolve has been tested through recent weather contingencies,” she said. “Having an additional challenge from the weather is actually a boost to employee morale — they like to show that they can put the food on the table no matter what,” she said.

Despite the challenges posed by inclement weather, Van Dyke said Yale Dining employees go to great lengths to ensure service is deliv-

ered to students during emergencies.

Staff shortages also caused workers to adjust their typical standards. In Jonathan Edwards College, the staff turned to paper plates and cups because many employees in the dish room did not make it to campus, and some dining halls modified their Thursday dinner menu and Friday lunch menu.

Aside from food service, staff performing other essential functions, such as public safety, were required to report to work.

Assistant Chief of Police Mike

Patten said Yale Security was fully staffed last week.

“Those of us who work in public safety do whatever it takes to keep the campus safe,” Patten said. “We are proud of our personnel who braved the storms to protect our community.”

Yale Dining is responsible for serving over 14,000 meals per day.

Larry Milstein contributed reporting.

Contact POOJA SALHOTRA at pooja.salhotra@yale.edu .

YALE DAILY NEWS · TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2014 · yaledailynews.com

PAGE 5

NEWS

“Sometimes I see it and then paint it. Other times I paint it and then see it. Both are impure situations, and I prefer neither.”

JASPER JOHNS AMERICAN ARTIST

Exhibit celebrates Jasper Johns

BY HELEN ROUNER STAFF REPORTER Though posters of his work may not grace as many dorm room walls as those of his contemporary Andy Warhol, artist Jasper Johns is being celebrated at Yale this spring.

“Reliable Tension, or: How to Win a Conversation about Jasper Johns,” a new exhibition featuring works by 20 contemporary artists in a variety of mediums, opened yesterday at the Yale School of Art’s 32 Edgewood Gallery.

The contentious conversation in the art world surrounding Johns inspired the exhibit, said Yale School of Art critic John Pilson, who curated the show. Pilson explained that the dialogue surrounding Johns consists of affinities rather than arguments and so is impossible to win, adding that the artist is famous for giving elusive answers in interviews. The exhibit examines these ideas of contradiction and language in addition to exploring conscious and subconscious chains of influence in contemporary art, Pilson said.

“Johns is a mystery,” Pilson said. “He was a lead, and I followed it.”

Many of the works in the exhibition explore paradox, or, in Pilson’s words, “having it both ways:” Works are simultaneously literal and abstract, familiar and uncanny, historically conscious and modern, or ready-made and yet deeply dedicated to craft.

Johns is famous for depicting objects so ordinary that viewers are forced to question their assumptions about those objects. Pilson cited Johns’s paintings of the American flag as an example of his characteristic use of iconography. “[ Johns’ work] is like alchemy,” Pilson said, adding that the same is true of many pieces in the exhibit. “You see if two objects can create a third thing while still retaining their integrity.”

Pilson explained that because he is an artist curating an exhibit, he organized the show based on his intuition rather than on a particular historical logic or trained curatorial practices.

Some of the work of artist Stuart Elster ART ’93 featured in the show consists of pieces of Marc Jacobs bags stretched onto panels and painted. Elster’s

pieces use the text on the bags, such as “Marc by Marc Jacobs” or “Jacobs by Marc Jacobs,” as the indexes of the paintings, Elster said, adding that his work, like Johns’, addresses linguistic confusion.

“The text [on the bags] is a meta-corporate self-portrait, and the irony of the branding is self-aware,” Elester said. “Language is an image that stands in for something else, and there are multiple or contradictory meanings embedded within my work.”

Pilson explained that Johns seems to approach language and visual art in the same way: Johns’ circuitous speech, like

his visual artwork, addresses the problem of abstraction, and Johns refuses to editorialize either.

The only literal reference in the exhibit to Johns’ painting lies in a work of embroidery by Elaine Reichek ’64. An iteration of Johns’s target paintings is surrounded by quotes about whiteness in its political and aesthetic connotations and other patterns stitched in white. Reichek explained that the repetitive brushstrokes of Johns’ target resonate with the texture of her own medium.

Other works in the exhibition include videos, an ATM and a

sound installation without visible speakers.

Pilson said that Dean of the School of Art Robert Storr issued an open call for exhibitions in the space and that Pilson proposed the idea for the exhibit last spring. All of the works in the show come directly from the artists’ studios or are loans Pilson has negotiated with individual artists.

“Reliable Tension, or: How to Win a Conversation about Jasper Johns” will be on display through March 28.

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

Planet Money host reflects on economic journalism

BY CAROLINE WRAY STAFF REPORTER Almost all human behavior can be explained through economics, according to Adam Davidson.

Davidson is co-founder and cohost of “Planet Money,” a radio program produced by National Public Radio and This American Life. On Monday afternoon, he spoke to approximately 25 members of the Yale community about his career as a journalist and his transition to economic reporting.

In his talk, Davidson emphasized the importance and challenges of helping the general public understand economic issues.

Davidson recalled arriving in Baghdad, Iraq as a war correspondent in 2003. Though he had previously studied religion, he said he was surprised to find that knowledge of economics was more helpful in deciphering the Sunni-Shiite conflict.

“Economics proved a much more powerful explanatory tool than the ones I arrived with,” he said.

For example, Davidson explained that his interactions with a Sunni businessman showed that much of the conflict boiled down to disputes over access to resources. A young man from Jordan once told him that he would become a suicide bomber “depending on the job market,” Davidson recalled.

When he returned to the United States ready to begin a career in journalism centered on economics, Davidson said he found that covering the financial crisis was actually more difficult than covering the war. While the constant evolution, challenge and nonstop pace of economic journalism “felt like covering a war” Davidson said the fundamental tenets of the conflict in the Middle East had been easier to grasp and explain than even the most basic financial concepts, such as stocks and bonds.

“Every day, some new term would appear at 3 a.m., and by 6 a.m., I’d have to explain it to millions,” he said. “It was a thrilling but also very frustrating time.”

Davidson said he and Alex

Blumberg began “Planet Money” in 2008 because they wanted to report on complex economic affairs in a useful, dynamic and easy-to-understand way.

Since journalism is based on the “core skill of storytelling,” Davidson said the ultimate goals of the radio show were to tell a compelling story and report news. “‘Planet Money,’ at its best, is a great person with a compelling story able to show a larger lesson about the economy,” he said.

Once again connecting his experience as an economic reporter to his previous job as a Middle East correspondent, Davidson compared the public’s understanding of the 2008–’09 financial crisis with its understanding of the events surrounding Sept. 11, 2001. Immediately following the dawn of each event, he said, “a moment of incredible openness” arose in the minds of Americans but was soon followed by polarized, binary and simplistic viewpoints about the world crisis.

Davidson concluded his talk by saying that public misconceptions about the economy can be attributed to the fissure between economists and laypeople.

“While my listeners seem to ask naïve but potent questions, the academics are asking interesting questions that do not meet the powerful need of the public to understand,” he said.

Three students interviewed said they found Davidson’s stories of his journalistic experiences more compelling than his views on the economy.

“It was a little surreal putting a body to the voice I’ve been listening to for so long,” said Abigail Schneider ’17, who listens to “Planet Money” regularly.

Schneider added that she found Davidson’s explanations of how to build a story — either from a specific narrative up or from a general theory down — particularly compelling.

“Planet Money” produces a semiweekly podcast and runs stories for several NPR shows.

Contact CAROLINE WRAY at caroline.wray@yale.edu .

KATHRYN CRANDALL/PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR

Adam Davidson of “Planet Money,” drew inspiration for the program from his experience as a war correspondent.

ALANA THYNG/CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER

An exhibition at 32 Wedgewood Ave. is showcasing works from over 20 modern artists, paying tribute to the visionary Jasper Johns.

You watch them.

You cheer for them.

Why not write about them?

Join SPORTS, and write about your favorite Yale teams.

JOIN@YALEDAILYNEWS.COM

PAGE 6

YALE DAILY NEWS · TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2014 · yaledailynews.com

FROM THE FRONT Corp seeks student input

“Never eat broccoli when there are cameras around.” MICHAEL STIPE AMERICAN SINGER AND LYRICIST

Students campaign for vegetable

J.R. REED/CONTRIBUTIBNG PHOTOGRAPHER

Three Yale undergraduates, with the support of local business, have launched a campaign in the Elm City to make broccoli “cool.”

BROCCOLI FROM PAGE 1

CARLY LOVEJOY/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

“University Teas” with members of the Yale Corporation, the University’s highest governing body, have failed to generate student interest.

YALE CORP FROM PAGE 1 poration members,” she said.

“We plan to keep track of who has signed up and will advise anyone who did not get selected for these teas about future teas.”

But the teas have not been heavily publicized. Instead of a University-wide email, information about the teas has been published on the website of the University Secretary, and only two out of the 12 college masters — Jonathan Edwards College Master Penelope Laurans and Timothy Dwight College Master Jeffrey Brenzel — emailed their students about the teas.

Of 45 Jonathan Edwards students interviewed Monday,

only one had signed up for the teas. Calhoun College Master Jonathan Holloway said he missed the email from Goff-Crews to college masters about the teas.

Out of roughly 50 students interviewed last week, 23 had never heard of the Yale Corporation and only 16 were aware of its responsibilities. In his email to Timothy Dwight students, Brenzel specifically wrote that the Yale Corporation is the name for the board of trustees and that it is the University’s highest governing body.

One of the teas this week will be with Marshall, while the other will be with Corporation Fellow Joshua Bekenstein. Marshall previously

served as the chief justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, while Bekenstein is a founder of the private equity firm Bain Capital.

Dhruv Aggarwal ’16, the sole JE student interviewed who signed up for a tea, said he has not yet heard whether he has a spot in the Thursday event with Bekenstein.

Aggarwal said he signed up for the tea because it provided a “rare opportunity” to meet with one of the most important figures at Yale. He added that he signed up to hear from Bekenstein, as opposed to Marshall, because most speakers at Yale emphasize public service. Bekenstein, on the other hand, comes from the private sector.

To attend the teas, students had to fill out an online form listing their activities at Yale as well as questions they would like to ask the Corporation member — a step that Aggarwal thinks may have discouraged some students from signing up.

Goff-Crews said the University is using the information from the forms to make sure that Corporation members are able to meet with a “broad range of students based on degrees, interests and backgrounds.”

The Corporation is composed of a total of 18 members.

Contact MATTHEW LLOYDTHOMAS at matthew.lloydthomas@yale.edu .

ing t-shirts, with slogans like “Brocclyn” and partnering with Blossom Shop to build broquets — or bouquets of broccoli. One poster reads, “Show a bro you care — give a bro a broquet.”

In an effort to build support around the movement and build “broccilitarians,” the trio is playing up the battle between kale and broccoli for vegetable supremacy. DiLeo said that kale is like broccoli’s “little brother,” adding that framing the campaign as a battle will appeal to a wide audience.

According to Goff, a student in the Food and Agriculture studies program, the campaign puts a positive spin on the vegetable, instead of simply shaming people into eating healthily. He added that they have been able to use the fact that the majority of businesses like to promote healty eating to lower the cost of the campaign.

“There’s all this goodwill around vegetables, and we’re trying to harness that because broccoli doesn’t have money behind it,” Goff said.

According to Morrison, when he reached out to Claire’s Corner Copia owner Claire Criscuolo, she told him that she had been “waiting her whole life for someone to start a broccoli campaign.” While neither Criscuolo nor the three students could confirm, DiLeo suggested that Claire’s could potentially offer broccoli cupcakes as a part of the citywide initiative.

Elm City Market Marketing Manager Amy Christensen said the grocery store plans to offer broccoli at discounted prices throughout the month to encourage customers to purchase more vegetables.

In addition to the discounted prices, Christensen plans to have Elm City Market bloggers write posts about broccoli and host a kale vs. broccoli cookoff. A dietitian will also be contributing articles and teaching classes about broccoli hosted at the market.

“We’re a co-op, and community outreach is what we’re all about,” Christensen said.

Christensen added that when the trio of approached them about partnering in this initiative the Elm City immediately jumped on board.

The broccoli campaign comes at a time of heightened focus on health issues in New Haven. Just last month, New Haven officially launched its 375,000pound weight loss challenge, and recently, Mayor Toni Harp proposed implementing a statewide soda tax. Harp has also promised to increase the number of school-based health centers throughout the city.

Morrison said the campaign is also a chance to have a little fun with a food campaign.

“Food is something that is very emotional for people,” Morrison added. “We do so much structurally in food policy today — to do something that’s about energy and fun is such a unique opportunity and something that can really get people to change their behavior.”

According to DiLeo, while Elm City Market will be tracking the amount of broccoli purchased throughout the month, and Claire’s has the capacity to track the popularity of their daily broccoli specials, the team is not solely focused on quantitative measures. It will also measure its success by the amount of buzz generated through newspaper articles and people talking about the campaign.

“It’s not just that we want people to eat more broccoli in [these stores],” DiLeo said.

“It’s putting the seed in people’s minds that broccoli can be exciting.”

According to the USDA, the average American eats four pounds of broccoli a year, 900 percent more than the average American 20 years ago.

Contact J.R. REED at jonathan.t.reed@yale.edu and HANNAH SCHWARZ at hannah.schwarz@yale.edu .

YALE DAILY NEWS · TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2014 · yaledailynews.com

PAGE 7

NATION

T

Dow Jones 16,154.39, +0.79%

S NASDAQ 4,244.03, +0.08% S Oil $100.75, +0.45%

S S&P 500 1,838.63, +0.48% T 10-yr. Bond 2.75, -0.22% T Euro $1.36, +0.01%

Train accidents stir worries about crude transport

BY MATTHEW BROWN ASSOCIATED PRESS BILLINGS, Mont. — At least 10 times since 2008, freight trains hauling oil across North America have derailed and spilled significant quantities of crude, with most of the accidents touching off fires or catastrophic explosions.

The derailments released almost 3 million gallons of oil, nearly twice as much as the largest pipeline spill in the U.S. since at least 1986. And the deadliest wreck killed 47 people in the town of Lac-Megantic, Quebec.

Those findings, from an Associated Press review of U.S. and Canadian accident records, underscore a lesser-known danger of America’s oil boom, which is changing the global energy balance and raising urgent safety questions closer to home.

Experts say recent efforts to improve the safety of oil shipments belie an unsettling fact: With increasing volumes of crude now moving by rail, it’s become impossible to send oilhauling trains to refineries without passing major population centers, where more lives and property are at risk.

Adding to the danger is the high volatility of the light, sweet crude from the fast-growing Bakken oil patch in Montana and North Dakota, where many of the trains originate. Because it contains more natural gas than heavier crude, Bakken oil can have a lower ignition point. Of the six oil trains that derailed and caught fire since 2008, four came from the Bakken and each caused at least one explosion.

That includes the accident at Lac-Megantic, which spilled an estimated 1.6 million gallons and set off a blast that levelled a large section of the town.

After recent fiery derailments in Quebec, Alabama, North

Interested in illustrating for the Yale Daily News?

CONTACT ANNELISA LEINBACH AT annelisa. leinbach@yale.edu

Dakota and New Brunswick, companies and regulators in the U.S. and Canada are pursuing an array of potential changes such as slowing or rerouting trains, upgrading rupture-prone tank cars and bolstering fire departments. Company executives were expected to offer a set of voluntary safety measures in the coming days at the request of U.S. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx.

“I’m absolutely positive the railway industry will come up with techniques to define how to minimize risk,” said Allan Zarembski who leads the railsafety program at the University of Delaware. “The key word is `minimize.’ You can’t eliminate risk.”

Since 2008, the number of tanker cars hauling oil has increased 40-fold, and federal records show that’s been accompanied by a dramatic spike in accidental crude releases from tank cars. Over the next decade, rail-based oil shipments are forecast to increase from 1 million barrels a day to more than 4.5 million barrels a day, according to transportation officials.

By rail, it’s roughly 2,000 miles from the heart of the oil boom on the Northern Plains to some of the East Coast refineries that turn the crude into gasoline. Trains pulling several million gallons apiece must pass through metropolitan areas that include Minneapolis, Chicago, Cleveland and Buffalo.

Some cities such as Chicago have belt railroads that divert freight traffic from the metropolitan core. But elsewhere, railroad representatives said, the best-maintained and safest track often runs directly through communities that were built around the railroad.

Trains sometimes have no option but to roll deep into populated areas. That’s the case

MATTHEW BROWN/ASSOCIATED PRESS

The railroad industry is considering a closer look at the risks posed by trains that now carry hazardous liquids through every region of the country. in Philadelphia, New Orleans, Albany, N.Y., and Tacoma, Wash.

Experts say the explosive nature of Bakken oil derailments caught everyone off guard — from regulators to the railroads themselves.

“I don’t think people understood the potential for a problem if there were a derailment,” said Jason Kuehn, a former railroad executive and now vice president for the industry consulting firm Oliver Wyman.

A major accident was narrowly avoided last month in

Philadelphia, where six tanker cars carrying oil derailed near the heart of the city on a bridge over the Schuylkill River. The CSX freight train had picked up North Dakota oil in Chicago and was headed for a refinery in South Philadelphia. Nothing was spilled, but the accident rattled nerves.

Sandy Folzer, a retired professor in Philadelphia, said she worries about oil cars travelling alongside commuter rails.

“During rush hour, I imagine there are a couple hundred people on each train,” Folzer said.

“That scares me, that there’s explosive material so close to where commuters are.”

Proposals to route trains away from population centers are modeled on rules adopted after the 2001 terrorist attacks to restrict cargoes even more hazardous than oil — explosives, radioactive material and poisonous gases.

When the rules were being written, California regulators pushed their federal counterparts to include oil. But Transportation Department officials said they were “not persuaded.”

Federal safety officials say it’s time to reverse that decision, given the huge growth in tank cars carrying crude and ethanol, another flammable liquid involved in recent derailments and explosions.

The rules gave railroads broad discretion, and routing decisions are not automatically reviewed by regulators. But the Federal Railroad Administration is authorized to reject any routes found to be too risky. That has never happened since the rules took effect, said FRA Associate Administrator Kevin Thompson.

PAGE 8

YALE DAILY NEWS · TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2014 · yaledailynews.com

SPORTS

American ice dancers golden in Sochi The United States had never won an Olympic gold medal in ice dancing, but the pair of Meryl Davis and Charlie White finally brought home the gold for Uncle Sam. As of press time, the United States and Russia were tied atop the medal count, with 18 apiece. Both countries had won five gold medals.

Victory takes Root ’14 for Elis

Bulldogs sweep BU

JENNIFER CHEUNG/SENIOR PHOTOGRAPHER

The women’s tennis will compete at the Blue Gray Invite in Alabama this coming weekend.

WOMEN’S TENNIS FROM PAGE 12

HENRY EHRENBERG/PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR

Captain Jesse Root ’14 (No. 20) has scored two goals in three different games this season, including Saturday’s win over Princeton.

MEN’S HOCKEY FROM PAGE 12 and took away second chances and rebound chances. Doing those things will definitely help us win and be very encouraging going into the playoffs.

Q

How does the team keep focused after the season has been this long?

A

I know for a lot of the older guys we know how to pace ourselves over the course of the season, and this is the point in the season where we need to be peaking.

The way the coaches and training staff run our program is such that we begin to peak around March and April. I think physically, we are in great shape at this point in the season. We can wear guys down in the third period. In order to stay mentally fresh, we need to keep a balance. Monday’s are our off

days and I think guys know how to shut it down and get their work done. When we’re at the rink we make sure we focus at the rink and when we’re in class we make sure to focus on class work. have been the biggest challenges the QWhat team has faced this season?

A

I think the biggest challenge we faced has been inconsistency. We’ve had games where we’ve scored a lot of goals and we’ve had games where we haven’t. Stringing games together when we’re great both offensively and defensively hasn’t been easy, but it is something we are improving upon.

When we instill consistency in our game I think we’ll be a very dangerous team.

Contact ASHTON WACKYM at ashton.wackym@yale.edu .

nent, 6–3, 6–2.

But the team was able to get back on track against the Terriers, winning without dropping a single set all afternoon.

“We went into Sunday really focused on improving from our match against Columbia,” Ree Ree Li ’16 said. “Everyone had their individual goals that they wanted to accomplish in their matches, and I think we all performed well.”

To capture the doubles point, the two schools each sent forth three teams of players, each of which played one set: whichever school won two of the three sets would win the doubles point.

Madeleine Hamilton ’16, the team’s top singles player, teamed with Li to win the No. 1 doubles match, 6–3. In the second set, Yu and Sherry Li ’17 defeated their Boston University counterparts, 6–2. Courtney Amos ’16 and Sullivan were on their way to a win,

but the match was suspended at 5–2 after the two other Yale teams had already won their sets.

The Bulldogs carried the momentum from their doubles matches into their singles matches. Hamilton dismantled her opponent 6–2, 6–4, while Ree Ree Li made short work of her adversary, 6–3, 6–2. Sullivan faced a tougher matchup, needing to go into a tiebreak in the first set to win 7–6 (7–5), 6–4. Both Yu and Sherry Li followed in the footsteps of their teammates, each winning, 6–2, 6–1. Amos was challenged by her adversary and nearly went into a third set before putting her opponent away, 6–1, 7–5.

“We can definitely take confidence from this match as we approach this upcoming weekend,” Ree Ree Li said. “There is going to be some tough competition this weekend but like every tournament we go in with the belief and goal of winning. We’ve

been training really hard all year so we will just continue doing so in preparation for this weekend.”

The team has a tough slate ahead of them, starting with its next tournament.

The match against Boston University is a prelude to the team’s upcoming weekend, where Yale will face some of the top teams in the nation, including No. 10 Virginia and No. 16 Alabama.

“We are so excited to play against some of the top teams in the country this weekend in Alabama,” Sullivan said. “We realize this weekend is a remarkable opportunity to upset high-ranked teams and to show what our team is capable of. Our team is very ready to rise up to the challenges and win close matches.”

The Bulldogs will travel to Alabama for the Blue Gray Invite this weekend starting on Friday.

Contact ASHLEY WU at ashley.e.wu@yale.edu .

Lax routs Tufts MEN’S LACROSSE FROM PAGE 12 on Sunday as he looks set to improve upon his goalscoring this season. The Greenwich, Conn. native has upped his goal total each of his past two season, with 20 goals his rookie year and 36 last year. Fellow attackman Brandon Mangan ’14 added two goals. Both Mangan and Oberbeck earned spots on the preseason all-New England Intercollegiate Lacrosse Association team, with Mangan receiving first team honors and Oberbeck featuring in the second team. Jeff Cimbalista ’17 started on attack with the dynamic duo and chimed in with two goals, while JW McGovern ’16 added a further score from attack.

Yale’s midfielders also made their presence felt on Sunday with five different players ripping twine. Newcomer Eric Scott ’17 continued his impressive preseason, scoring twice; Michael Keasey ’16, Ryan McCarthy ’15 and Shakespeare each added two goals and Max Skibber ’16 also tallied a score in the contest.

Levings, who also scored on Sunday, looks set to continue his dominance on faceoffs this season. The Chesapeake Bayhawks draft pick (24th overall) picked up preseason NEILA first team honors and will be a crucial part of the Elis’ offense this season.

“Levings is one of our most valuable players, as is any good faceoff guy in the nation,” said midfielder Michael Bonacci ’16.

“He changes the momentum of any game and he will be very important in getting our offense the possessions we need to be successful as well as keeping our defense from getting worn down from too many consecutive possessions from our opponents. If Levings can play as well as he is capable of playing, we will be in a very good position to be successful.”

The Bulldogs controlled the game from start to finish, going into halftime up 12-4. The Yale defense showed its teeth against the Jumbos, holding the 2013 NESCAC champions scoreless in the third quarter. Both Eric Natale ’15 and Jack Meyer ’14 had

IHNA MANGUNDAYAO/CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER

The men’s lacrosse team will open its regular season on Saturday, hosting St. John’s at Reese Stadium. impressive outings in net. Tufts eventually scored five secondhalf goals — all in the fourth quarter — with mostly bench players on the field.

“I think the defense as a whole felt more comfortable in the Tufts scrimmage than the Stony Brook scrimmage — mainly because we won the faceoff advantage pretty handily and the offense did a great job of holding the ball and having really great possessions,” said defenseman Jack Ambrose ’14.

“Playing against other opponents makes it easier for us to work on things like communication because instead of guarding the same players we guard in practice and knowing their names, we have to use jersey numbers and really make sure everyone is on the same page when playing someone new.

We didn’t see as many six-onsix possessions as we would have liked and will hopefully play a lot of half field in practice this week to prepare for our first game.”

The majority of Yale’s opponents’ goals came on transition opportunities rather than sixon-six play.

Shakespeare noted he was impressed with the pressure the Elis put on opposing attackmen

and midfielders, helping to cause more turnovers than they did last time out against Stony Brook.

Yale’s revamped defense of Jimmy Craft ’14, Michael Quinn ’16 and Ambrose had a strong outing in just their second competition together as a unit.

The Elis start the regular season with four straight-out-ofconference games against No. 18 St. John’s, Bryant, Fairfield and No. 14 Lehigh.

“There are going to be a lot of butterflies in our stomachs leading up to St. John’s,” Bonacci said.

“I think we just need to stick to our guns and focus on doing the little things right. We’re not going to win games based on skill alone this year. We are going to get more ground balls than other teams and outhustle and out-grit our opponents. We are going to play our game and as long as we are strong with our fundamentals I think we will be very happy with the outcome on Saturday.”

The Elis start the 2014 season against the Red Storm at Reese Stadium this Saturday at 1:30 p.m.

Contact FREDERICK FRANK at frederick.frank@yale.edu .

YALE DAILY NEWS · TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2014 · yaledailynews.com

PAGE 9

BULLETIN BOARD

TODAY’S FORECAST

TOMORROW

Snow before 2pm, then a chance of rain. High near 36.

THURSDAY

High of 43, low of 27.

High of 46, low of 38.

LORENZO’S TALE BY CHARLES MARGOSSIAN

ON CAMPUS TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 18 7:00 p.m. Sacred Harp Singing. Join in singing from “The Sacred Harp,” an American shape-note songbook published in 1844. Its eclectic repertoire includes tunes inherited from the folk tradition and other forms of hymnody, as well as songs of Colonial New England and tuneful melodies from the Great Depression. No previous singing experience necessary. Stoeckel Hall (96 Wall St.), Rm. B01.

7:30 p.m. The Yale Political Union Debates with Jeffrey Sachs. Join the Yale Political Union and Harvard economics professor Jeffrey Sachs to debate “Resolved: Fight Global Poverty with Substantial Foreign Aid.” Dr. Sachs has been a leader in sustainable development and a senior advisor to the U.N. in working to achieve the Millennium Development Goals. LinslyChittenden Hall (63 High St.), Rm. 102.

XKCD BY RANDALL MUNROE

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 19 5:30 p.m. Exhibition Opening Lecture: “Gazing on Parian Charms with Learned Eyes: Pope, the Portrait Bust and Eighteenth-Century Studies.” The Yale Center for British Art is opening its exhibition with a lecture given by the curator, Malcolm Baker. Baker is a distinguished professor of art history from the University of California, Riverside, and the Honorary Senior Research Fellow, Victoria and Albert Museum, London. Yale Center for British Art (1080 Chapel St.).

9:00 p.m. Evening Prayer Service. A beautiful, quiet Christian worship service of song and prayer, with a student reflection and an “active reflection,” putting the theme into practice. Dwight Hall (67 High St.), Dwight Memorial Chapel.

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 20 5:00 p.m. “The Future of Holocaust Literature.” The Yale Program for the Study of Antisemitism and Whitney Humanities Center presents Ruth Kluger from the University of California, Irvine, as part of the Benjamin ’62 and Barbara Zucker Lecture Series. Free to the General Public. Joseph Slifka Center for Jewish Life at Yale (80 Wall St.), Chapel Rm.

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CROSSWORD Edited by Rich Norris and Joyce Lewis ACROSS 1 JFK announcements 5 Athletic shoe brand 9 __ Haute, Indiana 14 Red dessert wine 15 A party to 16 Advil competitor 17 Two-toned treat 18 Bibliography, e.g.

19 Washer cycle 20 Phrase on a treasure map 23 Sycophant 24 Captain of industry 26 Novelist Deighton 28 Sinking ship deserter 29 Illuminated 31 Luxury SUV since 1970 36 Hard-to-hit tennis server 37 Black wood 38 Vigor’s partner 39 Locale 40 Criminal, to a cop 41 Sophocles tragedy 43 Giant Mel enshrined in Cooperstown 44 NBC late-night comedy hit 45 Pull 46 First film to win the Oscar for Best Animated Feature 48 “Take care of yourself!”

53 One of the things little boys are made of, and a hint to 20-, 31and 41-Across 57 Take as one’s own 59 Desert tableland 60 Pirate booty 61 Confused struggle 62 Cool and collected 63 Blackthorn fruit 64 Message limited to 140 characters 65 Lotion additive 66 __-de-camp DOWN 1 Glue for a model kit

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2 Mel, “The Velvet Fog” 3 Fields of study 4 Nor’easter, for one 5 Light lager 6 Part of BTU 7 Dance wildly 8 Bet all players must make 9 Fossil-preserving spot 10 “The Waste Land” poet 11 Budget vehicle 12 Natl. park campers 13 Wide shoe size 21 Actress Cuoco of “The Big Bang Theory” 22 Guide for the Magi 25 Female relative 27 Best-seller list entry 28 Make payment 30 “Jurassic Park” predator, for short 31 Auto loan default consequence 32 Helps, as a 40Across 33 Santa’s home 34 Econ. statistic

Monday’s Puzzle Solved

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7 9

3

1 7 5

8 (c)2014 Tribune Content Agency, LLC

35 YouTube clip, for short 36 Pacino and Capone 39 Washington’s __ Sound 41 Peeling potatoes in the mil., perhaps 42 Darts, commonly 44 Seven-person combo 47 Indian currency 49 Tostitos dip

2/18/14

50 Garlic mayonnaise 51 Monsoon aftermath 52 Makeup maven Lauder 54 Gym site, briefly 55 Negotiation goal 56 Northern European capital 57 Qty. 58 Beads on the grass

3 1 6 7 9

9 4 5

1 5 4 2 4 8 2 7 4

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YALE DAILY NEWS · TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2014 · yaledailynews.com

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY Neuroscience of love explored

ANNELISA LEINBACH/ILLUSTRATIONS EDITOR

BY LILLIAN CHILDRESS STAFF REPORTER Just in time for Valentine’s Day, a Yale study published on Feb. 12 investigated the brain regions that may help us wish others well.

To explore the neural foundation of this type of feeling, researchers used functional MRI imaging while both novice and experienced meditators practiced wishing love and kindness upon others. While previous research demonstrated that romantic love and drugs like cocaine triggered the same reward centers in the brain, selfless love deactivated these regions. The study pinpoints a potential biological foundation for meditative practices, such as those used in Bud-

dhism and other religions, said Judson Brewer, a study co-lead author and adjunct professor of psychiatry at the Yale School of Medicine.

“In the West we look at this stuff and think it’s all holding hands and singing Kumbaya,” Brewer said. “In reality, these practices have a neurological basis behind them.”

In the study, the researchers evoked feelings of selfless love in 20 experienced meditators and 26 novices by having them repeat the phrase “may all beings be happy” while their brains were being scanned. The study found that the posterior cingulate cortex and precuneus, areas that become active when we think about ourselves, were particularly deactivated in experienced

meditators compared to novices when both thought of selfless love while in the scanner.

When there’s no self, there’s no one to worry about the feeling of pain, so that’s where the compassion arises.

JUDSON BREWER Study co-lead author The researchers induced “metta” meditation in the scanner, a form of love and kindness meditation that has been prac-

ticed for centuries by various sects of Buddhism — and more recently in the West as part of Insight meditation, which is associated with the Theravada branch of Buddhism, said Kathleen Garrison, a co-lead author of the study and a post-doctoral student at Yale School of Medicine.

“This selfless love, it’s not about us, it’s about getting out of our own way,” Brewer said.

“When there’s no self, there’s no one to worry about feeling the pain, so that’s where the compassion arises.”

Garrison said this loving kindness is often depicted in many religious and philosophical traditions as a heartfelt feeling of selfless love, a feeling described both in ancient Greek texts and

the Bible as “agape.”

According to Andrew Quintman, Yale professor of religious studies, the kind of expansive awareness cultivated in many Buddhist traditions can blur the lines between oneself and others. The cultivation of these attitudes, including love, is often understood as a preliminary practice for other forms of mental development, he said in an email.

Brewer and Garrison both said they hope the study will be helpful to other researchers and scientists interested in seeing how the brain develops as the result of different types of meditation.

Brewer also said he hoped the findings will help improve different types of health care associated with mindfulness prac-

tice, such as mindfulness-based stress reduction.

Previous studies have found that romantic love, particularly in its most intense early stages, activates reward centers in the brain, Brewer said. However, these reward centers were not activated during the love and kindness meditation that the subjects were asked to cultivate. “[This] doesn’t mean [romantic love] is a bad thing,” Brewer said. “It just means it’s not necessarily perfect all the time.

There are as many songs about how painful love is as there are about how great love is.”

The study was published in the journal Brain and Behavior.

Contact LILLIAN CHILDRESS at lillian.g.childress@yale.edu .

Gay faculty less comfortable than closeted peers

BY CAROLINE HART CONTRIBUTING REPORTER According to a new Yale-led study, openly gay professors are less comfortable in their work environments across the country than their closeted peers.

Eric Patridge, a research associate at Yale’s Center for Molecular Discovery and study lead author, analyzed a 2010 data set of 5,000 faculty across the country in finding the disparity in faculty comfort. The study appeared on Feb. 10 in the Journal of Women and Minorities in Science and Engineering. The News sat down with Patridge to discuss the implications of his findings on both students and faculty, and what can be done to improve the climate.

Q

Can you summarize for me the conclusions of the study?

A

In general, we found that 11 percent of LBGT faculty is out across the country. Out of those who are out, 94 percent of them are uncomfortable, and those are the sort of numeric representa-

tions that get to the scope of the paper that LBGT faculty are more uncomfortable than their closeted peers. This pattern of LBGT faculty who are openly gay being more uncomfortable is especially relevant for faculty in the STEM fields. do you think this climate QHow affects students?

A

That’s actually our next step.

One of the things we wanted to do is help to empower those who can impact students —[it’s] the classical thought where you put an oxygen mask on yourself before you help those next to you. What we’re trying to do is empower faculty who can help to mentor the next generation of students. Our next step is actually to take the same data set that we originally used and do a similar analysis for students. We’re in the process of working out that data now, and we’re hoping that it will be ready in the next year.

do you think can be done QWhat to improve the level of comfort

both for people who are out and

closeted?

A

I think one of the ways in which faculty can be supported is to show interest in them.

Sometimes the best change is made through sitting down and having cups of coffee. At an institutional level, faculty also need support in terms of professional support, and sometimes that can take the form of creating opportunities for them to talk about them being LBGT.

Q

Do you think that the conclusion of the study speaks to a societal attitude towards openness in homosexuality, or do you think this has to do with the campus environment?

A

I would argue that the general sentiment across the country right now is in favor of LBGT communities. Academia, including [graduate] students, tends to lag behind the populous by about 10 or 20 years, and so what I think our paper is talking about is the academic culture.

do you think the trends in It’s important because in QHow faculty comfort differ for stu- Aterms of faculty career dents?

A

We have a polarizing generational difference where some of the older generation came out in a very different era. The coming-out process is a life process, and so those who came out in a very closeted and confining way might be substantially different from those who are just coming through now.

One of the things we wanted to do is help to empower those who can impact students.

ERIC PATRIDGE Study lead author

advancement, colleagues are perhaps the most helpful people who can advance their careers. In terms of tenure, and also the peer review process in academia, we publish a paper and they get reviewed by your peers and you write a grant and collaborate with your colleagues in your department. A lot relies on your colleagues and your ability to get along with them and personally relate to them. If you personally relate to your advisor more so than someone else, you’re more likely to do better in you academic career than the person who doesn’t necessarily relate to their boss.

founded Out in STEM QYou (oSTEM), a national organization promotes LBGT communities in science and technology. Can you tell me more about the organization?

do you think openness in oSTEM is a national society QHow the work environment affects Athat serves LBGT people in the professors’ relationships with one another?

the STEM fields and essentially we focus on educating students and building leadership oppor-

tunities for them. In the STEM fields you’re not often taught how to manage people. We wanted to create opportunities for that to happen. We started a couple years ago, and we do have a chapter at Yale now, which seems to be gaining fast interest. We have about 50 chapters now and our sponsors include Google, Alcoa, IBM, Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, the CIA, GE, GM, and Genentech just joined us. there anything else that QIsyou’d like to say about your research or what it means for the students?

A

I’m not sure students will necessarily understand the importance of this. I hope that this paper fills a long needed gap in the literature that will empower LBGT researchers. It would be great if students and faculty gave it a read and tried to figure out how to use this research and similar research in ways to support their local LBGT communities.

Contact CAROLINE HART at caroline.hart@yale.edu .

YALE DAILY NEWS · TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2014 · yaledailynews.com

PAGE 11

“I am simple, complex, generous, selfish, unattractive, beautiful, lazy, and driven.”

BARBRA STREISAND AMERICAN SINGER-SONGWRITER, AUTHOR AND ACTRESS

University gathers to tackle cholera

BY HANNAH SCHWARZ STAFF REPORTER On Saturday, students from seven schools across Yale’s campus came together to tackle one pressing global health problem.

The second annual Global Health Case Competition (GHCC) featured 13 teams composed of students from the Yale Schools of Public Health, Medicine, Forestry & Environmental Studies, Management and Law, as well as Yale College and the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences.

This year, students were asked to address Haiti’s current cholera epidemic, which began in the wake of the 2010 earthquake after U.N. peacekeepers inadvertently brought the disease to the country. The winning team, composed of students from the Law School, Graduate School, School of Public Health and Yale College, received a $3,000 prize and advance to the international Global Health Case Competition at Emory University on March 29.

“We chose this topic because there has been less work on topdown projects [that address the cholera epidemic in Haiti],” said Ryan Boyko GRD ’18, who organized this year’s competition after winning last year’s.

Boyko added that although individual NGOs have targeted certain aspects of the epidemic, there has not yet been a wellfunded, coordinated effort to combat the disease as a whole. On Saturday, the roughly 70 participants became consultants to the U.N. and with a $3 billion budget, presenting plans to compensate victims, end the epidemic and install sanitary water systems.

The teams were required to include students from at least three different Yale schools and had less than a week to prepare for the competition after the prompt was released, said Javier Cepeda GRD ’16.

The winning team proposed simultaneously tackling the cholera epidemic and establishing a national public health framework in Haiti. Since cholera spreads through contaminated water, the team also proposed rolling out Sunspring, a solar-powered, portable water purification system.

While all but one team proposed

some form of monetary compensation from the U.N. to the victims, the winning team suggested paying victims over a six-year period to prevent market fluctuations.

According to Raja Narayan MED SPH ’14, a member of the winning team, incorporating aspects of the Haitian Ministry of

Health’s cholera treatment plan was crucial. “[Using the strengths of the Haitian Ministry of Health’s plan] showed that the U.N. wanted to work with Haitians to solve the cholera epidemic rather than impose their own plan,” he said in an email.

The second-place team pro-

posed a mobile banking app that would enable victims across the country to file for compensation using only their phones.

The same team also proposed implementing a solar disinfection technique to sanitize water, which operates using only plastic bottles and sunlight.

One of the teams that tied for

third place, with a presentation called “Funding in the Time of Cholera,” was the only one which did not propose monetary compensation for victims, tackling only the epidemic. Because it can be challenging to identify the origin of the disease — and because Haiti’s government is notoriously corrupt — they argued that

it would not be economically feasible to pursue monetary claims.

Boyko said he plans on holding the competition again next year.

Last year’s competition focused on the health concerns of South African miners.

Contact HANNAH SCHWARZ at hannah.schwarz@yale.edu .

HANNAH SCHWARZ/CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER

Thirteen teams debated means to combat Haiti’s current cholera epidemic at the Global Health Case Competition held at Yale this weekend.

Children, monkeys transfer generosity

BY ADISA MALIK CONTRIBUTING REPORTER New research conducted at the Yale Psychology Department suggests young children and even monkeys have a more nuanced understanding of generosity than previously thought.

The researchers found that much like adults, both fouryear-old children and capuchin monkeys would repeat the same behavior performed to them to someone else, a phenomenon called paying forward.

Finding the behavior in such young children as well as monkeys suggests that paying for-

ward outcomes may be influenced by rudimentary behavioral strategies present early in cognitive development, rather than social or reputational factors, said Kristin Leimgruber GRD ’15, a co-lead author of the study and graduate student in psychology.

“Our findings that monkeys and children pay forward positive outcomes suggests a need to reconsider the morally and psychologically complex explanations often given for these tendencies in human adults,” Leimgruber said. “Although factors like gratitude and social norms likely play a role in this behavior in adult humans, our

results indicate that they aren’t required for generosity to be paid forward within a population.”

[The research] suggests that generosity is both more common and more sustainable than expected.

ADAM GRANT Professor at University of Pennsylvania While past studies have found that humans pay forward positive

outcomes, few have attempted to explain the causes of such behavior.

During the study, a group of capuchin monkeys from the Yale Comparative Cognition Laboratory and a group of four-year-old children from preschools in New England participated in donation games where the participants received a positive or negative outcome from another participant in the group, and decided whether to distribute a positive or negative outcome to a different participant in the group. The researchers found that the majority of children and monkeys paid forward the same type of out-

come that was received.

Pay-it-forward behavior is not necessarily driven by self-serving and socially influenced motivations, as people thought in the past, said Adrian Ward, a study co-author and a postdoctoral research associate at the University of Colorado. The research suggests the existence of a general, basic reaction that motivates this behavior, and gives a clue as to how cooperation and altruism may have evolved in human beings. Future studies will investigate the conditions for adults to pay forward positive and negative outcomes, Ward said.

“I love the evidence that four-

year-old children and capuchin monkeys pay good deeds forward as well as back,” said Adam Grant, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania Wharton School who was not involved in the study. “It suggests that generosity is both more common and more sustainable than most people expect.”

Grant said future studies should explore how pay-it-forward phenomena manifest in markets.

The study was published in the journal PLOS ONE on Jan. 29.

Contact ADISA MALIK at adisa.malik@yale.edu .

ANNELISA LEINBACH/ILLUSTRATIONS EDITOR

IF YOU MISSED IT SCORES

W OLY HOCKEY United States 6 Sweden 1

W OLY HOCKEY Canada 3 Switzerland 1

FA CUP Brighton 1 Hull 1

SPORTS QUICK HITS

y

M IVY TENNIS Columbia 4 Harvard 0

FOR MORE SPORTS CONTENT, VISIT OUR WEB SITE yaledailynews.com/sports

PHOEBE STAENZ ’17 WOMEN’S HOCKEY Staenz had five shots on goal, but the Swiss national team fell to the Canadian national team 3–1 yesterday. Her five shots on goal were tied for most on the team. With the loss, Switzerland will compete in the bronze medal game against Sweden.

GYMNASTICS TRI-MEET AT MARYLAND The Yale gymnastics team traveled to College Park this Saturday for its second road meet of the season, squaring off against the Terrapins and the Bowling Green Falcons. The Elis placed third with 188.550 points, while the Terps secured the win with 194.675 points.

M IVY TENNIS Dartmouth 4 Cornell 1

“We want to get the first round bye in the playoffs. That’s where our focus is at right now.”

JESSE ROOT ’14

MEN’S HOCKEY YALE DAILY NEWS · TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2014 · yaledailynews.com

The Root ’14 of Yale’s success

BY ASHTON WACKYM STAFF REPORTER

MEN’S HOCKEY

Forward Jesse Root ’14 helped the Bulldogs win the NCAA Championship last year in front of his hometown fans at the Frozen Four in Pittsburgh, Penn.

Now Root leads the way as the captain of the men’s ice hockey team. He paces the Elis with 26 points this season, including a two-goal effort in the Bulldogs’ 7–5 win over Princeton at home on Saturday. The News caught up with Root to discuss the team’s regular season, its freshmen contributors and the upcoming playoffs. has the team improved QWhat upon most since the beginning of the season?

A

I think we’ve been playing more as a cohesive unit.

I think there are still instances in our game where we can clean that up but in the beginning it was a bit more clustered. At first some guys played well together and others were trying to keep up. Now, everyone is more familiar with the systems, especially the forecheck and in the neutral zone. Guys are definitely more comfortable in their positions and getting to their spots.

have been some of the QWhat biggest contributions from this years’ freshman class?

A

Each of them individually brings something to the table. They have a ton of skill to begin with and all work really hard. As a class, they bring passion for the game and a passion to learn. We pride ourselves in that with Yale hockey and they really exemplify that.

HENRY EHRENBERG/PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR

Captain Jesse Root ’14 (No. 20) leads the Bulldogs with 17 assists and 26 total points this season. you talk about how I think our penalty has been QCan important special teams Apretty good — especially in — especially the penalty kill — have been recently given the three short-handed goals against Princeton?

the second half of the season.

We still let up a few power play goals for them even though we put three short-handed goals in.

I think we started to cheat a lit-

Elis strong at home

BY ASHLEY WU STAFF REPORTER

tle bit after we got the first shorthanded goal and it’s important that we don’t cheat and stay in position on the penalty kill even after we get a short-handed goal.

are the team’s goals QWhat going into the last few weekends before the playoffs?

A

From a logistical standpoint, we need to get two

points in every game, but from a process standpoint, I would be really happy if we tightened up our defense and limited the highquality chances of other teams SEE MEN’S HOCKEY PAGE 8

Bulldogs top NESCAC champs

The women’s tennis team registered a dominant performance against Boston University on Sunday, defeating the Terriers 7–0 at home in New Haven.

WOMEN’S TENNIS Yale (3–2, 0–0 Ivy), currently the No. 34 team in the nation, had no issues dismantling Boston University (3–4, 0–0 Patriot).

The Bulldogs swept the doubles match for the first point of the afternoon, then claimed all six singles matches in straight sets.

“This Sunday was a great match for Yale women’s tennis,” captain Annie Sullivan ’14 said in an email. “Our 7-0 score demonstrates that every one of us came out ready to play and get their point for the team.”

The Elis were coming off a tough match against No. 51 Columbia in the ECAC Indoor Championship Finals, where they lost 4–1 on Feb. 9. Against the Lions, the Bulldogs were able to muster only one point when Hanna Yu ’15 defeated her oppoSEE WOMEN’S TENNIS PAGE 8

IHNA MANGUNDAYAO/CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER

The men’s lacrosse team blew out Tufts in a scrimmage on Sunday, winning 20–9.

BY FREDERICK FRANK STAFF REPORTER The No. 13 men’s lacrosse team had its final tune-up before the regular season against Division III opponent Tufts in a scrimmage last Sunday. The Bulldogs swamped the Jumbos 20-9 thanks to dominant performances JENNIFER CHEUNG/SENIOR PHOTOGRAPHER

The women’s tennis team swept Boston University at home Sunday, 7-0.

STAT OF THE DAY 3

MEN’S LACROSSE

by faceoff specialist Dylan Levings ’14 and attackman Conrad Oberbeck ’15.

“I felt as though the offense was more fluid this week against Tufts,” midfielder Sean Shakespeare ’15 said. “Our ball movement on the perimeter was significantly faster, and the off ball movement inside improved a great deal.”

Oberbeck hit the back of the net five times SEE MEN’S LACROSSE PAGE 8

STRAIGHT GAMES IN WHICH GUARD ARMANI COTTON ’15 HAS RECORDED A DOUBLE-DOUBLE FOR THE YALE MEN’S BASKETBALL TEAM. The guard started his streak in Yale’s 74–67 road upset of Harvard and he is averaging 15.3 points and 10.7 rebounds during the stretch.