Daily Herald the Brown
vol. cxlv, no. 10 | Tuesday, February 9, 2010 | Serving the community daily since 1891
C R E AT I V E C O N S T R U C T I O n
Construction on the Creative Arts Center progresses on Angell Street.
Trustee may Faculty wage freeze may
face lawsuit be lifted for next year
from ex-wife
By Goda Thangada
Senior Staf f Writer
A high-stakes lawsuit against a Cor-
poration member may be brought
back to life after being dropped in
January.
Steven Cohen P’08, a trustee of
the University’s highest governing
body who amassed a vast fortune in
hedge funds, was accused by his
ex-wife Patricia Cohen in December
of concealing assets at the time of
their divorce in 1990. Her lawyer,
Paul Batista, dropped the suit in
mid-January, though Patricia Cohen
announced that she would continue
to pursue the suit with another law-
yer, Gaytri Kachroo, who told The
Herald that the case will be refiled
soon.
“What is open to us now is to
file a new complaint or an amended
complaint,” Kachroo said.
SAC Capital, the hedge fund
founded by Steven Cohen after
the divorce, was also named in the
suit.
“As we have said from the outset,
these decade-old allegations by Mr.
Cohen’s spouse are patently false
and entirely without merit,” said
Jonathan Gasthalter, an SAC Capital
spokesperson.
Patricia Cohen’s claims come
at time when the public is increas-
ingly scrutinizing the practices of
prominent hedge funds. In the suit
filed by Batista, she sought $300
million.
The earlier suit went into depth
describing Steven Cohen’s financial
continued on page 7
inside
News...1–5, 7
Metro.......6
News, 3
Nation...8-9 NOT AS THEY APPEAR
Editorial..10 Come shopping period,
Opinion...11 some students discover
Today........12 hidden class caps
www.browndailyherald.com
By Max Godnick
Senior Staff Writer
The University Resources Com-
mittee made a recommendation
to the Corporation earlier this
month that the freeze placed on
faculty and staff salaries be lifted
in the next year’s budget. Last
year’s budget initiated a freeze
on all University employee wages
Low point for the diving team Former
By Nicole Boucher
Staff Writer
Nothing brings a group together
quite like a road trip, and practice
has taken the diving teams out of
state twice a week for over two
years.
FEATURE
After structural problems led
to the demolition the Smith Swim
Center in 2007, a temporary aquat-
ics facility was built on campus
to accommodate the swimming,
diving and water polo teams.
However, the pool is not deep
enough to allow for three-meter
diving.
This setup places the diving
team in a unique situation — they
must travel off-campus twice a
week to practice with the three-
meter springboard.
“We deal with what we have
and we get by by thinking posi-
tively,” said Rebecca Tassell ’12, a
member of the diving team.
195 Angell Street, Providence, Rhode Island
Hilary Rosenthal / Herald
due to the harsh economic cli-
mate.
Should the recommendation
be acted upon by the Corporation
when the budget is passed later
this month, it would allow Presi-
dent Ruth Simmons’ Plan for Aca-
demic Enrichment to continue in
its efforts toward creating com-
continued on page 2
The temporary aquatics facility cannot accommodate three-meter
diving, forcing the team to travel to Massachusetts for practice.
Fish out of water — and out
of state
The team travels about 40
minutes to the University of Mas-
sachusetts at Dartmouth twice a
week to use the three-meter board.
They leave around 2:30 p.m. and
get back around 6, Tassell said.
“It’s hard on the team in terms
of traveling and commitment,” said
team member Kara Lindquist ’11.
Metro, 6
crazy journey
Rhode Island professor’s
dissertation turned into
Oscar-nominated film
Simmons won’t be
‘buffeted about’ on boards
By Alex Bell
Senior Staf f Writer
President Ruth Simmons said in
an inter view last week that she
does not expect negative publicity
about the practices of Goldman
Sachs, whose Board of Directors
she ser ves on, to carr y over to the
University’s image.
Simmons joined the board in
2000 while president of Smith Col-
lege. The New York–based financial
ser vices company Goldman Sachs
has suffered harsh criticism since
early in the current financial crisis
for doling out high bonuses to its
executives after receiving money
from the federal bailout program.
All 10 of the company’s directors
ser ve on its compensation com-
mittee, which is responsible for
determining and approving the
compensation for the company’s
CEO and executives, according
to the committee’s charter.
The debate over Goldman’s
practices is to be expected, Sim-
mons said, but she declined to
make a public statement on the
company’s past actions.
“There are lots of things in a
complex institution that go on,”
she said. “You’re not in charge of
ever ything that your friends do
and every policy that organizations
that you’re affiliated with issue.”
Nick Sinnott-Armstrong / Herald
Traveling takes time away from
school work and other social ac-
tivities, she added.
Diver Charles Kambe ’10 put
a positive spin on having to use
off-campus facilities. “On the up-
side, it makes us much better at
traveling,” he said. “We are bet-
ter at adapting. A lot of teams
continued on page 7
Opinions, 11
inspiring hope
Yue Wang ‘12 wants you to
befriend your neighborhood
high school student
In a statement on its compensa-
tion policies released in December,
Goldman stated that its compen-
sation policy, which emphasizes
per formance-based bonuses, is
“designed to attract and retain
the most talented human capital,
which has been a key contributor
to generating excess returns rela-
tive to peers.”
But to the surprise of many
analysts, Goldman announced on
Friday that the bonus received by
CEO Lloyd Blankfein will be only
$9 million this year and will be
delivered entirely in stock. Blank-
fein’s largest bonus, of $67.9 mil-
lion, came in 2007. Newspapers
such as the Times of London had
repor ted suspicions of a bonus
as high as even $100 million this
year.
In Januar y, Chairman of the Fi-
nancial Crisis Inquiry Commission
Rep. Phil Angelides, D-Calif., criti-
cized Goldman’s practices during
the months leading up to the finan-
cial crisis of selling debt products
tied to mor tgages it knew were
declining in value. He compared
the practice to “selling a car with
faulty brakes and then buying an
insurance policy on the buyer.”
Simmons said she can “fully ac-
cept” the public’s scrutiny, as well
continued on page 4
dean dies
at 88
By Ana Alvarez
Senior Staff Writer
Elizabeth LeDuc, former dean of
biological sciences and landmark
member of Brown’s Division of Bi-
ology and Medicine, died Jan. 31 at
88 years of age. At a time when few
women were included in academic
life, LeDuc left a legacy of effective
leadership and groundbreaking re-
search in biology.
According to the University Ar-
chives, “Dukie,” as her colleagues
called her, earned full professorship
in the BioMed division at Brown in
1964 — the third woman to reach that
rank in Brown’s history and the first
to do so in biology, the Providence
Journal reported.
LeDuc served as the division’s
dean from 1973 to 1977, another im-
pressive achievement for a woman
continued on page 4
The blog today
Make a day of…
Wickenden Street!
BlogDailyHerald’s guide
to the ins and outs.
herald@browndailyherald.com
Page 2 THE BROWN DAILY HERALD Tuesday, February 9, 2010

C ampus N EWS “It boils down to making sure that we remain competitive.”
— Rajiv Vohra P’07, Dean of the Faculty, on lifting the salary freeze

Hopeful outlook for U. salary increases higher ed news roundup

continued from page 1
petitive faculty and staff wages, said
Provost David Kertzer ’69 P’95 P’98,
who also chairs the URC.
“One of the goals of the Plan for
Academic Enrichment was to ensure
that Brown did have competitive
salaries to ensure that we can build
the best faculty possible,” he said.
The plan was successful in bring-
ing Brown closer to its competitors
in terms of median staff and faculty
salary by 2006, said Dean of the Fac-
ulty Rajiv Vohra P’07.
“In the first few years of the
plan we made rapid progress,” he
said. “By 2006, in terms of where
we stood as far as median salaries
are concerned, we had made up for
that gap.”
But by 2008, these improvements
had deteriorated due to changing
economic conditions and cautionary
measures that were implemented in
the budget, Vohra said.
“We undertook some cautionary
measures when the budget was to
be decided. Salaries of senior admin-
istrators — those receiving more
than $175,000 — were frozen and
faculty salaries went up only by four
percent,” he said.
At the same time, Vohra noted
that peer universities were still in-
creasing their salaries at the normal
rate — about five to six percent.
In 2009, University salaries took
an even greater toll when the budget
included no salary increases for any
faculty or staff.
“Last year we were faced with
having to very quickly cut $35 mil-
lion from our prospective budget
with very little time,” Kertzer said.
“One of the levers you can most
easily pull to save millions of dol-
sudoku
lars is freeze salary increases,” he
added.
Both Vohra and Kertzer noted
that Brown was not alone in its 2009
salary freezes.
“Last year it was hardly uncom-
mon for universities to have zero
salary increases,” Vohra said. “We
were part of the much larger sce-
nario.”
Despite similar trends at other
peer institutions, zero salary increas-
es are an unprecedented figure for
Brown, Vohra said.
Kertzer said this year, the eco-
nomic environment will allow for
salary increases.
“We are still faced with having to
cut tens of millions from the budget,”
he said. “But we have had the op-
portunity to do the organizational
review to look at ways we could ef-
fect savings without affecting the
core of the student experience.”
Vohra said the decision to lift the
salary freeze was made for two main
reasons: to increase Brown’s com-
petitiveness with peer universities
and to maintain employee morale.
“I think perhaps we have a win-
dow of opportunity in which we
can make up for the grounds that
we already lost,” he said. “It boils
down to making sure that we remain
competitive.”
Vohra and Kertzer both recog-
nized the importance of keeping
faculty and staff morale high.
“To have no salar y increases
means you are unable to reward
even the most productive employ-
ees,” Vohra said.
“A zero increase means that ev-
eryone is treated the same, regard-
less of their accomplishments, and
that’s a problem in itself, I think,”
he added.
Kertzer said that he is impressed
with the dedication of University
staff.
“Their good work is key to the
good functioning of Brown. Nothing
would function if they weren’t there
and working well,” he said.
The general sentiment among
faculty and staff regarding this year’s
salary freezes has been an under-
standing one, said Chung-I Tan,
professor of physics and chair of
the Faculty Executive Committee.
“The University has to make pri-
orities,” he said. “The priority right
now is to maintain what we have set
for the University, which include
preserving academic programs as
well as making sure that students’
interests are being taken care of
while they are on campus.”
“In this difficult time I think ev-
erybody agrees that the budget is
pretty tight,” he said.
Kertzer made similar observa-
tions regarding faculty and staff
reaction.
“It was widely understood that
last year was an extraordinary one,”
he said. “I heard no criticism from
faculty or staff.”
Vohra noted that some faculty
had gone as far as to advocate for
another year of salary freezes due
to the economic climate.
“I think that even today, there are
some faculty who are here saying
that we have such a difficult task
ahead in cutting $30 million from
next year’s budget, that perhaps
there shouldn’t be an increase,” he
said. “However, I do worry that if
(the freezes) were to continue, there
could be more long-term impact on
faculty and staff morale. We don’t
want to see our faculty beginning to
think about the possibility of greener
pastures.”
Vohra hopes that the decision to
lift the salary freezes will put Brown
back on the track that it was on be-
fore 2006.
“I think we are well-positioned
but I wouldn’t say that we can be
complacent,” he said. “It’s going to
remain a challenge, but if we are able
to ensure that we do not lose ground
in the next few years, then we should
ensure we will be in a reasonable
place for the years to come.”
heeyoung min
senior staff writer
Survey reports falling endowments nationwide
University endowments nationwide saw an average
endowment loss of 18.7 percent for the last fiscal year,
according to a report with data from 842 institutions
compiled by the National Association of College and
University Business Officers and Commonfund.
Colleges with small endowments, on average, saw better
returns than their wealthier counterparts — an outcome
that most experts have never encountered, Inside Higher Ed
reported Jan. 28. Brown’s endowment, which is among the
biggest in the nation, saw more than a 26 percent decline,
President Ruth Simmons wrote in an e-mail to the Brown
community Feb. 2.
Some of Brown’s wealthier peer institutions suffered
bigger losses — Harvard’s and Yale’s endowments took
the biggest hits, with a 29.8 percent and a 28.6 percent
reduction, respectively, according to the report. However,
several institutions with larger endowments than Brown’s
— including Princeton, Columbia, Northwestern and the
University of Chicago — reported comparatively smaller
decreases.
Yale cuts grad admission by up to 15 percent
Yale will downsize doctoral admissions to its Graduate
School of Arts and Sciences by 10 to 15 percent beginning
the next academic year, according to Inside Higher Ed.
The scale back in graduate admissions is one of several
efforts — along with staff layoffs and reduced salaries of
top administrators — to recover from Yale’s budget deficit
of more than $100 million, the Yale Daily News reported
Feb. 5.
Though master’s degree students pay tuition, Yale
supports each doctoral student with $65,000 to $70,000
per year in stipends and fellowships, Yale President Richard
Levin told the Yale Daily News.
Brown, faced with an endowment reduced by about $740
million, is considering $30 million in budget cuts for the
next fiscal year, according to Simmons’ e-mail to students,
faculty and staff Feb. 2, but doctoral programs may see
increased funding.
“The University’s resources committee’s budget
recommendations call for modest funding increases for
the Graduate School,” Dean of the Graduate School Sheila
Bonde said, “with improved stipends for doctoral students,
funds for 10 additional graduate students and enhanced
faculty compensation to ensure that Brown attracts and
retains top scholars, who work closely with both graduate
and undergraduate students.”
“Over the past decade, Brown has invested in
strengthening the Graduate School, which is central to
the University’s mission,” Bonde added. “The University
maintains that commitment.”

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Tuesday, February 9, 2010 THE BROWN DAILY HERALD Page 3

C ampus N EWS “We’re almost struggling with our success right now.”
— Professor Jan Hesthaven on Brown’s supercomputer

Professors limit enrollment

in some uncapped courses
By Matthew Klebanoff
Staf f Writer
Shopping period — already stress-
ful for many — becomes all the
more complicated when professors
require overrides for courses that
appear uncapped on Banner.
This semester, as in previous
years, some professors placed
registration restrictions on their
classes after the preregistration
period in November, preventing
students from joining without re-
ceiving instructor approval.
Most of these registration
restrictions were enacted when
more students preregistered for
a course than the professor ex-
pected, said University Registrar
because of an administrative slip-
up, Banner listed it as uncapped.
After preregistration period,
Hastings noticed that more than
30 students had enrolled in her
course, and she contacted the CCC
and decided to enforce registration
restrictions through Banner.
“The classroom I’m in didn’t
fit more than 30 students, and for
some of the labs I wanted to do,
there was only enough equipment
for a certain number of students,”
Hastings said. “Just from my ex-
perience in the department, that’s
the reason I hear most often that
there is a cap.”
Professor of Political Science
Mark Blyth said he decided to Alex Bell / Herald
Gov. Donald Carcieri ’65, center, was present in the fall for the ribbon-cutting at the supercomputer site.
place registration restrictions on

Supercomputer already swamped

Michael Pesta.
“If the professor at the begin-
ning of the semester finds out
that the resources they have at
their disposal aren’t adequate — if
they can only get so many TAs and
can’t handle any more students,
the (College Curriculum Council)
has said they can request to put
a restriction on the course,” he
said.
Assistant Professor of Geologi-
cal Sciences Meredith Hastings,
who teaches GEOL1350: “Weather
and Climate,” said her class was
supposed to have a limited enroll-
ment during preregistration, but
his course, POLS1420: “Money and
Power in the International Political
Economy,” when he realized his
classroom could not accommodate
the 118 students who had enrolled
in his class on Banner.
Blyth received a larger class-
room that could fit 110 students,
and ever yone who wanted to get
into his course received a spot,
he said.
But it was not just the space
restrictions that forced Blyth to
limit enrollment in his class. He
also chose to place a cap on his
continued on page 4
By Sydney Ember
News Editor
After almost three months in
operation, Brown’s multimillion-
dollar supercomputer is running at
full capacity, according to Profes-
sor of Applied Mathematics Jan
Hesthaven, the director of the
computational center. Spurred
by research projects initiated by
many of the University’s science
departments, use of the comput-
ing cluster has increased by about
50 percent since Nov. 20, when
the cluster was officially unveiled,
“It really is a resource that cre-
ates visibility,” he said. “We’re al-
most struggling with our success
right now.”
Though the cluster was initially
available to everyone, including
undergraduates in research-driven
courses, Hesthaven said the center
has had to limit who could use the
system by giving first priority to
University researchers.
The computing cluster — which
is located in the Center for Com-
putation and Visualization at 180
George St. — is available to outside
institutions such as the University
to spearhead a proposal for a Race
To The Top award — a grant to
advance education reform given
to states by the U.S. Department
of Education.
Brown is also hoping to receive
a significant grant to fund a math
institute at the University using the
availability of an on-site supercom-
puter as one of the cornerstones
of the award proposal, said Clyde
Briant, vice president for research
and another leader of the initial
computing initiative. The institute
would serve as a statewide think
tank for computational and experi-

Blog promotes social

Hesthaven said. of Rhode Island and the Marine mental mathematics, he said.
The enthusiasm for the high- Biological Laboratory in Woods “Having a statewide collabora-
performance computing cluster Hole, Mass., Hesthaven said, add- tion is really a good and healthy

entrepreneurship — which was initially created in

By Casey Bleho
Contributing Writer
The Swearer Center for Public Ser-
vice launched an 11-part series on
Change.org’s social entrepreneur-
ship blog last month. Organized by
Brown’s Social Innovation Initiative,
the series will showcase stories
and ideas from the University’s
students, faculty and alums on the
topic of undergraduate social en-
trepreneurship.
The blog’s main goal is to raise
awareness for the center’s work,
said Alan Harlam, director of social
entrepreneurship for the Swearer
Center. The center also hopes
their success with the blog will
lead Change.org to sign on for a
second series.
“The blog is an ever-evolving
and emerging tool,” Harlam said.
So far, posts have included advice
on how to create sustainable so-
cial entrepreneurship initiatives
and discussions about ethics and
generosity among social entrepre-
neurs.
The Social Innovation Initiative
was “formed to build a capacity
of student-led and -run projects,”
Harlam said. Students work to cre-
ate better constructed and sustain-
able projects to foster community
development.
partnership with IBM to boost the
University’s national research pres-
ing that other large companies in
the state have already begun using
the computer for a fee.
and strong thing to do,” Briant
said, adding that many institutions
in the area already have access
tige — will allow Brown to more Par t of the initial plans for to the system through secure ac-
“Our sense historically is that effectively apply for state and na- the supercomputer was to allow counts.
there are a lot of students at Brown tional research grants, especially Rhode Island middle- and high- Though Brown is using the
that get (these projects) started because of the system’s immediate- school students to use the facility, cluster to promote collaborative
both locally and globally,” said ly quantifiable success, he said. giving students from across the research across the state, the
Roger Nozaki MAT’89, director of The increasing University and state access to a system usually University is also seeking grants
the Swearer Center and associate statewide interest in the supercom- reserved for advanced research. for its own researchers. Since the
dean of the College. “It is the fabric puter could also generate further But so far, Hesthaven said the fa- supercomputer’s unveiling, many
of Brown. I believe that the Brown investment in the cluster’s develop- cility has not been opened up to professors have already used the
curriculum and natural interests ment and drive it into the TOP500 these students because the cluster facility in a wide range of grant
(of students) in social change leads — a prestigious list that ranks the is already swamped with University proposals to appeal to various agen-
to social entrepreneurship or a so- world’s 500 most powerful com- projects. cies, Briant said.
cial culture.” puting systems — in the next six “It’s something that we continue “Overall, there’s going to be a
“Our challenge at Brown wasn’t months, Hesthaven said. Already, to pursue,” he said. “But it’s some- lot of proposal opportunities cen-
to create a culture of social inno- the computer is the most powerful thing we have to find resources tered around supercomputing,”
vation among students,” Nozaki supercomputer in Rhode Island, to do.” he said. “Having a supercomputer
wrote in his Change.org blog post. with an ability to perform 14 trillion He said administrators have dis- makes the University an attractive
“We needed to figure out precisely operations per second. cussed using the supercomputer place.”
what we could do to increase the
potential for student learning and
significant, sustainable impact re-
sulting from what students were
already doing.”
“If the organization itself is going
to succeed, it must be well thought
out,” said Barrett Hazeltine, profes-
sor emeritus of engineering and
author of the second post on the
Change.org blog. To make their
projects sustainable, entrepreneurs
must have a “cold mind” focused on
profits, while making a difference
in the community, he said.
“Little things can really make a
big difference, and if you can make
life better for one family, it’s worth
it,” he added.
Page 4
C ampus N EWS
Dean LeDuc remembered Surprise course caps trip up students
as warm, professional
continued from page 1
at the time.
“She was a woman in an age
when there were not many woman
professors,” said Professor of Biolo-
gy Peter Heywood, who worked with
LeDuc at the time, “and certainly not
many woman full professors who
then became deans.”
Marjorie Thompson ’74 PhD’79
P’02 P’07 P’09 P’12, associate dean
of biological sciences, studied under
LeDuc as an undergrad at Brown
and later took over teaching LeDuc’s
course on histology.
“The thing that was wonderful
about Dukie is that it wasn’t about
gender,” Thompson said.
“We are making that observation
now in retrospect,” she added, “be-
cause she was in a sense free of all
the decrements of worrying about
whether this was a woman achieve-
ment or a man achievement.”
According to a short biography
Heywood penned about LeDuc, she
grew up in Vermont, earning her
bachelor’s of science from the Uni-
versity of Vermont in 1943. She then
went on to earn a master’s degree
from Wellesley College.
After obtaining her PhD at
Brown, LeDuc stayed on in Provi-
dence for a postdoctoral fellowship
and — after teaching anatomy at
Harvard Medical School — returned
to Brown for the remainder of her
academic career. As a graduate
student, she co-authored several
articles with her mentor, J. Walter
Wilson, Heywood said.
According to Heywood, LeDuc
taught histology, focused her re-
search on cellular biology, special-
izing in liver cells and pioneering
the field of cytochemistry.
“She helped push biology for-
ward at a time when other depart-
ments weren’t growing,” Heywood
said.
Outside of Brown, LeDuc was
recognized for her work as a re-
searcher and prominent leader in
the field of biology. She was the only
woman appointed to then-President
Gerald Ford’s nine-member Commit-
tee on Science and Technology, ac-
cording to Heywood’s biography.
During the summer months,
she collaborated with researchers
from the Institut de Reserches Sci-
entifiques sur le Cancer in France,
according to the biography.
“She was a member of 12 profes-
sional societies, served on several
editorial boards and was a member
of the National Advisory General
Medical Sciences Council of the
National Institutes of Health,” the
Journal reported.
But beyond her impressive ca-
reer, her colleagues remember her
most for her approachable and af-
fectionate personality.
“She was a very good person to
work with. She was a very profes-
sional sort of person, but she was
also a warm person, just ideal to
work with,” Heywood said.
Thompson said “she was sim-
ply someone who was a leader, who
was excellent and who engendered
the admiration, love and respect of
everyone.”
LeDuc was a “lover of travel, of
food, of the arts,” Thompson said.
Heywood shared LeDuc’s love
for French food.
“She loved to eat,” Heywood said,
“and for someone who in the labora-
tory worked with liver, she liked to
eat liver, too.”
He added, “I think she enjoyed
the good life and good food and good
company.”
THE BROWN DAILY HERALD
“It could funnel to me, but not to the University.”
— President Ruth Simmons on bad publicity from her board service
continued from page 3
course because the political sci-
ence depar tment could not pro-
vide enough teaching assistants
to accommodate the number of
students signed up for the course,
he said.
Senior Lecturer in Educa-
tion Luther Spoehr, who teaches
EDUC1200: “Histor y of Ameri-
can School Reform,” faced simi-
lar problems this semester when
his uncapped class attracted the
interest of more students than
expected.
“It regularly, ever y year, has an
enrollment of 24 or 30 students,
which meant that I was able to in-
Simmons says board service is important
continued from page 1
as potential regulations and legis-
lative actions regarding compensa-
tion policies that might ensue. But
she said she does not believe her
affiliation with Goldman Sachs will
garner negative publicity for the
University.
“I don’t see how it could funnel
into the University,” Simmons said.
“It could funnel to me, but not to
the University.”
She added that if she ever
thought her actions “put Brown
in a difficult position,” she would
be “ver y concerned.”
Stephen Nelson, an assistant
professor of educational leader-
ship at Bridgewater State College
who studies university presidents,
agreed that the likelihood of the is-
sue becoming a publicity problem
for Brown is relatively low.
“Generally, it runs under the
radar screen,” Nelson said of uni-
versity presidents’ positions on
corporate boards. “I don’t mean
that anybody is hiding it. It’s just
not that big of a deal for the aver-
age person.”
Regardless of the potential ef-
fects on Brown’s image, Simmons
said her work on corporate and
nonprofit boards is important to
her personally.
“What I’d like my students to
understand is that we all make de-
cisions about what we are going to
commit to doing,” Simmons said.
“In making that decision, and a
commitment, our obligation is to
do the best we can and to do it
ethically, but not to be buf feted
about.”
Simmons said she originally
joined Goldman’s board at the rec-
ommendation of Smith’s Board
clude a lot of discussion,” Spoehr
said. “So there are teaching tech-
niques, pedagogical reasons, why
numbers matter in a course like
this.”
When nearly 70 students at-
tended Spoehr’s first class this
semester, he decided to enforce
enrollment restrictions on Ban-
ner.
“My course is in a particularly
dif ficult position,” Spoehr said.
“It’s not a lecture course. (Having
so many students) was fundamen-
tally affecting the kind of course I
was teaching.”
Spoehr said about half a dozen
students told him they decided not
to take his course because they
of Trustees around the time that
she started a center for financial
literacy on campus.
“We had a big push to think
about how we could improve the
knowledge and ability of women
to manage their financial affairs,”
she said. “At the same time, there
was a good deal of interest in the
fact that women have not done so
well in the financial sector and on
Wall Street.”
Simmons said she and Smith’s
Board of Trustees sought to make
certain fields more accessible to
women and minorities through her
service on the boards of Goldman,
Texas Instruments and Pfizer.
“I think we had a good discus-
sion about whether or not the time
allocation and the involvement
with corporate boards would do
anything for my position as presi-
dent of Smith,” she said. “They
were persuaded that it would, and
so with some reluctance I acceded
to that.”
She called her work with wom-
en and minorities on boards mean-
ingful to her in “a way that a lot of
people won’t understand.”
Simmons said her ser vice on
Goldman’s board gave her the eco-
nomic savvy to take certain risks
that she might not have taken oth-
er wise, such as the introduction
of need-blind admissions. But Sim-
mons said she was unsure of what,
if any, skills still remain for her to
take from Goldman’s board.
“I appreciate the question about
whether or not it’s the right com-
pany for me to be involved with
at this point,” she said. “That’s a
legitimate question. It is one that
I think about, as I think about ev-
er ything that I do.”
If Simmons were to leave Gold-
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
had expected a small, discussion-
based class.
In order to provide his students
with opportunities for discussion
and more personal attention, he
decided to split ever y Friday class
into two sections that meet at dif-
ferent times.
Spoehr said he plans to put a
cap on his course before prereg-
istration next year, but said he
thinks the issues af fecting reg-
istration are highly complex and
require attention from administra-
tors, including the Registrar.
“I think there will be a lot more
faculty asking for caps because the
demand is both unpredictable, but
generally growing,”he said.
man’s board, she said, she does
not think she would join another
board.
“At this juncture, I sort of think
I would like to devote most of my
time to Brown,” she said. “So my
guess is that if I leave boards, I’m
not going to replace them.”
One reason Simmons cited
not to seek out new positions was
that the seniority she now enjoys
on Goldman’s board allows her
to advocate for programs to help
women and minorities.
Simmons said that, as with her
retirement from Pfizer’s board
three years ago, the decision to
call it quits with Goldman will not
be one she makes by herself, but
rather in cooperation with the Cor-
poration, the University’s highest
governing body, with which she
meets regularly to evaluate her
actions.
“I feel ver y strongly that I don’t
know enough as an individual —
a sole individual — to make that
decision alone,” she said.
Matthew Mallow ’64 P’02, a
Corporation fellow, also acts on
her behalf whenever a conflict of
interest could arise between her
function as president and a direc-
tor for Goldman, she said.
“The president is not involved
in any way” with the process of
selecting a bank through which to
issue debt, Executive Vice Presi-
dent for Finance and Administra-
tion Beppie Huidekoper wrote in
an e-mail to The Herald.
The University has employed
Goldman Sachs in the past for
debt ser vices, and Goldman cur-
rently ser ves as the remarketing
agent for some of the University’s
outstanding debt, Huidekoper
wrote.
Page 5
C ampus N EWS
Grads face a future
without health coverage
By Caitlin Trujillo
Senior Staf f Writer
Jessica Kissel ’10 turns 23 in March
— which is when her status as a
dependent under her mother’s
health insurance policy is slated
to end.
Fortunately for Kissel, she and
her mother are confident that she
can remain a dependent while she
is enrolled in school. But Kissel
plans to go directly into the work-
force after graduation, confronting
her with the prospect of living and
working in a world where she can-
not afford health insurance.
According to Edward Miller,
an adjunct associate professor of
community health, people under
30 make up nearly a third of un-
insured Americans and are the
fastest-growing group of people
without health insurance.
Miller said many states allow for
parents’ insurance to cover their
children as dependents regardless
of whether they are enrolled in
school. New Jersey, for example,
has one of the countr y’s best
plans for allowing dependents to
remain on their parents’ insurance,
Miller said. Children stay covered
until age 31, provided they have
no spouse or dependents of their
own, according to the National
Conference of State Legislatures
Web site.
About 30 states have laws that
allow for parents’ insurance to ex-
THE BROWN DAILY HERALD Tuesday, February 9, 2010
“Would you rather pay your cell phone bill or your health
insurance premium?” — Vincent Mor, professor
tend to their children regardless
of enrollment status, according to
the National Conference of State
Legislatures, according to the Web
site.
Parents might be willing to
help graduating seniors purchase
health insurance, Miller said, or
young alums may be able to enroll
in graduate school and purchase
health insurance there through the
university for a better price.
But those planning to leave
school behind will struggle to find
low-entr y jobs with adequate ben-
efits, Miller said, especially since
many positions require employees
to work for a certain length of time Herald file photo
before offering them benefits. Graduates may need to find new health insurance when they move away from University Health Services, above.
Miller said he expects many col-
lege graduates to forego health in- her cousin — who had no health phone bill or your health insurance to work for a year or so — not long
surance altogether until their jobs insurance — was in a bad car ac- premium?” Mor said. enough to gain benefits in most
offer it as a benefit or they can af- cident. She said the prospect of The problem, he said, was that places, she acknowledged — and
ford private insurance — especially lacking health insurance was some- people who cannot afford the in- then enroll in graduate school.
since college graduates tend to be thing she worried about, despite surance need subsidies. A fight She said she and her friends do
young and relatively healthy. her age. to improve the situation has been not talk much about their predica-
Unfortunately, Miller said, the Still, Mor said the motivation to raging in Congress, but Mor said ment, though she has a friend who
trend of younger people waiting go without health insurance was he does not expect the problem to has secured a position that will
to buy health insurance can drive strong, especially since many col- be resolved soon. come with benefits.
health premiums up. lege graduates might see paying for For her part, Kissel said she is “Mostly we just talk about,
“In a sense, you need those insurance as a waste of money. not sure what she will do about ob- ‘Lord, I hope I have a job,’ ” she
healthy people in as well to keep “Would you rather pay your cell taining health insurance. She plans said.
costs down,” Miller said.
Professor of Medical Science
Vincent Mor said people under 30
who go without health insurance
leave themselves open to accidents
and other “dastardly things.”
www.blogdailyherald.com
Kissel herself is aware of the
risk, she said. About five years ago,
Metro
The Brown Daily Herald
Rhode Island College professor Thomas Cobb did not expect his novel
to be adapted into a movie when he wrote it in 1989.
RIC professor revels
in novel’s success
By Mark Raymond
Contributing Writer
Thomas Cobb could never have
imagined that the story he wrote
when he was a student at Univer-
sity of Houston would one day be
made into an Academy Award-
nominated movie.
Cobb, an English professor
at Rhode Island College, wrote
“Crazy Heart” as a doctoral dis-
sertation, and got the inspiration
for the story’s protagonist from a
line that repeated over and over
in his head. “Bad’s got the sweats
again,” Cobb claims, served as
the inspiration for the character
known as Bad Blake, played by
Jeff Bridges in the recent movie
adaptation of the book.
Cobb, who worked as a music
critic while working towards his
doctorate, said he heard a song
about a washed-up country singer
on an album he was supposed to
review, and Bad Blake’s character
developed from there.
The book that resulted from
his dissertation was published in
1987, and while it received criti-
Are there things you like?
And things you don’t like?
Man, do we have a site for you.
www.diamondsandcoal.com
Hillary Rosenthal / Herald
cal acclaim, it did not sell many
copies.
“It got great reviews but it just
didn’t sell,” Cobb said. “It only sold
around 11,000 copies.”
The 2009 movie, directed by
Scott Cooper, has now made its
way to theaters nationwide and is
the recipient of numerous awards,
including Best Actor in a Motion
Picture (Drama) at the Golden
Globes for Bridges’ portrayal of
Bad Blake.
“I’m really happy with Jeff and
Maggie’s performances,” Cobb
said, referring to Bridges’ por-
trayal of Bad Blake and Maggie
Gyllenhaal’s portrayal of journalist
Jean Craddock. “Jeff really cap-
tures Bad Blake’s character and
Maggie’s performance was very
effective.”
When pressed about the mov-
ie’s chances at the Oscars, Cobb
placed great faith in Bridges’ like-
lihood of winning Best Actor, as
well as T-Bone Burnett and Ryan
Bingham’s prospects of winning
Best Original Song for “The Wea-
continued on page 7
— State Rep. John G. Edwards on the penalty for marijuana possession
R.I. considers decriminalizing pot
BY Jamie Brew
Contributing Writer
State Rep. John G. Edwards, D-Dist.
70, introduced a bill last week in
the General Assembly that would
decriminalize possession of up to
one ounce of marijuana.
Under current law, possession
of such small amounts is a criminal
offense that carries a $500 fine and
up to one year in prison. The sec-
ond offense counts as a felony.
Decriminalization would mean
that offenders could no longer be
convicted and sent to prison. Under
the proposed legislation, the only
punishment for small-scale posses-
sion would be a fine, much like a
traffic ticket. Additionally, the bill
would reduce the fine from $500
to $150.
The legislation “will keep people
from having their lives ruined for
something that is pretty simple and
insignificant. If you get caught with
a small amount of marijuana, your
life shouldn’t be ruined,” Edwards
said.
Edwards said 35 representa-
tives, including two Republicans,
have already signed on as cospon-
sors.
Rhode Island would be the thir-
teenth state to decriminalize mari-
juana possession to some extent,
after California, Colorado, Maine,
Massachusetts, Minnesota, Mis-
sissippi, Nebraska, Nevada, New
York, North Carolina, Ohio and
Oregon. In Nov. 2008, Massachu-
setts passed by ballot measure a
Under alum, TFA expands to R.I.
By Anne Artley
Contributing Writer
Teach for America, a program which
trains recent college graduates in
teaching and places them in under-
performing school districts, will start
sending teachers to Rhode Island for
the 2010-2011 school year. Heather
Tow-Yick ’98, a former teacher, is
heading up the organization’s expan-
sion ­­— which will send 30 teachers in
its first year — as the state executive
director.
Tow-Yick said TFA had “a lot
of support” from the Rhode Island
community, including philanthropic
groups, the Board of Regents and
Education Commissioner Deborah
Gist.
The program “works with com-
munities when the time is right,” she
said.
Tow-Yick added that Gist was in-
strumental in bringing the educational
program to the state.
“Teach For America has a reputa-
tion as an organization that trains intel-
ligent, qualified people,” Kim Rose,
the chief communications officer for
the Providence Public School District,
said. “We all know having an effective
teacher in front of kids is the most
important factor in education.”
Tow-Yick herself is a TFA alum.
After graduating from Brown, she
“Your life shouldn’t be ruined.”
Tuesday, February 9, 2010 | Page 6
law similar to that proposed by
Edwards.
The bill’s introduction came
just before the fifth meeting of a
Special Senate Commission that
is investigating possible marijuana
law reform in Rhode Island.
Sen. Joshua Miller, D-Dist. 28,
chairs the nine-member panel of
experts in economics, law and med-
icine, which includes David Lewis,
professor emeritus of medicine
and community health, and Glenn
Lour y, professor of economics.
“There’s a significant amount
of suppor t” for the bill, Miller
said. “More than most people ex-
pected.”
In its meeting last Wednesday,
the panel heard from Jack Cole, a
former narcotics officer who said
that police resources ought to be
directed away from drug cases and
toward more serious crimes, ac-
cording to a Providence Journal
article from last week.
“Let police get back to protect-
ing all of us from violent criminals
and child molesters. We will all be
much better off,” Cole told the pan-
el, according to the article.
Miller echoed Cole’s sentiment;
he said less strict marijuana laws
would provide “the potential for lo-
cal law enforcement to save worth-
while money.”
He was referring in part to the
cost to the state of incarcerating
marijuana offenders. It costs an av-
erage of $44,000 per year to house
inmates at Rhode Island’s Adult
Correctional Institute.
taught at a public junior high school
in the South Bronx.
Her passion for education start-
ed with an internship she received
while still an undergraduate at Brown.
During one winter break, Tow-Yick
worked with a fifth-grade teacher at
Community Preparatory School in
Providence, which was founded to
educate students of color from low-
income families. She described her
work with the students as “compel-
ling” and “wonderful,” adding that she
remembered this experience when
TFA came to recruit at Brown.
The program recruits its students
through their universities. After grad-
uating from college, TFA participants
must complete a five-week teacher
training program before applying for
teaching positions.
Tow-Yick, who double concentrat-
ed in English and American Civiliza-
tion, decided to continue working in
education after teaching in the Bronx.
She said she would encourage any
college graduate to apply to TFA.
“It’s a great opportunity to do
something that will have a measur-
able impact on society. Good teachers
can make a tangible contribution,”
she said. “Less than half of my kids
entered 8th grade reading at below
grade level, but after setting clear
goals, all but one kid exceeded ex-
pectations when they took the New
Edwards predicted his bill could
save the state anywhere between
$250,000 and $2 million annually.
But this savings might turn out
to be quite insignificant, said com-
mission member Jeffrey Miron,
who is a senior lecturer in econom-
ics at Har vard.
The bill “would save the state
some money, but not a lot,” he
said.
Still, there are compelling argu-
ments for relaxing marijuana laws
beyond pure economic benefits for
the state, Miron said.
“Ever ything should be legal
unless there’s some compelling
reason for it not to be legal,” he
said. “The burden of proof to make
it illegal should be on those who
want to make it illegal.”
Meanwhile, Miron said that al-
though in his view the bill would be
“a step in the right direction,” it was
noteworthy that it did not address
the laws punishing the production
and distribution of marijuana.
The commission will continue
to meet throughout this spring and
has pushed back its deadline for
issuing recommendations from
Januar y to March 31.
Asked about the role of the
commission, Edwards stressed the
need for quick action. “They’re go-
ing to talk about it until it’s dead.
My opinion is, get the bill in,” he
said.
Edwards’ bill is currently under
evaluation by a committee chaired
by Rep. Don Lally, D-Dist. 33, one
of its cosponsors.
York state English and language arts
exam.”
According to Tow-Yick, the mis-
sion of TFA is to bridge the gap in
academic performance between afflu-
ent schools and schools in low-income
communities.
TFA works with district partners
across America to identify disadvan-
taged schools with openings. While
critics have accused TFA of taking
jobs from traditional teachers, Rose
said the new teachers do not replace
anyone, since they have to go through
the same application process.
“Some people think the five-week
program is not enough, but we have
data that shows our teachers are just
as effective,” Tow-Yick said.
Rose said she hopes TFA teachers
will be employed in “harder-to-fill”
positions such as math, science and
bilingual education.
Even if TFA teachers decide not to
follow a career in education, Tow-Yick
said, she believes that their experience
will give them an optimistic attitude
and a solid work ethic that will allow
them to succeed in other fields.
“What’s most important is that
people come away with a deep con-
viction that the kids in these schools
can achieve as much as kids in afflu-
ent neighborhoods,” Tow-Yick said.
“They can take (this conviction) and
apply it to other professions.”
Page 7
C ampus N EWS
RIC prof ’s story hits the big screen Diving on the road: the
continued from page 6
team that has no home
ry Kind,” which is featured in the
movie.
“Jeff has a really good chance
and I also think the song has a
really good chance,” Cobb said.
“Maggie is up against Mo’Nique
who has won Best Supporting Ac-
tress twice already, so she has a
tough road ahead of her.”
Despite all the recent success, it
wasn’t always clear to Cobb wheth-
er or not his book would become
a movie.
“There was always the hope
that someone would get it made,
but I wasn’t holding my breath,”
said Cobb. “It was a real surprise
when Scott was actually able to do
it, because nobody had come that
close before.”
Cobb said a movie adaptation
had been considered on and off
ever since the book was released
in 1987, but Cooper was the first
person to get the film green-lighted
by a studio.
The professor’s life has certainly
changed now that the movie has
been released and is doing well all
across the country.
“I’m doing lots of press and fly-
ing back and forth between Provi-
dence and L.A.,” Cobb said. “I’ve
walked the red carpet a couple of
times.”
Trustee faces lawsuit from ex-wife
continued from page 1
gains during his career as a Wall
Street trader from 1978 to 1992.
The suit alleges that he had a con-
fidential source alert him to Gen-
eral Electric’s purchase of RCA in
1985. “Although she did not have
a college degree and had no train-
ing in finance or law, Ms. Cohen
questioned defendant Cohen about
the legality of trading inside infor-
mation,” the suit stated. In New
York, there is a five-year statute of
limitations against insider trading
charges.
Steven Cohen’s representatives
responded to the suit by request-
ing that Batista be sanctioned for
bringing a frivolous suit. “There
may have been a problem with the
prior complaint,” Kachroo said.
Batista told the New York
Times last month that he dropped
the suit because Patricia Cohen
was not returning his phone calls.
“I cannot fulfill my responsibilities
with a client who doesn’t speak
to me,” he said. He also told the
Times he believed the case was
strong, but that he could not move
forward without the cooperation
of his client.
Patricia Cohen claimed the suit
was dropped without her knowl-
edge, Kachroo said. “The former
attorney withdrew his counsel and
attempted to voluntarily dismiss
the case,” Kachroo said.
“We are not surprised that they
withdrew the complaint,” Gasthal-
ter said of the earlier suit.
Thomas Cobb’s novel is now an Academy Award-nominated film.
Cobb said the royalties from
the movie have also allowed him
to remodel his home, and that the
original book is now back in print
for readers to purchase.
“I’m happy that it’s back in print
after all these years,” said Cobb,
When asked whether Batista’s
move damaged her client’s case,
Kachroo said, “I don’t think so.
We’re going to file an amendment
anyway.” She said that a new suit
would have the potential to be
“stronger and more accurate.”
The case caused a stir in the fi-
nancial community, but no further
information on SAC Capital’s busi-
ness activities has emerged.
“I took the case because I
thought she had some strong
claims against Mr. Cohen and SAC
Capital,” Kachroo said.
Kachroo is no stranger to hedge
fund scandals. She has represented
Harry Markopolos, who blew the
whistle on Bernard Madoff’s Ponzi
scheme in 2005. Securities and Ex-
change Commission officials infa-
mously did not act on Markopolos’
claims at the time.
“I see Mrs. Cohen as an under-
dog, the same way I see Harry,”
Kachroo said. “Mr. Cohen is a very
powerful, financially capable, re-
sourceful man. Harry Markopolos
and Patricia Cohen don’t have the
same kind of resources.”
Vice President of Public Affairs
and University Relations Marisa
Quinn declined to comment on
the matter.
Steven Cohen is a very wealthy
man who has shied away from
the public eye during his career.
Forbes Magazine ranked him the
87th richest man in the world in
2009, with an estimated wealth of
$5.5 billion. After his career as a
trader, Cohen went into the emerg-
THE BROWN DAILY HERALD
“It would be nice to have a place to call home.”
— Diving Coach Alisha Hanoian on lacking an on-campus diving pool
Hilary Rosenthal / Herald
who is also the author of the 2008
novel “Shavetail.”
Even with his publicity and
teaching duties, Cobb continues
to write. He said he is working on a
new book that he hopes to complete
this spring if all goes as planned.
ing hedge fund market in 1992,
founding the stalwart firm SAC
Capital. SAC is incorporated in the
British West Indies, but maintains
trading floors in Stamford, Conn.
and New York City.
Suspicions of insider training
are not new to SAC. Though Mr.
Cohen seldom speaks to the public,
the Wall Street Journal published a
feature in 2006 on his career. The
paper referred to rumors about
SAC’s improper trading practices,
noting that the firm had never been
formally accused.
“If unethical behavior is not pe-
nalized, it will continue to grow,”
Kachroo said. Kachroo expressed
the need for more oversight and
regulator y ef forts over the fi-
nancial industr y. “There has to
be enough law on the books and
enough examples to send a very
clear message so that they’re care-
ful as to how they conduct their
business,” she said.
In December, former SAC
analyst Richard Choo-Beng Lee
pled guilty to insider trading at
the scandal-plagued hedge fund
Galleon Group. Lee said he will
provide information on any insider
trading that occurred during his
five-year tenure at SAC from 1999
to 2004. B.J. Kang, an FBI agent
investigating the Galleon Group, is
said to be looking into SAC with
the cooperation of Lee, the Times
reported in December. Kang previ-
ously looked into SAC in 2006, but
did not obtain evidence sufficient
for prosecution.
continued from page 1
struggle with that and we are more
flexible.”
Three days a week, the team uses
the one-meter boards in the tempo-
rary aquatics bubble for two hours
each day. The diving boards face
each other, said Katie Olko ’10, so
the diving coach cannot watch both
sides at the same time.
“We are in a very unique situa-
tion,” Olko said, and you “have to
give credit to all of us who have stuck
through it. I’m not sure other teams
could have stuck it out so much.”
No home field advantage
Team members agreed that the
setup impacts their performance
at meets.
“Our team has done very well
in remaining competitive, but we
are at the same time at a disadvan-
tage because most teams practice
the three-meter five or six times a
week,” Lindquist said.
Olko compared practicing the
three-meter only twice a week to
using only half of a basketball court.
As a result, the team has less confi-
dence than other teams going into
competition, she said.
“They have done a good job
overcoming the adversity,” said
diving coach Alisha Hanoian, who
joined the coaching team in 2008
after the Smith Swim Center had
already been closed. She said she
looks forward to eventually getting a
permanent, on-campus pool in order
to “give the team a better advantage”
in competition.
The team also regrets not hav-
ing meets at Brown. “It would be
nice to have a place to call home,”
Hanoian said.
Lindquist said that even with sup-
portive friends on campus, the extra
time needed to travel to the meets
at the University of Massachusetts
leads to limited crowd support.
Olko said parents have helped to
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
fill the absence of student support
at the games. “Swimming is not a
huge spectator sport anyway,” she
added.
Different perspectives
The seniors on the diving team
recall a time during their freshman
year when the Smith Swim Center
was still fully operational. When the
center was deemed unsafe to use,
the entire swimming and diving
team was forced to travel every day
for practice before the temporary
pool was built.
“At first, we pretty much pan-
icked,” said Kambe. “We weren’t
sure what would happen to the
team.”
Initially, Kambe said, the tempo-
rary pool seemed like a “God-send”
because it meant traveling only twice
a week for the diving team. Still, he
said it has been difficult to avoid
becoming worn out by traveling
every week.
Olko said the team dynamics
shifted after the Smith Swim Center
closed. With a permanent facility,
she said the swimming and diving
team “was more cohesive” because
they could practice together, which
is not always an option in the tem-
porary aquatics bubble. “The social
aspect is different,” she said.
She also said the diving team felt
more competitively confident during
her freshman year because they had
more practice time with the three-
meter boards.
Tassell and Lindquist knew about
the state of the facilities when they
signed on. Tassell said the unique
situation made her freshman year
difficult, but she tries not to focus
on the negatives.
Lindquist transferred to Brown
after her freshman year, knowing
that the swimming facilities were
temporary and that she would have
to travel. “I valued the swim team,
but the ultimate reason I came to
Brown was for the school.”
World & Nation
The Brown Daily Herald
Obama’s new budget sits better with Foreign internships
leaders at historically black colleges help job hunters in
By William Douglas
McClatchy Newspapers
WASHINGTON — The leaders of
the nation’s historically black colleg-
es and universities breathed a sigh
of relief last week when they learned
that President Barack Obama’s
fiscal 2011 budget includes a $30
million funding increase for their
financially struggling schools.
Last year, many black educa-
tors were shocked by what they
considered to be substantial cuts
to black colleges and other edu-
cational institutions dedicated to
select minorities, such as Native
Americans, in Obama’s first budget
proposal.
“The United Negro College
Fund and the entire community of
minority-serving institutions were
disappointed at last year’s budget
proposal, which recommended a
decrease from previous funding
levels,” fund President Michael
Lomax said in a written statement
analyzing Obama’s latest budget.
“The increase — $30 million higher
than last year’s levels — proposed
in the budget that has just been
released shows that the administra-
tion was listening.”
For the fiscal year that will begin
on Oct. 1, Obama proposes $279.9
million for historically black col-
leges and universities — $30 million
more than he proposed for fiscal
2010 and $13 million more than
Congress appropriated, according
to the United Negro College Fund.
Including other minority-oriented
educational institutions, Obama’s
total budget request is for $520 mil-
lion, up from $496.3 million this
year.
The proposed funds are dis-
cretionary, meaning that colleges
that receive the money would have
leeway to spend it on items rang-
ing from academic programs to
construction and maintenance of
instructional facilities to student
services.
Administration officials said the
funding request reflects the premi-
um it places on minority education
institutions, which they say will play
an important role in helping to meet
Obama’s goal of the U.S. having the
world’s highest college graduation
rate by 2020. The U.S. ranks 15th
among 29 developed countries in
college completion, according to
the most recent National Report
Card on Higher Education.
“I said from day one we desper-
ately need historically black col-
leges and universities not just to
survive, but to thrive,” Education
Secretar y Arne Duncan said in a
recent television interview with syn-
dicated columnist and talk show
host Roland Martin. “So, we want
to support the institutions. We’re
going to make sure many more
students can go through.”
HBCUs — 105 federally recog-
nized schools that were accredited
and established before 1964 for the
Biddle Hall at Johnson C. Smith University in Charlotte, N.C., in 1997. To-
day, leaders of the nation’s black colleges and universities praise President
Obama for recommending a $30 million increase in aid for their campuses.
purpose of educating black Ameri-
cans — are just 3 percent of the na-
tion’s higher education institutions,
but they produce almost 20 percent
of blacks who earn undergraduate
degrees.
More than 50 percent of black
public school teachers and 70 per-
cent of black dentists are HBCU
graduates, according to the United
Negro College Fund.
The impact of the nation’s weak
economy is being felt at all of Amer-
ica’s colleges and universities, but
officials at black colleges say their
schools have been hit harder than
most.
Heavily dependent on tuition,
with modest endowments and deal-
ing with declining student enroll-
ment, even some of the most pres-
tigious black colleges are shedding
faculty, reducing course offerings
and weighing other measures to
stay afloat.
Atlanta’s all-female Spelman Col-
lege, one of the wealthiest black
campuses, eliminated 35 teaching
positions last year. Its neighboring
brother school, all-male Morehouse
College, saw its endowment take
a $40 million hit last year. North
Carolina’s Barber Scotia College
made news last year when its enroll-
ment dwindled to double-digits.
In Mississippi, Republican Gov.
Haley Barbour is advocating merg-
ing three state-supported HBCUs
— Jackson State, Mississippi Valley
State and Alcorn State — to save
money.
Several black higher-education
officials quietly questioned the first
black U.S. president’s commitment
to black colleges last year.
They pointed to the administra-
tion not renewing a two-year, $170
Todd Sumlin / Charlotte Observer
million program that provided di-
rect funding to HBCUs.
White House officials said they
increased other direct aid support
for the schools, but officials at black
colleges argued that the expiration
of the two-year program yielded a
$73 million cut.
Administration officials disputed
the claim, asserting in a May e-mail
to BET.com that they’d raised
discretionar y funding for HBCU
undergraduate and graduate pro-
grams by 5 percent — “more than
twice the rate of inflation.”
“There were a lot of high expec-
tations among (black) educators
because of who (Obama) was that
they would do much better; he’s
a black president, they’re black
colleges — you expect to do bet-
ter,” said Ronald Walters, a political
science professor emeritus at the
University of Maryland. “There was
a lot of grumbling.”
“Obama is under pressure
to be ever yone’s president, and
that’s a difficult line to walk,” said
Mar ybeth Gasman, an expert on
black colleges at the University
of Pennsylvania. “I do think he’s
cognizant of the contributions of
black colleges and the challenges
they have.”
Seeking to avoid last year’s
controversy, black higher educa-
tion officials have stepped up their
lobbying on Capitol Hill and at the
White House.
“We’d like to see President
Obama engage HBCUs and (minor-
ity-serving institutions) in a more
robust way,” said Edith Bartley, the
United Negro College Fund’s direc-
tor of government affairs, “to really
taking a strong look and understand
the role that our schools play.”
Tuesday, February 9, 2010 | Page 8
tough environment
By Julie Wernau
Chicago Tribune
CHICAGO — After JPMorgan
Chase laid off Adi Clerman as
a recruiter in August 2008, the
26-year-old Chicagoan couldn’t
find a job — any job.
“I was looking and looking for
work and interviewing and inter-
viewing, and nothing was coming,”
she said.
So Clerman decided to go
abroad. She grabbed a five-month
internship in Tel Aviv, Israel, at an
American marketing firm through
MASA Israel’s Career Israel pro-
gram, a partnership with the Is-
raeli government that sends young
people to the country for work ex-
periences. It filled a huge gap on
her resume.
“When people asked me, ‘You
got laid off in August 2008; what
have you done since then?’ I had a
really great answer,” she said.
One month after returning to
the United States, she landed a job
as an admissions representative
at Harrington College of Design
in Chicago.
With available jobs at record
lows in the United States, and a
business world that is increasingly
global, more Americans are seek-
ing overseas internships and other
resume builders than ever before,
experts say.
The number of people travel-
ing abroad for internships from
2000 through 2008 doubled, from
6,950 to 13,658, based on a survey
of about 1,500 educational institu-
tions, according to the Institute of
International Education.
Officials at schools and other
organizations that help arrange
such work experiences say they
continued to see increases through
2009, partly fueled by those who
cannot find a job. Despite a lifting
recession, nearly 10 percent of
Americans remain unemployed,
and the rate is more than double
that for young adults.
“Everybody knows, of course,
that the U.S economy is not doing
well,” said Robert Trumble, direc-
tor of the Virginia Labor Studies
Center at Virginia Commonwealth
University. “Most people will look
for full-time jobs here, and when
that doesn’t work out, they’ll look
for internships anywhere.”
Lauren Krause, 21, a senior
majoring in journalism at Loyola
University Chicago, is counting on
her summer internship at a com-
munications company in London to
help set her apart in an increasing-
ly competitive field. She snagged
an internship last semester at Fox
Chicago and scored an interview
with ABC7, where she’ll intern this
semester.
“There’s thousands of journal-
ism students in Chicago alone look-
ing for jobs right now,” she said.
Victor C. Johnson, senior public
policy adviser for NAFSA: Asso-
ciation of International Educators,
believes an overseas experience
soon will no longer be an option
in lining up a good job.
“This is the next digital di-
vide,” Johnson said. “The kids
who graduate from school who
have international experience are
going to have a leg up in gaining
successful lives.”
Employers are looking to hire
people who understand the econo-
mies and cultures of the world,
he added.
“We just hear CEO after CEO
saying that the work force of the
future, really, the work force of the
present, has to be a cross-culturally
competent work force. Work forces
are cross-cultural; businesses are
global,” he said.
The Association for Interna-
tional Practical Training, a Mary-
land nonprofit that places about
2,500 people in internships abroad
each year in 24 time zones, saw a
20 percent increase in 2009 com-
pared with a 3 percent increase
the previous year. About a third
of their participants are young
professionals.
“It used to be that speaking
English meant you could work
anywhere in the world, but it’s
not the case anymore. Companies
are selecting candidates who are
multilingual,” said Craig Brown,
executive vice president at the as-
sociation.
Cadee Oakleaf, 22, a senior
at Colorado State University, has
studied abroad, volunteered in
more countries than she can count,
including South Africa and Costa
Rica, speaks Spanish and has taken
classes in French and Italian. She
hopes her experiences will show
global civil engineering firms in
the U.S. that she would be a good
candidate for one of their foreign
offices.
“I would love to go anywhere,”
said Oakleaf, who graduates in
December.
Still, some people with over-
seas experience say having that
background doesn’t guarantee a
job offer.
When Jay Johnson, 30, of New
York, was laid off from his first job
as a fashion stylist at Macy’s flag-
ship store after just three months,
he filed for unemployment and fo-
cused on getting additional unpaid
experience, including working on
an ad campaign for Napket, a high-
end coffee shop in London.
Now unemployed for more
than a year, Johnson said his ex-
perience abroad hasn’t paid off,
although some recent callbacks
have made him hopeful about his
job prospects.
“I was expecting way more,” he
continued on page 9
Page 9
W orld & N ation
Space shuttle Endeavour lights up Workers turn to foreign
the night sky in successful launch jobs to pad resumes
By Robert Block and Mark
K. Matthews
The Orlando Sentinel
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — Space
shuttle Endeavour brought an early
dawn to Kennedy Space Center on
Monday, punching its way through
cloudy skies to close the curtain
on night-time shuttle launches and
kick off the final year of liftoffs for
the aging orbiter fleet.
Low cloud cover almost
scrubbed the attempt for the sec-
ond straight morning. But in the
end Endeavour’s picture-perfect
launch, on time at 4:14 a.m. EST
was greeted with cheers from the
crowds that lined the roads from
Titusville to Cocoa Beach to wit-
ness the last time a shuttle climbed
into dark skies.
Only four shuttle flights now
remain — all scheduled daytime
launches — before NASA retires
the orbiters.
It was a bittersweet moment
for the agency and its contractor
workforce.
The 13-day mission is the first
of the final five, a long-anticipated
fate realized last week when Presi-
dent Barack Obama released his
2011 budget ruling out any further
orbiter flights and canceling Con-
stellation, the planned successor
to the shuttle.
The dramatic shakeup of
NASA’s human spaceflight program
cast a pall over the preparations
for Endeavour’s launch, but NASA
managers and astronauts did their
best to ignore the distractions and
focus on the task at hand: sending
Endeavour to the space station on a
major construction mission.
“OK Zambo, looks like the
weather came together tonight,
vehicle is in great shape, so it’s time
to go fly,” shuttle launch director
Mike Leinbach told shuttle com-
mander George D. Zamka.
Zamka was joined by his crew:
rookie pilot Terry Virts Jr. of the
Air Force; mission specialists
Nicholas Patrick, a British-born
engineer, Robert Behnken, a for-
mer weapons designer, Stephen
Robinson, a veteran of three shuttle
missions, and Kathryn Hire, the
first U.S. woman assigned to a mili-
tary combat aircrew.
In a post-launch press briefing,
NASA officials said they saw foam
break away from the external fuel
tank soon after takeoff, but that
their initial assessment determined
that no “gross damage” was done.
Falling foam that damaged space
shuttle Columbia in 2003 led to its
Thanks for reading!
THE BROWN DAILY HERALD Tuesday, February 9, 2010
continued from page 8 of the industry,” said Stephen Reilly,
destruction. program and its Ares rockets and director and program development
The main goal of Endeavour’s capsules that were supposed to said. “I thought it would make my coordinator for Global Experiences
mission is to add a final compart- replace the shuttle and return as- portfolio look like gold. What else Inc.
ment to the station. Named Tran- tronauts to the moon by 2020. can I do? I’ve done everything under The Internet has broken down
quility, the module will provide A White House blue ribbon the sun in order to become gainfully global barriers, said Reilly, who
astronauts additional room to panel last year found that the pro- employed again.” started the company nine years ago
work and a windowed dome, or gram was too expensive and behind Annie Lesser, 21, a native Chi- as a placement program for teaching
cupola, that will afford them an schedule. It recommended cancel- cagoan, has run into similar issues. English as a foreign language. It has
unparalleled view outside. Cur- ing Constellation and using com- Despite a resume that includes stints evolved to a full-service international
rently there are but small portal mercial rockets to take astronauts all over the world, from teaching internship program to meet the de-
windows on some compartments to the station. Until then astronauts English in China to editorial intern- mands of clients.
at the station. must hitch rides aboard Russian ships in Prague, she can’t get anyone “You’re coming into the worst
“The cupola is going to change Soyuz rockets at more than $50 to call her back. employment market in our history.
the quality of life for astronauts who million a seat. “I’ve sent out my resume to What sets you apart? I really believe
live on station because it’s going to The White House decision probably like 20 different places. a university degree isn’t enough any-
give them a window on the world,” stunned space supporters, espe- I haven’t heard back from a single more,” he said.
NASA Administrator Charlie Bold- cially at Kennedy Space Center, one of them,” Lesser said. Amelia Marksz, a business major
en, a former astronaut, told space which faces 7,000 job losses when Now in school at New York Uni- at Northeastern, noted that working
center workers on Friday. the shuttle retires. Many workers versity Tisch School of the Arts, abroad isn’t like studying abroad.
“Just having the opportunity to had been hoping Constellation Lesser said she finds herself los- She spent six months working
float into something like the cupola would save them. ing out to highly experienced in- full time at a startup in Singapore
and reinvigorate yourself is going “Distractions are there, shock dividuals who lost their jobs in the and five months working for the U.S.
to make an incredible difference is there, uncertainty,” said shuttle downturn. embassy in China, aiding renewable-
to their quality of life.” Launch director Mike Leinbach. Despite these stories, interest energy projects through Northeast-
Tranquility and its seven-pane “But I do not worry about the folks in overseas internships continues ern’s co-op program.
bay window were constructed in on console when they’re doing their to grow. “With study abroad, you’re kind
Italy by Thales Alenia Space for job. I do not worry about the people At Northeastern University in of sheltered,” Marksz said. “You’re
NASA and are the last major com- ... working on the orbiters. ... When Boston, more students are planning with a lot of other American stu-
ponents for the station. It will take teams are faced with challenges to go abroad for their co-op experi- dents. You’re with a university.”
three spacewalks to install the new they come together and they act ence: 112 students in the first half Working abroad, she said, meant
additions. Once attached to the left like a professional team.” of this year, compared with 96 in “I had to find a place to live. I had
side of the station’s central Unity The final space shuttle mission all of 2007. to get a phone. I had to get a bank
module, the station will be 90 per- is scheduled for Sept. 16. “It’s now the fastest-growing part account.”
cent complete.
The module will house life sup-
port equipment, exercise gear and
a toilet. NASA originally planned to
put Tranquility on the right side of
the station, but engineers decided
to move it to provide better visibil-
ity and more clearance for Soyuz
spacecraft docking nearby.
While spacewalkers are busy
attaching the new room, the rest
of the crew will be working on re-
placing part of the station’s water
recycling system. The urine pro-
cessor shut down recently when
a blockage disabled the unit that
converts waste into clean water
for the station’s six full-time resi-
dents.
Obama’s $19 billion 2011 budget
supports extending the space sta-
tion’s life through 2020. The $100
billion station would have been
splashed into the Pacific Ocean in
2016 under existing plans.
Bernardo Patti, the station pro-
gram manager for the European
Space Agency — one of NASA’s
international partners — said he
was very happy about the station’s
potential life extension. The extra
time, he said, would “give us a great
opportunity to use to the full extent
the (station).”
But while the budget was good
news for the station, it represents
a fatal blow to the Constellation
Editorial & Letters
The Brown Daily Herald

Page 10 | Tuesday, February 9, 2010

After you have read,

Reflect upon your feelings —
We will always care.

letters@browndailyherald.com

erik stayton and evan donahue

e d i to r i a l

Newsworthy
Last Tuesday, President Ruth Simmons e-mailed the papers in the dining halls — and leave them there in
Brown community to share a report issued by the good condition — fewer copies of the newspapers will
Organizational Review Committee, the group charged be necessary and the University will save money. Din-
with finding $14 million in cuts from the University’s ing Services should place a sign near the newspapers
fiscal year 2011 budget. As President Simmons noted, informing students of the expectation that newspapers
correction the budget process is ongoing, and we hope to con- will remain in the dining halls.
tribute continually to the conversation and help the Second, the ORC report noted that entire $33,000
A photo caption in Monday’s Herald (“Crooners for Haiti,” Feb. 8) administration find solutions that are economical, fair currently comes out of Dining Services’ budget. We
misidentified Austin Boxler ’12 as Lee Saper ’12. The Herald regrets the and sensible. Today, we would like to discuss one of hope administrators will take a look at this and see how
error.
the proposed cuts. the subscription costs might be more equally shared
In the report, the ORC suggested canceling sub- among multiple divisions.
scriptions to the New York Times and the Providence Third, the University should immediately conduct
Journal that are currently available in dining halls. These a poll to determine students’ news reading habits. The
t h e b r o w n d a i ly h e r a l d subscriptions cost the University $33,000 each year. New York Times has announced that it will start charg-
Senior Editors
Editor-in-Chief Managing Editor Deputy Managing Editors While we understand what an enormously difficult task ing for online content this year, and the Providence
Chaz Kelsh Sophia Li Ellen Cushing
George Miller
Seth Motel the Organizational Review Committee has undertaken, Journal said it is considering the same move. Polling
Emmy Liss
Joanna Wohlmuth we strongly disagree with this particular cut. information will help the University determine whether
editorial
Business Life at Brown can be insular, and newspapers pro- to curtail print subscriptions and channel savings into
General Managers Office Manager
Anne Speyer Arts & Culture Editor Claire Kiely Shawn Reilly
vide an essential link to the outside world. We rely on securing electronic access for the entire institution.
Suzannah Weiss Arts & Culture Editor Katie Koh newspapers to promote political awareness on campus, The University could also solicit voluntary dona-
Brian Mastroianni Features Editor
Hannah Moser Features Editor Directors connect our academic studies with current events, tions from parents and alumni who feel strongly about
Kelly Wess Sales
Brigitta Greene Metro Editor
Matthew Burrows Finance prepare us for professional futures, learn more about access to print journalism. We would hope that the
Ben Schreckinger Metro Editor
Margaret Watson Client Relations the Providence community and enable educated politi- cost of tuition covers newspaper subscriptions, but in
Sydney Ember News Editor
Christiana Stephenson Alumni Relations
Nicole Friedman News Editor cal decisions. For many students, casually skimming the worst case scenario, students can also be asked
Dan Alexander Sports Editor Managers a newspaper during a meal is an extremely important to make an additional contribution. For a nominal fee,
Andrew Braca Asst. Sports Editor Arjun Vaidya Local Sales
Han Cui Asst. Sports Editor part of the day. While students also have access to news students could subscribe to dining hall newspaper
Marco deLeon National Sales
Graphics & Photos Aditi Bhatia University Sales online and in libraries, the dining hall subscriptions service. Under one possible system, individual student
Stephen Lichenstein Graphics Editor Jared Davis University Sales provide a convenient avenue for thousands of us to get subscribers identified by a sticker on their Brown ID
Alex Yuly Graphics Editor Trenten Nelson-Rivers Recruiter Sales
Nick Sinnott-Armstrong Photo Editor Alexander Carrere Special Projects our daily news fix. would be allowed to take a newspaper upon entering
Max Monn Asst. Photo Editor Kathy Bui Staff When it comes to the budget, the $33,000 in savings the dining hall.
Jonathan Bateman Sports Photo Editor
Opinions would only represent about one-fourth of one percent of We understand that none of these solutions are
production Opinions Editor
Michael Fitzpatrick the total amount URC has proposed to cut. To eliminate ideal, and that none add up to $33,000. We also know
Kelly Mallahan Copy Desk Chief Alyssa Ratledge Opinions Editor
Jordan Mainzer Asst. Copy Desk Chief such a valuable resource for a minimal return would how difficult and painful the process of implementing
Marlee Bruning Design Editor Editorial Page Board simply be a poor business decision. Instead, we want budget cuts will be. However, the University should
Anna Migliaccio Asst. Design Editor Matt Aks Editorial Page Editor
Julien Ouellet Asst. Design Editor Debbie Lehmann Board member
to propose a few steps might help reduce the cost not underestimate the importance of our access to
Neal Poole Web Editor William Martin Board member burden. newspapers.
Melissa Shube Board member First, we implore students to stop removing newspa-
Post- magazine Gaurie Tilak Board member
Marshall Katheder Editor-in-Chief Jonathan Topaz Board member pers from dining halls. These newspapers are intended Editorials are written by The Herald’s editorial page board.
to be a communal resource. If students leave news- Send comments to editorials@browndailyherald.com.
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Opinions
The Brown Daily Herald
To the nay-sayers in Congress, keep naying
WILL WRAY
Opinions Columnist
Barack Obama recently took the opportu-
nity during his State of the Union address to
chide you nay-sayers for your negativity. “Just
saying no to everything,” he condescended,
“may be good short-term politics, but it’s not
leadership.”
Please pay him no mind. Keep saying no.
When the semi-governmental organiza-
tions, the bloated banks and failed car compa-
nies that no longer deserve the title of “busi-
ness” come begging for taxpayers’ dollars,
tell them no. It’s not your money to give. Tell
them that if they have a product worth selling,
someone will buy it.
When Obama wants to spend billions on
a high-speed rail that won’t reduce emis-
sions, traffic or travel time, tell him no. Let
the European cities keep their ambiance of
sophistication; we will take the coarseness
of efficiency.
When President Obama earns standing
ovations by announcing that he has and will
continue to cut taxes, then, not two minutes
later, announces further spending projects, tell
him that no, that’s not how money works, not
even for the president. You can’t have less of it,
spend more of it, and claim you are tightening
your belt all in the same speech.
When he appeals to Republicans by claim-
ing he has cut taxes for 95 percent of working
YUE WANG
Opinions Columnist
Born to a small Chinese village two thousand
miles away from Beijing, my father traveled
to the nation’s capital in the spring of 1978
and toured the city for the very first time.
Eighteen years old, he had been deprived of
the opportunity for normal schooling thanks
to the turmoil of the Cultural Revolution that
had engulfed the nation in the preceding de-
cade, and he had no idea what was to come
into his life.
By chance, he came upon the campus of
Tsinghua University, one of China’s top uni-
versities, and was enraptured by what he wit-
nessed: people conversing with each other in
foreign tongues and students quietly enjoying
their readings on the lawn. At each corner of
the campus he was able to find an authentic
ambience of learning.
He then snuck into a lecture hall, and
despite not understanding most of what the
professor was saying, he was impressed by
the old scholar’s calm confidence, mild hu-
mor and above all, the air of dedication to
the pursuit of knowledge and truth that the
professor was able to conjure up on the po-
dium. Returning to his hometown, he quickly
dropped the family’s plan for him to apprentice
for a local watchmaker and spent the next
two years studying for the college entrance
exam, a career choice that was considered
sheer madness by his family and friends. To
families, tell him that’s not enough. Tell him
that tax cuts shouldn’t be used as a device to
swell your constituency; they are given as a
matter of principle.
When he appeals to the welfare of your
constituents, when he claims that it is his
role to stand between two consenting adults,
American or abroad, who want to exchange
goods and services, well, say no to that too.
Don’t baby us, or soon we’ll be reliant on
your paternalism and cease to provide for
ourselves.  give of yourself. Even when you find yourself
Be mindful of the fact that the old D.C. game of
concentrated benefits/diffuse costs hurts those
of us who have chosen to hire workers instead of
lobbyists.
Don’t let a president who has never really
participated in the private sector decide how
to regulate it.
When you see a problem worth solving,
like the opaque and misaligned healthcare
market, please resist the urge to solve it on
the Senate floor. There are many causes worth
fighting for; there are few causes that will be
helped, not hindered, by more legislation.
Remember what has always been true in
the United States: The creation of wealth, the
employment of workers and the dissemination
of goods are within the realm of the American
entrepreneur, not the central planner.
For the sake of hope
this day, my father credits the day he visited
Tsinghua as the turning point of his life, and
attributes his life’s successes to the inspiration
he drew from that visit.
This is the story that my father has re-
counted to me many times, and it was the
story I bore in mind when I decided to sign
up for the volunteer program sponsored by
the Commerce, Organizations and Entrepre-
neurship program. The volunteering program
brings students from Hope High School in
Bringing those students over to Brown, even for
one day, to truly savor college life in its entirety
and authenticity — in Brown’s libraries and
seminar rooms — may have a more profound and
lasting influence on the psyches of those kids.
Providence to experience college life at Brown
for one day.
Hope High is a public school that seems
to have suffered all the problems that plague
American public schools. It is in an East Side
neighborhood and has been historically aban-
doned by the middle class, who prefer to send
their children elsewhere. The student body is
made up predominantly of ethnic minorities.
The school is handicapped by structure and
lack of funding to improve its performance.
Despite state authorities’ efforts to reform the
administrative structures and to aggregate
Remember that when you were elected to
Congress you abandoned the mantle of leader-
ship and assumed the mantle of protectorship.
Your salary, skimmed from the salaries of
Americans doing actual work, will be money
well spent only so long as you spend your time
in Congress protecting us from the savior
complexes of your companions.
When you are tempted to help the down-
trodden, the poor or the unemployed, remem-
ber that charity is charity only so long as you
moved by a sincere desire to better the lives’
of your constituents, say no to the emotions
that stir your heart. Do not be so cynical as
to assume that the empathy that moves you
does not exist within those whose money you
would spend.  demagoguery.
Do not be so prideful as to assume that by
virtue of your election, the bounds of your
largesse extend past those of our property
rights.
When your constituents approach you for
pork barrel projects, tell them no. Turn them
away. Be mindful of the fact that the old D.C.
game of concentrated benefits/diffuse costs
financial investment for the school, test scores
at Hope are extremely low, and not so long
ago, the dropout rate was 56 percent.
There are already many initiatives taken
by our fellow Brown students to help kids
at Hope High School, but I was particularly
intrigued by the promise of the COE volun-
teering program and signed up for it believing
that, just like my father’s trip to Beijing, one
day of an authentic Brown experience might
prove truly transformative and inspiring for
high school kids who may otherwise choose
to forgo college education altogether.
Existing programs on campus are indeed
abundant and valuable, and usually enlist
Brown students’ help in improving the aca-
demic performance of the students at Hope
High School. These range from SAT prepara-
tion to debate team coaching. Still, the role we
have in tutoring high school students seems
limited.
One thing that those eager to help need to
realize is that most Hope students have grown
up in underprivileged families and minority
Tuesday, February 9, 2010 | Page 11
hurts those of us who have chosen to hire
workers instead of lobbyists.
When he realizes that his grandiose notions
of Father Government have died on the Senate
floor and pares his legislative reforms down to
a face-saving fraction of their previous scope,
still say no. Tell him that he was not elected
to shake hands on television. Obstinance may
not play well on MSNBC, but you can hope
that your voters understand progress is more
than a new law.
Tell him that you were not elected to go
along to get along.
Remember that you were elected for your
principles and not for one man’s idea of prog-
ress. 
Always remember this quote: “The Ameri-
can Republic will endure until the day Con-
gress discovers that it can bribe the public
with the public’s money.” When people like
me lose conviction, when we smile wryly and
sigh that we are far past Tocqueville’s point
of no return, prove us wrong.
Tell us that the essence of self-sufficiency
that set the New World apart from the Old,
however battered it may be by bailouts and
New Deals, subsidies and pet projects, still
exists. Tell us it will prevail over political
 
Tell us that despite scandal and corruption,
egotism and demagoguery, there exists in
the U.S. Congress some ideal that outshines
desire for re-election.
Will Wray ’10 occasionally surrenders to
the joys of dogmatism.
neighborhoods, which is to say they grow up
in a world distinctly different from the “Brown
bubble,” an elitist circle. Some of the Brown
volunteers actually commit several afternoons
each week to walking a few blocks over to
Hope High School to tutor those children in
SAT verbal tactics, yet most of tutees remain
blind to what college life is all about. Even with
higher test scores, Hope students still live in
an environment of abject poverty, frequent
violence and depressing morale. Bringing
those students over to Brown, even for one
day, to truly savor college life in its entirety
and authenticity — in Brown’s libraries and
seminar rooms — may have a more profound
and lasting influence on the psyches of those
kids.
At Brown we always readily extend a
helping hand to the struggling kids in our
neighboring communities. Compared with
the academic tutoring services we bring to
Hope students, the COE volunteering program
suggests another possible way to help them:
What is more important than Brown University
reaching out to the community is perhaps
bringing in the local children and stirring
aspirations to great education and great expec-
tations. It is for this reason that I would urge
you to volunteer to couple with a Hope High
student for one day. Bring them to classes and
other campus venues you visit. Share your day
at Brown with one of those students, for the
sake of inspiration and hope.
Yue Wang ’12 is a political science and
German studies concentrator from
Shanghai. She can be reached at yue_
wang@brown.edu.
 Today
The Brown Daily Herald
t h e n e w s i n i m ag e s
5
c a l e n da r
Today, February 9
9:00 A.M. — Breakfast in Bed and
Bake-sale for Haiti, J. Walter Wilson
12:00 P.M. — Queering the Family:
Some Reflections on Making a “Gayby,”
LGBTQ Resource Center
menu
Sharpe Refectory
Lunch — Linguica Sandwich, Cheese
Quesadillas, Cheese Pizza, Hermits
Dinner — Orange Turkey, Acorn
Squash with Curried Rice and Chick-
peas, Chocolate Pudding
crossword
tomorrow, february 10
12:00 P.M. — Center for Gerontology
& Healthcare Research Brown Bag,
121 South Main Street
7:00 P.m. — Ice Skating with Class
Board, Bank of America Skating
Center
Verney-Woolley Dining Hall
Lunch — BBQ Chicken Sandwich,
Noodles Alfredo, White Chocolate
Chip Cookies
Dinner — Beef Lo Mein, Curry
Chicken Saute, Chocolate Marsh-
mallow Cake Roll
5
to day to m o r r o w
Homework versus health care
Decriminalization bill introduced
6
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
34 / 22 35 / 24
Page 12
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For more information, e-mail herald@browndailyherald.com
comics
Cabernet Voltaire | Abe Pressman
Dot Comic | Eshan Mitra and Brendan Hainline
Excelsior| Kevin Grubb
Fruitopia | Andy Kim
STW | Jingtao Huang