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(11/06/17 4:58pm)
By Heidi Cho
Nation & World Editor
Student Government passed three bills at its meeting on Wednesday, Nov. 1.
Associate Provost for Curriculum and Liberal Learning Christopher “Kit” Murphy kicked off the meeting with a presentation on implementing recommendations from the liberal learning program review.
Murphy emphasized that any changes to come from the review are still hypothetical and will not immediately change the curriculum for current students.
There are drafts to include degree level goals to the curricular structure and make liberal learning classes more helpful in the minds of students. Degree level goals would help students contextualize one of the six liberal learning domains with their major, according to Murphy.
A survey indicated that 53 percent of the College’s students consider liberal learning a hindrance to courses for their major, according to Murphy.
Murphy gave hypothetical and possible situations of degree level learning, such as that a biology major might have a package on gender discrimination in the sciences, or an engineering major may take a course that talks about gender in computer science.
“Everything that we currently have, we’re looking to keep, and then add a few things like leadership and sustainability and teamwork and things like that,” Murphy said.
Two bills were passed that provided more clarification to SG’s constitution.
The first bill included the definition of quorum into the constitution. Previously, the constitution did not define quorum, which in SG requires 75 percent of the number of elected members to be present, as necessary to change the constitution. The second bill changed the attendance policy so that associate SG members will be included in the distribution of points.
Vineeth Amba, a senator of science and sophomore biology major, proposed a bill which allows members to receive program participation points for community involvement in Trenton and Ewing, New Jersey.
The bill will add a section that gives an SG member one point for going to a community event in the local community, with a cap of two points from community events a semester.
Carly Mauro, SG’s executive vice president and a junior mathematics and statistics major, called for a friendly amendment to the bill. Mauro asked that the Alternate Student Trustee be allowed to determine if an event is point worthy, along with the Executive President and Executive Vice President.
The bill was passed with the friendly amendment.
Donations for the upcoming holiday season were discussed.
The remaining shirts from the Homecoming T-Shirt Swap will be donated to the College’s Residence Hall Association to give to families before Thanksgiving, according to Cassie Kriegel, the vice president of Student Service and a junior English and secondary education dual major.
The Here for Home, Always campaign has reached 88 percent of its goal with 13 days left as of Nov. 1, according to Melissa Sandoval, the vice president of community relations and senior Spanish and Secondary Education dual-major.
Albert Martin, the senator of engineering and a sophomore electrical engineering major, recommended auto-flush toilets.
“I just want to walk into a room and have it smell nice for once,” Martin said.
Justine Wilson, a senator of science and a junior biology major, gave a governance report about Community Engaged Learning.
The previously unofficial goals for CEL courses have been officially approved, and current CEL courses will be revised with respect to these goals, according to Wilson.
Director of Student Involvement Dave Conner introduced the interim coordinator for fraternities and sororities, Jessica Schnell.
This is the first official position the College has made to improve interactions with Greek life on campus, according to Conner.
(10/24/17 8:02am)
By Maximillian C. Burgos and Heidi Cho
Sports Editor and Nation & World Editor
Two lions made their debut on Saturday, Oct. 21, during this year’s Homecoming celebration.
The College revealed the newly trained and re-designed Roscoe the Lion mascot, as well as the William M. McLagan bronze lion statue.
The new, more huggable Roscoe the Lion mascot made its debut during the halftime show of the Homecoming football game.
While dancing and gesturing to the crowd, Roscoe the Lion showed off his new look during the Homecoming festivities, after years of needing an update.
“The old costume would scare children,” said a junior member of the Roscoe mascot team. “It would even scare some people our age. It really needed to be replaced.”
The former Roscoe costume was retired with a hug by the new Roscoe and then was swiftly driven off the field in a golf cart, ushering in a new era of a more friendly-looking Roscoe.
The new Roscoe costume will be donned by one of four trained students at any given time, who met this past summer at mascot camp at the University of Delaware. The camp, while intense, served as a bonding experience for the new mascot team.
“Mascot camp was incredible,” said a male senior member of the team. “It was pretty sick. I was nervous heading into it because I know it was going to be at U-Del and their mascot, YoUDee, is like really popular. Also, the four of us had never done it before.”
A female sophomore member agreed.
“It was wild,” she said. “We had never met before. I didn’t really know their names. I had their emails, but I didn’t know their names.”
The Roscoe team members quickly connected with one another, and even won “most improved” out of the schools in attendance.
“We were kind of shoveled into it all,” the sophomore female member said. “It was sort of cool to get to know each other in this kind of way. It worked out in the end though because we all got along.”
The male senior member of the group echoed her thoughts.
“When we were doing this, it was all kind of like, this is actually happening,” he said. “We are actually going to mascot camp.”
At mascot camp, the group was trained to interact with crowds, put together skits and have the best possible in-person presence as the school mascot. All of the members of the Roscoe team want the character to have a larger on-campus presence.
“We are trying to revive Roscoe here,” one male junior member said. “For us juniors, we never really saw Roscoe. We really just want more school spirit at the end of the day. We want people to be excited when they see Roscoe. If you ever see the mascot for the University of Delaware, people go crazy when they see him. Adults and kids all love him. He’s a big thing. We really want Roscoe to be more like that.”
The four students will rotate as Roscoe as the year progresses. With stellar dance moves and choreographed mascot antics, they are eager to bring more school spirit to campus.
Any club can request Roscoe to attend their events and the team is very excited for every opportunity to don their suit after Homecoming.
The brand new bronze statue was the other lion to greet students and alumni at this year’s Homecoming.
Named after its sole donor, alumnus Bill McLagan (‘87), the statue was revealed at the entrance to Lions Stadium prior to the Homecoming game.
While planning the statue’s design took McLagan and College administrators six years, the majority of the process has occurred within the past six months. The entire process cost between $68,000 and $70,000, according to McLagan.
When McLagan was a student, the school was still called Trenton State College and the lion statue outside Roscoe West was new.
It has been a personal goal of McLagan’s to give back to the College. His wish to donate a lion statue was fulfilled 30 years after his own graduation in a series of fortunate coincidences.
The William M. McLagan Lion was manufactured at the world-class foundry Art Castings of Colorado. Sculpted by Herb Mignery, the maquette has a very realistic style and pose, according to McLagan who was impressed with the final product.
Revealing the statue at Homecoming was made possible through one vital meeting McLagan had with John Kinkade, the executive director of the National Sculptors Guild. Kinkade had to personally call and beg Mignery to come out of retirement to sculpt the piece.
The commission process was successfully expedited three to four months faster so that the statute could be ready for Homecoming, according to Kinkade.
McLagan “couldn’t be happier” to see the final outcome and to stand next to the statue on Homecoming day.
The statue will be stored away in the winter, according to the College’s spokesman Dave Muha. The statue’s permanent home between the Art and Interactive Multimedia Building and the Brower Student Center will be constructed in the meantime. The permanent home will likely include benches, landscaping and a stone pedestal.
The statue will be permanently mounted sometime in the spring, according to the College’s Major Gifts Officer Guy Calcerano.
Lions young and old alike came together this Homecoming to show how much the College means to them. The heart and enthusiasm behind the new statue and mascot shone through this Saturday.
(10/17/17 6:35am)
By Heidi Cho
Nation & World Editor
The latest seminar hosted by the physics department on Oct. 3 focused its lasers on contemporary nanoparticle technology research.
Alexander Gerakis, an associate research physicist, gave students and faculty a closer look on modern nanoparticle experiments conducted at the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory.
The laboratory is home to the Coherent Rayleigh-Brillouin Scattering laser system. CRBS has several functions, but is one of a kind for its ability to obtain a CRBS spectrum in a single laser shot. Consequently, it is able to detect nanoparticles smaller than 10 nanometers, in situ, in an arc discharge, according to Gerakis.
In situ means that the particles do not need to be removed from the chamber they are created in for the laser system to collect data, according to Chris Lovenduski, a sophomore physics major.
Gerakis concluded from research that the single shot CRBS technique employed by the laser system is better than the spontaneous Raleigh technique.
CRBS is also highly localized and non-intrusive, meaning the nanoparticle synthesis isn’t disturbed by the examining method. CRBS generated signal also travels further, allowing the signal to be picked up at greater distances, according to Gerakis.
The speed of the CBRS technique is favorable for researchers.
“It’s boring to stay in the lab for 10 minutes” to collect data on the forming nanostructures in an arc discharge using the spontaneous Raleigh technique, Gerakis said.
The arc discharge in the Princeton lab uses graphite electrodes to synthesize the nanoparticles, according to Gerakis.The laser system then employs the more efficient data gathering technique by using electro-optic crystals to define the frequency of the laser output. It then uses a probe, another laser derived from a single pump, at the nanostructures generated in the arc discharge, according to Gerakis.
The precise frequency tailoring of the machine allows researchers to scan the thermal velocities of the particles populating the optical gratings that the physicist has created and designated. The polarization of the probe is also set to not interfere with other pumps, according to Gerakis.
“The carbon nanostructures that are being created are quickly being destroyed as a result of the intensity of the lasers (Gerakis) is using to conduct his experiments,” Lovenduski said. “That is why (Gerakis) receives a signal, which shows that they are being created, then quickly loses it, which shows that they are being destroyed.”
Gerakis and others can derive the dimensions of the detected nanoparticles from its measured thermal velocity, which is a function of the particle’s mass and temperature.
Lovenduski commented on the significance of the system to further assess nanotechnology.
“Being able to use these new diagnostic laser-based techniques to collect data from these created nanoparticles in situ will be a significant step in better understanding these increasingly useful nanoparticles,” Lovenduski said.
The future of nanotechnology is brighter than the lasers, as it could revolutionize technology and medicine, according to the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory.
“Carbon nanotubes in particular are showing a lot of promise for use in almost every industry, from consumer electronics to aerospace,” Lovenduski said.
Carbon nanotubes even outperform the conductivity of copper and other metals, according to IEEE Spectrum.
This could potentially replace all copper wiring and make current technology obsolete. Carbon nanotubes can also be implanted into bodies, and have already been used as dental implants, according to Intercalation of Anti-inflammatory Drug Molecules within TiO2 Nanotubes.
Gerakis’ presentation showed how much closer researchers are to understanding nanotechnology, and the future of humankind as we know it.
(10/17/17 5:32am)
By Heidi Cho
Nation & World Editor
In the middle of my hectic sophomore year, I was desperately looking forward to going home for fall break. After greeting my dog, catching up with family and settling down into my childhood home, I realized something — I missed college.
From the random screaming and giant bugs to the friends who will kill them for you — I realized the College has slowly become a place of comfort for me.
At some point, I started calling my dorm home. I realized home is a place where I feel safe enough to break down, and then build myself back up again. It’s where my Wi-Fi instantly connects, and where my heart is — to draw on a few of the infinite clichés.
I found home at strange places from dinky classrooms in the Georgian Colonial buildings to the street lamp lit paths of campus at 2 a.m. From looking at them, I would have never thought that I would have made a home in them.
That is partially why I found picking a college so difficult — you will never know where you’ll make your next home. Not only do students have to study, they have to be able to picture themselves living on campus too.
College is a perfect opportunity to learn more about yourself, and take a few risks. It’s a time where people are encouraged to explore, take chances and grow their interests. That includes getting into some strange situations, and finding others in organizations and clubs that can go through the bizarre experiences with you. In little ways, little places on campus have wormed their way into my heart, like a disease.
Without putting myself out there, I would never have found out more about myself and find places to miss even within an arm’s length of my family.
Don’t be afraid to try new things to make a home on campus. However, that doesn’t mean you have to let go of the old. I realized that home can be more than one place, and some of those places can be more like home than others. If home is really where the heart is, then my heart’s in more pieces than I thought.
Even if I enjoy living on campus within a few minutes of my close friends, I don’t have to let go of what I love at home. It goes further than appreciating the softer bed and larger personal space. I can miss my family and my favorite food without feeling guilty for wanting the freedom of living alone.
Home can be more than just one location. It can be several, and it can be so much more. Whether your home is a person, a book, a website, a song, or your favorite food, appreciate it while you’re there.
Even if we can’t always have the best of both worlds, we can still show each other how much we care for them even if we can’t always be there for them. You don’t have to forget about your roots to fly, only sever them.
It’s OK to be caught between different homes, between being an independent adult and your parent’s child, between flying and staying still. It’s a rough balance, but as long as you don’t let your past keep you from exploring, and don’t let the fear of getting lost keep you paralyzed, I think we’ll be fine.
(10/16/17 11:29pm)
By Heidi Cho
My definition of good writing has become increasingly ambiguous, between the academic papers, poems, novels and news articles I read. It was a welcome change to see the Nobel Prize in Literature winner — Kazuo Ishiguro — in my newsfeed between the natural disasters and nuclear war threats.
I naturally assumed that if one wins the Nobel Prize in Literature, there must be a reason. I thought to myself that Ishiguro’s work could surely remind me of what good writing is because only good writing could win a Nobel Prize.
The naïve trust I had in the Nobel Prize Foundation was only ripped away by this decision, much like Morty’s faith in superheroes in the “Vindicators 3: The Return of Worldender” episode of “Rick and Morty.” The lack of justification behind Ishiguro’s prize made me reconsider the Norwegian Nobel Committee’s authority to award the Nobel Prize.
Several media outlets scrambled to release Ishiguro’s life and works. “The Remains of the Day” and “Never Let Me Go” are two of his most prominent works, according to The New York Times.
While writing, “The Remains of the Day,” Ishiguro’s wrote from 9 a.m. to 10:30 p.m. — Monday through Saturday — for an entire month, according to The Atlantic. These long endless hours spent writing his award-winning historical romance novel really show the author’s work ethic and passion for literature.
Ishiguro was strategic in his writing, and he challenged what it took for a story to be fantasy with his novel, “The Buried Giant,” according to The Guardian.
The official Nobel Prize description of Ishiguro’s writing flagged in comparison to the detailed pieces by The Atlantic and The Guardian.
Sara Danius, the permanent secretary of the Swedish Academy, offered more insight into why Ishiguro won the Nobel Prize for Literature in an interview on the official Nobel Prize YouTube channel.
“He doesn’t look to the side. He has developed an aesthetic universe all his own,” Danius said, offering a snippet into the reasoning of Norwegian Nobel Committee’s decision.
On a grander scale, that offers no reasoning for why Ishiguro’s work was chosen over others. While there does not have to be a rubric for choosing a Nobel Prize winner — and there isn’t one — I feel like there could be more done to show the thought process of how the members of the Nobel Prize Organization chose winners.
The confidential nature of the prize selection process demands an element of trust on the behalf of the public. It could be contested that the trust of the public was broken when the committee in 1949 awarded Egas Moniz, a laureate for his studies on lobotomies, according to Nobelprize.org.
The committee awarded Moniz for a medical procedure that cured some patients of their mental illness, but actually robbed them of their personality and emotional capacity.
While the controversial procedure was considered a medical advance when Moniz received the award, the procedure is rarely performed today due to its harsh side effects.
The Nobel Foundation refused to acknowledge the mistake, or rescind the award, according to NBC.
In fact, the Nobel Foundation — as of Sept. 8 — has never revoked an award, even when faced with criticism, according to The Telegraph.
Amidst all the praise and prestige, it is easy to overlook the process of choosing a winner, especially when the names of the other competitors will be anonymous for 50 years, according to NPR.
Could the justification of Ishiguro’s award have been made clearer? How will the public know objectively why he won over his competition?
The Norwegian Nobel Committee has not broken the trust of the public to a point of public outrage. Providing more justification for each laureate could be a good way to prevent further accusations of bias. However, in time, the lack of transparency between the committee and the general public could lead to an event that would shatter the trust in the process permanently.
(10/03/17 2:26am)
By Joanne Kim and Heidi Cho
Staff Writer and Nation & World Editor
The Trump administration acknowledged on Saturday, Sept. 30, that there are direct communications with North Korea after escalating verbal and military threats, according to The New York Times.
President Donald Trump said on Sept. 19 that the United States could “totally destroy” North Korea during the U.N. General Assembly. Trump said North Korean leader Kim Jong-un is on a “suicide mission,” according to The Washington Post.
“Just heard Foreign Minister of North Korea speak at U.N. If he echoes thoughts of Little Rocket Man, they won’t be around much longer!” Trump tweeted on Sept. 21.
North Korean Foreign Minister Ri Yong-ho considered that tweet a declaration of war, according to CNN.
“The whole world should clearly remember it was the U.S. who first declared war on our country,” Ri said, according to The Washington Times. “The question of who won’t be around much longer will be answered then.”
Ri is under the assumption that North Korea will have every right to make countermeasures for future actions. That includes the right to shoot down the United States’ strategic bombers, even when they are not inside the airspace border of our country, according to CNN.
This is in reference to the U.S. Air Force B-1B Lancer bombers that flew the closest America has to North Korea in a century. The show of force on Sept. 23 was a demonstration of the range of military options available to Trump to deal with North Korea, according to CNN.
White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said that the United States has not declared war on North Korea and called the suggestion “absurd,” according to CNN.
In a rare public statement on Sept. 22, Kim said that he would tame Trump, the “mentally deranged U.S. dotard,” with fire, according to The Washington Post.
Trump responded on Sept. 22 by calling Kim a “madman” during a rally in Huntsville, Alabama, according to The Guardian.
The schoolyard-level taunts have only aggravated the tense relationship between North Korea and the United States, but the three new channels of direct communication could ease the atmosphere, according to The New York Times.
“I think everyone would like for it to calm down,” Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson said, according to The New York Times.
Tillerson’s sentiment is not shared by Trump, who further mixed signals by tweeting that Tillerson “is wasting his time trying to negotiate with Little Rocket Man.”
(09/26/17 5:16am)
By Heidi Cho
Nation & World Editor
Facebook released 3,000 advertisements seemingly linked to Russia over to Congress and the Special Counsel on Thursday, Sept. 21. The ads that ran in America between 2015 and 2017 were shared in order to help assess Russian influence on the 2016 election, according to The New York Times.
Facebook first disclosed that an unknown Russian company linked to the Kremlin bought over $100,000 worth of advertisements meant to further divide Americans on Sept. 6, according to The New York Times.
The ads focused on hot-button issues like race, gay rights, gun control and immigration, according to a post on Facebook made by Alex Stamos, Facebook’s chief security officer.
The accounts that posted over 3,000 ads appeared to be linked to a Russian entity that goes by the Internet Research Agency, according to Facebook’s official statement written by Colin Stretch, general counsel.
Facebook suspended 470 unauthentic Facebook accounts and pages that the polarizing ads were sponsoring. These so-called “dummy accounts” were run by fictional American activists that posted intentionally inflammatory messages on hot social issues, according to The Guardian.
The New York Times gave one example. Melvin Redick of Harrisburg, Pennyslvania, has no corresponding Pennsylvania records, and his Facebook pictures were taken from an unaware Brazilian.
Yet the account posted on June 8, “These guys show hidden truth about Hillary Clinton, George Soros and other leaders of the US. Visit #DCLeaks website. It’s really interesting!”
Posts like these were meant to polarize American citizens, and Bloomberg reported another instance where fake Facebook accounts were used to influence, divide and confuse citizens of France during their 2016 election. Facebook also shut down fake accounts then too.
“I don’t want anyone to use our tools to undermine democracy. That’s not what we stand for,” Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg posted on Thursday, Sept. 21.
“We have had to expand our security focus from traditional abusive behavior, such as account hacking, malware, spam and financial scams, to include more subtle and insidious forms of misuse, including attempts to manipulate civic discourse and deceive people,” Facebook said in the paper, Information Operations and Facebook.
The paper detailed techniques to stop the spread of misleading information on social media. It was released on April 27.
Zuckerberg on Sept. 21 additionally posted more steps that the company will take in an effort to keep similar situations from happening again, like requiring increased political ad transparency.
The role of social media in elections is still being investigated, as Twitter announced that it will meet with the Senate Intelligence Committee on Wednesday, Sept. 27, about Russian activity on their media platform as well, according to The New York Times.
(09/19/17 5:19am)
By Heidi Cho
Nation & World Editor
President Donald Trump decided not to terminate Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals on Thursday, Sept. 14, temporarily, according to The New York Times.
This decision also hits close to home, as approximately 12 of those DACA beneficiaries are on campus, according to an email from the College’s President R. Barbara Gitenstein.
Gitenstein addressed the campus community stating the point of view she held on the subject since last fall. She reiterated her support for the “dreamers” on campus and her hope for them to stay legally, and that she would continue advocacy for the cause in the email.
The New York Times reported that former President Obama signed an executive action able to protect minors illegally brought to America from deportation, and with the appropriate papers, study and work in the United States as well. DACA beneficiaries are also called dreamers.
Trump ordered that DACA end on Sept. 5, under extra pressure from the threat of a lawsuit by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton sent in June 2017. The letter was cosigned by officials from 10 other states, according to USA Today.
The New York Times reported the rationale of Trump and Attorney Jeff Sessions for behind the termination was the concern for “the millions of Americans victimized by this unfair system” that gave jobs to illegal aliens over Americans.
This decision would impact more than 750,000 dreamers across the nation who used DACA to “have received work permits and deportation relief,” according to the Pew Research Center.
Others showed their support for the dreamers by protesting in front of the White House and the Justice Department soon after the announcement was made, according to The New York Times.
Sixteen democratic and nonpartisan state attorneys came together on Sept. 6 to file a suit. The suit had five parts depicting the unconstitutionality of Trump’s decision. The lawyers made sure to point out the discriminatory nature of the decision against Hispanic and Latino people comprising most of the DACA recipients, according to CNN.
Trump rescinded his decision to terminate the program on Sept. 14 over dinner with Senator Chuck Schumer and Representative Nancy Pelosi. DACA was to be brought back in exchange for approval of better border security, excluding the wall, according to The New York Times.
The College’s interim vice president for student affairs, Angela Lauer Chong, emailed the campus community on Friday, Sept. 15, to reiterate the recent announcement of changes to the DACA program.
According to the College’s additional sources on DACA, the federal government will only accept renewal applications for eligible DACA beneficiaries through Oct. 5, 2017.
In response to the reinstatement of DACA, Trump supporters publicized their criticism over the action by posting videos of burning their “make America great again” hats, according to CNN.
(09/05/17 4:06am)
By Heidi Cho
Nation & World Editor
College Spokesperson Dave Muha warned against fishing, drinking, swimming and coming into contact with water from Lake Sylva on Tuesday, Aug. 29., in a campus-wide email.
On Aug. 25, the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection was alerted of a potentially hazardous algae bloom in Colonial Lake in Lawrenceville, according to NJDEP Bureau of Freshwater and Biological Monitoring Section Chief Victor Poretti.
During the summer, there was a toxic cyanobacterial algae bloom that originated in Lake Sylva that traveled downstream to Shabakunk Creek and Colonial Lake, according to Poretti.
“Because the last occurrence affected all three waterbodies, we resampled Sylva as a precaution,” Poretti said.
The sample results showed that the algae bloom in Lake Sylva is indeed toxic. Poretti said that the cyanobacterial bloom exceeded both toxin and cell count risk thresholds.
Cyanobacteria is usually a normal part of a lake’s algal community. Cyanobacteria is only harmful if there is an excessive amount, or when the toxin level exceeds risk thresholds, as it currently does in Lake Sylva.
Shabakunk Creek, however, harbors no such harmful algae bloom as of Aug. 31, according to Poretti.
The Ewing Health Department alerted the College of the return of the toxic algae bloom that Tuesday, and no earlier, according to the College’s Head Media Relations Officer Luke Sacks.
By the morning of Wednesday, Aug. 30, advisories about the toxic bloom were posted, and samples of the water were collected and analyzed, according to Poretti.
Poretti listed possible reasons for the presence of a harmful algae bloom, also known as a HAB. Environmental factors like heat, still water and high nutrient concentrations can promote the growth of a HAB. High nutrient concentrations can be caused by geese byproducts, lake sediment or fertilizer runoff.
The specific reason for the return of the toxic algae bloom as of Aug. 31 has not been identified, according to Poretti.
Heat and still water caused the previous toxic harmful algae bloom to last a few weeks in the summer, according to the Ewing Mayor Bert Steinmann.
The current harmful algae bloom is primarily composed of Anabaena sp., according to Poretti.
“Also noted to be present, but not in countable amounts were the taxa Aphanizomenon sp., Microcystis sp., and Coelosphaerium sp.,” Poretti said.
Algae blooms can last up to a few weeks, Poretti added.
“Disturbing or killing the algae can result in release of toxins,” Poretti said.
The current toxic bloom should subside naturally over time, as did the previous bloom, according to Poretti.
(08/29/17 2:58am)
By Heidi Cho
Nation & World Editor
A U.N. panel called upon the United States to identify and address the root of racism that fueled the tragic series of protests in Charlottesville, Virginia on Aug. 23, according to The New York Times.
Earlier this year, the Charlottesville City Council decided to remove a statue of Robert E. Lee from Emancipation Park, according to the Washington Post.
The decision inspired hundreds of protesters to congregate at the University of Virginia, according to The New York Times.
The Washington Post reported that protesters gathered with torches on Aug. 11 at the University of Virginia to protest the removal of the statue.
This group faced off against 30 University of Virginia students linking hands around the statue in a counter-protest. Shoving, pushing and torch throwing at both the students and statue ensued, according to The Washington Post.
The protests only escalated on Aug. 12 when militias showed up with long rifles, and supporters of the Ku Klux Klan brought clubs and shields directly to the counter protesters, who yielded sticks and chemicals, according to The Washington Post.
Authorities allege that James Alex Fields Jr. drove a car into a crowd protesting white supremacy, killing one of the counter-protesters. 19 others were injured in the attack, according to CBS.
Heather Heyer, a 32-year-old paralegal, died from the attack. Over 1,000 individuals showed up to Hayes’s memorial service sporting purple, Heyer’s favorite color, according to The Washington Post.
U.N. panel called upon the United States to address the racism that fueled the tragic series of protests in Charlottesville, Virginia (envato elements).
“If you’re not outraged, you’re not paying attention,” read Heyer’s last public post on Facebook, according to Business Insider.
Fields was charged with second degree murder, according to CBS.
Two of the injured are also suing Fields as the suspected van driver, as well as asking for $3 million in compensation costs, according to CNN.
By the end of the day on Aug. 12, 34 people were injured and two state troopers were killed in a helicopter crash while monitoring the protests without clear reasons, according to The New York Times.
Governor Terry McAullife had declared a state of emergency late Saturday morning, according to The New York Times. Police arrested only eight protesters.
Civilians have attempted to identify white supremacists in photos of the protests through social media, and caused real life consequences by shaming them out of their jobs or homes. While some people were correctly identified, others suffered the consequences of false identification, according to The New York Times.
President Donald Trump’s response to the events at Charlottesville was rebuked by several community leaders, leaders of other countries and now the U.N., according to The New York Times.
The future of the statue is yet to be decided, but for now the Robert E. Lee statue is shrouded, as decided by vote of the Charlottesville City Council, according to Fox News.
The “Unite the Right” event on Aug. 12 was the largest congregation of white nationalists in the past decade, according to Fox News.
(05/02/17 4:36pm)
By Heidi Cho
News Assistant
The College’s Board of Trustees discussed future tuition and budget planning, swore in new board members and said farewell to the current student trustee during its Wednesday, April 26, meeting.
Anthony J. Cimino, Carl Gibbs and Rebecca Ostrov were sworn in as new members of the Board of Trustees. College President R. Barbara Gitenstein also shared kind words about the student trustee, Dana DiSarno, a senior mathematics and statistics major, who shared insight during board meetings.
This year, Gov. Chris Christie’s budget includes level funding of $2.2 billion for higher education. It might look like flat funding in terms of appropriation, yet there is still a growing expense for fringe benefits, a supplement to an employee’s salary like company health insurance.
A portion of state funding to the College is being cut, according to the presentation.
“Every college and university in southern New Jersey... is seeing the exact same numbers being projected numbers,” Keating said.
While overall enrollment has increased by 200 full time equivalent students, there has been a drop in money from the state per full-time equivalent student. One full time equivalency, or FTE, is a measurement of how many full time study loads are being completed on campus. For example, one full time equivalent student could be two half-time students.
As the percentage of state support has decreased, students and their families are forced to pay more in order to attend.
One challenge is the negative rate of attendance in graduate programs.
In the future, increased maintenance costs and energy usage for the STEM Building will be an obstacle, according to the presentation.
At least a million dollars will be set aside to implement the College’s strategic plan, a long term sustainable plan made with the College’s principles in mind. At least three million dollars will be needed to improve IT facilities, and over a million dollars are necessary for fitness center and educational equipment.
To compensate for the rises in costs of running the College, tuition may increase.
If tuition is increased only by one percent, it would result in an overall deficit, according to the presentation. A two percent increase would result in approximately a $900,000 surplus.
While general funding may be a struggle, the College’s Educational Opportunity Fund program is one of the best in the state, according to Gitenstein.
While the existence of the program is threatened by possible financial cuts, Gitenstein remains optimistic that the EOF fund will be restored due to “huge advocates in legislature.”
Several people came to speak during the public comment portion of the meeting to discuss the closing of the TCNJ Clinic.
Other speakers called for the members of the board to speak to those affected by the closing of the TCNJ Clinic.
Later in the presentation, it was stated that four more mental health professionals for solely Counseling and Psychological Services will be hired.
In response to the protests made by staff and faculty without contracts, the presentation also mentioned that there were funds set aside to raise salaries in 2015 and 2017.
The College itself has to pay costs for any additional employees, such as the aforementioned mental health professionals, as only 859 employees are covered by the state, according to the presentation.
College Treasurer Lloyd Ricketts considered the College’s multi-year financial planning to be successful, according to the presentation.
(04/18/17 7:45am)
By Heidi Cho
News Assistant
There was no disrespect. No overlap. No arguing. The only exception was when two people accidentally spoke over each other, and both apologized in turns in rapid succession.
The words were powerful and the people were opinionated, but every view and person was more than respected — everyone was heard.
In these self-regulated conditions, the Advisory Commission on Social Justice held an open forum on Thursday, April 13, in the Library Auditorium. Students were able to discuss the implications of naming the College’s admission building, Paul Loser Hall, after a segregationist.
The discussion quickly evolved to focus on the College’s image and role within the Trenton, N.J., community, with a few students agreeing the name change would be an empty gesture to the College’s neighbors.
The two forum moderators first displayed and handed out copies of the Trenton Times article from October 1943 and letter penned by a mother of students in the Trenton school system that made the College reconsider the name of Loser Hall.
Paul Loser was said to have “dragged his feet” in the court-approved lawful desegregation of two black students into a whites only school, according to Kevin Moncayo, one of this forum’s moderators and a senior psychology and history double major.
The history behind the naming was further clarified by John P. Donohue, the vice president of College Advancement. Tom Loser donated $1 million to the College and wanted no recompense, according to Donohue. At the College’s insistence, Tom basically said if you have to name something after me, name it after my father, Paul, who was an educator, specifically a superintendent.
“There was no economic incentive to not change or change the name of Loser Hall,” Donohue said.
The decision, if not about money, “should be a no-brainer,” according to Andrew Holt, a sophomore mechanical engineering major who experienced Trenton’s education system first-hand.
Mark Scott, a sophomore open options major who was a student in Trenton’s public school system, also questioned the value in a name change.
“Where does changing the name help my community?’ Scott asked.
The focus should be on what else the College can do for its local communities, according to Hold.
“This is like one smidgen of a very huge, bigger problem,” Holt said.
This debate deals with what role the College plays in Trenton and the implications of that role or if it even impacts the citizens of Trenton at all.
Each student has to participate in eight hours of service in first-year community engaged learning, or CEL, days.
Holt shared what influence CEL days had on Trenton’s public school system. He lives 12 to 15 minutes away from the College.
“I didn’t really see much of a presence at all from TCNJ, and as everyone stated, the presence I did see was like the forced like ‘Ugh, I have to be here.’ Like I knew that these kids were here because they had to be here,” Holt said.
“This was the closest college, but it was yet the furthest college away from me,” Holt added.
Holt said he felt many other students from Trenton shared that same sentiment.
Victoria Guerra, a sophomore nursing major and a Bonner scholar, agrees there is a sense of frustration and forced resentment around CEL days.
“It is very frustrating to do service that provides an apolitical means to try to solve, not even solve, but try to contribute effectively to conditions that have been very much politically produced,” Guerra said.
Guerra also asked how the College will avoid gentrification and a savior complex while helping the community.
Chris Loos, a sophomore history major in the audience, felt that the College has already taken actions that connote a patronizing nature symptomatic of a savior complex.
“Community service… almost has the sort of sense of a top-down approach, where we, the people from TCNJ, nobly come into Trenton and solve all the problems,” Loos said.
“Instead of describing reform, (there should be) focus on cooperation with the community of Trenton, fostering growth from the ground up, working with them, taking care not to gentrify,” he added.
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Similarly, the TCNJ Clinic is another tie to the Ewing, N.J., and Trenton communities.
“The affordability and quality mental health services that the TCNJ Clinic offers is invaluable to the Ewing, Trenton and nearby communities,” Moncayo said.
The TCNJ Clinic is scheduled to close at the end of the 2016-17 academic year.
These ties between the College and the Trenton community are underwhelming at best, according to Tim Osborn, a senior physics major. He questioned what progress can be made on a shaky foundation where the TCNJ Clinic is closing and CEL days are surrounded by an atmosphere of force.
“If you can’t hold steady ground, how can you start to improve?” Osborn asked.
Throughout the discussion, questions like these probed the deeper issues plaguing the conflict between the role the College perceives itself to have and what it really does in Trenton.
The majority of the intense hour and 30 minutes delved into what Christopher Fisher, an associate professor of history and member of the TCNJ Committee on Social Justice, called “an existential question.”
“We don’t know who we are as an institution,” Fisher said. This stems from the College not knowing itself well enough to know how to engage with Trenton, according to Fisher.
“This is about our identity, answering these questions and bridging these connections with Trenton,” Fisher said.
The way the College markets itself only further convolutes and contradicts the liberal learning environment it claims to have.
“The College needs to drastically change the way it markets itself,” Osborn said.
“It is marketed as a school for upper middle-class white people, by middle-class white people, with a sole purpose to upper middle-class white people. And I think when you have that mindset, when your student body looks like that and your study body thinks like that, and that’s all they care about, you are naturally going to create a populace that doesn’t think these issues are important,” Osborn added.
Sarah Bennett, one of the forum’s moderators and a sophomore elementary education and English double major, believes she was tricked by the College’s marketing. “I was thinking of TCNJ kind of using their minority students in flyers, students and videos, and you get on campus thinking like ‘Where’s that girl from the video?’” Bennett said.
Fisher perceives a similar lack of diversity among faculty.
“Look for the number of African American men on campus. I wanna bet maybe five,” Fisher said. “And of those five, I’m probably the second oldest here. Now that’s a problem.”
While Fisher talked about the lack of racial diversity among professors and faculty, students like Scott and Guerra see a reversed version of the same problem in the on-campus staff.
“When all the Eick managers gather together, and they have a meeting, there is not one black face in that crowd. There’s about four to five people and they are all white,” Scott said.
Guerra ran into an old friend from the Trenton school system while in line at Quimby’s, except her friend was on the other side serving food.
“Being from Trenton, it is incredibly confusing to be served by someone I’ve been to high school with and understand that they do not have the investment and the resources available for them to actually go to college,” Guerra said.
The core issue is the same. These students perceive a lack of diversity that does not naturally lend itself to fostering the discussions that either of these students were hoping for.
“The College needs to market itself as a place for these conversations,” Osborn said.
Fisher agrees that discussions like these are what differentiates “a college from a trade school or a technical school.”
“They train you basically to work at a job. We train you to be leaders and to be citizens. That requires more from you than just knowing your major,” Fisher said.
This forum made students, faculty and staff reevaluate itself and its place in Trenton’s community, and it asked students to know what they paid for and why they chose to come here.
“It’s a conversation I don’t think we have in TCNJ. Why the hell are you here?” Fisher said.
(04/11/17 7:34am)
By Heidi Cho
News Assistant
“Rick and Morty” is a dark comedy show that follows the interdimensional adventures of a mad scientist and his rather unintelligent grandson, Morty. In the last episode, Rick turns himself in to the Galactic Federation for the endless list of crimes he has committed as a freedom fighter in return for his family’s ability to live a normal life on their version of Earth recently brought under Galactic Federation rule.
Under the Galactic Federation, Earth is technically the safest it’s ever been with the aid of its advanced alien technology. Diagnosis and treatment are immediate, everyone is kept healthy and all those able to work are assigned jobs by the Galactic Federation, much to Jerry’s, Rick’s son-in-law, excitement.
Rick’s character flaws have been demonstrated time and time again in the show, and his other family members certainly don’t like him any better for it. Jerry Smith is the epitome of every foolish human being. He acts in contrast with Rick’s obvious genius. He is consistently overlooked by other members of the family, and deplores Rick for good reason –– Rick is self-destructive and has a tendency to leave people behind in his catastrophic mistakes.
One huge mistake lands Rick in jail, which prompts Morty and Summer, Rick’s granddaughter, to attempt to bust him out.
The episode really demonstrates how powerful, deadly and genius Rick really is. His character growth is almost palpable. He spent the entire episode getting revenge on Jerry, who wanted to turn Rick in in the first place. Rick is unsympathetically a prick of epic proportions, but also a complex anti-hero capable of making the audience believe that he cares both about his family and his szechuan dipping sauce.
His characterization remains true. Even Justin Roiland, the show’s creator, works hard to prevent Rick from becoming a one dimensional character.
The amusing and complex characters complement the sci-fi show, and its undertone makes light of messed up situations in their twisted entirety. It takes cliches and terrible situations, and embraces how funnily messed up it is. The show wants us to laugh at our insignificance compared to the vastness of the world, and uses a running shit gag in the episode to do it. It manages to keep even this tense episode hilarious.
Morty’s character becomes more developed, as well. Through his interactions with Summer, he gets to share information about the multiverse he has learned about. His character development shows when he defiantly snarks at authority while being held prisoner, and shared some wisdom about Rick.
“Ricks hate themselves the most, and our Rick is the most himself,” Morty said.
For those reasons and more, Morty doesn’t buy the idea that Rick is a hero like Summer does. He instead calls Rick out as someone akin to “a demon or a super fucked up god.”
Ultimately, the relationship between Rick and Morty keeps the show real. It holds itself to the laws it sets, at least the ones that Rick hasn’t broken yet anyways. It makes the show refreshingly poignant and hilarious, and the season premiere is a fantastic opening for what will be a great season.
(04/04/17 10:14pm)
By Heidi Cho
News Assistant
Adolf Hitler, Evo Morales and Donald Trump — what do they all have in common?
Carlos de la Torre, a widely published expert on Latin American populism and politics, can answer that question: They are all populists.
That is what Trump, with his millions of dollars, shares with Morales, a llama shepherd who “would see buses going into his community and people would throw from the window, peels of oranges and bananas… that he would eat. His dream to grow up was to ride in a bus,” Torre said.
Morales, the current Bolivian president, shares his humble beginnings with the impoverished majority of his country. Trump shares his thirst for change and ideals with his own people.
Torre spoke on March 28 in the Library Auditorium about the ties between Trump’s populism and lessons to be learned from populism in Latin America.
When defining populism, there is no founding text. It is not an ideology.
Populism is a political strategy intended to take dissent in the populace and divide groups even further.
“In Latin America, we have deep crises of political representation, political parties, Congress, the courts, all institutions of democracy,” Torre said.
In America’s Rust Belt and Bolivia, people are affected by economic distress and live in impoverished conditions. People see how they live and believe that the government, the established system, has failed them.
“Populism is a response to a crisis,” Torre said.
Bolivia and America have found themselves in these crises where people are willing to look for a scapegoat for the unfortunate state of their lives.
Populists find or make common enemies to rally against in their political campaigns, whether it be the media, government, big business or all of the above.
“Because for (populists) politics is creating, recreating, inventing enemies, confronting enemies,” Torre said.
While creating enemies for the people to attack, they proclaim to belong to the class of the common folk.
“These leaders do not aim only to represent the people — they claim that they are the people, that they are the embodiment of the people, and those who are not with them are enemies of the people,” Torre said. With Trump, only two sides seem to exist.
“Either you are with him and the people, or you are an enemy of the people,” Torre said.
Torre listed the media as one of Trump’s many enemies.
“Trump doesn’t have friends — he has enemies,” Torre said.
Trump also opposes globalization, North American Free Trade Agreement, the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement and socialized medicine. He linked national economic decline with the absence of industrial production. He singled out corporations for moving factories overseas, according to Torre.
These views fall in line with the acts taken by Latin American populists while in power: censorship of media, taking control of all state institutions and laws to control non-governmental organizations or NGOs, according to Torre.
While Torre never specified Hitler as a populist, Pope Francis did in his interview with El País, a Spanish newspaper, while Trump was being sworn in as the 45th president.
In the same way that Rome did not fall for a single reason, but many, it is hard to fix a system in need of many repairs. It is easier for someone to aim the public’s dissent at the Jewish people, the Mexicans and the Muslims.
Using the same techniques as Hitler, populists gather and rally the people en masse to go against all those that oppose them. Populists also tend to go from a leader into a character larger than life like a father figure to the country.
“Populists always promise to bring power back to the people, but in Latin America, they ended up creating a totalitarianism,” Torre said.
Will America follow that same path? Torre is unsure. The pessimistic path would see a rise in xenophobia, racism and hate speech, where division fragments democracy. The optimistic path Torre suggests is one where democratic institutions prevail.
“Are the foundations of American democracy and the institution of civil society strong enough to resist Trump’s brand of radical right wing populism?” Torre asked the audience.
He invited the audience to discuss it with him, as the future of America is, in one word, uncertain.
(03/27/17 7:30pm)
By Heidi Cho
Imagine a world without potatoes, watermelons or strawberries. Beware of this world — a world without bees.
Imagine if bees went extinct due to individuals and companies underestimating the complexity of the environment.
It’s already happening, and there needs to be more awareness of the bees’ precarious situation.
Bee populations began dropping in 2006. Colony collapse disorder plagued beekeepers’ bumblebee colonies, according to the Centre for Research on Globalization.
Currently, habitat loss from pesticide use has pushed more than 700 bee species toward extinction, according the Center of Biological Diversity. Just this month, the rusty patched bumblebee officially became a critically endangered species, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
To bring attention to this cause, General Mills removed the mascot, Buzz the Bee, from Honey Nut Cheerios cereal boxes to create buzz around the dropping bee population. To help bring back the bees, the company advertised the fact that they would give away free packets of wildflower seeds that bees like to visit.
Cheerios gave away 1.5 billion seeds, blowing away the initial goal to give away 100 million seeds, according to the Cheerios website.
In doing so, Cheerios failed to fully think through the consequences of sending the same seed mix to different environmental regions. If you want to plant bee-friendly flowers without upsetting the environment, look at growtherainbow.com to find regionally specialized seeds.
Cheerios’s seed packets included the California poppy, which is an invasive species in Tennessee, according to the USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service. This means that the poppy could be potentially harmful to the existing plant species in Tennessee, as it does not natively grow there.
In Massachusetts, the Chinese Forget-Me-Not also included in the packet is banned and considered a noxious weed, according to the USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service.
Even though Cheerios managed to publicize the plight of the bees, the company did not factor in the complexity of the environment when deciding how to help save the honey bees.
Nature.com conducted a study that showed how honey bees, wild bees and pesticide-covered seeds interact in real life. It found that honey bees are not even the species most affected by pollutants and human activity. That title goes to solitary bees, such as those belong to the andrenidae family that burrow underground.
The American Association for the Advancement of Science studied which bees best enhance fruit crops and found that of 41 different crop systems, wild bees like those of the andrenidae family accounted for 86 percent of the increased crop yield. Commercialized bees only accounted for 14 percent.
To top it off, andrenid bees are one of the most common five families of wild bees, according to the pamphlet entitled “Bee Basics: An Introduction to Our Native Bees” published by the USDA Forest Service and Pollinator Partnership. They rarely sting and are native to America.
There are several popular misconceptions about bees that are a part of the underlying problem: a lack of concern and basic education about how the environment and food system works.
There are 4,000 different species of bees native to North America, according to “Bee Basics.”
The image of the honey bee as the most important kind of bee in America is false, as it is not even native to America, according to the USDA Forest Service.
To be better environmentalists, we shouldn’t just care about the environment and other creatures when they are on the brink of extinction. It’s important to cultivate a culture that understands our place in the environment.
(02/27/17 7:13pm)
By Heidi Cho
Staff Writer
Although the West Coast is one of the three largest tomato producers in Florida, there are no West Coast tomatoes, according to an investigative journalist who dug deep into the food production system and shared his findings on Wednesday, Feb. 22, in the Library Auditorium.
As long as the media does not know about it, big tomato producers can get away with not branding their products because they have no public image to uphold.
This invisibility is what allowed them to enslave their farmworkers and hide behind Ol’ McDonald’s farm without consequences — until Barry Estabrook released his book, “Tomatoland,” in 2010.
Estabrook’s book details the farming habits of the tomato industry that kept their workers in worse conditions than their tomatoes. Through the efforts of the marginalized farmworkers, the book soon became completely outdated “in the best way,” Estabrook said.
How did the migrant, poor, semi-literate farmworkers turn the tomato industry’s harvest of shame into hope?
Estabrook told of the template created by the farmworkers to help others rise from their chains.
“Forget anything you ever thought of as a farm,” Estabrook said.
Tomatoes in Florida, one of the largest locations of tomato production in the world, are grown in fields of sand. The vast plots are pumped with the exact amount of water and nutrients needed to produce the bare minimum to grow a tomato. Then, they are picked and transported to conveyor belts.
This is a modern farm, where growing stalks are battlegrounds and chemical warfare is fair play.
Workers then separate the ripe, red tomatoes out from the green, sturdier tomatoes that are more likely to pass through transportation unscathed. The green tomatoes move on to to be gassed in ethylene to color them orange.
The environment in which the tomatoes were grown was bad, but the conditions under which the farmworkers had to pick them were even worse.
People lived off of 50 cents per 32 pounds of tomatoes they picked. The mostly Hispanic population could only afford to live in trailers that housed 10 or more people.
Some would be shackled with chains, “so people don’t run away,” Estabrook said.
One-third of the pesticides, herbicides and fungicides used are “bad actors:” mutagenic, carcinogenic, acutely toxic and neurotoxic chemicals.
Although it is possible for consumers to avoid the pesticide residue on 54 percent of grocery store tomatoes, most farmworkers will not be able to avoid it: 96 percent reported pesticide exposure at work, and 53 percent reported pesticides have touched their skin.
Pregnant women ran from the spray of pesticides that came through with workers in the fields, so that their babies are not disabled like Carlito, the son of a farmworker who was born without arms and legs because of exposure to pesticides in the womb.
These working conditions did not qualify as “indentured servitude” or a “peculiar institution.” It could only be classified as slavery, according to Estabrook, who referred to the tomato industry as “ground zero” for modern slavery and sweatshops. The only thing that changed was the skin color.
People were whipped, beaten and raped in the fields, like 16-year-old Edgar who had to go to the hospital after his transgression: getting a drink of water.
Someone held up Edgar’s blood-soaked shirt high in the crowd that had formed around the crew boss who had beat the teenager, and said, “Today it was Edgar’s shirt. Now, it’s everyone’s shirt.”
Edgar’s shirt taught the workers the first of three lessons — strength in numbers. As the workers rose up around the bloodied shirt like a war banner, the farmworkers realized that they had more bargaining power together, so they decided to talk to the bosses in groups for fairer conditions.
It wasn’t enough, though, as one boss refused to talk to the workers because he does not talk to his tractors.
In response, “I am not a tractor” was written in Spanish on workers’ headbands.
“One more cent per pound” was written in Spanish on several signs, too.
Getting media attention was the second lesson, and the third lesson was that the major tomato industry customers would do anything to protect their image: They knew they could protest the fast food companies have images to protect. With the help of media and college students, they first went after Taco Bell to sign onto buying tomatoes from ethical producers.
From these lessons, farmworkers continued to grow their cause to get better conditions for every worker. As media attention grew, they became known as the Coalition of Immokalee Workers.
Farmworkers had come up with the Fair Food Program, which included education for every worker before they went into the fields, shade during breaks, 24/7 surveillance in the fields and a third party that would investigate and punish the companies based on a 24-hour telephone line to report any issues.
Today more than 14 buyers, including McDonalds, Walmart and Yum Brands, and more than 20 participating grower, are partnered with what The New York Times called “the best workplace-monitoring program” in America and what The Washington Post said was “one of the great human rights success stories of our day.”
While the farmworkers’ working conditions have changed for the better, they still live in trailer parks. Other farming industries around the world still have slavery rings.
The modern tomato is still a “tasteless, nutrient-less” produce, according to Estabrook. It is the poster child for what industrialized agriculture has done to farming, workers and consumers.
“My generation has failed you,” Estabrook said.
Yet the farmworkers demonstrated how people together can rise and fight oppressive systems. To Estabrook, the audiences that attend his presentations mean something to him.
“To see young, intelligent, soon-to-be well-educated people like you taking an interest in this vital issue is — I can’t thank you enough,” Estabrook said. The full audiences that have attended the 30 to 40 presentations he has given mean that the rising generation cares.
Julien Blanchard, a sophomore English major, said many people think that liberal arts college students are “intellectuals with no realistic solutions."
However, a class he is taking this semester, Student Faculty Interdisciplinary Seminar Toward Just and Sustainable Communities, brings together multiple perspectives on environmental issues like the one discussed in Estabrook’s presentation. Blanchard felt the concrete and realistic plan offered by Estabrook was one step toward actual change.
Jessica Hwang, a sophomore biology and public health double major, is in the same class as Blanchard and felt moved by the work the migrant workers had accomplished and that college students had helped.
When the farmworkers were doing hunger strikes outside of Taco Bell offices, executives did not mind. When a few college students managed to shut down 15 outlets in the college’s area, that was when the executives caved.
“Clearly, it just takes a little bit of passion to make a change,” Hwang said.
(10/19/16 2:52pm)
By Heidi Cho
Staff Writer
Introduced with a snazzy new theme song and jazz music on Wednesday, Oct. 12, in Mayo Concert Hall, Trenton Makes Music focused on the history of blues and jazz for the project’s second event this semester.
Interviews with guest panelists provided insightful information about famous figures within the genres and the history behind them. The program also featured live performances by the panelists themselves and the College’s Jazz Ensemble, as well as video clips of performances from famous musicians interspersed throughout the night.
Kim Pearson, project director and an associate professor of journalism and professional writing, said that Trenton Makes Music is meant to capture the wonderful music that has come from Trenton, N.J., and is about “the great, untold story about Trenton music.”
Sarah Dash, a singer from Trenton, one of the founding members of Patti LaBelle and the Bluebelles and the creator of the Trenton Makes Music theme song, elaborated on the specifics planned for the night.
“Tonight is really a family reunion because we have some old school creators here and some new school innovators,” Dash said. “We’re going to be talking about jazz, blues and how it grew… the African migration from the south to the north, farms to the city… and you’re going to have people from out of Trenton High and Carver Center.”
Thomas Grice, a local jazz legend, was greeted by Dash as though he was family when he received an award onstage. As one of the oldest music teachers in Trenton, he has influenced many lives while performing and teaching. Grice was Dash’s teacher when she was 13 years old, she said.
Dash then turned to Gary Fienberg, conductor of the College’s Jazz Ensemble and an assistant professor of music, to answer questions regarding the beginning of jazz history. Jazz originated during the late 19th century as a distinct music form in the African American community, according to Fienberg. However, it wasn’t until the 1900s and 2000s that the genre became mainstream.
According to Fienberg, jazz music emerged all over the country, and it is a myth that New Orleans was the genre’s only birthplace.
“When people first heard jazz music, it was — for many people — a startling experience,” Fienberg said. “That strong rhythm and the passion in the music, really, for some people, this was too exciting, too strange, too exotic.”
Blues and jazz music were sometimes referred to as the “devil’s music” and had controversial beginnings. According to Fienberg, this negative view was due in part to the implausibility of something enduring coming from African American communities.
While there are those who had a poor response to jazz as a new musical form, there were others who were inspired by it, such as Jimi Hendrix, Robert Johnson and George Antheil, whose performances Fienberg analyzed for the audience.
“The unmistakable reference to jazz with his left hand, he’s striding on the keyboard… In the other hand, you hear kind of frantic rhythms — the jazz rhythms,” Fienberg said of one of Antheil’s performances.
Musician and panelist Joe Zook said that Hendrix “opened the universe up with a guitar.”
Zook had equally positive remarks about Johnson.
“They thought this man must have sold his soul to get that kind of talent in such a short time and be so much better than all the rest of us,” Zook said.
Dash, too, talked about Johnson’s talent.
“When Keith Richards first heard him play, he said, ‘Who’s playing with him?’ That’s how great this man was.”
Following live performances by Zook and his fellow panelist, blues musician Paul Plumeri, the discussion about these two legends — Hendrix and Johnson — were brought back into the night’s conversation one last time.
“I think (Johnson) only lived to be 27 years old,” Zook said. Zook later called Hendrix a modern Johnson due to their similar talent and an early death at 27 years old — an unfortunate trend in the music industry.
“I was told the stars shine so bright that it explodes and turns inside out, and therefore, it ends the life of the musician,” Dash said.