Daily 06.07.12
Daily 06.07.12
Daily 06.07.12
ON THE FLIPSIDE
Flipside founders graduate, leave behind a new tradition
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Residential Education (ResEd) officials met with leaders in the Greek community last week to discuss the dozens of alcohol-related incidents that occurred during the new member education period, along with steps fraternities and sororities may take to alter the culture of bid week in the future. Im not naive to think that every person in the room was holding hands and singing Kumbaya, but I feel like most people there were honest, and most people were serious about wanting to address these things, Dean of ResEd Deborah Golder said of the meeting.
Alcohol incidents during bid week On May 17, Associate Dean of ResEd Nate Boswell sent a letter to all Inter-Fraternity Council (IFC) and Inter-Sorority Council (ISC) members expressing concern about a spike in incidents involving the consumption and distribution of alcohol during the recruitment period, citing a fundamental disconnect between Stanfords stated expectations of responsibility around alcohol and the manner in which your chapters are regulating your use. The letter also directed the Greek organizations on campus that they must take steps to show that they are about far more than drinking or risk losing University recognition. If our current trajectory contin-
ues, it would not be out of the realm of possibility for the Stanford administration and Board of Trustees to consider serious changes to the Greek community on this campus as we know it, IFC President Ben Laufer 12 wrote in an email to The Daily. Sororities were eliminated altogether once before, and it is not inconceivable that Stanford will once again reconsider the status of Greeks here at Stanford. Boswells letter listed five areas of concern: reports that recruits returned to freshman residences so drunk they were vomiting and passing out, reports of medical transports because of alcohol poisoning, reports
UNIVERSITY
STUDENT GOVT
Stanford hopes to use next years opening of the Bing Concert Hall as an opportunity to better integrate the arts into campus life and to engage with local communities, the University announced Monday at an event that also included the introduction of Stanfords rebranding of its four-decade-old performing arts program. Stanford Live will replace Stanford Lively Arts, the previous organization tasked with helping to cultivate the performing arts on campus. Its inaugural season will begin January 2013 when the Bing Concert Hall holds its first performance. Engaging with surrounding communities is going to be a priority for us, said Bing Concert Hall Managing Director Wiley Hausam. A second priority is to build new audiences. The $111.9 million concert hall named after the financial supporters of the project, Helen and Peter Bing 55 is expected to open on schedule and on budget, the University announced. The theme of the opening weekends performances is a celebration of the Bay Area. Bing Concert Hall is a shared facility, said Stephen Hinton, faculty director of the Arts Initiative and the Stanford Institute for Creativity and the Arts. It doesnt belong exclusively to any groups on campus, but its also
The new $111.9 million Bing Concert Hall is under construction behind the Arrillaga Alumni Center. The facility is projected to open on schedule, with its first performance Jan. 2013.
for local artists. Hinton said that Stanford Live and the new concert hall will help students complete the recently revised breadth requirements that include courses in aesthetic and interpretive inquiry and creative expression. The University is committed to integrating the arts in its curriculum as an extension of the classroom, Hinton said. We will link the [concert hall] schedule to other events on campus. For example, I will be teaching a freshman seminar next year, and we will use the schedule as a cycle for our class. Another plan for integrating the arts with the rest of campus is the Beethoven Project. Various groups performances of all of Beethovens symphonies and piano concertos in the 2013 season will coincide with a symposium of international scholars called Heroism in the Age of Beethoven. Hausam added that this academic intertwining is aimed to attract students who probably would not otherwise be inclined to attend a Beethoven concert. There is a sense of social exchange and dynamic energy within the hall, said Jenny Bilfield, the artistic and executive director of Stanford Lively Arts. The University campus is the performing arts center of the 21st century with its integrated and interdisciplinary approach. Bilfield also stressed the intimacy of the venue, with its 844-person seating capacity and unique vineyard shape designed by acousti-
After five weeks in office, ASSU President Robbie Zimbroff 12 and Vice President William Wagstaff 12 have yet to make cabinet staffing decisions. According to Zimbroff, the two have been working on completing administrative tasks and will begin tackling larger initiatives during the summer. I think something we were reluctant to do is to rush into things just to say that we have them done, Zimbroff said. Zimbroff said he would assemble his cabinet over the summer by communicating with and interviewing potential candidates via Skype, phone calls and email. Were just looking for people with good heads on their shoulders and who know generally how the campus operates, he said.
Tech tunes
MONEY
The Stanford Laptop Orchestra (SLOrk) and the Stanford Mobile Phone Orchestra (MoPho) performed their spring concert Wednesday night in Dinkelspiel, featuring laptops, iPhones and iPads.
RESEARCH
Stanford is a rarity as one of eight universities in the United States with strong ties between its medical and engineering schools, with hundreds of pieces of research resulting from the collaboration. Officials from the School of Engineering and the School of Medicine said that this collaboration is largely grass roots, springing out of faculty familiarity and mutual
interests. The collaboration almost never comes from top down from the administrative level, but is rather based on individual faculty or students meeting each other, talking about what they do and finding a common or complementary interest, said Russ Altman, chair of the Bioengineering Department. Stanford does, however, offer some grant
The 2012-13 budget will reflect the Universitys very strong financial position in the allocation of funds to academic, administrative and auxiliary units, according to University officials, as both revenues and expenses are projected to rise from previous years. Vice Provost for Budget and Auxiliaries Management Tim Warner MBA 77 formally presented the budget plan at the May 31 meeting of the Faculty Senate. The budget will be submitted to the Board of Trustees for approval in June. Were in a strong financial position not quite where we were prior to the recession, but gaining back, Warner wrote in an email to The Daily. In composing the budget, Warner emphasized continuity in spending priorities from previous years, with sustained focuses on strengthening budgetary support for undergraduate financial aid and boosting the Universitys competitive faculty salary position. Warner also acknowledged the impact of a struggling economic recovery and potential government cuts in the budget plan. Federal direct research funding of which the University (excluding the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory) currently anticipates $478 million in 2012-13 constitutes over 10 percent of projected University revenues. These are both issues we are keep-
ing a sharp eye on, Warner wrote. They are also why we are budgeting a surplus next year in General Funds so that we have some cushion in the event of shortfalls in investment income and research funding. The University will also retain many of the budget cuts made at the height of the economic recession. While funding for programs such as Overseas Seminars and Sophomore College has been restored,Warner told the Faculty Senate on May 31 that the program of cuts is really starting to pay off. Consolidated expenses for the 201213 fiscal year total $4,096.3 million and are divided among expenses incurred by the Universitys academic units including its seven schools and those incurred by administrative and auxiliary units. Consolidated revenues for the 201213 fiscal year will total $4,443.4 million. Academic units The Universitys academic units will incur a projected $3,367.8 million in consolidated expenses next year, though the amounts disbursed to individual academic units vary greatly. The School of Medicine will receive 43 percent of all academic unit expenses next year, totaling $1,459.6 million. The school expects an overall surplus of $21.2 million next year, compared to this years $18.9 million surplus. The schools budget plan notes, how-
Recycle Me
BUDGET
The speech of Chinese citizens is individually free but collectively in chains, said Gary King, director of Harvards Institute for Quantitative Social Science and a professor in Harvards Department of Government. King gave a presentation Wednesday afternoon in Encina Hall titled, How Censorship in China Allows Government Criticism but Silences Collective Expression. There are many looming challenges facing China ahead, said Jean Oi, director of the Stanford in China program and a senior fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute, who introduced King and his project. One of them is how China is going to deal with the Internet and the flow of information. People have a lot of assumptions and speculations about censorship in China, she added, The question is, what do they censor and what are they trying to do? Kings lecture centered on disproving conventional wisdom that the goal of Chinese censorship is to stop government criticism, instead arguing through his empirical research that it is the threat or possibility of collective action that the censors target. King said that only two topics pornography and criticism of the censors themselves are always blocked. We as observers often think that the Chinese censorship system is leaky and imperfect, but actually it is our understanding of it that is so, he said. Although he acknowledged that countries like Iran, Saudi Arabia and Vietnam also block sensitive content, King stated, China is the largest effort to censor human expression in history. While exact numbers remain unclear, King said censorship in China is a huge manual effort involving hundreds of thousands of people. He divided the censorship into two broad categories: search filtering, which involves blocking certain terms in search engines, and content filtering, which involves removing individual posts by hand. According to King, websites like Sina, Chinas largest infotainment web portal, hire up to 1,000 people to censor content. With the help of Harvard graduate students Jennifer Pan and Molly Roberts, King undertook a sixmonth project, spanning from Jan. 2011 to June 2011, to use automated
content analysis software he developed and patented to download over 3 million social media posts from 1,400 Chinese social media sites. King then divided these posts into 95 topics and, for each post, examined the content, placed it on a timeline and revisited the site to see if it was censored. According to King, 13 percent of social media posts are censored overall, even though there are significant differences across geographic regions and topics. Drawing from the data collected, King showed that among some of the most-censored events in the earlier half of 2011 were protests in Inner Mongolia, the arrest of dissident Ai Weiwei and the rush to buy salt following the Japanese earthquake. King referred to the last case as an example of a topic that did not criticize or threaten the government, but was characterized by collective action and was thus heavily censored. To provide more evidence for this theory, King showed how criticism of key government policies, including the One Child Policy and education policy, have low censorship percentages, arguing that this is due to their lack of collective action potential. King also pointed out that in the cases of the protests in Inner Mongolia and Ai Weiweis arrest, posts were censored whether they supported or criticized the state. Citing cases such as the downfall of politician Bo Xilai and a South China Sea peace agreement, King also suggested that his software and findings can predict certain events before they occur. With the Chinese government leaving huge footprints and exposing themselves, we can tell what they are going to do before they do it, King said. He also noted that Chinese censorship is not ambiguous or hidden, showing a picture of a blocked Chinese site that stated, The page you requested is temporarily down. How about you go look at another page? I am not favorably impressed, but nevertheless impressed, by the Chinese censorship system, he said. This may be the optimal way to have a censorship program, as the government gets to see what everyone thinks, eliminate collective action potential and can measure and deal with problems. Contact Natasha Weaser at nweaser@stanford.edu.
ment payouts as a revenue source, with such transfers projected to constitute 34 percent of the GSBs total revenue of $190.2 million, alongside private gifts, which will provide a further 12 percent. Stanford Libraries will be allotted 3 percent of consolidated academic expenditures. The unit will run a deficit of $2.6 million in 201213, as the unit hires more specialist staff and plans and implements capital projects such as the relocation of collections currently housed in Meyer Library to the former GSB South Building. The Law School, the School of Earth Sciences and the School of Education will each receive 2 percent of total consolidated expenses. Remaining expenses, which total 3 percent, will be divided between the Hoover Institution, the Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education and the Vice Provost for Graduate Education. Administrative and auxiliary units Consolidated expenses for University administrative and auxiliary units will total $1,143.0 million for the 2012-13 fiscal year, with the largest segment belonging to Land, Buildings and Real Estate (LBRE). LBRE will constitute 20 percent of total administrative and auxiliary expenses next year. While expenses for 2012-13 will rise by 7.5 percent to reach $234.2 million, the unit will generate a small surplus of $2.4 million next year, according to the budget plan. Business Affairs and Information Technology will consume a smaller portion of overall expenses next year relative to this one, with its share falling from 18 to 16 percent of total expenditures. The unit, which has projected revenues of $190.4 million and expenses of $191.6 million, will run a small deficit next year. Residential and Dining Enterprises (R&DE) will make up 15 percent of consolidated expenses
for administrative and auxiliary units and will generate a small deficit of $1.7 million for the upcoming fiscal year. Minimal expense growth and a 2.7 percent growth in revenues largely attributable to planned room and board increases will result in a smaller deficit relative to this year. The Office of Undergraduate Admission (UGA) and the Financial Aid Office (FAO) will receive 14 percent of total administrative and auxiliary expenditures, with almost all of the units $160.5 million in expenses constituted by an outlay of $153.1 million on undergraduate need-based financial aid. The Department of Athletics, PE and Recreation (DAPER) will receive 9 percent of consolidated expenses, with a projected budget balanced by $97.4 million in expenses and revenues alike. Among the remaining units, the Office of Development and Alumni will receive 9 percent of consolidated expenses; the Office of the President and Provost will receive 6 percent; the Office of Student Affairs will receive 5 percent; and the remaining 6 percent will be divided between the Stanford Management Company, the Office of the General Counsel, the Department of Public Safety and the Office of Public Affairs. Capital Budget In addition to academic and auxiliary and administrative expenses, Stanford will spend a further $529.5 million in 2012-13 through the Universitys Capital Budget. The 2012/13-2014/15 Capital Plan, which totals $2.1 billion and is 14 percent larger than last years plan, will advance major projects such as the construction of the Stanford Energy Systems Innovations (SESI) project and the repurposing of the vacated, old Graduate School of Business Complex. Contact Marshall Watkins at mtwatkins@stanford.edu.
BIOMED
the process to dating. In addition to being a good match in expertise, its important that the collaborators get along. Altman attributes the productive relationship partly to the physical proximity of the School of Medicine to the School of Engineering, since the move of the School of Medicine from San Francisco to Palo Alto in 1959. All the schools are on the same campus, coming in from all different parts of the University operating at high levels of expertise, Altman said. Chaney also recognized the rich resources that being in Silicon Valley offers to the collaborations. In the early stages of the projects, entrepreneurs from the area can provide funding or experienced managers, he said. And ultimately, the collaborations can make a difference to patients and to health. In the future, Altman sees only
a closer interaction between the two schools. There is going to be a new bioengineering and chemical engineering building that will have an animal facility that will be for the engineering school, Altman noted. Its going to create an easy gateway between engineers and the medical school. The building, which will host teaching labs and lecture halls on the first floor and offer shared facilities in the basement, is expected to be completed by the summer of 2014. Altman predicted that all the engineering departments in
general are going to be seeing a lot more biology. Stanford Hospital is undergoing a major expansion campaign, and while the new construction doesnt directly impact the collaboration between the School of Medicine and School of Engineering, Altman said that the best clinical fellows are likely to be attracted to the Stanford School of Medicine and are likely to take advantage of the collaboration to innovate. Contact Catherine Zaw at czaw 13@stanford.edu.
FEATURES
HISTORY CORNER
Steinbeck at Stanford
CHANGE
founder of Change.org, discusses his popular social justice site
By STEPHEN COBBE
y his junior year at Stanford, Ben Rattray 02 planned to become a banker, earn a lot of money, then retire and enter politics. A double major in economics and political science, Rattray was wellequipped for such a career path. But after returning home for winter break that year, one of his brothers revealed that he was gay and everything changed for Rattray. My brother said the thing that was most painful when he was younger wasnt the people who were explicitly homophobic or anti-gay that he saw around him, but that people would refuse to stand up and speak out against it, people like me, Rattray said. Frankly, I was ashamed in a deep way for the first time in my life. Over the following weeks, Rattray realized that finance was not his calling. He wanted to
CLICK FOR
BEN RATTRAY 02
n 1925, during the sixth and final year of John Steinbecks time as a Stanford student, the soon-tobe famous author moved off campus to a one-room shack behind a larger house in Palo Alto. The room was seven square feet and Steinbeck loved it. Steinbeck called the shack the Den of Pegasus after the mythological flying horse because it symbolized [his and his writer friends] soaring ambitions, said Art Ring, a former Steinbeck Collectors Club member. An avid Steinbeck enthusiast, Ring used to lead tours across the Stanford campus that detailed Steinbecks life at the University. Several years later, Steinbeck changed the symbol to a winged pig, explaining . . . I find Im more a Pigasus than a Pegasus; a lumbering soul but trying to fly, Ring said. To Steinbeck, that summed up the progress of his career at that point in his life . . . Steinbeck used that symbol throughout his life. This is the Steinbeck persona. Steinbeck had a colorful career at Stanford. In the six years that he was enrolled at the University, starting in 1919, he only accumulated 93 units becoming equivalent in status to a junior. He came to Stanford to mollify his parents, primarily his mother, explained Kevin Hearle 80, a visiting scholar at the Bill Lane Center for the American West. He wasnt excited about it. He didnt see why he needed a college education to be a writer. Steinbeck had no intention of graduating, according to Ring. Instead, the future Pulitzer and Nobel Prize-winning author took a collection of courses that he thought would help him hone his craft as a writer. His grades were far from stellar, and he often withdrew from classes before the final if he found them uninteresting. Despite his varied college career, he did meet two English professors who he came to respect greatly. Margery Bailey 14 M.A. 16 and Edith Mirrielees 07 would have a formative impact on Steinbecks writing. Mirrielees taught a class on the short story, a form of literature in which Steinbeck would become a heralded voice. Edith Mirrielees was the first to spot Steinbecks talent, Ring said. She restored his ego, and gently and quietly would fire him with hope.
Ben Rattray 02 founded Change.org, a website that facilities the creation of online social petitions to address specific instances of social inequity, in 2007 with former dormmate Mark Dimas 02.
somehow shed light on stories of social injustice and help give a voice to those who had been victimized. Eventually, these ideas culminated in the launch of Change.org in 2007. The website, founded by Rattray and a former dormmate, Mark Dimas 02, facilitates the creation of online social petitions to address specific instances of social inequity. Petitions support a host of different causes, including gay rights, the environment, economic and criminal justice, education and immigration. Nearly 15,000 petitions are started each month on the site a number that continues to grow. My concern was that there was a disconnect between general interest in taking action and the specific, practical ways to do so effectively, Rattray said. After graduating from Stanford, Rattray received a masters degree from the London School
Flippin around
Co-founders of the Stanford Flipside reminisce about stunts, jokes and trickery
By JOSEE SMITH
W orlds Best Minds Gather at Exotic Erotic. Students Poor Midterm Grade Actually Causes Apocalypse. Report: Stanford Student Too Busy To
Breathe. Center for Coming Up With Fancy Names for Silly Things Announces New Global Peace Summit for Prosperity and Change. These headlines come from none other than the Stanford Flipside, a weekly satirical news publication that combines pop culture, social and political commentary and campus-centered humor to entertain students. Known for being one of the more unique and quirky campus publications, the Flipside also contains popular puzzles students typically solve upon picking up the pamphlet in the dining hall. It all started more than four years ago, when Jeremy Keeshin 12 and his high school friends created a publication similar to the Flipside at their high school. The Flipside is still published at Deerfield High School and Northwestern University. A few of my friends were really into The Onion and satirical writing, Keeshin said. I brought it here to Stanford, doing it with some of the guys in my freshman dorm. At Stanford, the Flipside started out as a club, with a newspaper format and multiple pages. Keeshin realized that this was not the best format for easy consumption and adapted the Flipside into a short, weekly format, which increased readability, offered more visibility and allowed for wider distribution. The distribution process has been pretty much the same since the beginning, said Zach Galant 12, Flipside co-founder. Wed say Lets go to dinner at Wilbur! and wed eat dinner there and distribute it there and the next night wed be at Stern and wed distribute it there. It started out with just us distributing it and we got some friends to do it but it was pretty tough initially. Even in the early years of the Flipside, the growing readership met the distribution with a mixture of excitement and anticipation.
Growing
college D
By ERIKA ALVERO KOSKI
DESK EDITOR
up in
ashing from room to room in Serra, in striped bathing suits and with plastic water pistols dangerously set in their palms, six-year-old twins Aisling and Sabha may be a surprising sight to most students who are accustomed to seeing a general population over the age of 18. But for the Serra freshmen, the formidable pint-sized duo is part of the dorm community. For freshmen this is their first year away from home, said Susan OHara, Serra resident fellow (RF) and the twins mother. A lot of them have younger brothers and sisters, so it triggers those automatic nurturing kind of things. Growing up on campus as a child is a unique experience, with perhaps some pitfalls. How can six-year-olds fit into the college world, a world of individuals on the cusp of entering the workforce? According to OHara, the advantages of raising a family on campus are what bring many RFs to the position. Actually, one of the reasons we did it was because of what wed heard about, from other RFs, about their kids, OHara said. In fact, the children of RFs may gain an intellectual experience to which few of their school peers have access, perhaps accelerating their precociousness. They grow up having this very rich experience of college life, said Marie-Louise Catsalis, RF at Toyon and mother of two boys, four-year-old Tobin and seven-year-old Kai. Just from being around college students, I hear their vocabulary expanding, and they use words and concepts that college students are thinking about. Like, Oh, what will I do
Aisling and Sabha Bennett, six-year-old twin daughters of Serra Resident Fellows (RF) Susan OHara and Stuart Bennett, were caught eating a chocolate cake in a students room. The girls are among many RF children who grow up among undergraduates on the Farm.
next with my career? A shifting vocabulary is a change noted by the Serra RFs as well. Theyll say, Whats up, dude? said Stuart Bennett, OHaras husband. And theyll call me Stu. They dont call me Daddy. Everybody calls me Stu, so they do, too . . . its kind of funny because theyre six years old and they talk like theyre eighteen. To some students, the children take on a younger sibling role. This, however, causes some awkwardness for older RF kids. Andrea and Federico Clerici-Hermandinger, who grew up in Cedro, found that as they grew older these interactions became fewer and fewer. I feel like we [hung out with students] when we were younger, said Andrea, now a sophomore at Palo Alto High School. Now theres such a close age difference its a little more awkward. A high school senior, Federico ClericiHermandinger will be leaving Palo Alto and heading to Boston College. I didnt even think about applying to Stanford because Ive just been on campus for so long, he said.But its still been a good experience, and its showed me a lot of what college is about. For the younger children, though, Stanford is still home. Living on a college campus establishes a model of college life for the children, setting Stanford as the norm of what follows high school. So a few months ago Kai started saying, I want to go to Stanford . . . At the moment, he likes Stanford; this is the place, Catsalis said. But as a seven-year-old, thats all he knows . . . Most teenagers are thinking, As far away as I can get from my parents. But at
OPINIONS
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s spring quarter progresses, a familiar refrain is repeated with increasing frequency, reaching a fever pitch as May turns to June. From dining halls to IHUM sections, students, faculty, and well-meaning strangers raise the inevitable question: So what are you doing this summer? The inquiry itself is innocuous enough, yet it often carries with it implicit assumptions about what a Stanford students summer should entail. Students who brightly chirp about their plans for international research, consulting internships or Silicon Valley start-up work are met with approving nods, while students whose plans are uncertain, or who plan to go home and find a summer job, may encounter confusion, condescending sympathy or even derision. While the diverse pursuits undertaken by undergraduates are impressive, the Editorial Board advocates a broader understanding of what summer undertakings are considered valuable and important. The current culture of the Stanford summer is at best elitist and at worst classist, and Stanford students may be reluctant to pursue unconventional summer paths due to the mentality that the question So what are you doing this summer? consistently reinforces. Students are asked about summer plans as early as January, when the gauntlet of interviews and applications begins in earnest. Summer, a time that was once occupied by recreational pursuits or creating memories with friends and family, is now a precious and pressing opportunity for career advancement. This, in turn, has a negative impact on campus mental health, as summer plans and the social pressures that are associated with them can be enormous sources of stress. If a student accepts an internship or research position that ultimately proves dull, will she view the experience as a summer wasted? Even travel or volunteer work is often discussed in terms of the instrumen-
tal value of the experience or perspective it can provide, as another tally toward personal development. Ask yourselves this: When was the last time you had a summer that didnt have to count for anything? The ramifications of this problem extend far beyond the realm of which students land a coveted internship and which do not. Indeed, our attitude toward summers strikes at the heart of what is both extraordinary and stifling about being at Stanford. Opportunities are numerous, but the sea of possibilities can sometimes drown out endeavors that dont fit the prevailing wisdom of what a Stanford student should be doing. For example, the hierarchy of summertime activities may alienate our peers who work during their summers to support their families. Furthermore, the high value placed on internships often obscures the fact that many students simply cannot afford to accept unpaid positions. Imagine a Stanford community in which every impulse to ask What are you doing this summer? was instead replaced by Whats the most interesting thing you learned this week? We owe it to each other to be more invested in the current experiences of our peers, rather than placing arbitrary value on summer plans. Summer, besides offering an opportunity for career advancement, is a chance for rejuvenation, an escape from the predictable schedule of papers and midterms around which we organize our lives, and in doing so occasionally forsake or forget our passions. It also presents an opportunity to live away from the norm of instrumentality that is so often overly present on campus. The Editorial Board hopes that each of you finds a space for critical engagement, from urban boardrooms to rural ranches. Until the fall, we wish you three months of discovery and inquiry, wherever your divergent paths may lead you.
Contacting The Daily: Section editors can be reached at (650) 721-5815 from 7 p.m. to 12 a.m. The Advertising Department can be reached at (650) 721-5803, and the Classified Advertising Department can be reached at (650) 721-5801 during normal business hours. Send letters to the editor to eic@stanforddaily.com, op-eds to editorial@stanforddaily.com and photos or videos to multimedia@stanforddaily.com. Op-eds are capped at 700 words and letters are capped at 500 words.
MARKS MY WORDS
Unsigned editorials in the space above represent the views of the editorial board of The Stanford Daily and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the Daily staff. The editorial board consists of five Stanford students led by a chairman and uninvolved in other sections of the paper. Any signed columns in the editorial space represent the views of their authors and do not necessarily represent the views of the entire editorial board. To contact the editorial board chair, e-mail editorial@stanforddaily.com. To submit an oped, limited to 700 words, e-mail opinions@stanforddaily.com. To submit a letter to the editor, limited to 500 words, e-mail eic@stanforddaily.com. All are published at the discretion of the editor.
raduating students, have you found that all of your interactions are plagued by one question? As you reminisce about freshman year dorms, late-night study sessions and crazy parties, is your mind overshadowed by one thought? And do you feel vaguely anxious because, whenever you interact with someone, youre busy thinking just one thing: Am I going to keep in touch with this person after graduation? Your parents may have told you to invest in your future. Well, now its time to start investing in your social future. Its time to pick the people who will be your lifelong companions, the people you can point out to your grandchildren as the friends from college. So look around at all the people youve met and liked over the past four (or five or more) years. Will you keep in touch with everyone? Probably not. Lets be honest: after graduation, you wont see some of these people ever again. Theyll go off to other cities, states and countries. You can try to keep in touch, but it probably wont work anyway. In twenty years, youll walk by each other at Trader Joes, and youll think, Oh, wow, that person looks like a 45-year-old version of [name of college acquaintance]! But is it your friend? It might be hard to tell by then. Just in case, youll make sure to avoid eye contact. Fortunately for us, were graduating from college in the Facebook era. Even after graduation you can continue to follow your friends Instagram uploads and see what theyre eating, where theyre shopping and who theyre hanging out with every weekend. Youll know where they live and what they look like for many more years to come, which will make that casual run-in at the
grocery store a little bit easier to handle. As for those friends you also interact with outside of Facebook, there are ways to actively keep in touch. Go ahead and schedule Skype sessions and phone dates its a great way to regularly check in with friends in those faraway places. Letters? Sure, you can write those too. Google+? Some people use it. Gchat? Its like it was invented for people who are bored at work. The thing is that when you graduate, youll have to figure out how to keep communicating with those friends in faraway places. They wont be down the hall, across the street or an inconvenient 10-minute bike ride away. Thats when youll have to decide not just whether to keep in touch but how often to do it. Would you Skype with someone every day? Call someone every hour? Gchat someone every minute? But keeping in touch requires time, and keeping in touch with more people will take up that much more time. Especially when these friends are in other places, you may realize that youre spending hours in front of your computer or on your phone. Your efforts to catch up with people cut into your opportunities to explore a new place, to meet new people or (if youre in grad school) to study a lot more. In one extreme scenario, you might find that your entire social life has turned into a never-ending cycle of keeping in touch with people from college. Whether youre making an effort to stay connected with a lot of people, or whether youre keeping up constant check-ins with just a few of them, youre neglecting whatever else it is that you could be doing in the present. Keeping in touch obviously isnt bad, and you likely wont find yourself in the situation
Miriam Marks
I DO CHOOSE TO RUN
he most epic thing I have ever learned is how similar people are. Across time and space, were the same. We havent changed after centuries of civilizational development, revolutions and scientific movements; we dont change according to birthplace or method of upbringing. Im convinced that our biggest problems are the eternal ones, like happiness, loneliness, power and all of the other one-word bombs our society cant seem to diffuse. Everything springs from those. Our toys may get shinier, but the human condition does not. The reason I majored in international relations is that I see this play out on the global stage. Every foreign affair can be stripped down to something remarkably human. There are big players in the European Union that break the rules they enforce on others; this starts on the school playground. North and South Korea vie for a status with financial benefits; this happens in our families. Our cultures and languages, too, are just clothes for the same concerns. A pie in the sky in English is the picture of a rice cake in Korean. (Isnt that awesome? I learned that last week.) Parallels abound. Theres a map in my head of everything Ive ever learned, and everything on it leads right back to a common human nature. In a way, the Stanford institution supports this, because our unity is emphasized through our
Nina Chung
great diversity. Behind each community center, ethnic theme house and extracurricular is a purported celebration of difference, also printed in every promotional booklet admitted students receive. Many of us hear more a cappella, eat more South American grains and are exposed to more kinds of sexual self-identification here on this campus than we ever did before we came. As a result, though, the loudest proclamation we make to the world is that our student body has, at least superficially, digested the divides of ethnicity, socioeconomic status, ideology, religion and appearance. Hence, our sensitivity to political correctness; we expect ourselves to embody a universal embrace, as if the idea were attached to our Stanford degree. And here my doubt lingers. For as we tout big victories of acceptance and toleration, what do we do every day, privately? We speculate about friends behind their backs. We laugh at each others expense. Rant angrily about others achievements. Give people cold
high school teacher of mine once observed that if we truly wish to understand the soul of a society, we need only look at what it builds. Public architecture, he argued, gives material form to the abstract values of the community that constructed it. The peoples of medieval Europe built their cities around immense cathedrals their own humble homes dwarfed by the house of God, its spires and pinnacles pointed skyward to redirect the eyes from the mundanity of earth to the glories of heaven. The Romans placed the enormous Colosseum at the center of their capital, an edifice of public entertainment in the heart of an empire of bread and circuses. Nazi Germany crushed its population under the gargantuan weight of an architecture of militantly straight lines and implacable granite immensity, subsuming the individual man in the great mass of Vlkisch oneness. As I prepare to leave this place after four years, I cannot help but wonder if we might locate at least part of the elusive, hard-to-define Stanford spirit the spirit the New Yorker tried to capture this year, the spirit that animates this Universitys innumerable accomplishments and triumphs, the spirit that courses through the veins of every student and alumnus
in our architecture as well. Perhaps in the ever-flowing stream of creative destruction that razes old buildings and erects bigger and better ones, we could discern Stanfords dedication to the intellectual cutting edge, to the perpetual abandonment of old ideas in the pursuit of new knowledge. In the essential sameness of the Main Quad, unchanged amid the unending upheaval of the rest of campus, we might see Stanfords dedication to the core principles of a liberal education given physical form a recognition that as new technologies change the world, the fundamental questions of humanity stay the same. We have countless gyms for a community driven by fitness and appearance; an enormous new business school to give concrete form to our restless entrepreneurialism; community centers for a diverse student body that hails from around the world and from every corner of society, economy and sexuality. But some unanswered questions remain. I cannot help but wonder if our architecture might symbolize our communitys imperfections as surely as it does our successes. There is, for example, no community center, or any dedicated space at all, for Stanford military veterans. Might that symbolize a
Miles Unterreiner
troubling gap in our commitment to diversity and inclusion on a campus where, all too recently, there were only seven undergraduate veterans out of a student body of some 6,800? Everywhere we see sandstone, Spanish mission architecture, redtiled roofs conformity. As represented by the battle over Chi Theta Chi this year, are we uncomfortable with true, as opposed to superficial, human difference, or deeply alternative notions of what constitutes a life well lived? What does it mean that at the very heart of our thoroughly secular campus lies a church? Is MemChu simply an paradox, a bizarre antiquation out of place in and unsuited for the rigors of an uncomfortable modernity? Or does it reflect the unacknowledged presence of an enduring faith in universal progress, reason, the fundamental and ineradicable goodness of man? At an event for returning alumni during Homecoming Weekend this year, a particularly
Portugal
A taste of
knew next to nothing about Portugal when I decided to travel to Lisbon. My knowledge of the country only went up to about the 16th century and the period of exploration. Even my moms insistence on the usefulness of Spanish for basic conversations with Romance language speakers did not help me, and I was unable to have the Spanish-Portuguese conversations I believed I would. Initially, I tried speaking Spanish. I had signed a Spanish-only pledge for the quarter and did not want to slip into English when Spanish was so similar to Portuguese. The language barrier proved to be higher than I anticipated. My fellow Stanford in Madrid students and I tried to order in Spanish. Our waitress would not have that. She helped each of us pronounce the Portuguese words from the menu. We quickly learned that speaking Spanish only invited Portuguese lessons, while English worked and got us what we wanted the cost of an item, directions, etc. Attempting Portuguese transformed us from travelers into friends. It was not long before obrigada and obrigado female and male versions of thank you were added to our regular vocabularies. In Portugal, I learned what pride the Portuguese have for their lan-
guage. More than anywhere else I have visited, the locals wanted to teach us. Whether it was a simple hello or thank you, they wanted to share. This even rang true in commercial places, where employees would take the time to explain cultural nuances, even if sacrificing efficiency to do so. Once I got past the language barrier, Lisbon eased my homesickness, due to its striking similarity to San Francisco. We wandered through Lisbons hilly streets, populated by cable cars, and stumbled upon a large flea market. In the distance, a red suspension bridge spanned the wide river. The fresh coastal air even smelled like San Francisco! After nostalgically noting the similarities, I reminded myself that I was in a foreign city and took in the citys individuality. I admired all the ceramic tiles lining houses, churches and fountains. Later I sat on a tiled bench and sunk my teeth into Lisbons delicacy, not sourdough bread, as is commonly thought, but rather sweet egg tart pastries called pasis de nata. A taste of Lisbon, a few lessons in Portuguese and many new experiences later, I returned to Madrid with my group for our last few weeks on the Iberian Peninsula.
Rebecca Amato
Stanford in Madrid student Rebecca Amato 14 and fellow students practiced their Portuguese, ate paseis de nata and admired the cermaic tiles, churches and fountains of Lisbon on a side trip.
was making that night, prompting curious stares from other shoppers. The high number of RFs with families on campus has created a built-in community of RF children, a network both for the parents and children. Theres a monthly RF meeting, to figure out what were doing and its hard to have conversations with kids, Bennett said. So some of the RAs usually volunteer to entertain the kids or just watch over [them], so thats always fun. Living on campus exposes the children to a range of interesting events. Weekly events in the Toyon performance hall range from Shakespeare and opera to Ballet Folklrico, exposing Tobin and Kai to events beyond the experience of most kids. Ultimately, however, they are still children and while they may live on a college campus, they are not yet ready to fully take part in this world. When asked if college students are weird or cool, Tobins reply was weird. Why? Because they have weird tshirts, he answered, as a matter of fact. Contact Erika Alvero Koski at erikaa1@stanford.edu. rine Lab also gave Steinbeck an ecological perspective. Almost all of his works begin with looking first at the setting, at the environment . . . because of his notion that people are part of an environment, he added. That aspect of humans as animals and humans as part of an ecosystem is central to Steinbecks understanding of the world. In 1925, Steinbeck left Stanford to pursue a writing career in New York with neither a diploma nor an intent to return. Although he remained close to several teachers and friends he had met in Pacific Grove and Palo Alto, he did not keep up a relationship with the University. In a 1964 letter to his good friend Dook, Steinbeck asked, Do you ever go near Stanford? I dont think I would like to go. It would be kind of embarrassing because I was such a lousy student, I suppose. Anyway, I have no call for the Groves of Academe. The Groves of Academe, however, had housed him well in some regards. In a 1962 letter to Mirrielees, he wrote about her influence on his writing. Although it must be a thousand years ago that I sat in your class in story writing at Stanford, I remember the experience very clearly, Steinbeck said. I was bright-eyed and bushy-brained and prepared to absorb from you the secret formula for writing good short stories, even great short stories. You canceled this illusion very quickly.
Taylor Grossman 1964 letter from Sandstone & Tile, Winter/Spring 2002 publication. Citation: John Steinbeck to Carlton Sheffield. June 21, 1964, Sag Harbor, Long Island, New York. Steinbeck Collection
KIDS
would be not good for them to see, or how they would process all this, OHara said. I think actually since weve moved in, we havent found that to be much of a problem. OHara and Bennett do not let their children into the dorm on party nights like Friday and Saturday. Aisling and Sabha even managed to sleep through Band Run, which passed right by the Serra RF cottage. Though on weekdays the door between the cottage and the dorm will often remain open, allowing the girls to run out and mingle with the students and the students to run in as well, on weekend nights
the RFs close the door, effectively separating the family world from that of often-rambunctious college students. Catsalis concurred, though she expressed potential concern for the future. I wonder if its going to be sustainable when theyre teenagers, just because there will be a lot more temptations, she said. Living with a built-in dining hall has its advantages as well, though it does present a somewhat unrealistic image of the real world for the youngsters. OHara recalled a trip to the supermarket where one of the children asked what the chef
STEINBECK
Continued from page 3
In terms of his actual education and what he got out of it . . . at first he probably didnt get much, Hearle said. But he eventually found a group of fairly like-minded guys who were interested in writing and who knew that they wanted to be writers. Some of his best friends over the years people he kept in touch with his entire life were Stanford guys, he added. One such man was Carlton Sheffield 23 M.A. 30, affectionately known to Steinbeck as Dook. Dook would become Steinbecks lifelong companion until the latters death in 1968. Along with filling the role of best man at Steinbecks wedding to first wife Carol Henning, Dook also once saved Steinbecks life during a camping trip. Another was Ed Ricketts, a man who would later be immortalized as Doc in Cannery Row. Rickets and Steinbeck later wrote The Log from the Sea of Cortez, a description of their trip to the Gulf of California. Steinbeck met Ricketts at the Hopkins Marine Station, Stanfords marine laboratory, during a summer session. According to Hearle, Steinbecks time at the station in Pacific Grove was pivotal to his work as an author and granted him as awareness of biological and ecological systems. He wound up becoming probably the most scientifically, especially biologically trained major American novelist of his time, Hearle noted. The Hopkins Ma-
Courtesy of the Martha Heasly Cox Center for Steinbeck Studies, San Jose State University
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UNTERREINER
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thoughtful audience member spoke eloquently on the essential importance of place, arguing that there was something special, indefinable but real, about this campus, something he simply felt and knew every time he returned to Stanford. He worried that the proposed expansion to New York City might irretrievably alter the character of this University, even if the same faculty, students, classes, donors and sponsors inhabited and supported our East Coast branch. There would be, he feared, something missing there. Something lost. I cannot help but agree. Stanford somehow retains its essential identity even as its constituent parts the students, faculty and staff who give it life uproot themselves and move on. This place is defined by more than the people who, for a fleeting moment or two, occupy its dorms and classrooms, its dining halls and auditoriums. Stanford whatever that is cannot be replicated, moved, copied or imitated. It is here and only here. In addition to the buildings and the campus, however, we are Stanford as well. Wherever we go, there, too, will Stanford go. We will carry it with us always, imperfections and all. Miles has been honored to have the opportunity to write this year, and to hear your comments and criticisms. Email him any last words anytime at milesu1@stanford.edu.
or the first time, Stanfords Three Books program goes beyond the book: a documentary film, a suite of smartphone applications described on a website that includes articles and video documentation, as well as a book. It is hoped that the diversity of format encourages students to think about how ideas are expressed differently by the written word, in filmic presentation, through music, or by using contemporary social media. In light of the opening of the $112 million Bing Concert Hall, Undergraduate Advising and Research (UAR) chose to focus Three Books 2012 on the arts and chose Professor Mark Applebaum to select the texts. Professor Applebaum believes the opening of the concert hall begs the questions: What is it for? Who gets to use it? The issue of access that surrounds the concert hall is deliberately paralleled in the Three Books selections: what ideas are worthy of our attention (a book about heavy metal); which people ought to make art (a film about a 4-year old); and who should have access to tools (a discussion about smartphone applications). When the idea to examine smartphone applications initially surfaced, we were intrigued by the possibility and conscientious about the inclusion of a medium that, at first glance, may seem divisive. We understand the initial reaction the Three Books announcement has generated from some in
questions relevant to a liberal education? What is the role of the student in actively shaping that education? There are no right answers to these questions, but they are good starting points for the dialogue we hope to cultivate with students this fall and throughout their careers at Stanford. As Professor Applebaum states in his study guide, We hope for a class of open-minded, joyful skeptics, not sleepwalking academic sycophants. Part of that dialogue, we are certain, will address the Editorial Boards opinion that the apps dont offer an opportunity for intellectual engagement. As an academic community, we actively encourage the expression of differing opinions, and the Boards questioning of the Three Books program aligns with our intent. However, we regret that the Board did not take the time to first learn about the logistical infrastructure and conceptual agenda supporting our selection. We believe, had the Board considered the goals and care that went into designing this years program, it would share our excitement about what is sure to be a most thoughtful event. Even though the editorial failed to tell the full story, it has succeeded in sparking the very questions the selections are intended to provoke.
JULIE LYTHCOTT-HAIMS 89 Associate Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education and Dean of Freshmen and Undergraduate Advising
CHUNG
life may be yoked with the rest of the worlds. To accept that someone else has a heart is to accept that they want the same basic things and struggle with the same questions as you do. Its to accept that they were, in fact, created as equally as beautifully as you. Its an ideal we announce quite loudly on banners and broadcasts, but means something real only if we pursue it in our social lives now. Idealism, buzz words and institutions for world peace aside, lets be real. I believe in hope for us an eternal kind. But I believe its a personal thing, above all. Hey readers, Nina thanks you. And if you havent yet, you can find her at ninamc@stanford.edu for a little while longer.
MARKS
SPORTS
MANAGING EDITOR
By JACK BLANCHAT
In the midst of a run to the Super Regionals of the College World Series, seven Stanford baseball players were selected in the MLBs firstyear player draft this Monday through Wednesday. The bevy of Cardinal athletes entering the pro ranks began on Monday, when star junior pitcher Mark Appel was picked eighth overall by the Pittsburgh Pirates. Appel, one of three finalists for the Golden Spikes Award given annually to the top player in college baseball, has compiled a 10-1 record and a 2.27 ERA in 2012. Im currently concentrating on winning a national championship and finishing
my academic endeavors at Stanford, Appel told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette on Monday, as he will be the Friday starter for the Cardinals Super Regional matchup with Florida State. I will address the possibility of a professional career in due time. With his 6-foot-5, 220pound frame and 99-mile-perhour fastball, many MLB experts and scouts expected Appel to be selected first overall by the Houston Astros, who instead selected 17-year-old shortstop Carlos Correa with the first pick. With the unexpected slide, Appel ended up being the third righthander picked in the first eight picks of the draft, and the third consecutive righty that the Pirates have selected with their first pick in the draft. In 2011, the Pirates selected UCLA fireballer Gerrit Cole
Jacob
Jaffe
Stat on the Back
COMEBACK KIDS
CARDINAL RALLIES TWICE TO WIN REGIONAL AT HOME
By JOSEPH BEYDA
DESK EDITOR
s I finish up my time on the Farm, its hard not to look back and think about my four years here. All of a sudden, I understand all of those speeches we sat through during Admit Weekend and NSO about how fast this would go by, and since Dean Julie is leaving, Ill try to temporarily fill-in as leader of nostalgia. When I came to Stanford, I had the fears that everyone else had about college. Except I had all of them. I wouldnt be able to fit in, I wouldnt be smart enough and I would make Stanford second-guess its decision to let me in. As far as classes go, I knew that Id do something techie, mostly because I hated reading, writing and public speaking with a passion. I did not understand anything about literature, writing an essay induced more tor-
Three up, three down for the Cardinal baseball team. Stanford swept its regional for the second straight year, beating Fresno State once and Pepperdine twice at Sunken Diamond last weekend to stay in contention for its first national title since 1988. It took two come-from-behind wins over the Waves after junior righty Mark Appel shut down the Bulldogs on Friday night, but the Cardinal (41-16, 18-12 Pac-12) showed
why it deserved to host a regional for the first time in four years with a weekend of solid play. We battled, and at this stage of the year you have to be able to do that, said head coach Mark Marquess. Besides Appel, Stanfords starters hit some rough spots, but the bullpen gave up no earned runs in its 9.1 innings of work. The Cardinal did benefit from its opponents mistakes a combined seven errors, 20 walks and eight hit-by-pitches over the three games, including a three-run wild pitch that proved crucial in game two but its
best hitters also showed up on a big stage. Junior catcher Eric Smith, sophomore first baseman Brian Ragira, sophomore second baseman Danny Diekroeger and junior shortstop Kenny Diekroeger were all named to the allregional team, with Ragira reaching base 10 times in his 14 plate appearances. Im just trying to get on, and we have a bunch of run-producers throughout the lineup, Ragira said. I know that the guys behind me . . . are going to come up big for us. Stanfords team offense would have been
Caroline Caselli
hen faced with one of the biggest decisions of my young life back in 2008 choosing where I would attend school for the next four years I knew very few specifics about what I wanted out of my college experience. However, three things were certain: I wanted to go to a good school (whatever that means), the weather had to be tolerable and sports were important. By default, small liberal arts schools and the Ivies were out, and my application list quickly came to resemble the more temperate half of the then-Pac-10 conference. As inconsequential as my criteria
The Stanford baseball team downed Fresno State and Pepperdine over the weekend to take home a regional victory in the first round of the College World Series. Now, the Cardinal travels cross-country to Tallahassee, Fla., to take on the Florida State Seminoles in a best-of-three series in the Super Regionals. The winner will advance to Omaha, Neb., and the College World Series finals at TD Ameritrade Park.
BASEBALL
The No. 13 Stanford baseball team may have swept its regional last weekend, but it still has a cross-country trip up next. Thats a story thats all too familiar to the Cardinal (41-16, 1812 Pac-12), which was eliminated at No. 7 North Carolina a season ago after dominated the Fullerton regional. The Tar Heels shut
down Stanfords bats in the opener before barely escaping a Cardinal comeback the following afternoon, which featured a threehour-and-32-minute rain delay right in the middle of a four-run Stanford rally that fell just short. Now the Cardinal must travel to the Southeast once again, this time to face No. 3 Florida State, another experienced national seed that will benefit from playing on its home turf against a jet-
lagged Stanford squad. This time, at least, all three games will be played at night, a welcome departure from the sweaty afternoon opener that seemed to catch the Cardinal off guard in Chapel Hill last year. I just think we kind of got overwhelmed going down there, said junior centerfielder Jake Stewart, who was drafted by the Detroit Tigers in the ninth round of this weeks MLB Draft. It was
100 degrees with 100 percent humidity, and I think all those factors got to us. Stanford is also much more experienced than last years group, which often started seven underclassmen in the field. I think in some ways we were almost happy to be there, said Stanford head coach Mark Marquess. The expectation level last
SUPERS
miles down the road in Gainesville, between Florida and North Carolina State. Florida State (46-15, 24-6 Atlantic Coast Conference) earned its right to host a Super Regional with one of the nations top records, fueled by three separate win streaks of at least seven games. The Seminoles didnt lose a weekend series until mid-May, though they entered the NCAA tournament with a thud after failing to win a game in the ACC tournament for the first time in school history. But those struggles seemed long behind them by the end of the Tallahassee regional, with
Freshman Alex Blandino (above), who was named a freshman All-American by Collegiate Baseball on Wednesday, helped spur the Stanford baseball team to two comeback victories against Pepperdine over the weekend to keep the Cardinal in contention for its first national title since 1988. Continued from page 7
MENS GOLF
DRAFT
high school, Diekroeger was a second-round pick of the Tampa Bay Rays, but the Woodside, Calif., has seen his draft stock drift in the past few years after a stellar first season where he was named Pac-10 freshman of the year. After moving back to shortstop in place of injured sophomore Lonnie Kauppila, Diekroeger hit only .269 this season, but has played excellent defense, cutting his errors in half from last season. The Detroit Tigers made centerfielder Jake Stewart the next Stanford player to be picked, selecting the junior in the ninth round. Stewart, who was drafted in the 14th round by the Phillies coming out of high school, showed some serious pop in his junior campaign, hitting seven home runs and 15 doubles while batting .290 as the teams leadoff hitter. The Los Angeles Dodgers were next, selecting catcher Eric Smith in the 18th round. Smith, who switched from the infield to catcher before this season, hit an impressive .330 with 32 RBI in his first season as a starter. Finally, the Pirates bookended the Cardinals drafted players when they picked outfielder Tyler Gaffney in the 24th round on Wednesday. After a dominant 2011 campaign in which he hit .327 and tallied 35 RBI, Gaffney had a swoon in his junior year, hitting a meager .240 with just 17 RBI. Gaffney, a backup running back on the Cardinal football team, could potentially return to school to play another year of both sports. For now, though, all the Cardinal players must refocus on the task at hand, the Super Regionals against Florida State in Tallahassee, Fla., this weekend, just one step away from the College World Series. Contact Jack Blanchat at blanchat @stanford.edu.
Weighed down by a poor second round, the Stanford mens golf team stumbled to a 19th-place finish at the NCAA Championships at Riviera Country Club in Los Angeles. After three rounds of stroke play and three more rounds of match play, Texas won the national championship, narrowly defeating Alabama. We obviously had higher expectations, said head coach Conrad Ray. The guys fought hard. We had two really solid rounds, and then the middle round kind of shot us out of the water. In a competitive field [with] as many good teams as there are, you cant afford to have that bad round. Although freshman Patrick Rodgers, a Ben Hogan Award finalist and the nations fourth-ranked college golfer, shot rounds of 69-72-73 to finish in a tie for ninth at one-over par, the rest of the Cardinal struggled on the difficult Riviera course. Junior Andrew Yun was the Cardinals second-lowest scorer, finishing at +10 to tie for 69th. Its a tough golf course. I think we had a couple of guys that were struggling to find some confidence out there. It was difficult. There just werent too many places where you could really miss, Rodgers said.
We knew all year that we had a good enough team to win the national championship. Its just a matter of putting it all together at the right time, and obviously we dont have any tournaments left to do that, so its disappointing. Ray said the breeze and tough pin locations made the course especially difficult during the second round of play. No Cardinal players broke par that day. We strung too many bad holes together, Ray said. I think our guys got off to maybe a little bit of a slower start than they wanted, and then sometimes if youre trying to make birdies, you can make bogies in a hurry, especially at a course like Riviera. I think we probably pressed a little bit too much. It was just one of those days. Yun said the teams poor performance could not be attributed to a lack of effort. I definitely think that everyone was working really hard. We didnt have any excuses for playing badly we just didnt have our best stuff, he said. Despite the teams disappointment, Ray said there are a lot of positives to take from the season. Golf is very competitive and unpredictable, he said. For our team, being fairly young really . . . to be
ts almost over. Its the fourth quarter. Its the bottom of the ninth. Were halfway up the 18th hole. In reality though, its the end of spring quarter, and Ive got a little more than one week left on the Farm. Ive found that senior year is a good time to think about memories and spend time swapping stories about the last four years, but more importantly, its a good time to reflect on who we are, how weve changed, how twists of fate and luck brought us here today and why we do what we do. And with this being my final column in The Stanford Daily, Ive got just one last chance to reflect on my time covering Stanford sports. Last week, it struck me that my graduation would occur in Stanford Stadium, a place thats been immensely important to my time here. Ill never forget watching Andrew Luck complete a perfect 50-yard pass in his first Cardinal-White game or beating USC on a last-second field goal in 2010. Its pretty easy for me to say that many of my most unforgettable moments here have occurred in various Stanford stadiums, and Im glad my last Stanford moment will happen there. But it also struck me that my graduation would occur on Fathers Day, with my dad in the stands. And for a somewhat mundane, Hallmarkcard holiday, its one that has a lot of significance in my life. My dad spent his first Fathers Day behind a glass wall, watching me in the neonatal intensive care unit in Dallas,Texas, hobbled by pneumonia that left me with just a 50 percent chance to live. Hell spend his 23rd watching me cross the stage at Stanford, his alma mater. And really, theres no better way to explain what brought me here than to start with him. In the course of those 23 years, I have to attribute a lot of my character today to him, including my love of sports, reading and writing that inevitably drew me to Stanford and The Daily.
JOHN TODD/Stanfordphoto.com
In the final tournament of his college career, senior David Chung (above) and the Stanford golf team struggled over the weekend at the NCAA championships in Los Angeles, finishing in 19th place out of 30 teams.
GOLF
the year, Yun won the Pac-12 Championships, and Rodgers, recently named a PING First Team All-American, won two tournaments in his first year of college golf. Senior captain Chung is departing, but Stanford has signed two new recruits for next year: 2010 Washington State Golf Association Junior Boys Player of the Year Dominick Franks and David Boote, member of the Welsh National Mens Amateur Squad and winner of the 2011 Welsh Boys Golf Championship. Yun and Steven Kearney, who shot rounds of 74-77-73 to finish in a tie for 77th at Riviera, are the teams rising seniors, while Andre DeDecker will be a redshirt junior. Losing David [is] obviously going to be a big loss and tough shoes to fill, Rodgers said. I know he struggled this year, but hes a great player and he played great for Stanford for four years, so he should be really proud of what hes done. Were all really thankful to have him here at Stanford. Chung compiled an impressive list of honors in his four years on the team. He played in the 2011
Masters and U.S. Open and helped the U.S. team defeat Europe in the 2010 Palmer Cup. He won the 2010 Western Amateur and the 2010 Porter Cup, and in his sophomore year, he was named a Ben Hogan Award semifinalist and a PING Third Team AllAmerican. He was also named to the All-Pac-10 first team that year. Over the summer, players will compete regularly to stay sharp. Rodgers and Yun will travel to Northern Ireland to play for the United States in the Palmer Cup, which starts June 28 and pits top American college golfers against their European counterparts. Last year, Yun went 4-0 in Palmer Cup match play to lead the United States to its second straight victory. Rodgers said the team is highly motivated to perform better next year. Here at Stanford, the goal never changes its to win a national championship and every year you dont [win], youre going to end the year disappointed, he said. Were going to work hard and hopefully get back with a chance to win next year. Contact Austin Block at aeblock @stanford.edu.
ll good things must come to an end, and so it is that the Class of 2012 a group that can name football quarterback Andrew Luck and womens basketball forward Nnemkadi Ogwumike among its ranks is finally leaving us. The world of collegiate athletics is a cruel one, and the life of a college star is almost always shorter than it is sweet. Both Luck and Ogwumike leave as number one picks in their respective drafts and with title and school records to their names, but with their ultimate college ambitions unrealized: neither managed to get their hands on a national title. Pro sports teams can build legacies on the shoulders of key players. Manchester United, for example, has won 12 out of the 20 seasons since the inception of the Premier League and throughout that time has relied on the talents of midfielders Ryan Giggs and Paul Scholes. Even now, with their youthful energies fading, they remain key members of the club. College teams, meanwhile, must cope with losing their best players every four years, and even more frequently when athletes jump ship early to launch professional careers. With such a rapid turnover of players, it is incredibly hard to build momentum and retain sufficient experience and leadership in a team year after year. Luck and Ogwumike are impossibly fortunate individuals. Many Stanford stars, legends in their own backyard, must wake up from the dream now. Perhaps their sport just doesnt receive nearly the same sort of monetary support in the professional world as in the collegiate one, or perhaps, regardless of the records they may have set here or the importance they have held in their team, they just dont have the right physique or skills to get paid to do what they love. As each sports season has come
KARL EIKENBERRY
By NATASHA WEASER
DESK EDITOR
arl Eikenberrys office in Encina Halls East Wing holds hints of a decorated, controversial and adventurous past. Books on politics and history line the shelves, pictures and certificates hang on the walls and an Afghan rug is laid out on the floor. Eikenberry M.A. 94 has had a distinguished military and diplomatic career. Prior to his current position as the Payne Distinguished Lecturer at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI), he spent 35 years in the United States Army. As U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan from May 2009 to June 2011, he led President Obamas civilian surge, which occurred in conjunction with a 30,000-troop surge. Eikenberry, with his soft-spoken manner and friendly disposition, recalled how his father would discuss his World War II experiences in the Asia Pacific region over dinner at his home in Goldsboro, N.C. I still consider Goldsboro home, Eikenberry said, pulling out the key to the city, which was given to him by Goldsboros mayor in August 2007. In 1969, Eikenberry left Goldsboro for the United States Military
Academy at West Point. He received a letter from the Dean of the Department of Foreign Languages requiring him to study two years of a foreign language. I looked down the list and saw French, but I was already studying it, Eikenberry said. I wanted something new and exciting. I saw Russian and that was the time of the height of the Cold War but then I saw Chinese and thought that was the most exotic. The decision led Eikenberry down a path that would see the fluent Mandarin speaker form close connections with China and the Asia Pacific region. On May 17, 2012, Foreign Policy magazine published an article by Eikenberry titled Stop Ignoring Taiwan, in which he argued for revitalizing diplomatic and economic relations between Taiwan and the U.S. in the face of Chinas economic and military ascendance. Over three decades we have quite skillfully managed to balance commitments to Taiwan and continuing to evolve our complicated relationship with China, he said. Going forward, with good diplomacy skills we can maintain this balance but . . . theres going to be points in time where we have to make difficult decisions, he added. Eikenberry acknowledged President Obamas pivot toward Asia, citing Chinas growing mar-
Former U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan Karl Eikenberry now serves as the Payne Distinguished Lecturer at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies. Eikenberry, whose military and diplomatic career has spanned almost four decades, led President Obamas civilian surge in Afghanistan from 2009 to 2011.
itime claims as a key issue. Since World War II, the U.S. had the assumption that we have complete mastery of the military in the Pacific Ocean. As China rises it will challenge our assumption of complete supremacy how to manage this is the question, he said. Despite his connection to China and Asia, it is Eikenberrys efforts in Afghanistan that have been the most noted. Before becoming ambassador, he served two tours in Afghanistan. His first tour was as security coordinator and chief of the Office of Military Cooperation from September 2002 to September 2003, and during his second, from 2005 to 2007, he served as commander of the American-led coalition forces. Eikenberry summarized his experience as U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan as extraordinarily intense. The mission was complicated, the expectations in Washington were understandably very high and in the strategy we were implementing, time mattered, he said. Despite his intense focus on the mission, the people of Afghanistan left the most profound effect on Eikenberry. These are a people that have been through three decades of unimaginable horror, conflict, war. Some of the stories we heard from them are almost untellable, he said. Yet here was a group of people who had still retained their pride and a very strong, compelling culture. There is a saying that when we leave Afghanistan, we leave a part of our hearts behind this was certainly so for me and my wife, he said. According to Eikenberry, his frequent walks through Afghan bazaars with his wife, Ching, led him to be dubbed as the The Afghan Peoples Ambassador by locals.
RATTRAY
will pass in the future because of this aggregation of victories. But the most widely felt Change.org petition came in March from the parents of Trayvon Martin, an unarmed 17year-old boy who was shot and killed by a neighborhood watchman. The petition, which received an unprecedented 2.2 million signatures, helped bring Travyons death to the national spotlight. Charlotte Hill, communications manager for Change.org, remembered the atmosphere at the organizations San Francisco headquarters while the petition was going viral. As excited as we were to see the petition from Trayvons parents taking off and gathering support, we all knew that a victory would only be a victory in a certain sense; this kid had died and there was no bringing him back, Hill said. But there was also a feeling of pride in our model that it could serve Trayvons parents in this way, and that it could allow their story to more easily spread and resonate with people across the country. A number of causes affecting the Stanford community have also found a platform in Change.org. The site hosted a petition to the Israeli government to free Stanford graduate Fadi Quran 10 in February of this year, and is currently hosting a petition to President Obama to commute the 36-month jail sentence of Missouri businessman Shakir Hamoodi, father of Salahodeen Abdul-Kafi 12. While the majority of successful petitions succeed independently of any help from Change.org, the organizations staff, which has grown from 20 to almost 90 in little over a year, plays a role in fostering the development of certain petitions by offering services like peer-to-peer support, campaign advising and media training. We look for petitions with an incredible personal story that appeal to a broad swathe of people and that arent highly divisive, Rattray said. Another part of the team focuses on developing algorithms to match petitions with the people who are most likely to be passionate about the cause. Change.orgs emphasis on technological innovation is reflected in the many rows of computers that fill the organizations San Francisco office. In fact, Rattray said that without the teams chief technology officer, Dimas, the organization would not have succeeded. The most critical element in the beginning stages of almost any start-up is having someone who is extremely technically competent, Rattray said. The only way we got through all the challenges we faced was Mark [Dimas] and his willingness to wake up every day to code at home for 14 hours in his underwear, though he says he was dressed. Tyler Rattray, Bens brother and executive assistant of Change.org, also made an important contribution to the organization in its early stages. As a college freshman, he loaned his life savings to help keep the organization afloat in its first year.
Four years later, Change.org is now profitable and on track to bring in $100 million in annual revenue within three years by running campaigns for a variety of organizations such as Amnesty International. Tyler joined the Change.org team after having a lengthy conversation with his brother about the direction in which his life was headed. Ben always talked about the importance of leaving a legacy no matter what youre doing, he said. After our conversation, I realized that building a tool that could give anyone the power to
leave their own legacy was such a powerful thing and was something that I wanted to be a part of. Looking toward the future, Ben Rattray plans to further expand into the international market and develop the websites mobile interface. Last year, mobile phone activity accounted for 6 percent of Change.orgs total traffic. This year, that number rose to 28 percent. The futures clearly in the computer in your pocket so were spending a lot of time finding more effective ways to engage people through their cell phones
to allow for more responsive and dynamic types of organizing, Rattray said. When reflecting on his time at Stanford, Rattray said he believes that the culture of audacity that permeates the campus was a key inspiration for him. Instead of making it seem like a scary thing, Stanford makes quitting your job, raising money and disrupting an industry you have no experience with seem like the most natural thing in the world, he said. Contact Stephen Cobbe at scobbe @stanford.edu.
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Itd be like Its the Flipside guy! Galant said. People come to expect it on Mondays and if there was a holiday and we distributed on Tuesday, people would be like Where were you yesterday? Distribution was difficult at first because just Galant and Keeshin were handing out copies, with hopes to cover the entire campus. Galant recalled bringing copies to IHUM lecture and putting them next to the lecture handouts. People would just come by and take the Flipside along with the handouts and I always thought it was really cool seeing people read it in lecture, Galant said. As the Flipside grew, so did its structure. The staff began having weekly brainstorm and editorial board meetings and added a DDay the groups name for Distribution Day, on which the Flipside staff walks around campus, distributing copies of the Flipside to various dining halls. They also experimented with different collaborative websites in hopes of finding new ways to plan, structure and organize the newspaper. We still have the same problem that a lot of groups have of keeping people involved, but its gotten easier, Keeshin said. Weve started doing group writes, Galant said. Wed have a Google Doc and a bunch of people would be working on an article at the same time, building off of each other. It made the process so much better, getting a chance to work with other people. Along with articles and headlines, the Flipside features weekly cryptograms and Rebus puzzles. People get really excited about the puzzles, Keeshin added. My main goal is to have people read the articles but if theyre reading it for the puzzles, then I think theyll also read it for the articles. My favorite part is definitely the cryptograms, said Katherine Scavo 15. One of my friends in the dorm and I really like figuring out the quotes and decoding them. The Flipside staff has added more outside activities to the Flipside over the years, including a
Jeremy Keeshin 12 (far left) and Zach Galant 12 (far right) founded the Stanford Flipside, a popular satirical campus publication, as freshmen in 2008. Also pictured: Senior Flipside writers Adam Adler (second left), Laney Kuenzel (center) and Eric Karpas (second right).
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Given the nature of the mission, Afghans can get frustrated with necessary military operations, he said. Putting the face of the U.S. embassy out there was important and helped mitigate the frustration Afghans understandably felt with the international military forces. The relationship between Afghans and U.S. troops has been tumultuous, with civilian deaths a major issue of contention. However, Eikenberry remains adamant that the war was necessary after 9/11, stating that the notion to just ignore Afghanistan was not an option. I would have disagreements with aspects of strategy in Afghanistan but never questioned
whether we needed to be there, he said. Eikenberry stated that the core of the mission was to harden Afghanistan so that it would become a state with a reliable government, an accountable security force, an appropriate justice system and a significant economy so that it will no longer be a sanctuary of international terrorism to attack the U.S. and its allies. I dont classify this [the war in Afghanistan] as winning or losing. We are attempting to help the Afghan people achieve progress and make sure we will not be threatened by international terrorism, Eikenberry said. Here at Stanford, the sandstone arches and palm trees put Eikenberry in a world startlingly different from that of the bustling streets of downtown Kabul or the rugged terrain of the AfPak mountainous border. When not in his office, Eiken-
berry can be seen at the gym seven days a week, taking a break at the CoHo and even recruiting potential football players for Stanford. Although he enjoys biking, he said at Stanford, biking sometimes makes me think that Im in Beijing. What I love about the Stanford campus is the combination of the aesthetics and the sense of seriousness and purpose, he said. What I see in terms of the caliber of students is extraordinary these are the future leaders of our society. He particularly enjoys speaking to students about their future career paths, relying on advice his father once gave him. When it comes to the end of the day in lifes journey and what you see in the mirror makes you smile then you can say you did reasonably well, he said. Contact Natasha Weaser at nweaser@stanford.edu
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running color commentary on every home video and had to be restrained by other dads when my brother was violently taken down in a soccer game.Photo albums from the first five years of my life document a smattering of Giants and As games and great retro Bay Area sports paraphernalia, and many of my earliest memories involve traveling up and down California (to glamorous hotspots like Modesto and Morgan Hill) to watch my older brothers various (and frequent) sporting events. But in 1995, my family of four was rocked by tragedy when my dad was diagnosed with a brain tumor; nine months later, he was gone. My brother, 11 at the time, sought solace in his busy schedule of athletic commitments.A six-year-old girl now lacking a father figure, I sought solace in my brother. From that point on, what my brother liked, I liked, which meant any team facing the Lakers,theWorld Cup before it was trendy in the States and Barry Bonds, despite his surly demeanor and regardless of whether or not he took steroids (ask either of us, he didnt).When my brother chose to attend Stanford in 2003, I became a Stanford sports enthusiast right alongside him, celebrating the glorious 2004 basketball season (minus its untimely end) and woefully enduring
zero Big Game victories during his four-year tenure. When I too became a Cardinal in 2008,our sports worlds converged still further, and now, most Saturdays in the fall are spent sharing drinks with friends at Gate 10 followed by raucous cheering in Stanford Stadium. Forever bonded by a passion for Stanford athletics,I have no doubt that our future holds years of season tickets, bowl game excursions and March Madness brackets that optimistically take Stanford farther than theyll go. On Sunday, June 17 barring any academic catastrophes I will graduate from Stanford University. My commencement falls squarely upon Fathers Day, and although my dad wont be present alongside my mom and brother in the stands to watch me receive my diploma, I like to think that he would be proud of the daughter, and more specifically, the sports writer, editor and enthusiast that I have become in his absence. And even though he was a Bear, I know hed be a closet Andrew Luck fan. Caroline Caselli doesnt write columns often, but when she does, theyre the best. Thank her for her four years at The Daily at carolinecaselli@stanford.edu or follow her on Twitter @carolinecaselli.
The Stanford baseball team made short work of its home regional last weekend, but the road ahead gets much more difficult for the Cardinal, as it must travel across the country to take on the Florida State Seminoles, a team that spent much of the season as the nations top-ranked team.
Jack Mosbacher was a member of the Stanford baseball team from 2008-2011. Each week, he takes a look at the Cardinals ups and downs on its road to the College World Series.
This is was what I was afraid of all along. The good news is that the Stanford Cardinal easily won its regional and punched its ticket to the Super Regionals, just one step short of the coveted College World Series in Omaha, Neb. The bad news is that the Cardinal now has to travel to Tallahassee and face a Florida State team that spent the majority of the 2012 season as the countrys top-ranked team. Those who have followed my writing this season may have grown weary of my constant talk of the importance of obtaining one of the top eight national seeds for the postseason tournament and, in doing so, securing the right to host a Super Regional. This weekend, my friends, is my case in point. Super Regionals are always tough the last 16 teams alive in the tournament each year are always talented and capable of beating one another but winning on the road is an even more daunting task. First and foremost, Florida State can flat-out play. This years team won the regular season Atlantic Coast Conference title before getting knocked out early in the conferences postseason tournament. The Seminoles spent a large portion of the season as the nations top-ranked team, their
regular season performance highlighted by sweeps of eventual ACC postseason champions Georgia Tech and future regional hosts Miami and Virginia. Though the Seminoles are a young team, they had three players selected in the top seven rounds of this weeks Major League Baseball Draft. Simply put, theyre loaded. On top of their on-field talent, the Seminoles boast one of the countrys great home-field advantages. Not only do Florida State games attract almost 5,000 fans a night (compared to roughly 1,500 on the Farm), but their fans are also among the most knowledgeable and intense in the game. To put it lightly, a game at Dick Howser Stadium is a different experience entirely than one at idyllic Sunken Diamond. When it steps onto the field, the Cardinal is going to feel much further away from home than the 2,500 miles that already separate Palo Alto and Tallahassee. The heritage of Florida States fans is best exemplified by their most famous tradition. The actual origin of this tradition is still hotly contested even among Seminole fans themselves so Ill just tell it the way I first heard it. Sometime in the 1980s a team came to Tallahassee with a roster including a pitcher from Canada, and the Seminole fans had done their research. When this pitcher was called into the game in the fifth inning, the entire crowd serenaded him with a hearty a cappella rendition of Canadas national anthem, O Canada, repeating the song several times as he tossed his warm-up pitches. The Semi-
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Together, through road trips to catch SEC football games, hot afternoons spent trying to hook fish and our fair share of nights watching the double-A Arkansas Travelers at Ray Winder Field, sports became the huge part of my life that it is to this day. Thanks to his near-obsessive level of reading books and magazines, there was always plenty of reading material to keep me occupied growing up. And thanks to his stories about the Theta Delt house or John Elway firing baseballs like rifle shots from right field to home plate, I always wanted to go to Stanford. That said, the relationship between a father and his son is often a complicated one. At some point in our lives, just about everybody has to tangle with the marks that a father (or the absence of a father) leaves on us. Some of the things that we bear from our fathers are easy to understand maybe youre a Packers fan because your dad is from Wisconsin but other times, there are things that you never understand or dont understand until years into the future. Like at the 2004 Masters golf tournament, when my dad told me a
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away powerhouse programs like flies and ascending to the top ranking in the land. Then, the Cardinal struggled. It lost one series, and then another. Key players fell to season-ending injuries. The countrys most potent offense fell silent. Darkness had descended. All seemed lost. But it battled back. Stanford showed remarkable resilience, climbing into contention for the Pac-12 title before a disappointing series loss to Cal in the season finale. Today, as the Cardinal boards a plane for Tallahassee, the players know that theyll need to play the best baseball of their lives if they hope to pass through the last gauntlet between here and Omaha. Theyll have to ignore the deafening cheers and angry insults of college baseballs toughest fans (and struggle through whats guaranteed to be biased home field umpiring). Theyll have to play hungry, relentless, fearless baseball. In short, the odds are stacked against the Card. But the stage is set for what could turn out to be the dramatic, penultimate chapter of the greatest story of their lives. I, for one, cant wait to watch. Contact Jack Mosbacher at jackmos@stanford.edu. portunities that came to me, and that has made all the difference in my life. Of course, opportunities are in some ways all about luck, and I got incredibly lucky to get where I am today. Stanford opened up such incredible opportunities for me, such as the ability to write this column for four years and broadcast playby-play of some of the best athletes in the world without any prior experience. I also got extraordinarily lucky to come to Stanford at a time when so many amazing people were here. For instance, my freshman hallway in Branner (the greatest hall of all time) had four athletes in four different sports who played at Stanford the full four years. One set a school record and won a national title in mens volleyball; one was a first-team All-American and won a national title in womens soccer; one was an All-American three times in singles and in doubles and won the national mens tennis singles title; and one is a 14-time AllAmerican and set multiple school and American records in track. What an amazing way to enter college. And it kept going from there. I got to see the best football player, womens basketball player and baseball player (its ok, Mark Appel, the Astros will soon realize their mistake) in the country perform here. I watched live from the press box as Stanford went to the only three bowl games it had been to in a decade, including the programs first-ever BCS bowl victory last year. I saw three straight Heisman runners-up who easily could have been winners. I saw four straight Final Fours for the womens basketball team and the mens team start to reap the benefits of rebuilding with an NIT title. I saw the mens volleyball team go from worst to first right here at Maples. I saw womens soccer finally break through, womens tennis grind out a thrilling championship and womens water polo go backto-back. The wonderful thing about Stanford, though, is it isnt just about that. At Stanford, you get to meet some of the greatest athletes in the world and you get to see
tions Commission (NomCom), which Zimbroff said his administration has now completed. I dont need to send a campus-wide email saying what Ive accomplished, Zimbroff said. I think thats something students dont like about the ASSU. The majority of Stanford students arent going to be upset that the ASSU isnt flooding their inboxes, he added. NomCom is responsible for screening and appointing student representatives to committees and boards across campus. During the previous ASSU administration, no new NomCom members were recruited because the ASSU Executives assumed that an amended constitution, which included a reformed NomCom process, would pass, according to Zimbroff. However, the constitution did not pass, leaving the ASSU with no way to appoint students to University committees. This wasnt something we planned on or campaigned on, but it was something we needed to do, Zimbroff said of appointing students through the NomCom process. The ASSU Executives will be taking a break from ASSU activities over Dead Week and exam week in order to focus on their studies. However, once their academic obligations are over, the pair plans on resuming planning for the 2012-13 school year. Zimbroff said that he and Wagstaff plan on talking with administrators about how to prepare harsh, given the seriousness of the situation, I personally felt it was appropriate, Laufer wrote. ResEd and Greek community response At the meeting, Golder stressed to Greek leaders that their organizations tend to get lumped together in the public eye, regardless of which organization is associated with particular incidents. Even if only half of the alleged incidents occur, people dont say it was this organization or that, Golder said. The University just goes, Oh, its fraternities and sororities. Golder noted that some reports from the period in question have been confirmed while others have been found not to have occurred. A lot of what were trying to determine is, Did something occur that was egregious? Golder said. If it did, whats the appropriate follow-up that should occur? Some fraternities and sororities have internal judicial processes that they use to determine accountability for incidents, a process some of the organizations had already started before meeting with ResEd, Golder said. She added that other situations are referred to the Organizational Conduct Board (OCB). Incidents that are referred to the OCB an organization analogous to the Judicial Affairs board, but for student groups are University-level policy violations. In general, incidents involving public disruption, as well as incidents that result in police reports, end up on the desks of the University President, the Provost and the Vice Provost for Student Affairs, Golder said. I think that most of the people at the table were being really honest, and I think that the reality is the folks who are in the leadership roles in these fraternities and sororities care about their organizations, they care about the members of their organizations and they actually understand and dont disagree for the most part with where the University is coming from, Golder said.
for next school year while they are on campus over the summer. We see this summer as a great way to hit the ground running, Zimbroff said. One specific plan that Zimbroff discussed for the upcoming school year was to bring food trucks to campus or have better food-delivery options for students late at night. He said that, over the summer, he and Wagstaff will be negotiating with campus administrators and local restaurants in order to get these options ready for the fall. The pair has also made a point of saying that although they do have plans that they want the ASSU leadership to spearhead for next school year, they also want ASSU leaders to feel comfortable in a supporting role on campus. I dont feel compelled to roll out a slew of sustainability initiatives, Zimbroff said, citing one example of the philosophy in practice. I think the ASSU should play a supporting role for groups who are already doing a great job with sustainability initiatives on campus. Zimbroff stressed a need for practicality in the job of ASSU executive. You dont always have to have a new revolutionary program and do it two weeks after taking office, Zimbroff said. You just have to do what works. Contact Mary Harrison at mharrison15@stanford.edu. Theyre in the tough position of trying to get their membership to understand it as well. Laufer agreed that open communication between the Greek community and ResEd is important, but added that sometimes ResEds manner of approaching a situation leads the Greek community to shut down toward the administration. The best way the IFC collective can react to ResEds concerns is to remain open and willing to self-reflect on the actions we have made that have resulted in their concerns, Laufer wrote. Defensiveness is not constructive. However, I do think that ResEd should keep in mind that playing the blame game will lead to said defensiveness. This springs spike in alcoholrelated incidents comes in light of progress on the part of the Greek community since it came under ResEds purview several years ago. Theyve been doing really well all year, frankly, in terms of concerns around party management and other things, Golder said of the Greek community. Organizations overall have been doing really well. Despite her generally positive assessment of the year for the Greek community, Golder said that there are major areas for concern in the drinking culture, particularly because fraternities and sororities are accorded special status by the University among student groups. She said that she holds housed fraternities and sororities to particularly high standards because they get a multi-million dollar house due to their affiliation as a Greek organization. Youve got to be better than everybody else, not worse, because its a really special thing, Golder said. If you cant do better, if youre teaching on purpose, passively or actively, that all you are is about drinking, then thats not a theme Im going to support from ResEd. Were not going to have the get drunk house as a theme, she added. Contact Alice Phillips at alicep1@ stanford.edu. As we begin to work with this space, we can develop its uses, Bilfield said. Its up to the imagination of the visitors and the performers. The schedule for the concert halls first season which will extend from Jan. 11, 2013, to June 1, 2013 includes more than 40 performances. The pre-season events, Harmony for Humanity on Oct. 3 and Grammy Award winning Chanticleer on Dec. 11, will be held in Memorial Church this fall. Featured performances in 2013 will include cellist Yo-Yo Ma with pianist Kathryn Stott, violinist Midori with pianist Ozgur Aydin, pianist Emanuel Ax and vocal groups Cappella Romana and the New York Polyphony. Stanford student groups will also appear at the venue throughout the season. In addition to independent student performances, artists such as singer Vusi Mahlasela, who has a history of working with the a capella group Stanford Talisman, will involve students with their appearances at the concert hall. Contact Sarah Moore smoore6@stanford.edu. at
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be working in the business office next year). Last but not least, I must mention Sam Svoboda why do all good sports reporters first and last names begin with the same letter? and Nate Adams. Both have since flirted with other roles at this paper Sam technically graduated last year but hung around as vice president of sales, and Nate has floated around as editor at large but will always be sportswriters in my mind. There are more of you, too. People I should thank but I dont have space to mention here because thats not entirely the justification for writing this column. What I really wanted to do was draw an analogy to the very teams these folks have written about. None of these organizations are going anywhere. There will still be a football team, basketball teams and even this newspaper on campus next year. But they will look and feel a lot different. Standards are always high at Stanford, and, for example, Lucks position at quarterback is going to be a very big hole to fill. Perhaps, though, this is what makes life at university so interesting. Clearing out the seasoned talent, space is left for new stars to rise and others to step out of the shadows. Teams rebuild because they must, and we fans never have enough time to get bored with the status quo. And as much as well miss these seniors, by September well be inspired, frustrated and thrilled by those brand new freshmen. Tom Taylor is never, ever leaving Stanford, or The Daily for that matter. Tell him to make room for some younger guns at tom.taylor@stanford.edu.