Hand count determines firstyear Senate election results

First-year students voted on Tuesday for the four senators that will represent them in the Associated Students of Whitman College Senate.

Stephen Stradley, Matt Dittrich, Duji Tahat and Elisa Jaramillo were elected to represent the Class of 2012 in this year’s ASWC Senate.

Mired by technical difficulties, the finalvote count for the election was hand-counted by Kendra Vandree, Oversight Committee Chair, Andrea Ramirez, Director of Student Activities, and Leann White, Assistant Director of Student Activities, Vandree said.

Then, on Wednesday morning, the count was approved by the ASWC Oversight Committee.

“I was very, very excited,” Jaramillo said. “One of the other people who won actually called me and I didn’t find out until about 1 p.m.”

Though it is difficult to gauge what percentage of the vote each candidate received–ASWC uses a preferential voting system as opposed to the more common all-or-nothing system – Stradely had the highest percent at 12.3 percent, Dittrich followed with 10.6 percent while Tahat and Jaramillo came in with 9.2 percent of the ‘first preference’ vote, according to voting numbers released on Wednesday.

The election, whose campaign season officially began on Sept. 12, saw one of the largest fields in recent years, said Paul Butler, Oversight Committee member.

“We had 17 candidates running this year, whereas last year we had eight,” Butler said. “That’s a huge increase.”

The field was initially set at 20, however, three candidates retracted their names at the last minute, according to Butler.

Candidates noted the difficulty of such a long list of potential senators. “With 18 people up there, it’s really hard to differentiate yourself,” Tahat said.

The increase in candidates may have also had an impact on voter apathy, which has gone down, Butler said.

“When we did the forums, there were more people there than I’ve seen at any other ASWC event,” Butler said.

Exactly two-thirds, 292 students, of the first year class voted in ASWC’s preferential voting system in which students are able to rank candidates based on their preference as opposed to a winner-take-all system in which voters may only vote for one candidate.

The system is one Whitman has adopted in order to give each vote “more input” and, by extension, the voter more of a say in the election’s outcome, Butler said. “Instead of just having one vote you cast for one candidate, you put your order of preferences down,” Butler said. “So in this election, you can vote one through 17, if you want to, listing all of your preferences in order.”
Butler suspected the voter turnout on Wednesday was higher than that of previous first year elections.

“We usually don’t get the greatest turnout,” Butler said. “If we get above 60 or 70 percent, that’s pretty good.”

Going into Tuesday’s election, many of the candidates felt confident in their qualifications. “All of the other candidates are really experienced, just like I am. We’ve all been a part of a community leadership position in high school,” Lihn Le said. “Personally, I think I have experience because I’ve been involved in student government all four years of high school… I have the motivation and drive to make this a better place.”

“In my junior year of high school, I was one of the first juniors in over a decade to be on the executive board,” Tahat said. “I was on a youth council board where we actually got to give away $50,000 grants to various nonprofit organizations in my community.”

“I was my high school student body president,” Stradley said. “We were very successful, finishing with the highest surplus in school history and also had the school’s first rave and drive-in movie.”

Several of the candidates believed they could bring a new perspective to ASWC by virtue of their diverse heritage.

“I was born in the Philippines and my dad is from Jordan,” Tahat said. “I have a very unique background.”

“I grew up in a different country, an African country called Eritrea,” Yonas Fikak said. “I believe I have a different perspective than most of the students here because I’ve been in the third-world and now, all of a sudden, I’m here in the first-world.”

Mental health resources added for ex-“happiest” students

Almost a quarter of the Whitman student body used the Welty Counseling Center’s resources at some point over the course of the 2007-2008 school year, according to Dr. Richard Jacks, Associate Dean of Health and Wellness at Whitman College. Depression was the second most common issue faced by students, despite the school’s highly publicized status as having the “happiest students” nationwide.

With the recent release of the Princeton Review’s Best Colleges: 2009 Edition in July, Whitman, which in the 2008 Edition was ranked in first place for “Happiest Students”, now ranks 17th, a significant drop in rankings.

Although this drop in rankings upset a number of the Whitman community, for some, it provides a sense of relief.

“When we say that Whitman is the happiest campus it definitely puts a lot of pressure on people’s emotions because it sets a norm. [Peer Listeners] definitely heard this last year and we’re talking about working against that. Whitman is a happy campus, but that’s not a requirement of being here,” said senior Justin Daigneault, a Co-Leader of the Peer Listeners.

According to the International Foundation for Research and Education on Depression, one in five people will suffer from depression at least once during their lifetime. College students are especially prone to experiencing depression, as many mental illnesses become symptomatic during young adulthood.

A report by the Mental Health Work Group on depression in college students stated, “Over
the course of a single year, one in 12 college students in the United States will make a suicide plan, and seven of every 100,000 college students die each year from suicide.”

Last spring, these statistics hit home when a Whitman student took his own life.

Whitman is creating more resources for students dealing with mental health issues. One such resource is the Depression Support Group.

Whitman’s Depression Support Group was formed at the end of last semester in response to a Peer Listeners’ survey on mental health and awareness at Whitman in which students indicated that such a support group would be beneficial to the student community.

The Support Group is completely student led and confidential. “[Its] goal is to connect students dealing with depression, allowing us to share stories, strategies, and experiences,” said junior Leah Koerper, one of the Co-Leaders of the Peer Listeners and the mediator of the group. “Depression is a very isolating and stigmatizing illness. We hope to combat that.”

“I encourage anyone dealing with depression to give this group a try. Depression is a disease of loneliness and helplessness, and coming together with others can help alleviate these feelings. As someone who has struggled with depression myself, I can attest to the power of sharing experiences,” said Koerper.

The Depression Support Group meets every other Saturday in the Spiritual Activities room in Prentiss Hall at 4 p.m. The next meeting is on October 4.

Sixty students fall pray to hackers’ phishing scam

Computer hackers from places such as Russia and Africa are increasingly targeting busy and intelligent Whitman students, staff and faculty as part of a “phishing” scam through e-mail.

“It’s a play on the word ‘fishing.’ You’re actually throwing out some bait and trying to catch something with it,” said Kevin Kelly, Whitman College Technology Service’s Director of Network Technology.

So far, 60 students, 3 staff members and 1 faculty member have been victimized by these hackers. These e-mails pretend to be from WCTS, eliciting the ID and password of innocent Whitman students for malicious intentions.

“They’re looking to steal your identity, empty our your bank account and get your credit card number, and they’re all designed to get money out of you one way or another. They’ll try to lure you too. Charity fraud is huge; I wouldn’t at all be surprised that because of Hurricane Ike, for example, there are now fake charities soliciting money” reiterated Kelly.

Phishing e-mails may only ask for a Whitman login password, but others may even pose as your bank asking for your online banking information. A Whitman faculty member fell for the scam and allegedly lost up to $4,000 from his or her bank account by unknowingly giving online banking information away to a malicious third party. Although they pose as WCTS, these e-mails are designed to bypass Webmail’s Postini spam filter.

“There are still seniors and juniors who don’t have [Postini] turned on by default so they’re getting a lot of phishing e-mails,” said Kelly.

For those who don’t have it on by default, you can turn Postini on by going to the Student Toolbox part of the Whitman Students homepage. Click the link titled “Postini” and you can turn the spam filter on. What makes these e-mails dangerous is that WCTS can’t block all of them before students read them. Jenna Mukuno was one such unlucky student who unwittingly gave her Whitman account information away.

“I got an e-mail and it said, if you don’t respond to this e-mail in three days, your account will be deactivated because we’re basically trying to clean out whitman.edu, because too many e-mails are on that server. I didn’t even think about it. I responded right away. I gave them my username and my password. Then within 24 hours, I couldn’t use any of my Whitman account,” said Mukuno.

Once WCTS detects that an account has been co-opted by hackers to send spam, they immediately disable the account. Reactivating it takes approximately 30 minutes of staff time, and it takes several hours to get Whitman’s internet domain name off the blacklists of several internet service providers, such as Yahoo and Google.

The key to stopping phishing e-mails is to educate users, Kelly emphasized. “It’s a war, a never ending game, and unfortunately they’re usually a step ahead. There’s a lot more of them and they’re motivated by money,” said Kelly.

Whitman mentors to visit Nixyaawii community

The American Indian Association is recruiting Whitman mentors to join in a cultural initiative project at the Nixyaawii Community High School in Pendleton, Ore. With 56 students currently enrolled, it is the first school to be opened on the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation. Students and mentors involved in the program will focus on oral tradition and an interview project surrounding the elders of their community.

While the school provides both language and cultural classes, the mentors will assist high school students with a hands-on learning project in their community. The project will encourage Nixyaawii students to meet with elders from their community once a week to share stories and learn about their lives. The students will then select an artistic medium of their choice to portray these stories. There will also be a written portion of the program. The culmination of the project will be in December, when students will present their project to the entire Nixyaawii community.

The Whitman mentors will serve as guides for the students by helping them formulate ideas and prepare their presentations.

“It’s an important opportunity to get to know another culture. Whitman students have an opportunity to be a part of a very important cultural movement,” said sophomore Chelsea Marks, a second-year veteran of the program.

“The project is, for me, a statement of the tribes’ ability to self-represent their culture and traditions as well as engaging their youth with the elders. It is the passing of knowledge through stories and teaching the students their tribal history as it should be taught—by word of mouth, not in a text book,” Marks said.

The American Indian Association hopes to preserve Native American cultural traditions and stories through this initiative.

“Oral traditions have within them valuable information, such as history, culture, traditions and the language. For me, stories told by my grandparents resonate with me and guide me toward the path I need to be on,” Marks said.

The project also aims to bridge the widening gap between the elders and youth of the community.

“The elders know how things once were, before assimilation, before reservations, before boarding schools. To give the gift of knowledge to the youth is important for the well-being of the tribe, because one can’t quite know where they’re going until they have know where they have been,” Marks said.

It is undetermined what day of the week the Whitman mentors will visit the Nixyaawii community,
but mentors should expect to spend approximately two hours per week at the school with transportation provided. If you are interested in being a part of this project, please contact Chelsea Marks at markscq@whitman.edu.

Police chase rages past campus

Wailing sirens pierced the air on the night of Monday, Sep. 22, as a high-speed car chase intersected campus. Walla Walla Police began their pursuit at about 9:20 p.m., after an officer spotted the vehicle in question driving recklessly around a parking lot and then merging onto the street, where the driver sped through stop signs and ignored instructions to pull over.

Another patrol car joined in the effort to apprehend the driver as police pursued the vehicle from around Rose Street and Woodland Avenue to the intersection of Isaacs Avenue and Clinton Street northeast of campus.

The outcome of the chase was even more unexpected. According to a report by the Walla Walla Union Bulletin, officers called off their pursuit of the suspect after attempts to block traffic at the intersection of Isaacs Avenue and Clinton Street resulted in the collision of a patrol car with another oncoming vehicle.

Police Sgt. Matt Wood told the Union-Bulletin that the car chase lasted about twenty minutes and ended with the suspect evading custody. During that time, Whitman students housed all across campus, from the corner of Isaacs and Stanton to the Mill Creek Bridge, reported hearing sirens or seeing the cars pass.

“I was sitting in the living room doing homework when I heard a bunch of sirens,” said sophomore Ari Frink, a resident of the Writing House. “Then I saw a white car speed by and three cops chasing it down Otis Street. There were three of them but they couldn’t catch him.”

The Walla Walla Police Department suspended the chase due to safety concerns after the patrol car that was trying to clear the intersection hit another car.

This week in ASWC

ASWC Public Speaker Dr. Michael Shermer will visit campus Wednesday, Sep. 31, at 7 p.m. in the Maxey Auditorium. Dr. Michael Shermer is the founding publisher of Skeptic Magazine, Executive Director of the Skeptics Society, a monthly columnist for Scientific American, the host of the Skeptics Distinguished Science Lecture Series at Caltech, and Adjunct Professor of Economics at Claremont Graduate University.

Nominations Committee applications are due Thursday, Sep. 25, at 5:00 p.m. to the ASWC office.
Questions can be directed to Julia Nelson at aswc_nominations@whitman.edu.

A record number of 18 first-years ran for Senate this year. Elections were successfully executed on Tuesday. Results can be found posted on the door to the ASWC office, found on the top floor of Reid. You can find information about elections conduct at whitman.edu/content/aswc/governmen/oversight/elections or contact Kendra Vandree at vandrekl@whitman.edu.

The annual ASWC Retreat will be held this weekend for all elected and appointed officials. The agenda includes a review of Robert’s Rules and presentations by Executive Council members of their immediate and year-long goals. Executive Council Members include Elliott Okantey, President; Ryan Lum, Clerk; Rand Biersdorff, Communications Director; Aisha Fukushima, Ombud; Kendra Vandree, Oversight Chair; Roman Goerss, Policy Chair; Julia Nelson, Nominations Chair; David Changa-Moon, Finance Chair; and Rachel Stein, Programming Chair.

Student users frustrated, torn over New Facebook design

Status Update: Thousands of users of the popular social networking site Facebook are joining forces to protest the site’s new design.

After Facebook’s new look was unmasked in July, users were given the opportunity to try out the new design and give feedback to the site’s administrators before the changes were made permanent this month. While many users are unaffected by the site’s redesign, other are adamant that the changes are unnecessary, confusing and restrictive.

“Your fans’ hearts are breaking,” one student posted on the site. “The new Facebook, like everyone else said, is confusing and hectic.”

The newest phase of reforms aims to make the site more organized and practicable.

“When we set out to update Facebook, we tried to keep three things in mind,” said Product Manager Mark Slee in a recent news post. “First of all, we wanted to make the site clean and simple by reducing clutter, we wanted to give you more control over your profile and we wanted to focus on the recent and relevant content on the site.”

Unlike the site’s former look, the “New Facebook” consolidates news, updates and personal correspondence on one screen. At the same time, separate “Profile,” “Wall” and “Info” tabs catalog information into organized sections.

“One of our key goals of this project has always been to make the site simpler and cleaner,” said Slee. “That said, we know it can be hard to get used to things being in different places, which is why we wanted to make it easy for you to switch back and forth for a little while, in order to learn where everything went, and how the new site works.”

Despite Facebook’s pledge to develop a more user-friendly format, thousands of the site’s 100 million members are dissatisfied with the new design.

“I am so confused,” said junior Hillary Fairbanks. “It simplifies things, but I feel like I don’t have the time to sit down and actually see what the differences are.”

In response to negative feedback, founder Mark Zuckerberg reminded users that change is an inevitable consequence of technological progress.

“Many people disliked ‘News Feed’ at first,” he said in a post last week. “Now it’s one of the most important parts of Facebook. We think the new design can have the same effect.”

Adds junior Ty Whittier, “People are just used to going to the old site over and over again. The new site is more integrated…Once users get the muscle memory down, it too will become part of the pantheon of time-wasting activities.”

Burbank chemical spill causes diesel, gasoline contamination

In April 2008, the Port of Walla Walla, in the midst of building a potable water system, discovered petroleum contamination on their property in Burbank, a town in the Tri-City metropolitan area. The contamination is located at the Burbank Industrial Park, a property of the Port’s, right under Chevron diesel and petroleum pipelines.

Upon discovery of the contamination, the Port immediately hired a local environmental firm to do some preliminary testing of the soil and subsequently hired another environmental engineering firm, GeoEngineers, Inc., to do additional testing of the soil and groundwater in the area.

“They found diesel and gasoline contamination,” said Mike Boatsman, Site Manager of the Toxic Cleanup Program of Eastern Washington for the Washington Department of Ecology.

The levels of contamination in the soil exceed the acceptable levels of benzene and other petroleum constituent chemicals set forth by the Department of Ecology, Port officials said. The Port has also put in a number of soil borings, which drill holes into the ground, and water monitoring wells to monitor the level of chemical contamination.

However, the contamination does not appear to pose a significant risk to public health. The water in Burbank already has significant levels of nitrate, so the water isn’t potable, and the water pipeline the Port was installing has its source from outside the area.

“There is no indication that the contamination poses a threat to local drinking water supplies. We’re talking about parts per million. They weren’t identifying gallons of petroleum,” Boatsman said.

There is no liquid gasoline floating in the groundwater. As such, the Department of Ecology is satisfied that there is not an on-going chemical release at this site. While there is a privately owned water well in the Burbank Industrial Park, the water is mostly used for processing purposes, such as flushing toilets, Port officials emphasized.

However, they have promised to double-check the privately owned wells in the area.

“At this point, we’re not aware of any irrigationwells within the vicinity of that site that could be immediately impacted,” said Boatsman.

The Burbank Industrial Park is also located near the Snake River’s intersection with the Columbia River, but Port officials said they don’t know yet if the groundwater could migrate and leak into the larger Snake River. Last Thursday, the Port commissioners—Paul Schneidmiller, Mike Fredrickson and Fred Bennett—authorized drilling additional wells outside of the initial area of contamination in the Burbank Industrial Park to determine the how far the contamination may have spread.

The Port has notified Chevron of its discovery, but Chevron has not taken an official position on whether or not it’s liable for the contamination in the ground around its pipelines.

“Even though we don’t know where we stand at this time with Chevron, that’s not keeping us from getting out there, and getting these additional studies,” Schneidmiller said.

Chevron received an easement, or a legal right to operate at that property, in the late 1950s by the Port of Walla Walla. By the time the additional testing is finished—six to eight weeks from now—this investigation of the soil contamination will have cost the Port an estimated $185,000. The Port has already spent $110,000 on this investigation.

However, Chevron has not detected any current leakages in their pipelines.

“Indications are that it’s an old release. That tempers our concern too. Our first response is to make sure that there’s not some ongoing release,” said Boatsman.

However, that does not mean that Chevron cannot be liable, because neither the Port nor the Department of Ecology knows when the soil in the industrial park first became contaminated.

“We’re not saying that there’s an active leak now. We’re saying that there are contaminants in the ground and the highest concentrations are underneath the bloc valve, so Chevron might be right. It might not be leaking right now. The contamination is in the soil, underneath their block valve. We have the ability in the statutory rights to take legal action against Chevron as the Port,” said Jim Kuntz, Director of the Port of Walla Walla.

However, no legal action is imminent. Both Chevron and the Port are awaiting more information from the studies.

“We’re going to try to work cooperatively with Chevron so we can get this site cleaned up in an expeditious manner,” Schneidmiller said.

In Julia’s kitchen: Heirloom tomatoes the way to go

A woman at the farmers’ market leaned across the display of tomatoes at our produce stand and hefted a paper bag bulging with tomatoes into my open hands.

“You didn’t tell me these things were addictive when I got some last week. I’ve just got to get more,” she whispered, almost giddy, eager for her next fix of summer tomatoes.

“I know it. Welcome to the club. Aren’t they incredible?” I replied. At the farm I work on, we grow tomatoes with names like Green Zebra (noted for its tangy flavor and unique green color when ripe), Zapotec Pleated (a Oaxacan variety that has people coming up to our stand, picking up the three-quarter pound beauties, and asking, “Is this really a tomato?”), Doctor Wyche’s Yellow (named after the circus owner who bred the variety and fertilized his plants with elephant manure) and Marvel Stripe (a multi-color beefsteak in hues of red, orange, and yellow). The names of these varieties suggest something quite different than do the red slicers, red romas or cluster tomatoes you can pick up any time of year in your nearby generic supermarket. They refer to lineage, history and seasonality.

These tomatoes, the ones the woman confessed her love for at the market, are heirlooms. That word might ring a bell. Oh yeah…those fancy ones…the ones that cost more. But heirlooms mean more than emptying out your wallet. The word “heirloom” refers to breeds whose seeds have literally been passed down through generations. According to Seed Savers Exchange, a non-profit that collects and sells heirloom seed, heirlooms are “the result of thousands of years of adaptation and selection in diverse ecological niches around the world. Each variety is genetically unique and has developed resistances to the diseases and pests with which it evolved.” This makes them unusual compared to most of what we eat—industrialized hybrid and genetically engineered crops, where genes are selected for maximum production, uniformity, cross-country shipping and overall efficiency which often put flavor and variety on the backseat.

Heirloom lineage is often rooted in specific places, flavors and colors. Heirloom tomatoes cannot easily be grown on a large scale because they do not make a uniform product. They are, therefore, a summer treat usually grown somewhere nearby—in a neighbor’s backyard or on a farm down the road—and savored religiously for a few months every year.

To enjoy heirloom tomatoes, don’t try and dress ‘em up. My advice is, keep it simple. Appreciate their natural, unique flavors raw and unmasked. Pick an array of colors of heirlooms, slice them into quarter-inch thick rounds and arrange them in a spiral shape on a plate, alternating colors.

Drizzle a spoonful of olive oil and balsamic vinegar over the tomatoes and season with salt and pepper. Try adding oregano or basil over the top, preferably fresh. If you have the time, slide some slices of fresh mozzarella in between the tomatoes, and you’ve got yourself an Italian Insalata Caprese. So hurry up and get some heirloom tomatoes soon before fall hits hard and it’s time to revert back to the supermarket. But remember, they are addictive.

Going green, making green: fair brings living wage, environmentally friendly jobs

As the whole country raises money and sponsors events to “go green,” there may not be an event bigger and more effective than the Green Jobs Fair, occurring nationwide on Saturday, Sept. 27.

Called “the national day of action to build the new economy,” 397 venues in 47 states will throw block parties, house parties, teach-ins, living room discussions and public programs with food, music and poetry.

Organized largely by Green for All, a national organization dedicated to building a green economy strong enough to lift people out of poverty, the Green Jobs Fair hopes to raise awareness about the need for green jobs and advocate for local, state and federal commitments to job opportunities in the emerging green economy.

On campus, the Campus Greens and the First-Generation and Working Class Students at Whitman College have collaborated to help out at the Green Jobs Fair.

“We are all putting an effort in to make this a great event for the campus and the community,” said junior Amelia Singer, co-President of FGWC. “It is a unique and interesting joint venture because we are bringing together groups with very different goals in mind.”

Usually environmental concerns are not an essential part of FGWC’s mission, but since the green jobs movement is about training low-income people from urban areas in specialized, environmental work, they were more than happy to join forces with the fair.

At the fair and on campus, the clubs hope to show films and urge people to sign the Green Jobs Now “I’m Ready” Petition, which asks Congress to fund the Green Jobs Act. This act, passed last year by the House of Representatives, would train workers for jobs in the renewable energy industries.

“This is something people don’t know a whole lot about, even groups that could benefit from it,” sophomore Elli Matkin said. “[The fair] is an opportunity for them to be educated and to say that they want it to happen.”

Since green jobs aim to build a strong middle class and promote environmental sustainability, supporters of this cause strongly believe this may be the key out of the recession and the energy crisis.

Green-collar workers would install solar panels, retrofit buildings to make them more efficient, construct transit lines, refine waste oil into biodiesel, erect wind farms, repair hybrid cars, build green rooftops, plant trees and much more.

“This is the future,” Singer said, “And I hope we can get people involved and excited about green jobs.”

Tree-hugging through the ages: A history of environmental activism at Whitman

Environmental activism, although alive today, is something that has not always had a strong presence on Whitman’s campus.

“The way I see it, the 60s were all about social rebellion with a moral purpose: The Civil Rights Movement, which segued into the anti-war movement where promiscuity and dope became a political statement,” said General Studies Professor and former Environmental Studies Department head Craig Gunsul. “The 70s were a time of social rebellion without a moral purpose; people just wanted to get high and laid.”

Gunsul helped create a group of Whitman students who went to the Washington State Penitentiary in the mid-70s. He believes this helped to re-spark people’s interest in activism and channel the energy that would have gone into environmental issues.

However, some work was done during one of the Arab oil embargoes of the 1970s. Students put “Turn Off the Lights” stickers on light switches on campus in order to conserve gasoline.

Until the 1990s, there was little Whitman-Walla Walla interaction with regards to environmental activism. Gunsul credits President Tom Cronin (1993-2005) with encouraging Whitman students to get involved in the community.

Geology and Environmental Studies Professor Bob Carson has been impressed with the efforts of individual students over the years.

Kristen Kirkby ‘07 and Jay Heath ’07 were involved with The Paper Campaign, which makes recycled notebooks from cereal boxes and paper printed on one side. Brittany Smith ’08 and Juliana Williams ’07 worked with Campus Greens and Campus Climate Challenge for alternative energy.

However, Carson remains unmoved by environmental activism at Whitman as a whole.

“I think a very large proportion of Whitman students are enviromentalists or consider themselves to be,” said Carson. “A smaller proportion is going to join the coal plant working group to try to stop the big coal-fired electricity plant; an even smaller group is going to be in your face trying to get a protest started.”

Sophomore Gary Wang, co-President of Campus Climate Challenge, a branch of Campus Greens focusing on climate change, believes that one reason for this is the homogonous atmosphere on campus.
“I think the problem is that at Whitman most people care about the environment; they’re pretty similar politically, but because of this similarity you don’t need to take any action—there are always other people out there doing it for you,” said Wang.

“Look at how many environmental studies majors there are versus how many are working with environmental organizations to change day-to-day life at Whitman College,” he said. “I wouldn’t say it’s apathy. But there is no sense of urgency.”

Wang acknowledged Whitman’s green appearance, even though “there is still a lot of work to be done.”

Carson agreed, saying Whitman could be on par with schools like Oberlin College, Middlebury College, Western Washington University or The Evergreen State College.

Campus Climate Challenge has been a popular way to get involved.

“Our first meeting, we filled up all of Reid 207. We had to bring in extra chairs,” said Wang.

Wang attributes this to the Freshman Green Dorm guide handed out to incoming students and the optional workshop entitled, “Environment Now: Environmental Problems and What Whitties Do” with Bob Carson and Campus Greens during opening week.

The group is currently trying to get a 25-kW solar panel installed on either the science building or Jewett Hall.

How to change a bike tire

Follow these directions, and whether you pop a tire in the middle of Ankeny or the outskirts of Tollgate, you’ll be ready to ride in no time.

Step 1: Remove the bicycle wheel from the frame. Some bikes have a quick release that releases the wheel; others require a wrench to loosen the nuts on either side of the axle.

Step 2: If the tire is not entirely flat already, release the air from the tire.

Step 3: Using two tire levers, slide them under the edge of the tire about 6 inches apart with the “spoon” side up.  Push them both down simultaneously, causing the tire to pop off the rim.  Use one lever to slide the remaining edge of the tire out of the rim. 

Step 3.5:  Pull out the inner tube.  If the inner tube needs to be patched rather than switched completely, follow the patching steps on a tube patching kit. If the inner tube needs to be swapped for a new one, first check your tire to make sure that the kind of tube purchased matches the kind required for your bike (size is radius X width, ex. 700 X 28). Also check the tire for what caused the flat.  Run your finger on the inside of the tire to feel for any thorns.  Pull them out.

Step 4: Inflate the new tube a little bit. Slide the tube into the tire. Make sure the tube is not twisted when sliding in or it will pop when the tire is pumped up.

Step 5: Find the hole in the rim for the inflation valve, which is the piece of metal attached to the rubber tube into which air is pumped. Pull the valve through the hole in the rim and pull the tire over the wheel, starting over the valve.  Work the tire into the rim in either direction from the valve.  You should have the remaining bit of tire to go into the rim on the opposite side of the valve.   

Step 6: Wedge both tools under the tire edge, one on either side of the gap remaining to be inserted, with the “spoon” side down.  Push the levers up, shoving the tire into the rim.

Step 7: Push the rubber lip of the tire back into the wheel frame. Make sure the tube is not pinched between the edge of the tire and the rim.

Step 8: Repeat this on the other side of the tire. When the tire is almost on the rim, it will be taut and will require a last hard push to get it in the rim of the wheel.

Step 9: Re-inflate the tire until it reaches its recommended pressure as printed on the side of the tire.

Inner tubes can be purchased at the O.P. in Reid for $2.50. Problem tires and bikes can be brought to the bike shop behind North Hall from Mon. 7-9 p.m. or Thurs. 1-3:30 p.m.
compiled by Shannon Buckham

Back Page Issue 2

Andrew Hill sings from the heart

Senior Andrew Hill, a musician since age 7, a song writer since age 10, entertained Whitman students while performing at Coffeehouse in the Reid Center on Friday, Sep. 19. A past performer at Coffeehouse, Hill again relished in the supportive ambiance and expressive freedom it provided. Like other Whitman student musicians, Hill took full advantage of the opportunity to perform for his peers in an upbeat and relaxing environment.

Every song Hill performed was his own creation and reflective of his musical ingenuity. He enjoys explaining his honest opinion on poverty, racial inequality and the war through music. Hill’s voice and songs are entirely unique and expressive of his personal take on the world.

“I write mostly classic rock, but also what you would consider folk or pop. They usually deal with issues of social justice or love,” said Hill.

Hill described song-writing as a difficult process, one in which you need to be true to yourself. In the end, he finds it rewarding and worth encountering a little adversity.
As a child, “I was indoctrinated with rock and roll by my father,” said Hill.

Since Hill’s childhood, music has become a highly significant part of his life, considering that he taught himself to play the guitar.

“I have never taken any music classes at Whitman. I am in chorale, but that’s it. I have never even taken guitar lessons,” Hill said.

In addition to his parents, Bruce Springsteen and Neil Young have impacted Hill in monumental ways.

Hill once attended a Springsteen concert and described it as “a performance rather than a concert. Springsteen established a connection with his audience. The sense of energy he transmitted was so powerful and inspiring.”

However, unlike these celebrities, Hill does not own the latest model or most expensive electric guitar in existence.

He possesses quite the opposite: “It’s an old model I picked up at a pawn shop called a Vesper. It’s not well-known, but it works. I have had it for a long time.”

Hill’s instrument may not be the most modern, but it proves he can play on just about anything.

The effect on the audience was indubitable.

Audience member Emily Kitzman said, “His songs covered a wide variety of world issues and human emotions”.

First-year Monica Paulson said, “It was obvious that he is passionate about the subject of his songs.”

After graduating from Whitman College this spring, Hill plans to attend graduate school to study French. He has no concrete plans to study music; however, he will definitely continue playing the guitar.

“It will be a study break and a life break,” Hill said.

A true rock and roll aficionado, Hill transcends all conceivable limitations, writing songs from the heart and spreading the ideals of understanding, love, and equality through a medium everyone can appreciate – music.

Justice department misconduct

Have you ever been discriminated against because of the color of your skin? Your religion? Your gender? Your sexual orientation? Unless you’re a straight, male WASP like me, your answer is probably “yes.” But have you ever been discriminated against because you care about the environment, or because you’ve fought against domestic violence?

A report issued in June by the Justice Department’s inspector general said that a hiring committee routinely reviewed applicants for nonpartisan jobs in the department based on their political affiliations.  The report found that young lawyers with any ties to “liberal” organizations or the Democratic Party were rejected far more often than their less qualified, Republican-affiliated counterparts.

Among those rejected for political reasons were Rhodes scholars, law review editors, and top-honors graduates from the nation’s top law schools. The report found that these highly qualified applicants were turned down because of involvement in environmental organizations, groups fighting against domestic violence, and groups advocating human rights.

An NPR story covering the report aptly noted, “Considering politics in the hiring process is a violation of department policy and federal law.” Obviously. But what really pisses me off here is not that a crooked committee recurrently chose unqualified Republicans over highly qualified Democrats (this has been regular enough under the Bush administration, I’m sure). I am outraged that fighting domestic violence and advocating for human rights were considered “liberal affiliations.”

That abusive husbands shouldn’t beat their wives, and that human life should be treated with respect and dignity shouldn’t be politicized issues that are up for debate. How could anyone, possibly, in good conscience, dismiss these causes as unimportant, liberal nonsense. I wish I lived in a country where the people can agree that these things are important.

I can certainly understand why there are debates between liberals and conservatives about taxes, immigration, social security, etc. These are political issues. These are difficult questions about how we should run our country, and they are up for debate. It seems entirely backwards that questions with categorical answers should be addressed in the same way—questions like, “is domestic violence acceptable?” or “are human rights important?”

In an e-mail to one of her peers, a member of the committee said she voted against candidates because their essays used what she called “leftist commentary and buzz words” like “social justice.” Social Justice should not be a political issue! In this enlightened era, I thought that even the most socially conservative politicians were supposed to at least pretend to back it. I guess Geoff Davis, the G.O.P. House member who called Barack Obama “boy,” didn’t get the memo.

Are we actually starting to openly recognize that the distinction between “liberal” and “conservative” is the distinction between those who fight against injustice, and those who turn a blind eye to it?

If recognizing that black people and women have been, and are oppressed is characteristically “liberal,” if fighting for human rights is “leftist,” and if conservatives are fighting so hard (and underhandedly) to keep the people who do these things out of powerful positions, it makes me wonder: Do these conservatives endorse the perpetrators of domestic abuse and human rights violations? Do they support the thousands of hate crimes committed in the U.S. every year?

This hiring committee was doing everything in its power to make sure that victims of domestic violence remain dominated by their abusive partners. This committee was breaking the rules to ensure that people can continue to be tortured.

What’s worse is that it took so long before the committee was held accountable for their actions. When the inspector general first confronted them about their questionable decisions, they denied considering politics as part of the hiring process. When the inspector general came to them with the report’s findings, the committee said they were “surprised.” It took years before key members were forced to resign.

“Specimen days” pieces together stories to understand human psyche

“Specimen Days,” written by Michael Cunningham, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of “The Hours,” is a compilation of three stories: a ghost story set during the Industrial Revolution, a modern crime mystery, and a futuristic romance between an android and a reptilian woman from another planet. These wildly different chapters are linked to each other by the enigmatic presence of a captivatingly beautiful bowl, Walt Whitman’s “Leaves of Grass,” and the following sentiment: “Urban society is pretty terrible. We should all move back to nature.” While Cunningham’s daringness and originality should surely be admired in this novel, greater issues, such as the stories’ collective message and the crafting of a cohesive narrative, seem to fall by the wayside in the face of unbridled imagination and Walt Whitman worship.

The first part of the novel is about a young boy struggling to take care of his parents and his brother’s fiancé after his brother is killed in a factory. Inexplicably obsessed with “Leaves of Grass,” he comes to believe that his brother, and all those passed, are haunting the living through the various machines that dominate the urban environment. Reading this section of the novel, I was hooked. Although certain elements remained unexplained, the story seemed whole on its own and demonstrated profound character development as the plot unfolded and a strikingly original take on love, loss, and ghosts with unfinished business.

The second chapter is the story of a forensic psychologist working against the clock to discover a strange cult of child “terrorists” whose mission seems to be inspired (once again) by the prophetic lines of Whitman’s poem. In addition to another compelling (if somewhat slow) plot, the story gives weighty insights into the life of a middle-aged black woman whose mind is a maze of questions, unexplainable thoughts, and impulses that lead to an ending even more haunting and baffling than the first.

Although their conclusions leave something to be desired, the first two chapters of “Specimen Days” get their message across in a way that allows readers to forgive them for their less-than-complete endings. The last chapter, however, ruins this suspension of frustration. While it demonstrates an even deeper journey into the imagination—where the future New York City is one massive theme park where tourists pay to be assaulted by druggies and gang members—it does so with far less discernable significance and explanations needed to understand it. The ending, though beautifully written, trails off into an ellipsis, which most readers would find rather irritating.

These stories are fragments (or specimens) of existence as it spirals into an underworld of ennui, detachment, mechanization. However, aside from truly fascinating and frightening worldviews and futuristic visions, the novel as a whole has little more to say for itself than a visceral yearning to be freed from the shackles of urban decay, of which I think most of us have already heard plenty.

Fraternities seek to improve community relations

Students might have found themselves scrambling for their ID cards when they attended a fraternity party at the beginning of the semester.

The rule was implemented by the Interfraternity Council (IFC) in response to some incidents last year involving Whitman students and Walla Walla community members.

“Over the course of last year . . . there were a couple of fights between community members and Whitman students (some Greek, some not) and also three possible incidents of attempted date rape druggings.  Two of these incidents occurred at off-campus, independent house parties and one at a fraternity,” senior Chase Cooper, President of the IFC, wrote in an e-mail.
Cooper clarified that these incidents extended to the Whitman College campus as a whole, and were not centralized to just the fraternities on Issacs Ave.

“Point being, the issues surrounding community relations/tensions  extends to the entire Whitman College community, and is by no means isolated or confined to the Greek system or fraternities,” Cooper wrote.  Since the passing of the new rule, there have been no new incidents reported.

In fact, the problems between the fraternities and the Walla Walla community may be exaggerated.

“[In] the past we’ve had groups of kids from [Walla Walla] show up at the TKE house on more than one occasion.  More often than not, they are simply looking for a place to drink a beer or people to interact with,” wrote junior TKE fraternity member Micah Babbitt in an e-mail.

Babbitt assured that in the event something drastic happened, the residents of the house would know how to handle it since “it has been a point of interest over the past year.”

The IFC has been proactive with the community in an effort to prevent any further complications.  According to Cooper, the organization sent out “a simple community relations” letter stating their intent to encourage communication between the fraternities and their neighbors.  Sent out last semester, the letter provided contact information as well as a schedule for the all-campus parties.
Renovations made to the TKE house over the summer, including large rocks placed in front of each basement window, should also help fraternity-community relations. According to junior TKE Alex Miller, the house has received noise complaints from neighboring houses as well as from Jewett Hall. The new rocks should help dampen sound from parties at the house.

Fraternities are typically involved in community service as well.  “The TKE’s do a blood drive each semester, host a Thanksgiving dinner for a couple hundred . . . senior citizens where we take donations for Alzheimer’s disease, play bingo at the Oddfellows, and we had about twenty guys . . . involved in the Whitman mentoring program last year,” wrote Babbitt.

Cooper sees the problems between the Walla Walla community and fraternities as declining, citing “solid relations” in general.

“While still strained at times,” Cooper said,  “I feel as though the frats are – generally speaking – far more respectful of the community at large than they used to be.”

Football kicks off intramural season

It’s the most popular, the most intense, the most played, the most centripetal and, ultimately, the first intramural sport on campus. Intramural football begins this upcoming weekend with many teams eager to get at it.

“People seem to take football more seriously. People really want to win football,” said Intramural Committee Chairman Michael Warren Anderson.

“It’s one of the only IM games that people actually come and watch. Maybe because it’s on Ankeny, maybe because it’s so intense,” said Intramural Committee Member Sydney Stasch.

However, attached to the sport’s intensity is the sense of camaraderie it fosters.

“IM sports really resonate with how I feel at the school in general insofar as it promotes a sense of community, because even though we’re in competition, we’re essentially just all playing together on Ankeny,” said Anderson. “It’s just a more organized form of what you’d see on any beautiful afternoon.”

A lot of people find that their sense of community while playing football isn’t contained to the football field either.
“I’ll hang out with my friends on the football teams and we’ll just talk about plays that worked, what happened in the game, what was memorable and it’ll go on for hours,” said Stasch. “Even when we go out at night we’ll just play football. It’s weird, but we can’t help it—it’s addicting.”

IM football is also a way for first-year sections to bond with each other and older teams.

“Since [football] happens on Ankeny, it gives the freshmen a great way to come together and make more friends and so it becomes more of a social experience as well,” said Anderson.

For first-year Linh Le, member of team “That’s What She Said” from Jewett 3-West, football will be a way to bond with her section, as well as her first experience with playing sports.

“I’ve always wanted to play sports, but I’ve never felt like I was good enough to play a team sport that was a real commitment and I feel like IM sports are really low-key and anyone, whether they’re experienced or not, can join,” Le said.

Out of respect for what intramural football means to the Whitman campus, the IM Committee has increased its intensity as well. According to Stasch, last year the committee only met once a week for about 10 minutes, if that. This year, the IM Committee has met every week for at least an hour to discuss all the problems that might arise during competition. There are several.

Sometimes, people’s intensity for playing football carries over into their reaction to the way the IM committee governs the game.

“It’s frustrating because people accost us from outside of the IM Committee,” said Stasch.

To help focus this discussion into one forum, Anderson created the IM Athletes listserv, where discussion of rules, incidents in games and announcements or advertisements for other sports will be found. However, so far there are only about 300 students on the listserv, which is not enough to make sure everyone knows the important information.

“I continue to receive e-mails from people asking questions that are answerable if they were on the listserv in the first place,” said Anderson.

That way, people can leave their intensity on the field.

Restaurant review: Stone Soup lives up to legend

A little restaurant that resembles a bustling New York City café on the West side with its black roped poles and the blue awning out front boasts both good food and a laid back atmosphere.

Located a block down from the Goodwill, Stone Soup Cafe provides its famished patrons satisfaction. The inside is very quaint, aside from the fake plants which are distributed in random areas. There are paintings by Whitney Hopter Graphics on the walls, many of them of living fruit and vegetables (and by living I actually mean living: they have legs and arms and appear to be spraying each other with water bottles). A little stand draped with a flowery fabric reflects that it is indeed a small-town restaurant. The elderly drop by for a cup o’ Joe and they laugh and chat as they order their sandwiches.

There are multiple menus: a generic white board off to the side shows the basics like the types of sandwiches, the drinks, and the prices. A more elaborate, original menu written and colored on a blackboard hangs to the side of the cashier, which, if exercised the right way, would be a more aesthetically pleasing sight to see for hungry clientele.

The restaurant is set up so you order at the counter and then enjoy your meal at a table in the front. The cashiers are friendly and attentive, and the help is just as efficient as they are pleasant. Food was very prompt and arrived within ten minutes of ordering.
Although it is called the Stone Soup Cafe, the only soup that appears to be on the menu is the soup of the day. Needless to say, their name is deceiving. The sandwiches, however, are pretty appetizing. With soft bread, a selection of colorful vegetables, lunch meats and a variety of cheeses, the sandwich is just as attractive as it is delicious and for an affordable price. There are some side dishes that go along with the deluxe sandwiches which include cole slaw, potato salad, pasta salad, or chips. The presentation of the food is not exactly up to par with that of a five star bistro, but putting more emphasis on cooking than their aesthetics is a sign of an eatery with its heart in the right place.

The appeal of this restaurant is not just because of its good eats, but also because of the derivation of its name as Stone Soup Cafe. The legend of Stone Soup reads that there were three starving soldiers returning from the Hundred Years War in France. Failing to find any benevolent people to give them food, they ended up tricking the peasants by gathering a huge cauldron, boiling water with stones in it, and claiming to make “stone soup”. The peasants subsequently began joining in. They began adding ingredients to the soup such as herbs, meat and vegetables. Everyone then enjoyed the best meal they had all had in years, and decided it would be impossible to go hungry again now that they knew that you could make soup from stones. The restaurant even has a copy of the story available for those who wish to read it.

While the name may be slightly deceiving, Stone Soup Cafe has flavorful food that can keep a customer sufficiently pleased. Welcome to “Stone Soup.” You’ll never go hungry.

Taking a Closer Look at the Candidates

It’s easy to remember why Barack Obama was such a hero for American Democrats, and even many Republicans, when he first announced his decision to run for president.  He is young, fresh, exciting and appears honest and trustworthy. Americans want change and a government we can believe in.  Obama, with his rock-star smile and inspirational words, has been a no-brainer from the beginning.  He is everything that Bush isn’t and Americans have been associating him with hope and a morally driven government since the beginning.

At first it seemed guaranteed that the Democrats were going to win the presidency.  After all, Obama promised change!  How could anyone beat that?

And then McCain played his trump card.  Single-handedly changing the tone of the race, he announced his running mate: Alaskan Governor Sarah Palin.  Where Obama is young and fresh, Palin is newer and fresher!  Obama is black, but who cares?  Palin is female (and Alaskan, at that)!  Obama is a people-person, but Palin is a lipstick-wearing soccer mom.  Obama’s family, race and name all hint that he can bring peace and maybe some kind of international cooperation.   But Palin is a mother to whom many Americans feel they can relate, suggesting intra-national cooperation and unity.

What a conundrum!  Americans are suddenly thrust in the middle of the battle for who is the real Fresh President (putting aside that Palin isn’t even running for president).  This is excellent!  This battle can only have one outcome.  Americans will have to look beyond the faces, beyond the lipstick and the rhetoric, beyond the hope-inspiring speeches and examine their actual policies and goals for the country.

While judging a presidential candidate by his or policies may seem obvious at first, it is actually really intimidating to judge and analyze suggested policies.  Not only do we have to understand the jargon and have to think for ourselves, but we have to trust that the future president is not lying, trying to screw us over, misrepresenting the facts and otherwise being completely honest.

Ignoring policies is an understandable mistake in light of America’s severe lack of trust in our government.  Understandable, but inexcusable.  We are picking a president here, not America’s next hot top model!

McCain’s choice of running mate is politically brilliant.  He gave all the Americans who wanted to vote for Hillary because of her gender someone else to vote for.  Democrats now have to find another reason to support Obama.

Taking a closer look at our politicians can only be better for our future as a nation.  Being young and new to politics just won’t be enough to win the race anymore.

Lecturer comments on conceptions of “Gods and politics”

September 18, at 7:30 p.m., Wade Clark Roof, one of the country’s foremost scholars on religious pluralism in America gave a well attended lecture titled “America’s Gods and Politics.”

“He’s a particularly prominent figure, doing important research on pluralism and the connection between religion and politics,” said Melissa Wilcox, professor of religion and the director of the gender studies program at Whitman.

Wilcox was a graduate student under Professor Roof and the faculty sponsor for this lecture.  With the presidential election a mere two months away, Professor Roof traced the relationship between religious groups and political contests from 1960 to the 2008 election and examines how different conceptions of God influence political values.

Professor Roof examined how various customs governing the relationship between how religion and politics have changed in the last 50 years.  In 1960, when John F. Kennedy ran for president, he diffused the controversy over his Catholicism by swearing by the absolute separation of church and state at that time.

“Clergy did not tell Americans by and large how to vote.  There were no religious tests for candidates running for office,” said Roof.

However, 20 years later, customs governing religion and politics began to change.  “In 1981, 20 years after Kennedy, Ronald Reagan speaking to the National Association of evangelicals, said, ‘I know that you cannot endorse me but I endorse you.’ This short sentence marked a major break in customs and the beginnings of a more visible and explicit recognized mixing of religion and politics.  We have clergy distributing moral scorecards on politicians’ views on moral subjects.  And politicians court religious communities with religious rhetoric and promises to fund faith-based religious issues,” said Roof.

Roof also emphasized that religion and politics are inevitably intertwined because religion shapes the moral views of many individuals and those moral views are translated into support for particular candidates and policies.

Professor Roof then presented data on how differing views about the nature of God and God’s relationship toward the world correlates with political values.  He divided Christian believers into four different categories: those who believed in an authoritarian God, a benevolent God, a critical God, and a distant God.   Authoritarian and benevolent God believers view God as deeply engaged in the world, with the former believing in an angry punitive God and the latter believing in a loving nurturing one.  Critical and distant God believers view God as less engaged in the world.  He noted a strong positive correlation with religious participation, measured in the frequency of church attendance and prayer and with one’s conception of God.  Authoritarian God believers attend church more often and have more favorable views on President Bush, the war in Iraq and the belief that God is on the side of the United States.

Critically, Roof noted that the notion of as an authoritarian father figure God has been used to legitimate American nationalism, military conflict and essentially, an empire ideology.  However, Roof pointed out that the evangelical movement, the group most closely associated with a conception of an authoritarian God, is broadening its concern to not just abortion and gay marriage but also poverty and climate change.

“The critical question is, can benevolent believers with critical and distant God believers overwhelm the authoritarian God constituency?” Roof said.

At the end of the lecture, Roof proceeded to take several questions from the audience.

“Overall, I thought his talk made things really understandable and interesting,” said Max Adcox, an audience member.  Professor Wilcox was right; Roof’s lecture timely illuminated for many the diversity of God imagery within Christianity

Block Party suceeds indoors

Reid Campus Center buzzed with excitement last Saturday as students sporadically dropped to do pushups, jumped in an inflatable bouncy-castle and sprayed paint on T-shirts during the annual Interest House Community (IHC) Block Party. The interest houses were encouraged to put on events pertaining to their respective houses.

Patrick Herman, IHC Resident Director, wanted to spread awareness about the houses. “I really wanted to have a good time and to invite people to learn about the houses… We have a goal to really open the IHC to campus this year,” said Herman.

Students were invited to partake in a variety of events. Many houses offered food. There were crepes, piñatas with candy, Vietnamese rice pudding, cotton candy and popcorn, among other treats offered to students.

“The food is great!” said Elizabeth Bragg, who lives in the Global Awareness House.
Students were encouraged to meet the residents living in the various interest houses.

“I want everyone to get to know the people and the houses. The IHC is a great resource we have that’s really unique to Whitman. We want people just to be able to stop by the houses anytime, like they would with any of the other halls on campus,” said Herman.

IHC residents came to the block party with various goals for the afternoon.

“We just want to let people there’s a Spanish House and that they’re welcome to come hang out whenever,” said Abby McCoy.

The Co-op encouraged students to volunteer for a stream restoration project this Saturday, and to commit to more community service throughout the semester.

“We’re really pushing people to pledge 20 hours of community service,” said Sarah Reichardt. “We could have collected money for a charity, but this way we’re getting more people involved in community service.”

Other residents saw the block party as just an opportunity to have fun.

“We’re here for good food, good conversation, good dancing. Like the French,” said Danielle Witt from the French House.

“We’re just listening to great music and chilling out with our good friends, the Outhouse and the German House,” said McCoy.

Students outside of the IHC also enjoyed themselves.

“This is awesome,” said sophomore Rachelle Sloss. “I think it’s better than last year’s because all the activities are really fun. Lots of good food, and I got to make a headband.”

For many of the interest houses, this was the first of many planned events for the year. The Global Awareness House advertised for a pizza party this week. The Spanish House hinted at their plans to have “the best dance parties on campus,” and the Co-op encouraged students to make a lasting commitment to community service.

“The block party is such a success,” said Herman. “It was really fun when George Bridges got dunked and it was great of him to do that.”

Some residents admitted disappointment that the block party was moved from its original outdoor location to the Reid Campus Center on account of rain.

“It’s not as good as it could be because it’s not outside, but it’s still been a lot of fun,” said Writing House resident, John Loranger.

The block party was well-attended and many houses ran out of supplies long before 5 p.m., when the party ended.

“We just bought a bunch of art supplies and let people go crazy with it. We’re actually basically out of shirts to paint,” said Rachel Hahn of the Fine Arts House.

“We’re out of piñatas, but we’re just chatting with people in Spanish and giving away candy,” said McCoy.

Laughing the night away with Theatre Sports

“Do I have a best friend? Well of course I do. It’s my hand.” Jokes like these had the entire audience laughing hysterically ten minutes after 10 pm on Tuesday Sep. 16. The comedy came from Whitman’s improve theater group known as T-sports, who put on their first performance of the school year.

There were no scripts, no props (except for chairs) and yet the audience never stopped laughing. “I fully believe in improv as a form of performance, and I want to be involved in it for the rest of my life,” said Sarah Hatheway.

The seven person team – sophomore Finn Straley, junior Peter Richards, senior Evan Cartwright, senior Sarah Hatheway, senior Kevin Moore, senior Benjamin Kegan, and alumni student Julie McQuary – come from different backgrounds with improv and acting.
For Kegan, his first experience participating in T-Sports was his first year at Whitman when he went to audition for T-Sports after seeing it once and thinking that it looked like fun. “It’s just really fun to go up on stage and make a fool of yourself,” Kegan said of his experiences.

Hatheway likes the additional challenge of thinking on her feet. “Nothing compares to the rush of being on stage without the safety net of a script to fall back on. It’s a discipline that tests your memory, your confidence, and your knowledge of everything from ancient history to pop culture,” she said.

Kegan believes the most important part of T-Sports is that individuals are “willing to fail and take risks. Improv is not stand-up comedy, it’s not about jokes. You have to be able to tell a story.”

This event, the first one of the year, is one of many T-Sports will put on throughout the year. Kegan said the team plans to have a couple shows a month to provide “safe, alcohol-free, campus-wide entertainment.”

“I think there’s something wonderfully interactive about experiencing improv live: you know that you’re never going to see the same show twice. It’s exciting to watch people doing what they love. The fact that we’re all very good looking and charming probably helps,” said Hatheway when asked why students come to improv shows.

Students had varied reactions to the show. First year Caitlin Feeney said “I really like “Who’s Line is it Anyway?”, so this was fun to watch.”

Alyssa Fairbanks, another first year student was more critical, “It was really funny,” she said “but I felt like they could have had more of a variety of games.”

During finals week, T-Sports puts on short shows for the purpose of giving students a short break. Kegan said, “It’s a great break from studying. It’s a therapeutic laugh, and a chance to fool around.”

Along with these promoted campus-wide performances, T-Sports puts on bi-weekly shows in Kimball Theater that provide an experimental form of improv. In these smaller shows, the team tries out new forms of improv in a community setting.

The improve group’s highlighted performance of the year happens in the spring when they put on a 24-hour T-Sports fundraiser for Blue Mountain Heart-to-Heart, a non-profit organization that supports people living with HIV/AIDS. The fundraiser provides an excellent opportunity for excessive amounts of coffee and team bonding.

Kegan said that his best friends have been in T-Sports. “It’s a cool feeling, there is a high level of trust within the group,” he said.

Should you register to vote in Walla Walla?

Contributed by Lenore Barkan
Walla Walla Democratic Party Canvassing Co-Chair

If they are not registered to vote, many Whitman students wonder whether they should register to vote in their home town or in Walla Walla. If they are already registered, Whitman students often ask whether they should change their registration from their hometown to Walla Walla or whether it would be better to vote absentee in their hometown.  Here are the pros and cons of voting in Walla Walla.

Pros of Voting in Walla Walla

1. All balloting in Walla Walla County is by mail.  Your receive your ballot in the mail, and you can return it either by mail or by taking it in person to the Auditor’s Office located in the County Courthouse on Main Street. Receiving your ballot at your Whitman address may be easier than having a ballot from somewhere else forwarded to you by your parents or signing up to receive an absentee ballot. You only have to register once in Walla Walla, and then you will receive your ballot for every election at the address for which you registered.  However, if you move, you will have to change your address at the Auditor’s Office.
2. You will be able to become involved in local and Washington State election issues, which may be more important to you than issues at home.
3. If you see Washington as a more important “swing” state in the presidential election than your home state, you may want to vote in Washington. Should you decide to register to vote in Walla Walla, you will eventually be mailed a voter registration card.  However, because the office which handles voter registration is now very busy, you might not receive this card until after the election.  After you submit your reigstration form, call the Walla Walla Auditor’s Office at (509) 524-2530 if you have any questions about your registration status.

Cons of voting in Walla Walla

1. You must vote in the locale that is your permanent residence. By registering to vote in Walla Walla, you are declaring that Walla Walla is your permanent residence.  Under state law this means that you have 30 days from the time you register to vote to also register your motor vehicle in Walla Walla and, if you are from out-of-state, to get a Washington driver’s license. If you are stopped by the police for some unrelated offence, e.g. speeding, there is a hefty additional fine for not having the correct vehicle or driver’s license.
2. You may, in fact, be more interested in political controversies in your home state than in Walla Walla. Reigistering in Walla Walla would prevent you from voting in your home town.  If you see your home state as a more important “swing” state in the presidential election than Washington, you may want to vote at home.

It’s time for Whitman to let its voice be heard

PIONEER BOARD EDITORIAL

Each day, 18,000 children die of hunger and/or malnutrition; there are over 23 million refugees and internally displaced persons worldwide; and billions of people live each day with no guarantee of freedom of speech.
In the meantime, American colleges and universities are busy chattering about whether the drinking age should be lowered to 18.
Around 130 college presidents have signed onto the petition to lower the drinking age.  While this is but a mere drop in the bucket of the approximately 3,500 college presidents nation-wide the petition has created quite a stir, eliciting attention from major and minor news outlets and colleges, students and parents.

Citing the college’s practice of political neutrality, George Bridges refrained from signing the petition.
Bridges’ choice was a wise one considering that there is no evidence to support the claims made by proponents of a lower drinking age.  Additionally, it would have been essentially impossible to get the consensus of the trustees and administrators to support such an amendment.

The practice of total neutrality, however, denies the power we possess as an institution and leaves many important things unsaid.

As with all non-profits, Whitman, as an institution, is prohibited from endorsing partisan political statements.  And it makes sense.

Non-profit designation is why churches can’t inform their congregations that voting for a particular candidate is the will of God.  It’s why highly controversial groups like pro or anti-abortion groups can’t be non-profits.  It’s why you can’t donate to the Democratic or Republican party and write it off on your taxes (at least not without pulling a few extra strings).
In terms of political issues, it makes sense for Whitman to remain neutral.   It would, after all, contradict the school’s very mission of encouraging students to “develop capacities to analyze, interpret, criticize, communicate, and engage” if the school were tell us who to vote for and what stores to shop at.

And Whitman does an excellent job of this.  The school pours millions of dollars into students so that we can go protest the treatment of workers in meatpacking plants or improve water quality in India—or even put up Ron Paul signs and make Barack Obama buttons.

Yet the precedent of neutrality has been so strong that it has kept Whitman from taking a stand on issues of universal human rights.

When faced with the apartheid in South Africa, Whitman chose not to take a stance on the fundamental injustice of institutional racial discrimination.

Over 150 colleges and universities chose to divest their financial assets from South Africa in protest to the fundamental injustice of apartheid.  Despite intense student and faculty pressure, Whitman, citing the policy of political neutrality and the best interests of the students, chose not to divest.

The colleges that did choose to take a stand saw the power of their actions. Nelson Mandela noted that the efforts of colleges to take a stand against apartheid and divest their assets from South Africa helped to bring down apartheid.

Colleges have long been viewed as engines of positive, progressive change.  While much of this weight rests on the backs of students and faculty, the institutions themselves would do well to explore the virtues they encourage in their students.
Indeed, it is inherent in the critical nature of a liberal arts education that we should know how to draw the line between partisan politics and an assault on human rights.

We cannot maintain neutrality as millions are killed, raped, abducted and displaced in the Darfur region of Sudan.  We cannot pretend to be too busy fiddling with our books to say something when a hurricane ravages a nation and the government barely puts a Band-Aid on a gaping wound.  We cannot wave our non-profit flag as we mumble “no comment” while HIV/AIDS ravages the entire continent of Africa.

As a college in control of an approximately $400 million endowment, not to mention the minds and ears of thousands, we have a powerful voice.  Yet silence in restraint and silence in apathy both render our voice unheard.

We cannot afford to cling so tightly to the safety of neutrality that we neglect to use our strength to offer a helping voice to those rendered speechless.  For years of restraint have not rendered us silent but will make our voice all the louder when we do speak out.

Editor’s note:  This opinion piece reflects the view of The Pioneer and not necessarily the views of each individual associated with the newspaper.  The Pioneer welcomes Letters to the Editor or contradicting opinion pieces.

Discrimination still alive in Justice Department

Have you ever been discriminated against because of the color of your skin? Your religion? Your gender? Your sexual orientation? Unless you’re a straight, male WASP like me, your answer is probably “yes.” But have you ever been discriminated against because you care about the environment, or because you’ve fought against domestic violence?
A report issued in June by the Justice Department’s inspector general said that a hiring committee routinely reviewed applicants for nonpartisan jobs in the department based on their political affiliations.  The report found that young lawyers with any ties to “liberal” organizations or the Democratic Party were rejected far more often than their less qualified, Republican-affiliated counterparts.
Among those rejected for political reasons were Rhodes scholars, law review editors, and top-honors graduates from the nation’s top law schools. The report found that these highly qualified applicants were turned down because of involvement in environmental organizations, groups fighting against domestic violence, and groups advocating human rights.

An NPR story covering the report aptly noted, “Considering politics in the hiring process is a violation of department policy and federal law.” Obviously. But what really pisses me off here is not that a crooked committee recurrently chose unqualified Republicans over highly qualified Democrats (this has been regular enough under the Bush administration, I’m sure). I am outraged that fighting domestic violence and advocating for human rights were considered “liberal affiliations.”

That abusive husbands shouldn’t beat their wives, and that human life should be treated with respect and dignity shouldn’t be politicized issues that are up for debate. How could anyone, possibly, in good conscience, dismiss these causes as unimportant, liberal nonsense. I wish I lived in a country where the people can agree that these things are important.

I can certainly understand why there are debates between liberals and conservatives about taxes, immigration, social security, etc. These are political issues. These are difficult questions about how we should run our country, and they are up for debate. It seems entirely backwards that questions with categorical answers should be addressed in the same way—questions like, “is domestic violence acceptable?” or “are human rights important?”

In an e-mail to one of her peers, a member of the committee said she voted against candidates because their essays used what she called “leftist commentary and buzz words” like “social justice.” Social Justice should not be a political issue! In this enlightened era, I thought that even the most socially conservative politicians were supposed to at least pretend to back it. I guess Geoff Davis, the G.O.P. House member who called Barack Obama “boy,” didn’t get the memo.

Are we actually starting to openly recognize that the distinction between “liberal” and “conservative” is the distinction between those who fight against injustice, and those who turn a blind eye to it?

If recognizing that black people and women have been, and are oppressed is characteristically “liberal,” if fighting for human rights is “leftist,” and if conservatives are fighting so hard (and underhandedly) to keep the people who do these things out of powerful positions, it makes me wonder: Do these conservatives endorse the perpetrators of domestic abuse and human rights violations? Do they support the thousands of hate crimes committed in the U.S. every year?

This hiring committee was doing everything in its power to make sure that victims of domestic violence remain dominated by their abusive partners. This committee was breaking the rules to ensure that people can continue to be tortured.

What’s worse is that it took so long before the committee was held accountable for their actions. When the inspector general first confronted them about their questionable decisions, they denied considering politics as part of the hiring process. When the inspector general came to them with the report’s findings, the committee said they were “surprised.” It took years before key members were forced to resign.

Dino Rossi appeals to Walla Walla community

In an attempt to expand his range of voters, Washington gubernatorial hopeful Dino Rossi spoke at Walla Walla’s Elk’s Lodge in a luncheon address last Thursday. In a packed room of Rotary Club members, the Republican candidate lamented the current affairs of state politics and touted his ability to effectively lead Washington out of its decline.

Rossi, running his campaign based on Democratic incumbent Christine Gregoire’s “failed” term as governor, is implementing a method of “compare and contrast” to woo disgruntled Washingtonians.  He wants the citizens of Washington to reconsider their gubernatorial choice.
In 2004 Gregoire beat Rossi in a highly controversial race.  After three million votes were cast, Gregoire was proclaimed the victor by a mere 261 votes. Three recounts later brought the margin of victory down to 133. Rossi sued, claiming that Gregoire’s camp had illegally registered both felons and the dead.  The judge ruled in Gregoire’s favor and even nullified four illegal votes for Rossi.  Dino lost by 129 votes.

But in front of the Rotary Club on Thursday, Rossi spoke confidently and glibly to an enthusiastic audience. He highlighted his success as Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee in the Washington State Senate in 2003 and the expanding “citizens’ movement” surrounding his campaign.

Rossi lampooned Gregoire’s supposedly irresponsible spending and the state’s $3.2 million deficit. In contrast, he stressed his own fiscal responsibility, promising to balance the deficit without raising taxes, claiming, “I’ve done it before so I can do it again.”

Rossi also spoke extensively on his goal to make small businesses in Washington more profitable. He wants Olympia’s concentration to move away from Seattle, Boeing, and Microsoft and instead focus on rural Washington and its contribution to the state.  He claimed that as small and medium sized businesses grow, they hire more people and improve the economy.

Having made his first million dollars at the tender age of thirty, Rossi emphasized his empathy toward the turmoil of the entrepreneur.  Rossi wishes Washington to be an “entrepreneurial state” and “wants Washington to be…the best place in America to start a business.”
Though Rossi never explained specifics or the necessary steps to bolster the might of small business, his statement inspired an explosive applause.

For much of his address, Rossi emphasized his can-do attitude and the hardships he has had to overcome to become a gubernatorial hopeful.  As the seventh child of a “Brady Bunch” style family living off a school teacher’s salary, Rossi is no stranger to adversity.
He attended business school at Seattle University, but only by working construction and janitorial jobs.  Against the odds, he became successful in real estate by ignoring the “naysayers.”

He ended his speech by promising to take a “fresh set of eyes” to governorship. He even appealed to the Rotary Club to find community members to help him in Olympia.

In all, Rossi’s engaging address served more as a rallying cry than a discussion of specifics.

Bush’s Pakistan policy

President Bush is playing the gotcha game, yet again.

In July, well before Russia invaded Pakistan, he authorized United States Special Operations forces to invade Pakistan at the sound of the word ‘terrorist.’ Then, in August, after Russia was provoked and proceeded to invade Georgia, he criticized their invasion as being “disproportionate and unacceptable.”

Camouflaged in the word ‘freedom’ and seemingly hunting for the word ‘terrorism,’ since Sept. 3, the U.S. has unconditionally invaded and killed 40 people in Pakistan, of whom at least 20 were women or children That, ladies and gents, is ‘disproportionate and unacceptable.’

If the U.S. so strongly supported the territorial integrity of Georgia, a fervent supporter of the U.S.’s crusade against Middle East ‘terrorism’ who, at one time, had as many as 2,000 troops in Iraq alone, then it is bewildering why the U.S. no longer supports the territorial integrity of Pakistan, also a staunch pro-American nation who at one time deployed a troop level 36 times that of Georgia in the name of ‘freedom.’

Sounds paradoxical? Well, not really.

In the eyes of the Bush Administration, Pakistan recently committed the cardinal sin of allowing their people in a truly democratic election to –guess what– select a not-so-pro-American government, headed by the late Benazir Bhutto’s widower, President Asif Ali Zardari.

Moreover, Pervez Musharraf’s successor as military chief, Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, who at first still seemed loyal to the pro-American precedent set by Musharraf, has proven more moderate and realistic than President Bush had anticipated. With respect to the recent U.S. bombings in Pakistan, Kayani unwaveringly said that “no external force is allowed to conduct operations inside Pakistan.”

By commanding missions in Pakistan without prior approval by its government, U.S. forces will further destabilize the tribal areas between Pakistan and Afghanistan they so dearly want to control. The Pashtun, tribesmen native to northwest Pakistan, have already vowed to pool their resources against an American incursion into their territory, which includes nearly all of the North-West Frontier Province (a 75,000 square-kilometer chunk of Pakistan’s north).

Pakistan’s government is green and must get on its feet before it can readily install a counterterrorist force in its most vulnerable border regions. The U.S. must accept that. And the U.S. policy that will best accomplish its goals of asphyxiating Al-Qaeda’s presence and resources is one that is patient and unimposing on its Pakistani allies.

Several problems, however, still remain. In a recent poll, some 80 percent of Pakistanis do not favor a U.S. strike on Al-Qaeda within their border. The Bush team seems bewildered by this: ‘Why are these guys all-of-a-sudden turning their backs on us when we’ve been training and equipping their military for the past half a decade?’ The simple answer is that Pakistan didn’t really elect former President Musharraf (he seized control in a 1999 military coup d’état) and, hence, the Bush Administration has been clouded by the dictator’s cooperation in his crusade against Middle East ‘terrorism.’ Pakistani’s were rarely, if ever, in favor of Musharraf’s under-the-table dealings with the United States. By 2007, Musharraf’s approval rating was nearly as poor as Bush’s, at a measly 34.8 percent according to Dawn, Pakistan’s most respected English news network.

The more complex answer delves into the nature of the relationship the Musharraf-led government had with Al-Qaeda, a dangerous precedent that persists today. Leading up to the Sept. 11 attacks, former Inter-Services Intelligences head (the Pakistani CIA) Mahmud Ahmed had fueled $100,000 from the government to the pocket of Mohammed Atta, the lead hijacker. Though he was fired, this was not until 2004, nearly 4 years after the money was appropriated.

The ISI and, by extension, the Pakistani government still somewhat follow this precedent. However, nowadays it is not followed to fund jihadist proxies, but followed to calm the tribesmen nervous of an American presence. If the government were not to delicately move away from this precedent (i.e. following a haste, here-and-now U.S. policy), it is likely that the region would erupt in a tribal war, consequently putting potential U.S. forces there in a deadly situation.

The Pakistani government and its people feel, and rightly so, that they are being oppressed by the U.S. invasion of their territory. Whatever the U.S. does, the Pakistanis must follow suit. Thus, they also feel that the wars in the north (i.e. ‘War on Terrorism’) against Al-Qaeda and the Taliban are not theirs to fight.

So before President Bush leaves office in less than four months and northern Pakistan in a chaotic, bomb-ridden mess, he can walk up to Mr. Zardari, tag his arm and instead of saying ‘Now it’s your problem,’ he can say, ‘Gotcha!’

Core falls short of doing job

At this point in the year, everyone reading should be familiar with the Core program.  Core has been the subject of a great deal of controversy, and has withered assaults from many quarters, but still perseveres.  This article has two parts and will attempt to shed some light on why exactly Core might not be doing its job, and why the job it purports to be doing might not be such a great thing in the first place.Core is an extremely important class for Whitman College.  By making it the sole mandatory course for all students, the college is making a deliberate choice to approach knowledge and community in a very specific way.  Because Core is one of the few academic aspects of the college that all (or almost all) Whitman students interact with, it plays a powerful role in shaping our community norms and standards.  By positioning the course so centrally, the identity of Whitman and the identity of the Core program are tied together.  But what do we learn when we learn Core, and how does the discourse of Core shape our experience at College?The Core program has a sizeable scope.  In the course description, it bills itself as covering, “the continuity in the transition of dominant world views, but also to competing and alternative visions.”  That’s a lot of material, and the way in which its covered leaves a lot to be desired.The choice of texts for the Core curriculum was not one that was made lightly.  Choosing the few texts that every Whitman student must read to be a member of the community has a lot of implications, and I think the texts that have been chosen reflect a very upsetting worldview.First I would like to ask who speaks in the Core curriculum.  With the exceptions of Toni Morrison and Emily Brontë (which I will address in a moment), all of the authors in the “modernity” unit are wealthy white men.  This is not to say that people occupying such a subject position have nothing valuable to say.  Quite the contrary; I think that everyone has valuable things to contribute.  But for a course that is supposed to cover both the creation of dominant worldviews and competing and alternative visions, I’m left wondering what role that non-whites and non-males have played in the creation of these “dominant” and/or “alternative” worldviews.I don’t believe the inclusion of Toni Morrison in the Core curriculum reflects a good faith interest on the part of the Core program to meaningfully integrate non-white voices in the program.  The subject matter of the book differs greatly from that of the other texts that are read in a way that makes its cross-application difficult, and little to no context is given for the events which it discusses.Similarly, Brontë’s work is rendered toothless by the context in which it is placed.  Although it is not impossible to use Brontë to make a feminist reading of other Core texts, her critique in Wuthering Heights fails to “rattle the cage” of the other authors in any serious way and rather attempts to find a voice within the meta-narrative of Enlightment thought.Core is all about “classics,” and nowhere is this more evident than in the first semester of the course.  The texts that are chosen to represent “the ancient world” come, without exception, from Western sources.  Pardon me for not having known that all “dominant or alternative” worldviews originated in Greece.  The culture and ideology that one learns about in the first semester of Core is a White one.  Whitman’s priorities here are quite clear.  There are no texts from non-western sources, and no attempt is made to discuss such texts.The notion of a “classic” itself needs to be problematized.  For whom are these texts “classics,” and what about them makes them such?  Is there an essential character or quality to their writing that marks them as different in kind from other texts written during their periods?  Dominant worldviews do not spring into existence independently from people.  They are shaped and fashioned by works of all kinds, but they are articulated and reproduced by dominant social groups because they support the interests of these groups.  When we learn Core, we are learning the history and the voices of dominant social groups (in this case, rich white people), and the token voices of others that are sometimes given lip service.  To me, this means that Core is not doing its job.  Part II of this article will address criticisms of these dominant views.

Mentor Program receives record 170 applicants

With a record number of 170 student applicants, the Whitman Mentor Program is busting at the seams – and the organizers could not be happier.

“There are so many Whitman students involved – over 10% of the student population. We are happy because the biggest problem is getting people to commit,” Mentor Program Intern, sophomore Rachel Sicheneder, said.

The mentor program is unique in its non-academic nature. Instead of focusing on meeting standards, local elementary-age youth are matched with a college-age companion solely to interact and bond.

“The one-on-one time the mentors spend with the students here is a special time for them because someone is concentrating on them. It encourages them in all sorts of ways and the mentors can give them extra input in areas of difficulty. It’s like a big friend, a big brother or sister,” Barbara Thatcher, the Intervention Specialist at Green Park Elementary School, said.

The Whitman student’s companion-like role makes the program enjoyable both for the children and for the college students.
“The best part is, you aren’t helping them by being a counselor, or a teacher, or a security guard. Instead, you are being a friend,” senior Shayna Tivona said.

Although the Mentor Program has a relaxed nature, Whitman students are given the opportunity to speak into the lives of at-risk children who may otherwise lack a positive adult role model.

“Students are often referred by the teachers or other staff members. One reason might be that they have difficulty making friends or in social interactions with their peers. Many are from a single-parent family so they wouldn’t have that male or female role model. Sometimes they may not have confidence in their abilities or self-esteem,” Thatcher said.

This program is important to adults who work with these children on a daily basis. Whitman mentors help compensate for the inevitable limitations of educational field workers.

“I had a student who was in third grade when he first started having a mentor and was constantly getting into trouble on playground and classroom – his attitude wasn’t very positive. We matched him with a mentor who was very positive, very encouraging, and I think it made a really big difference in this boy’s behavior,” Thatcher said.

Because the mentor program focuses on positive interaction instead of rehabilitation or counseling, the changes in elementary-age mentees are not always this apparent – but the impact is no less significant.

“I think the fact that the mentees have an older person they can confide in and depend upon to show up once a week is very positive. A lot of these kids experience a lack of stability in other parts of their lives. Having a cool college friend who is always going to be there that one day a week is something they can rely on and look forward to,” junior Jacqueline Kamm said.

This one-on-one attention is a valuable component to the development of the students’ self-esteem and success in the classroom. Even if the students do not always let on to their appreciation, it means a lot to them.

“Last spring when it was time for me to go home for the summer, I told her that I wouldn’t be seeing her for a while and she got kind of quiet and told me she wasn’t happy that I was leaving. I had to cheer her up afterwards. I had no idea she liked me that much!” Kamm said.

Not only do Whitman students engage their sense of civic responsibility through the Mentor Program, but it is simply a fun time.

“You can make a difference, and it only takes one hour each week!” Tivona said. “Plus you can play tetherball, four square, and tag. How awesome is that?”

America Green vs. America Greed: The push for renewable energy

Not long ago, it seemed as if the world was ending.  The dizzying ascent of oil prices sent many people (including yours truly), pondering and fretting about oil at $200 a barrel and beyond.  Though this frenzy seems to have tapered off in the wake of a de facto recession (and thus decreasing energy use), I anticipate that the distraction from energy prices will only be temporary.  Increasing demand from booming economies, such as China and India, will certainly put a strain on supply in the future, and energy prices will rise once again.
While environmentalists have praised solar and wind energy for years, mainstream America is JUST beginning to catch on.  Look no further than the campaigns—the presidential candidates of both major parties have thrown their support behind such technologies (at least, they have in rhetoric).  Though such popularity has coincided with the rise of energy prices, it has also coincided with the increasing acceptance and acknowledgement of the global warming phenomenon.  Thus, the question arises: why the push to be green?  Is it conscience that leads Americans to buy a Prius and install solar panels on their roofs, or is it capitalism?  Is it for morality or money?

Two figures stand out when evaluating this dichotomy.  On the capitalist side, you have T. Boone Pickens, now famous for his “Pickens Plan,” which you can learn more about at the aptly named Web site, pickensplan.com.  On the conscience side, you have Al Gore, which, aside from his usual stances, caused quite a stir this past July when challenging the United States to supply all of its energy from renewable fuels within 10 years, costs be damned.  I may be accused of being glib in polarizing these two figures, but, I feel that this is an effective example.  Pickens is a man who characterizes the recent energy shock as a primarily economic challenge.  His evangelical attempts at converting Americans into renewable believers often comes with the statement, “we spend nearly $700 billion every year buying foreign oil, which represents the greatest transfer of wealth in the history of mankind.”  Meanwhile, Gore, when discussing his ambitious goal of powering America 100% on renewable energy, states “once again, we have the opportunity to take a giant leap forward for humankind.”  The language here has a tone of greater urgency, regarding an issue perceived as more important than money.

With different tactics and backgrounds, they are likely to draw in vastly different crowds.  Pickens, with his straight talk and businessman-like style, is likely to be more successful with a conservative crowd, while Gore, with his penchant for grandeur and environmental ideals, can easily recruit those on the left.  Okay, it doesn’t take a genius to point this out.  But, regardless of whether people are doing it for ideals of green or greed, people are starting to make a marked change in their lifestyles.  The recruitment is working, whether it’s the result of the Pickens Plan and higher energy prices or ‘An Inconvenient Truth’ and concern about our planet.  People are starting to wean themselves off fossil fuels, or at least reduce their usage.  The number of miles driven this past year has decreased for the first time in over 20 years.  Sales of SUV’s and other gas-guzzling vehicles have plummeted.  And public transportation systems across the countries are reporting drastic increases in ridership.

I know that my job on this column is to opine about something with conviction, without vacillation.  Yet, I can only say with conviction that I don’t know whether capitalism or conscience is winning.  While my idealist half would like to think that humankind is quite concerned about carbon emissions and the fate of our planet, the pragmatic half is convinced that people are dumping the SUV to pa-y the rent.  What I am convinced of is that this is only the beginning in a series of societal changes.

We will gradually cease to afford cheap, carbon-based fuels, whether due to economical or environmental issues.  Instead, we will only be met with challenges on how to push our society forward.  And so, as a great man once said, “the torch has been passed to a new generation.”  It is up to us now to do what our parents wanted and needed to do, but couldn’t or wouldn’t.  It is up to us, whatever our motives are, to survive; to learn to harness the awesome strength of nature, for the benefit of all – for the peaceful coexistence of both our natural environment and humankind.

Obviously, as you can see, I’m a fan of Mr. Gore.

To the Editor:

I’ve worked many years for women’s rights. I should be pleased that another woman has been chosen as a Vice-Presidential candidate (remember Geraldine Ferraro on Walter Mondale’s democratic ticket in 1984), but I’m appalled at the cynically exploitative nature of her selection. I suppose Senator McCain thinks choosing a woman enhances the image he’s promoting of a maverick. If he were a true maverick, he’d become a Democrat.

I won’t be voting for the McCain/Palin ticket just because she is a woman and I won’t be voting against it because she is anti-choice and I am pro-choice. I’ll be voting against it because they support and are supported by a party that doesn’t support women’s issues. McCain and Palin won’t change that. They both agree with Republicans’ extreme social conservatism. There have always been women opposed to equality. In the fight for women’s right to vote, many women were opposed, some citing the Christian Bible. Palin seems to fit into that tradition.

Republicans tried to stop the reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act and adequate funding for it. VAWA supports programs and shelters such as the national and local YWCAs provide. Republicans have acted against women’s health issues in the U.S. and made rules depriving women in other countries access to information about abortion if we provide any funding, scaring recipient countries into fear of providing information about birth control. Republicans have opposed sex education in schools—apparently believing ignorance is a deterrent to promiscuity.

They also squashed recent efforts to reintroduce the Equal Rights Amendment in Congress. Washington State has an equal rights guarantee for women in its constitution, but the U.S. constitution does not.

I left the Republican Party when Ronald Reagan turned it into the patriarchal body it is now. The current party wants to control women not help them become equal.

Women have made a lot of progress since 1920 when they got the vote, but haven’t achieved full equality. Women still only earn 77 cents to a man’s dollar. Apologists say, incorrectly, this is because so many women work part time. All women are under-represented in Congress, but Republican women are especially so. Of the 100 Senators only 13 are women and of these only 3 are Republicans. Of 435 Representatives only 61 are women and of these 43 are Democrats and only 18 are Republicans.
I hope the upcoming election will tip things in favor of women and not continue the current trek backwards.\

–Betty Hull

Whitties: going, going, Greek!

This year’s recruitment solidifies an upward trend for the Whitman Greek system.

According to Panhellenic Recruitment Coordinator Rachel Constantino-Wallace, 89 girls went through recruitment last year.  This year that number increased to 104.

Although the fraternities do not keep track of numbers during rush, there is a similarly good vibe about the body count.

“My estimate just from experience is probably that about 70-80 guys are going through rush—20 guys per house, which would be a really good rush for the fraternities,” said Interfraternity Council President Chase Cooper.

According to Constantino-Wallace, recruitment has been especially successful considering national trends.  The number of Greek affiliates at liberal arts colleges has been decreasing. Both Cooper and Constantino-Wallace attribute this year’s success to the large number of Greek RAs.

“I think there is a pretty large concentration of Greek RAs, and even though they are disaffiliated during rush, it still helps people figure out that so and so is a TKE or Phi, and that helps to turn people on to thinking about the system in a way that they wouldn’t normally,” said Cooper.

“In years past when there were poor numbers, you can usually attribute that to the fact that [first-year students] don’t meet a lot of Greeks.  It really helps to have RAs that are Greek because they see that Greeks are very involved in things outside of their house and that Greek life does not displace everything else,” said Constantino-Wallace.

Whatever the reason, the high numbers may mean changes for the Greek community.

“If the numbers continue being pretty high, then we would be looking for a fourth sorority in the next few years,” said Constantino-Wallace.

This is especially interesting considering that in 2005, the sorority Delta Delta Delta was pulled from Whitman by its headquarters because their numbers had been declining for many years.  However, with the success of the last few years, Constantino-Wallace thinks Whitman could support a fourth sorority.

“With pledge classes of 35, you could easily take ten out of each of those and give it to the other sorority and get them down to 25. That’s a very attractive proposal for those girls: they get to be the founding members, they get to build it from the ground up and they get to establish what it is.  So I think that the fact that [a new sorority] isn’t established on campus will be somewhat out weighted by the fact that it is new and exciting and different,” said Constantino-Wallace.

Regardless, there is an intangible aspect to recruitment.

“Some years the buzz on the campus is good about the Greek system for x, y and z reasons and some years it’s not,” said Cooper.

“It’s a very weird process. We joke about it being sort of like dude-flirting or man-dating. That’s basically what you are doing, you’re sort of courting them on a very informal date because we aren’t committed yet,” he said.
As weird as rush might be, Cooper also sees it as important.

“You can invoke stereotypes [about Greeks], but we have a really good relationship with the administration and the community.  We experience very few of the problems that you could hypothetically have.  I think the Greek system is really important to the campus, and it’s really exciting to see it do so well,” said Cooper.

Four groups, two sides, one goal: Vote.

It’s supposed to be one of the closest presidential election races America has seen in years, so it’s no wonder Whitman students and Walla Walla community members are fully engaged with the latest political happenings. Although the opinions and voting behaviors of people can be polar opposites, there seems to be one goal with both sides around here: get out the vote.

“Especially before the primaries, we like to call and make sure people go out and vote. We’ll start doing that again soon,” Lenore Barkan said. Barkan runs the Walla Walla County Democratic Party headquarters where signs, candidate information and voter registration forms are availableThe close gap between Obama and McCain support numbers in the area has proven to be a challenge and motivating factor for the county Republicans to keep Walla Walla’s traditionally red base going strong.

“Education tends to liberalize a community a little bit,” County Republican Chair Jim Johnson said. With three colleges in the area, their efforts as a party could use help from volunteers and donations.

“Because of the influx of some different demographics, it’s changing a little bit over time [and] we’re going to have to work harder,” said Johnson about the shifting voting behaviors of the community. The Republican headquarters also provides the same resources as the Democratic headquarters and they both have some energetic support coming from Whitman.

Roman Goerss, the Campus Conservatives president, has been particularly active in connecting with local Republicans by attending county meetings with Johnson and gathering students to volunteer their time to help the party.

Since Washington may be considered a swing state, both sides are focusing on gathering more support by strengthening the bases they have while also persuading the unregistered and undecided to vote in their direction.

“There’s an incredibly small base to draw upon, there’s an even smaller amount of people who have the time to be active,” said Goerss about getting others involved with the club’s efforts. Like the Walla Walla County Republicans, it’s harder to find people with the time to put a lot of work into the conservative cause.

The focus on getting people to vote can potentially help both parties greatly. Voter registration drives going on all across campus have been the result of not only the political clubs, but also from individual efforts.

Whitman’s Young Democrats president Becca Sexton has also kept that focus in mind for the sake of the Democrats.

“This election has gotten people so excited, so whatever we can do to get people to support Dems would be great,” Sexton said.

Barkan suggested that the Democratic community in Walla Walla is “way more active now. The Obama campaign has really activated Democrats in this county.” The headquarters have been a good place for students to meet other Democratic supporters. According to Barkan, about 125 Whitman students are part of their volunteer crew.

The Democratic and Republican parties in the area have been fairly active this year by setting up booths at local fairs and other public events. Johnson saw this as a great opportunity for his party to register people who haven’t done so already.

“There are two reasons why we wanted to do this: one, as citizens, we want everyone to vote. Two, in Eastern Washington, two-thirds of the people that vote tend to vote Republican so we want to make sure everyone is getting heard,” Johnson said.

The presidential debates this weekend will be the next area of interest for both groups. The Global House is planning to host a discussion after the televised debate and have invited Sexton and Goerss to represent their respective campus clubs.

“We want to have a discussion of what was said and the differences in the candidates. Basically, just getting the conversation going,” Sexton said. She hopes that the talk is more educational for people and not as much a conflicting argument.
For more information on how to get involved here on campus, you can contact Sexton and Goerss via email. To get involved in the county, you can go to the Democratic Headquarers located on 226 East Main Street and the Republican Headquarters located on 1622 Plaza Way.

Penelope Cruz dazzles audience in Woody Allen’s latest feature

Woody Allen’s 39th installment will, among other things, quench an intellectual cinematic thirst that has been snoozing in a den of stupid-comedies since the Oscars, save those of you who watched any of the late HBO miniseries’ or movies, including “John Adams,” “Recount” and “Generation Kill.”

In “Vicky Christina Barcelona,” a type-A lanky brunette, a free-spirited blonde artist in search of her calling, an attractive and impulsive established painter and, in the words of The Economist, a “sloe-eyed, chain-smoking Iberian hurricane” are tossed together in a mixture that – in the end – reveals how treacherous and impatient, yet astonishingly close to inconsequential, an episode of romance can be.

The backdrop, Spain’s northeastern city of Barcelona, is idyllic in the sense that it strongly appeals to the three of the movie’s senses: culture, art and romantic getaways.

Vicky (Rebecca Hall) is in it for the culture. Her pursuit of a master’s degree in the enigmatic subject of Catalan Identity takes her to visit and live with a distant relative and her husband. With her, she takes her love for Gaudí, her love for the Spanish guitar and her complimentary antonym, Christina.

Christina, played by Woody Allen’s late obsession, Scarlett Johansson, is in it for the art. While she masks her purpose in the idealistic hope of somehow getting her first big break in the aesthetic world, in reality, she has no premeditated strategy for subsistence, let alone for getting her art noticed. To Barcelona, she takes a camera, an open mind and pipe dream she will stop at nothing to realize.

What they soon realize, however, is that regardless of their diametrically opposing personalities and aspirations, their trek through Barcelona’s gothic architectural forest and cultural shrubbery is a similar one. They experience spontaneity and love and challenge their seemingly uneventful lifestyles all the while attempting to keep a sense of direction and purpose.

The movie moves along swimmingly, like any decent romance novel, until Juan Antonio, played by the deceptively attractive Javier Bardem, turns it on its head by impulsively inviting the two women to go with him to Oviedo. Christina enthusiastically and Vicky reluctantly subscribe Juan Antonio’s proposal, and the movie takes off from there.
Perhaps the most important variable in Allen’s romantically melancholic equation, Maria Elena, played by the versatile Penelope Cruz, takes the movie by storm, intrepidly injecting into it the danger, unpredictability and Latin fire it necessitates to become a classic. She is Juan Antonio’s ruthlessly emotional ex-wife who teeters on the brink of both genius and insanity (she is a highly-acclaimed modern artist and, during their relationship, nearly killed Juan Antonio with a knife).

Not only should Cruz get an Academy Award nomination for her performance, but she should, finally, win one (most likely for best actress in a supporting role). This romance would have been lackluster and cliché without Maria Elena.

“Vicky Christina Barcelona” is a return to cinematic prominence for Woody Allen, who, since “Match Point,” his 2005, seamless dark-romantic drama, has been in a slump. So far, this movie is this year’s best motion picture. But we will have to wait until December’s dramatic onslaught, which includes “Milk,” “Revolutionary Road,” “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” and “The Reader,” among others, to find out how Allen’s flick will match up with the one’s tipped so far to steal the show.

A Salute to Georges

Whitties spend their summers abroad

Iceland, India, Italy, New Zealand, Spain, Mexico, Uganda and France were only a few of the countries Whitman students studied in over this summer.

Of the 56 Whitman students who studied abroad this summer, about half of them participated in two Whitman-sponsored programs.

Sixteen students traveled to China through the Whitman Summer Studies in China (WSSC) program. This was the fifth year of the six-week WSCC program which was established in 2001 and typically runs every other summer. According to WSSC’s Web site, “The purpose of the program is to give students an opportunity to study conversational Chinese intensively in an environment where it can be put immediately into practice, as well as a chance to learn firsthand about Chinese culture and contemporary society by living and studying there.”

Program participants spent the first week touring Beijing.

They spent the following four weeks in southwestern China in Kunming, the capital of the Yunnan Province, where they lived and studied at Yunnan University. There they enrolled in a four-credit intensive language course taught by the university’s professors. Whitman History Professor Brian Dott led the WSSC program and students also took a two-credit course from him focusing of the history on ethnic minorities in Yunnan.

They spent their final week traveling around other parts of southwestern China.

Sophomore Elizabeth Bragg participated in this summer’s WSSC program.

“Traveling and studying abroad is an important part of personal growth. Immersing yourself in another culture is also a way to better understand your own culture,” Bragg said.

Students who have completed Chinese 106 or its equivalent at Whitman are eligible to apply for the WSSC program.

Ten students also participated in this summer’s inaugural Whitman Ethnographic Field School in Highland Ecuador program led by Whitman Anthropology professors Jason Pribilsky and Suzanne Morrissey. Students in the seven-week program lived with host families in a rural, indigenous community in the Ecuadorian Andes. They enrolled in an eight-credit course taught by Pribilsky and Morrissey entitled “Culture, Health, and Indigenous Development in the Andes.”

Students in the program also learned how to use ethnographic research methods to study the relationship between health and social change in the developing world. They used these newly acquired skills to conduct their own research and to produce an ethnographic report of their research.

Participants’ projects ranged from the study of dental hygiene practices to the rise of evangelicalism in the community. Senior Shawn Kelly researched the psychological effects of migration on children in the community.

“I wasn’t able to study abroad last school year,” Kelly said. “All of my friends had studied abroad and I wanted to have that experience.”

Whitman students who did not travel abroad through Whitman sponsored programs participated in a wide range of programs ranging from language intensives to thematic studies relating to their particular country.

“In recent years, summer study abroad has been especially appealing to first and second year students who are not yet doing research for their major or are not yet interning but still want to do something useful, productive, or fun during the summer,” Whitman Director of International Programs Susan Holme Brick said.

“Summer study abroad is a wonderful way to get overseas in a structured format, especially for students who for some reason are unable to participate in study abroad during the academic year,” Brick said.

Whitman does not currently provide funding for summer study abroad; however, some programs do provide scholarships.

Summer study abroad program deadlines usually range from early January to late May. Brick recommended that students interested in studying abroad during summer 2009 begin planning in October or November. The study abroad office’s Web site (whitman.edu/study_abroad) is a useful starting place and it lists all of the pre-approved summer programs. Interested students can also set up an advising appointment with the Study Abroad office.

First Writes: A Letter from the Editors-in-Chief

Welcome back everyone! We hope that the beginnings of your semesters have been going well and that you have been settling in to your routines. As much as we all enjoy the excitement of the first weeks of school—with switching classes, all-campus parties, and Greek rushing—it certainly can get a little tiring. Here at The Pioneer, we have been very busy reviewing policies and preparing for our much awaited first issue. To start this inaugural editorial off, we’d like to say congratulations and many thanks to our entire team who contributed to this issue and everyone else who supported us as we were figuring out the ropes.

As Pioneer Editors-in-Chief this semester, one of our biggest goals is to overcome the reputation that has surrounded this newspaper in the past. We are sure that some of you reading this feel as though you have been misquoted or misrepresented in The Pioneer, and for that we apologize. We hope that the Whitman community will give us the opportunity to build the confidence and trust that is essential between a newspaper and its readership. While we promise you that providing quality, accurate news is our priority, we hope that you will understand when mistakes occur, as they undoubtedly will given that we are a student-run newspaper with limited resources. However, to that extent, please let us know when we make mistakes, so we can fix them and avoid repeating them in the future. The Pioneer has been and will continue to strive for the highest journalistic integrity, so please help us achieve our goals.

We want The Pioneer to be something that each member of the student body, faculty, administration and alumni can pick up and read with pride—pride because Whitman students have independently researched, written, designed and produced this newspaper, primarily for their sake.

While we improve The Pioneer’s quality and integrity over time, we are not hoping to avoid controversy. In fact, in some ways, one of the goals of a newspaper is to promote it, by putting issues on the table and in the hands of readers that they care about deeply, that affect them in their day-to-day lives. The Pioneer will strive to promote controversy and discussion in an informed, respectful manner, and not in a way that is unnecessarily hurtful or slanderous. To do so, The Pioneer will publish a weekly Board Editorial. These editorials, as described in our editorial policy, will be opinion pieces designed to promote community discussion, that reflect the views of The Pioneer, and not necessarily the views of each individual associated with the newspaper. The Editorial Board will gather weekly to choose the topic and discuss opinions for the Board Editorial. We hope that the Board Editorial will spark discussion and focus attention on issues The Pioneer deems important. The Pioneer welcomes letters to the editor or any opinion pieces with conflicting views.

We also hope to strengthen our readership. We want all Whitman affiliates—students, faculty, alumni, staff, and community members—to be engaged with The Pioneer and view it as reliable news source. While our primary audience is Whitman students, we want to serve the extended Whitman community as well.

Part of the effort to improve The Pioneer involves setting attainable goals for each area of the newspaper. Each editor has outlined a mission statement for their area of oversight, including the following sections:

This semester the News page will strive to responsibly report on anything that happens on campus or stirs student reaction. In dealing with all Whitman staff, students, faculty, alumni, parents and community members the News page’s goals are professionalism, efficiency, and precision. The number one priority is to provide the reader with accurate, informative, and interesting news while maintaining the highest level of journalistic ethic.

The Opinions section will aim to include more opinions from people other than the regular staff columnists. The Pioneer is supposed to be a mouthpiece through which all Whitman students can make their voices heard. To limit this privilege to our own staff would be contrary to everything that we stand for.

This semester, the Sports section has four overarching goals. First, it will have more news related articles that cover specific sporting events. Second, the sports editor plans to continue publishing at least one preview for each team so every athlete gets equal respect. In addition, the Sports page is aiming to maintain sports columns this year, and to publish the results for each game Whitman competes in during the previous week, along with the schedule for the upcoming week. This will let people know how Whitman teams are doing compared to the rest of the Northwest Conference.

The goal of the Community section is to increase awareness about the Northwest and Walla Walla community events, issues, and news within the Whitman community. In doing so, the page will strive to promote dialogue and greater mutual understanding between Whitman and its surrounding community on issues that concern both parties.

The goal of the Outdoors section is to create a balance of articles about environmental politics and the outdoors. The page will feature a recurring segment of outdoor trips of Whitman students and welcomes student submissions.

The Features section aims to give readers a mix of light-hearted food for thought along with serious issues we should all be thinking about. The section will be based around input, surveys and reports it receives from the entire community.

The goal for the Politics page is to inspire activism and debate by informing the Whitman community about local, campus and national political issues. The politics section will focus on mining our thriving campus and community political life, and reporting not just on feelings, but also actions and events.

The Life section will provide students the chance to express themselves creatively in ways that might not fit into other sections. The focus of the section is not on breaking news; rather, we include columns and features on a diverse range of topics.

Last, but certainly not least, the Humor page’s mission is to provide consistently humorous content for The Pioneer, without “dumbing down” humor to the least common denominator The objective of Humor is to respect the intellects of Whitman students, faculty and staff providing jokes, articles and pictures intended to appeal to a broad range of comedic tastes.

Please keep your eye on The Pioneer’s progress towards these objectives. Thank you in advance for your support of our efforts. To our staff: thanks for getting out our first issue—keep up the good work! To our readers: thank you for giving us a chance to be part of your weekly lives. And if you have any ideas for content, improvements or complaints please contact any members of the Editorial Board.

The legacy of 9/11

When Senator McCain claimed that the lesson of Sept. 11 is the need to serve our great nation, I wanted to barf. The idea that America is once again to be manipulated by the emotional intensity left by the attacks on the twin towers is frustrating at best, infuriating at worst.

America is still healing from the wound left by Sept. 11 and you can bet politicians will continue to manipulate the event so the lessons will be whatever they need us to believe they are.

During the last elections, Sept. 11 was on everyone’s mind. National security and terrorism were issues that deserved top priority and both Kerry and Bush’s campaigns were run with this in mind.

Now the fact that we’re at war with Iraq, could potentially be going to war with Iran, and are engaged in an open-ended “war on terror” is pretty low the list of what American’s care about this election.

Yet the legacy left by the Sept. 11 attacks will be with Americans for years to come. The fear instilled by the attacks and encouraged by the government still substantially effects our lives today. Pro-McCain Web sites are quick to point out that Obama’s lack of initiative will inevitably lead to more terrorist attacks and that Sept. 11 taught him nothing. This is like saying, “America, we are in constant danger of attack. This means going to war with Iran and voting for McCain are the right things to do.”

Bush announced to the nation, “We live in a dangerous world, and we need a president who understands the lessons of Sept. 11, 2001: That to protect America, we must stay on the offense, stop attacks before they happen, and not wait to be hit again.” This is a clear message to the nation that the only way to protect ourselves is to be on the offense. It is also suggesting that the lesson of Sept. 11 is one of war. Didn’t we learn something more? Something about unity or maybe heroes? Or at the very least, didn’t we learn that we’re not dealing with national security in the conventional sense. Terrorism is a whole new kind of threat that can’t be treated in the way we’re used to understanding threats. We can’t go to war with terrorism. Terrorism is not a nation. Iraq is not terrorism.

Or maybe we should have learned about how susceptible we are to giving up the liberties we claim we’re spreading throughout the world. The Homeland Security Act was bad enough when it first came out. With provisions that suspended the habeas corpus in matters of “national security” the Act is a symbol of just how easily Americans were willing to give up their rights.

But this is not just a thing of the past. This year, Bush extended the state of National Emergency in which we have been since Sept. 14, 2001. This means Bush has the power to suspend or modify the constitution in light of the “immediate terrorist threat.”

As of September 12, 2008, the Department of Homeland Security has deemed the terrorist threat level to be a yellow, which means, “elevated or significant risk of terrorist attack,” unless you are flying on a domestic flight, in which case the risk is orange, or high.

This brings me to the legacy that I find hardest to grapple with. America is riddled with a severe mistrust of our government. This is easy to see in our election and our strong desire to elect a leader that is “like us.” Both Obama and McCain have acknowledged the distrust of the government, and both are playing to be the more “honest and trustworthy” leader.

I am sick of being manipulated. I am sick of my fears and emotions being a tool of the government. I am sick of distrusting the government. When are we allowed to stop looking for lessons in Sept. 11, and to start looking for lessons in the post Sept. 11 world? Lessons such as “Don’t let the government make all the calls. Use your head. Think policies through before supporting them. Don’t let fear be the victor. Don’t be manipulated so easily. War will not make us more secure.”

I can only hope our new president will not be so quick to manipulate America’s fear and need for security. But I am distrustful.

The political rule of engagement

For the presidential candidate, it seems as if the rules of the game are always changing. For instance, only a few weeks ago Barack Obama was lambasted for not having enough experience. After the choice of rookie Sarah Palin, however, the argument quickly changed to type of experience, with executive experience trumping all other. Invigorated with this newfound argument, the Republicans set out mutilating Obama’s record of experience – not only legislative, but lifetime as well.

As I viewed the Republican National Convention a few weeks ago, my impression was that the party was truly worried. Firebrand speech followed firebrand speech, dripping with red meat in a slanderous sauce, enough to sustain this party hungry for victory. Case in point: the Thursday speeches. I graciously allowed Rudolph Giuliani, America’s former mayor, as well as Governor Sarah Palin, into my living room, only to allow them to besmirch the reputation of some of America’s most upstanding and honorable organizations and leaders. “Who?” you may ask. The community organizer.

Judging by the diction and intonation of the speeches, it seemed as if some Republicans viewed community organizing as a worthless enterprise. When contrasting the experiences of McCain and Obama, Giuliani built up McCain’s experience as a war hero, and portrayed him as a man of staunch principle. Before chiding Obama’s experience as a legislator, he sarcastically noted, “On the other hand, you have a resume from a gifted man with an Ivy League education. He worked as a community organizer, and immersed himself in Chicago machine politics.” But, it was the remark of the audacious Gov. Palin that broke the camel’s back. “I guess — I guess a small-town mayor is sort of like a community organizer, except that you have actual responsibilities,” Palin remarked flippantly.

Perhaps Mrs. Palin is correct. Perhaps César Chávez, when he fought for fair wages and greater workers’ rights, was just messing around. It’s possible that Jane Addams, while doing philanthropy work and advocating for universal suffrage, really had nothing better to do. Maybe Martin Luther King, Jr., when fighting for civil rights and organizing boycotts, was just out for a historic joyride. Frankly, there’s a chance that in spite of accomplishing great things, these people may have bore few, if any, responsibilities. It’s not as if their activists and organizers were under any sort of threat for challenging the status quo. It’s not like their supporters entrusted them with the noble mission of seeking liberty and justice for all.

Surely not.

At least, that’s the mindset the Republicans have sought to project.

Perhaps it is naïve of me to fantasize over an honorable and consistent fight in politics, and perhaps too idealistic. It’s possible that such vile comments, endlessly shifting priorities and ground rules are inherently part of this dangerous game. Indeed, John McCain engaged in said game, as he recently sought to soften the blow of his running mate’s caustic phrase. While speaking in the presidential forum on service this past Thursday, McCain lavished praise on those who have served this nation. He also sought to justify, and apologize for, Mrs. Palin’s comments, while simultaneously lauding his rival’s accomplishments. “Look, Gov. Palin was responding to the criticism of her inexperience and her job as a mayor in a small town…Of course I respect people who serve their community. And Sen. Obama’s record there is outstanding.”

Yes sir. The rules, they are a’changin.’

Challenge yourself.

Challenge your preconceived notions. We hear that a lot at Whitman, and in many respects, we students do it everyday, from the politics class that questions the foundations of the global North’s domination of the South to the physics class which questions our understanding of the fundamental particles of matter. Underlying this constant reappraisal is the ancient understanding that we cannot attain new knowledge without breaking through the dams of assumption and prejudice. In Plato’s allegory of the Cave, the Philosopher escapes the murky cave and beholds the awesome sun, imbuing him with understanding of the true principles which bind all things. His return to the cave is met with revulsion, those still entrenched in its darkness reject his knowledge and call for the death of the agitator. However, all the while, only the philosopher, the sole voice of reason, understands the truth, while the cave-dwellers are bound with chains to ignorance and intolerance. Challenge your preconceived notions. At Whitman, we all acknowledge the importance of freeing oneself from the bonds that hold back intellectual discourse. However, the act of challenging one’s own presuppositions and foundations is far more difficult. The only bond we refuse to throw off is that which ties us to our own ideas. We readily turn our critical eye outward, but we avoid its inward gaze, fearful of its piercing indictment. This is our challenge.

Whitman College ranks in Princeton Review’s top 5 “happiest students” list. Clearly, an abiding sense of happiness and contentment gently cushions our lives here, and who could blame us? Whitman is a little patch of heaven—charming little town, green grass, hypnotically rolling wheat fields. Granted, people take action within the community and stay up to date with current events, but for the most part nothing touches us. The ugly voice of politics is but a mere echo in the quiet bliss of Whitman life.

However, what we fail to realize is that current events are not the only possible source of discontentment. Looking at the Whitman psyche, one notices an overwhelming sense of docility and satisfaction with the status quo. It is not a liberal or conservative issue, a rather pointless issue to debate (yes, Whitman is incredibly liberal and our obstinacy towards offending each other will make sure it remains such). Rather, this status quo we are guilty of upholding goes lies with our own stagnant set of ideas. This stagnation is precisely what has allowed us to reduce the complexity of the world into mere convenient ideology, and form our beloved “bubble”.

But aren’t we too young for that? This should be our time to grapple with the most difficult and problematic issues. This is our time to complicate the world. This should be the winter of our discontent! But what prevents us from this complication, by what force have we made up our minds already? The answer goes hand-in-hand with our aversion to offending people: we do not want to examine our ideologies critically, especially if those ideas are about the things most important to us.

Herein lies our dilemma: the very thing which will allow us to form fully developed opinions, which can weather all counter-arguments, is that which threatens our Princeton Review rated happiness. If we allow ourselves to be challenged—if we offend ourselves by contesting the very presuppositions that enforce our entire way of thinking—we will be discontent.

–

But discontent needn’t be our enemy. Our growth as responsible, engaged adults is a blossoming, not a static, dead thing. Contentment results from honoring stability, a principle that can surely protect, extend, and deepen happiness, but which can also lead to stagnation. Once contentment ceases to be an active rejoicing in fresh revelations and new growth, it becomes backwards-facing and torpid. It is only too easy for contentment to slide odiously into complacency.

Nowhere is it easier to see this unacceptable transition than in those things that we tell ourselves most often and hold most dear. It is the easiest of all criticisms to question the positions and arguments of those with whom we disagree, but is a much more difficult matter to approach the arguments of our intellectual allies with the same sort of rigor. Hardest of all, though, is to maintain the same insight and skeptical force regarding our own opinions.

The force of habit and the influence of history build great inertia in our own ideas. The opinions most difficult to question are those held the longest. Often, we even forget to ever question our opinions on the most basic of our views, and thus relegate those opinions to indisputable truths. In this, though, we do enormous violence to one of the most basic of all human qualities: our power to change and adapt ourselves in accordance with our changing understanding of the world. It is not enough merely to question ourselves regarding those life principles that we are in the process of achieving; we have to question also those principles held long and deep.

In truth, to question those deepest principles is the most important of all critical examinations. We can build the higher and more recent levels of our understanding to the most rigorous of standards, but an unstable foundation will surely cause the entire structure to fail. The Cartestian principle still stands: one can only discover truth by first “eradicating from [one’s] mind all the erroneous opinions [accepted] up to that moment” (Discourse, Part 2).

Oftentimes, many of the opinions we fail to thoroughly question are those that we are conditioned to believe early in our lives. Despite the enormous intellectual and emotional growth that each of us have undergone since, say, fifth grade, we often continue to blindly adhere to the same opinions of politics, religion, social mores, and an array of other opinions that we learned even before we were capable of understanding their true import. The test case is simple and lies within each of us: have you significantly changed your position on gun control, or abortion, or dogmatic patriotism, or the existence of a deity in the last year? The last five? Ten? Ever?

Ultimately, the constant questioning of opposing views tends to strengthen our own conceptions of the world. So long as our own ideas are securely rooted in a critically examined truth, this can be a rewarding and beneficial process. If our own positions are riddled with untruths, however, and have not been adequately (or ever) examined with the same sort of incisive criticism that we level at contrary views, the already difficult process of removing our personal intellectual and moral weaknesses is greatly hindered. So in the coming months, as the authors of this column ask difficult questions about the foundations of sundry issues, we ask that you do not merely reject these questions offhandedly. To truly grapple with them will at worst make you more sure of the truth of your own opinions, and will at best help to resituate your moral foundations on sturdier ground. And that’s something we can legitimately be happy about.

The example of our power

The European Union will soon find itself between a jagged rock and a harder place if it continues its campaign of empty threats against Moscow. Russia is confident that neither the United States nor the E.U. will militarily prevent them from having their way in the Caucasus. And now they are becoming more confident that economic sanctions, as well, will be soon thrown out of the U.S.-E.U.’s diplomatic arsenal.

In Brussels several weeks ago, the European Union agreed to assist Georgia, presumably through economic and humanitarian aid packages, but shied away from imposing economic sanctions on Russia.

This is a faux pas step in the right direction. While it does the good deed of abetting the now war-torn Georgian nation, it fails to address the problems with Russian military presence in a free democratic nation. In other words, the move today sidesteps the major issue of Russia’s invasion of Georgia.

Many who have commented on this issue are quick to blame Russia for their aggression. However, they seem to miss one indispensable fact: the Georgian militarily instigated this war. Georgian forces began their military offensive on the night of August 7th, after agreeing to a ceasefire and Russian-mediated peace talks. In their surprise attack, they killed 15 innocent civilians and practically leveled the South Ossetian ‘capital,’ Tskhinvali, with gunfire.

Russia’s response, however, was overwhelming and unnecessary. It has led to some 400 Georgian military deaths, 1,492 civilian deaths and over 230,000 refugees. Nonetheless, we must still view Russia’s response as a reactionary measure taken by Moscow instead of an unprovoked invasion.

Had Russia invaded Georgia on its imperialistic whim, our reaction and, by extension, their punishment should be much more severe. But, this is not the case.

Seeing as it cannot and should not do anything militarily to end this conflict, it would be prudent for the West to engage in something that has been lacking in the Middle East to end the conflict in the Caucasus: thoughtful diplomacy.

So far, neither party has canvassed this option. The Republicans, spearheaded nowadays by the pseudo-foreign-policy tag team of John McCain and Sarah Palin (by virtue of living in Alaska which is “up there near Russia,” as several Fox News correspondents have pathetically pointed out), have said that “we are all Georgians” and must stop at nothing to help Georgia and only Georgia in this bipolar conflict between good and evil.

The Democrats, headed also by their nominee for president and vice president, Barack Obama and Joe Biden, have belatedly called for a somewhat more pragmatic and realistic call for restraint on both sides. But, like the Republicans’, this trying move falls well short of a solution on this precedent-setting contemporary foreign policy decision.

It would be best if the United States set this precedent with a prudent decision that appropriately appraised the United States’ and Russia’s future ties. They are the difference between a second Cold War, exacerbated by thousands of nuclear weapons going unaccounted for, and a peaceful coexistence that not only would find and secure all of Russia’s loose nukes, but see Russia remain in the G-8 and join the World Trade Organization.

The U.S., at least, can easily broker a deal with Russia that would go a long way in restoring a congenial relationship with its former Cold War foe.

Russia despises the U.S.’s missile defense system in Poland, which to even the mediocre military technocrat looks like a tatterdemalion instead of a polished example of the Pentagon’s potential.

Russia does not want Georgia to join NATO; Georgia probably would not have been able to join NATO anyway because of the many requirements, such as defense spending, size of military, etc., it does not and probably will not meet.

The United States wants Russia to leave Georgia proper and the two breakaway regions, Abkhazia and South Ossetia, and install a peacekeeping force that will do its job rather than one, like the previous Russian ‘peacekeepers,’ that instead of solely providing humanitarian aid was instrumental in exacerbating the conflict to its tipping point.

This give-2-take-1 deal could greatly help the United States in its quest to refocus Russian relations toward nuclear nonproliferation. Moreover, it would prove that the United States is willing to give a little more than it gets, for once, in a peace treaty – an exemplary moral stance the U.S. must take in order to begin restoring its place in the world.

As Bill Clinton unveiled in a wonderful chiasmus last week during his speech at the Democratic National Convention, “people the world over have always been more impressed by the power of our example than by the example of our power.”

Whitman’s unexpected visitor: Pan the Raccoon

Students have been getting a bit of a surprise the last few weeks.

“My house was ‘attacked’ by a raccoon tonight,” senior Mike Sado began in an e-mail. “It followed my housemate as she was coming from Reid and it stayed at our door for about an hour while we all ran around screaming like little children.”

At the beginning of this summer, Associate Professor of Chemistry Allison Calhoun rescued a 5-week-old raccoon that had been orphaned near her house. After consulting a wildlife rehabilitation vetewrinarian, Professor Calhoun decided to raise “Pan” in her home.

During the summer, Pan continued to grow. At the same time Whitman students began arriving back on campus in mid-August, he began to venture farther away from home.

Students began to see Pan stalking the night streets and lurking around their porches. Several reports were made to Campus Security about students being followed and even chased by Pan.

Perhaps the most disturbing thing about Pan was his completely fearless attitude towards humans.
Senior Brett Muckler recalled his first interaction with Pan as confusing.

“This thing is flashing its eyes at me and I can’t see three feet in any direction around me, it’s so dark,” said Muckler. “I see these two animals, sparring or playing. ‘Oh, cats!’ I say. It’s a raccoon.

And it’s not walking away from me like it should, it’s walking towards me, with a grin on its face. We fled. We ran so hard keg cups were dropped, items were abandoned at full speed. The raccoon pursued.”

Though Professor Calhoun had sent an e-mail about Pan to the student listserv, the many students who don’t read the listserv were left in the dark as to his identity. Pan’s unusual behavior prompted many students to believe that he was rabid.

Stories continued to circle around campus about run-ins with Pan.

According to Professor Calhoun, “unconfirmed reports tell of his attendance at many fraternity parties, a night spent in the Phi house, an attempted breach of the Olin Hall perimeter and several incidents of uninvited participation of student meals and rest time on Ankeny.”

Although not all of Pan’s wanderings could be confirmed, he did in fact spend a night in the Phi house with senior Forrest Carver.

As Carver said in an e-mail, “One night I saw the raccoon in question wandering around near my house… I sat on my stoop and he actually crawled up on there with me… I decided to bring him inside and show him to another East Coaster that would be very surprised to see such an atypical raccoon.”

The night didn’t end there.

“After that, I brought him up to my room, where he promptly fell asleep. I couldn’t put such a chubby, cute little varmint outside, so I just went to bed. He woke me up a few times during the night by trying to pick at and eat my ears, nose and eyes, but he wasn’t very rough or vicious,” said Carver.

Pan’s reign over campus concluded last week when he was released back to the wild.

As Professor Calhoun wrote in an e-mail, “His new home is graced with a cascading stream, a small pond and plenty of trees and bushes. At the time we left him, he was prying rocks out of the stream bed in search of crawdads and other tasty treats.”

Forrest Carver didn’t get off so easy.

Said Carver, “general acquaintances haven’t looked at me the same since. I think they might have taken ‘slept with a raccoon’ too literally.”

Walla Walla Sweet Onions Parade

Although Walla Walla is already known for its sweet onions, the recent addition of onion sculptures on Main Street aims to bring together the art and agriculture of the city.

“The inspiration for this idea began when the Walla Walla sweet onion was named the vegetable of Washington. I wanted to do something cool and different that fits in with the fabric of Walla Walla,” said Michael Davidson, president and CEO of Tourism Walla Walla.

“People submitted designs and sponsors paid for the onions, which were made out of fiberglass,” said Davidson.

Among the designs selected was “Entwined,” by Whitman seniors Meghan Urback, Mia Huth and Elsbeth Otto.

With the assistance of Professor Mare Blocker who acted as faculty adviser, the girls got involved with the project.

“Lynn Lunden [Associate Vice President Development — Major Gifts] contacted me first and
asked me if I would gather a group of students to work on the project as a team…and the money
raised will go towards public art and events in Walla Walla to enhance our community,” said Blocker.

As faculty adviser, Blocker was responsible for meeting with the girls, giving them feedback and urging them to stay on schedule. The students came up with the design in the spring of last year, but the onion did not arrive until school was almost over.

“Megan, Elsbeth and I came up with the original design together, which was quite different from how you see the onion now.  Megan and Elsbeth began work on the onion, only to discover that it was not likely to weather the summer,” said Huth.

“We didn’t receive the onion until school was almost out, and it didn’t get completed until late summer.  By that time, each of the three of us had worked on the onion but had previous summer commitments and had to leave Walla Walla, and I believe Elena Mitchel, a junior, actually finished it,” said Urback.

“Susa Roberts, the Technical Assistant in the studio art department, also gave assistance
to the team,” said Blocker. “I really appreciate how it turned out to be a project that involved a
variety of members of the Whitman community, including faculty, staff and students.”

“I really appreciate how our onion was placed away from campus, suggesting movement and interaction within our community at large. And compositionally, I think it speaks about the colors and patterns that we see in the agricultural landscape that surrounds us, and are inspired by, throughout the seasons,” said Blocker.

The sculptures are all located along Main Street in downtown Walla Walla, and on any given day, people can be seen photographing the oversized onions.

“It’s an onion that looks like wheat fields—kind of ironic.  I hope our onion stirs people to go take a walk or a bike ride in the wheat fields.  There is a lot in them, and I see the fields in a new way every time I’m out there,” said Huth.

The onions are a part of “Sweet Onions on Parade,” and will be on display in town until later this fall.

“[Sweet Onions on Parade] is a fundraiser for local groups, including the Downtown Walla Walla Foundation, Sweet Onion Marketing Association and the Blue Mountain Community Foundation,” said Davidson. “We’ll be holding an auction in the fall for the onions, and businesses around town can choose to purchase them as well. Some have already shown interest in purchasing them.”
Already, the onions have begun to take root in the community.

“When I walk around, I see people taking pictures. It’s done what it’s supposed to do—grab people’s attention,” said Davidson. “I wanted to connect the art with the agriculture. The onions won’t be around for much longer, because like the onion, they will only be in season for some time.”

Community service at Whitman with the Co-op

The residents of the Community Service House have more than just mealtimes and bathrooms in common– they share an active passion for volunteering. As part of the larger Interest House Community, these community-minded students chose to live together to support one another and encourage service on campus.

Each year the members of the Community Service House, also known as the Co-op, decide what their focus will be on, whether environmental issues or health concerns.

“We determine the goals and direct changes each year,” Resident Assistant Stephanie Silver said.

The Co-op residents have chosen local stream restoration as their first group project this year. They plan to encourage other students’ involvement at the Interest House Community Block Party on Saturday, Sep. 20.

This endeavor is the first of many, according to Silver, a junior. The Co-op is looking forward to “trick-or-canning,” a Halloween-time tradition that raises canned goods for the underprivileged.

The Co-op plans to “hold one all-campus project each month and have several ongoing ones in the Interest House Community during the semester,” said Silver.

Additionally, they partner with the Volunteer Club and Center for Community Service to advertise service opportunities. They hope to partner with first-year sections to put on community projects.

The residents are not just passionate about encouraging other Whitties to volunteer. Each of them has personal interest in a variety of endeavors throughout Walla Walla.

“Each of us pledged 26-and-a-half community service hours this semester—we’re kind of random,” resident junior Maia Hansen said, laughing.

Kara McKay, another resident of the Co-op, said she volunteers at the S.O.S. Clinic as a physician’s shadow and works with uninsured people in Walla Walla.

“It’s cool because everyone who works there is a volunteer, even the doctors,” said McKay, a sophomore. As a pre-med student, McKay is happy to have found an outlet to combine her future interests with community service.

Living in the Co-op with other like-minded students provides a tight-knit, supportive group for students such as McKay who want to continue volunteering throughout their life. Their dedication is evident in their eagerness to pick up forgotten, but no less important, projects on campus.

“We take the leftovers from Prentiss Dining Hall to the Walla Walla Senior Center,” resident Sarah Reichardt said. Were it not for the Co-op, this project would not still be going on.

The residents of the Co-op play an important role in fostering community service on campus. They also serve as resources for students looking to help out around Walla Walla and are excited to meet other volunteer enthusiasts.

“Feel free to stop by and hang out anytime,” Silver said.

More information about Community Service House-sponsored projects will be distributed on the listservs throughout the year.

Record low admittance rate

From class presidents to team captains and editors to Eagle Scouts, the Whitman class of 2012 has more to it than just the many extra bodies you see crowding the campus. This fall the community welcomed its second largest class in the college’s history.

“We enrolled another group of bright, intellectual, talented, highly involved, passionate and down to earth group of students, who will contribute to and benefit from the Whitman experience,” said Dean of Admissions and Financial Aid Tony Cabasco.

With over 3,200 applications, the 45 percent admittance rate this year holds the record as the lowest in the college’s history. Subsequently, the entering class of 431 students is the second largest ever, falling only seven students short of the 1978 freshman class of 438 students.

To accommodate for the additional students, one section of first-years is being housed in North Hall, a traditionally upper-classmen dorm located several blocks off campus. Fanny Domijan of White Salmon, Wash., was one of the first-years placed in this dorm.

“It’s really cool,” Domijan said. “I have a single room and my own toilet and sink. I really like the people, so I don’t even mind that it is so far away.”

In addition to the large first-year class size, there has been a rumor floating around campus regarding the distorted gender breakdown of the incoming class.

“I heard the girl to guy ratio was 70:30,” said sophomore Tiffany Choe. The actual figures are 58 percent female and 42 percent male, which is in fact more balanced than the preceding 59 percent female sophomore class.

“For perspective, 57 percent of all undergraduates in the U.S. are female, and our entering classes have fluctuated between 41 percent to 50 percent male in the last 5 to 6 years,” Cabasco said.

The class of 2012 is not just notable for their quantity, however.

“My first impression of the class is that they are very diverse, friendly and intelligent” said Domijan.
Cabasco added, “I think that many current students have the notion that each subsequent entering class is ‘better’ than the previous classes. While the percentage of students admitted has been going down in recent years, the percentage change is not as dramatic as many people believe. The last five entering classes have had similar grades and test scores. The admission staff members and I have focused on admitting students who are the right fit for Whitman and who would enhance the campus community. We know that a student is more than just the sum of his or her test scores.”

Aside from 44 class valedictorians, 41 editors of their high school newspaper or year book and 17 ASB or class presidents, a few notable achievements of the class of 2012 include: writing an opinion piece subsequently featured in the New York Times, starring in an episode of “CSI Miami,” working as a US Senate Page, attending the Global Youth Leadership Conference and working on a dairy farm in the Swiss Alps.

“I know a student whose high school marching band went to Beijing for the Olympics, and another person who spent the summer in South Africa doing Peace Corps-type work,” Domijan said, “I was worried that people in my class would fit into a certain mold here, but they totally don’t. They are much more diverse and act totally different than I expected, in a really good way.”

Senior accused of drug, child porn posession

When junior Margaux Cameron was house hunting at the start of last semester, the student who placed a listserv ad for a single seemed helpful and friendly.

“He posted a listing on the listserv saying he had a one bedroom place, so I said I’d go look at it,” she said. “It was a little ways off campus so he picked me up and drove me to the apartment building. It wasn’t really what I was looking for, so I told him that I was just looking for something closer to campus.”

The student, David Carlisle, 33, was scheduled to appear in court on Monday, Sept. 15 to address accusations of steroid, marijuana, and child pornography possession. According to Walla Walla County Clerk Kathy Martin, however, Carlisle did not make his court date, and a warrant has now been issued for his arrest.

In 2003, Carlisle pleaded guilty to a charge of third-degree child molestation, as reported by the Walla Walla Union-Bulletin. These most recent criminal charges are the result of an investigation that began last spring. During a search of Carlisle’s residence, police uncovered what appeared to be infant marijuana plants and documents related to both the manufacture of marijuana and to steroid usage. A court document reveals that police also found a laptop computer containing 19 images of minors engaged in sexually explicit activity, as well as files suggesting Carlisle purchased the steroids over the Internet.

Carlisle’s enrollment at Whitman was confirmed by Assistant to the Dean of Students Donna Cummins and by Jennifer McNeil of the college registrar’s office. Both administrative offices further confirmed that Carlisle was registered for this Fall 2008 semester, but would not release additional information.

Carlisle identifies himself on his Facebook page as a member of the Whitman class of 2009 and an Economics major.

Despite his criminal background, campus security asserts it is not concerned about Carlisle’s presence on campus and has not taken any special action to protect students.

“His crime is not related to something that is deemed a risk to the students,” said Craig McKinnon, Associate Director of Security.

Federal law mandates that institutions of higher education must provide students with information on how to access state records on sexual offenders, but are not required to disclose students’ personal information.

Cameron, like others on campus, was taken aback by recent revelations about Carlisle’s past.
She recalled e-mailing Carlisle last spring to let him know that she had found alternate housing arrangements and would not be leasing from him.

“I said for sure that I wasn’t interested. He was just like, ‘I’m really glad you found what you were looking for, and it was nice meeting you.’ He seemed really nice. I didn’t know he was so much older than us until he mentioned he had gone to high school with a staff member on campus.”

According to McKinnon, Carlisle’s current whereabouts are unknown.

College presidents petition to lower drinking age to 18

“Philosophically, people would question why, if you can do so many things, can’t you do [drink alcohol],” said Rich Jacks, Director of Counseling. Many would agree he has a point: at 18, individuals are legally allowed to smoke, vote, buy porn and go to war, but they are not permitted to drink.

In the past few weeks, the Amethyst Initiative, a statement signed by 129 college presidents calling elected officials to support open conversation about the drinking age, has come to the attention of people throughout the nation.

Twenty-four years ago, the National Minimum Drinking Age Act passed, prohibiting people under the age of 21 from consuming alcohol, in hopes that this would decrease the number of alcohol-related deaths and accidents. Today, controversy centers around the argument that lowering the drinking age would promote moderation.

“The issue here is student safety. That’s the reason people are against it, and why people are for it,” said junior Allison Gill.

For parents, who spend their lives protecting their children, this means keeping them from becoming a statistic.

For many college presidents, there are other angles to look at. George Bridges, President of Whitman, said, “As an administrator, I believe that a lower drinking age would make aspects of working on alcohol issues with students easier. All students would have legal status. There would be less worry and concern about so called students being ‘minors in possession’ and in violation of state laws.”

However, Bridges has refused to sign the initiative.

“As President I won’t sign the initiative even though I personally believe that discussion of these issues is important. It is a practice at Whitman that the college’s presidents do not endorse partisan political initiatives or movements. The Board of Trustees has the authority and responsibility for directing the college ultimately. They would need to make a collective decision to endorse an initiative of this sort. In other words, the decision is above my pay grade.”

In representing Whitman College, Bridges and the faculty work to give students the chance to experiment, without worrying about huge repercussions.

“We are a college about discovery. That involves experimentation. Intellectually, emotionally, personally. If an administration is repressive, students can’t experiment and take risks in an open environment,” said Bridges.

Students at Whitman do not take advantage of the administration’s less strict policy.
Barbara Maxwell, Associate Dean of Students, said, “The majority of Whitman students consume alcohol from time to time, but it doesn’t consume their lives. You can’t be successful here if you drink excessively. Whitman students typically act in ways that don’t interfere with school, friends, family and other things important to them.”

From the view of a student, Gill says, “Binge drinking isn’t as big here [as on other college campuses]. A higher percentage of students drink moderately or not at all. I’ve never felt like drinking has a strong presence on campus.”

Students at Whitman are given the chance to discover and explore life’s possibilities. Ellen Collette, Director of the Welty Health Center, said that students “have the opportunity to be on their own and define themselves.” The college experience is unique and often coincides with multiple areas of experimentation.

Stephanie Silver, a junior, likes the idea of the initiative on the basis that it “legitimately looks for what’s best rather than just taking sides.”

“Dialogue is one of the best things,” Gill agreed. “So far it has been dominated by presidents and angry parents. Student voice needs to come out.”

Whitman commemorates 9/11 through film showing

This Sep. 11, Adjunct Assistant Professor of Religion and General Studies Roger Miles and Assistant Professor of Religion Melissa Wilcox opted to commemorate the terrorist attacks on New York’s World Trade Center in a new way. As President Bush was observing a moment of silence and Senators McCain and Obama were placing flowers on a memorial at Ground Zero, Whitman students were watching a movie.

After Sep. 11, 2001, reports of hate crimes and discrimination towards Sikhs prompted then-20-year-old Stanford student Valarie Kaur to travel around the United States and document the incidences of violence. She produced the first feature-length documentary on post-Sep. 11 hate violence, entitled Divided We Fall: Americans in the Aftermath.

“I think this is just another way of reflecting on Sep. 11,” said Wilcox.

The movie touched on themes of identity and the process of othering racial minorities.

“In times of insecurity, like 9/11, we try to find some sort of uniformity – but mistaking unity for uniformity is dangerous,” said Miles.

The documentary encouraged viewers to unify without excluding Sikhs and Muslims. It depicted accounts of American Sikhs who showed their support for the country, but were still discriminated against, sometimes to the point of violence.

Kaur challenged viewers, asking questions such as, “Who counts as American?” and “What does an enemy look like?” She traveled around the country, and even spoke with a woman in India to answer these questions. “The heart of America is found in the spaces where people have come together, for just a moment, and left a trace,” said Kaur in the movie.

The movie had a strong impact on students.

“It felt very personal,” said sophomore Tristan Grau. “I’ve never really been discriminated against like they were, but I had a strong reaction because the sense was that the only people who would cover this issue are two college student amateurs.”

The film has reached over 150 campuses across the nation and won numerous national and international awards.

“I really admire the filmmakers. Valarie jumped and her life took its own direction. She’s lived a life of meaning and I admire that,” said Miles.

The documentary has been hailed around the country for encouraging introspection and discussion of its viewers on race, discrimination and identity.

Construction workers injured

At least two construction workers working on Sherwood Athletic Center were injured in an accident on the afternoon of Wednesday, Sept. 10.

Station 2 of the Walla Walla Fire Department responded to the scene of the accident. Upon arrival, one critically injured worker was rushed to a local area hospital.

Two fire trucks and one ambulance were present at the scene.

One of the injured workers, who had been working on the roof of Sherwood when injured, was lifted via forklift from the roof down into the ambulance.

The Fire Department cited confidentiality and declined to comment on the specifics or the nature of the accident.

The injured workers were part of Opp & Seibold construction company.

Alcohol-related student arrest interrupts BSU dance

An incident at the annual Black Student Union dance last Friday, Sep. 12, resulted in the arrest of a first-year student on alcohol-related charges.

Housed in the Reid Campus Center Ballroom, the event was monitored by both organizers and campus security to try to prevent clearly intoxicated students from entering and ensure students did not bring alcohol into the dance.

“The policy for the BSU dance is if a student has clearly consumed alcohol and appears drunk then they are not allowed to enter the event,” said former BSU President Sarah Deming, who is currently studying abroad. “We have people watching the door to tell people to leave if they are too drunk… We have security guards at these dances precisely for these reasons – if we ask a student to leave and they refuse, that is typically when we will have the security guards step in.”

Associate Dean of Students Barbara Maxwell, who said she was not present at the event but had since reviewed security logs for the night, cited Whitman’s alcohol policy in response to questions about the arrest.

“Obviously, the Reid Campus Center Ballroom is a public area in a campus building, so the policy forbids alcohol from this location,” Maxwell said.

According to Maxwell, alcohol was also strictly off-limits at this event because the BSU is ASWC-funded.

Deming emphasized that the incident was not due to lack of diligence on the part of the BSU, and points to preventative measures that were taken at the dance, such as the security presence and the fact that students were not allowed to take coats or bags into the ballroom.

“We took precautions against these problems,” she said.

Both Deming and Maxwell noted that the arrest was highly atypical of events hosted in Reid, including past BSU dances.

“To my knowledge, this is an isolated incident – I am not aware of any other Whitman students who have been arrested in events hosted in Reid Campus Center,” Maxwell said.

Higher numbers for fall recruitment

Recruitment occurs every fall and spring and provides students with the chance to meet members of the fraternities and sororities on campus. Through scheduled events, first-year students get a chance to interact with upperclassmen and acquaint themselves with greek life.

Even students who are not planning on rushing often enjoy the preliminary lunches.

“It was great going to lunch and just talking to the guys,” said Michael Rogers, a first-year. “They didn’t pressure me at all about rushing, so it was just a great opportunity for me as a freshman to talk to some upperclassmen.”

Although it seems pretty informal, there are some rules and regulations that have to be followed. Among them is strict silence, a rule which spans from the beginning of rush to bid night, when the sororities and fraternities give potential new members an invitation to join their group.

“At the informational meeting we were warned that the sorority girls wouldn’t be allowed to talk to us in fear of giving us false hopes, which is understandable,” said Justis Phillips, a first-year resident of Jewett Hall.

“Freshmen also aren’t allowed to come over to the houses for the first few weeks,” said Matt Macquivey, a TKE, “and for obvious reasons no alcohol can be consumed when a potential new member is present.”

Fraternities and sororities have to deal with the stereotypes and preconceptions of being a part of greek life, but fewer people believe that they are like those represented in Hollywood.

“I’ve heard that Whitman sororities and fraternities are atypical compared to other schools,” said first-year Lauren McCullough.

“I was little skeptical at first with the fraternities and their reputations like in ‘Animal House’,” said first-year Mark Glasionov, “but I’ve been hanging out with the guys, gone out to lunch, and they told me about the frat. Since then I’ve gotten to go to the dinners and see the houses, and it wasn’t at all what I’ve expected, so I’m actually pretty excited.”

“I think the pledge class is going to be really great this year because both the boys and the girls have such unique personalities and overall they’re just a diverse class,” said Katie Barich, a sophomore Delta Gamma. “In general, the student participation in greek life is expanding right now.”

Professor’s book appeals to new audience

As a Whitman professor and avid climber, Kevin Pogue’s enthusiasm for the City of Rocks reaches both in and out of the classroom. His new book, “Etched in Stone: The Geology of City of Rocks National Reserve and Castle Rocks State Park, Idaho,” is the first of its kind to explore the geology of the area in a format that is accessible to both park naturalists and visitors.

Published this year by the Idaho Geological Survey, the book provides a detailed overview of the geological evolution and history of the City of Rocks National Reserve and the adjacent Castle Rock State Park. Featuring a glossary of important terms and photographs of geologic structures, the book is designed to appeal to readers with a broad range of educational backgrounds.

“The idea behind the book was not only to make something that summarized and explained the geology scientifically for geologists, but was also approachable for the layperson,” said Pogue.

The culmination of six years of research, the book is the only academic resource available that provides a comprehensive, intelligible study of the park’s geological development.

“One of my driving inspirations for this book was that once the City of Rocks became part of the National Park Service, all the interpretive resources were geared towards the historical California trial,” says Pogue. “There was nothing about the rocks and how they formed and what made this unique landscape. What I wanted to do was put [these resources] in a form the park naturalist could work with and be able to understand.”

The book’s accessibility may stem from the fact that both professors and students collaborated on the project.

“I had about nine different student senior theses that I supervised in the City of Rocks and those theses helped confirm the various types of geologic processes that were operating in the park and how they affected the evolution of the landscape there,” says Pogue.

Working with students, he says, is the most rewarding part of doing research. From the Wallowas to the Himalayas, Pogue has led Whitman students on a number of field trips.

“The coolest part about doing the book was wandering around in this incredible landscape, gathering the data and making discoveries with students who were excited about being out there in the field,” said Pogue.

On Sep. 20, Pogue is returning to the City of Rocks, where he will be leading field trips and giving a talk for the twentieth anniversary of the park.

Whitman only U.S. college to stream Al Jazeera English

Earlier this month, Whitman College became the first undergraduate institution in the United States to begin streaming live video of the English version of the Arabic news station, Al Jazeera.

The idea for the stream, which airs in Café 66 in the Penrose library, was initiated in part by Dr. Shampa Biswas and Dr. Bruce Magnusson, associate professors of politics, who wanted it as a resource for their “Politics of the Iraq War” class.

“We were interested in [Al Jazeera] because we teach international politics and wanted to have several different global news sources on campus,” Biswas said. “But it was really an initiative started by the library.”

Lee Keene, head of reference and instruction, helped “put all the pieces together” by working with the school administration, Whitman College Technology Services and negotiating contracts with Al Jazeera English, college librarian Dalia Hagan said.

The new Al Jazeera English stream is part of a global studies initiative at Whitman to, among other things, provide students daily access to international news sources in English, Hagan said.

“It’s an enormous opportunity to hear how the rest of the world presents the same news or different kinds of issues that are not being raised in the U.S. media,” Biswas said.

Hagan agreed with Biswas’ assessment.

“Any news source that [the library] can provide that’s not from an American perspective is extremely important.”

Al Jazeera English is based in Doha, Qatar, where the U.S. has a large military presence. It is considered a standard source of news in the Middle East and there are reports of American soldiers in the region watching it, according to Magnusson.

Al Jazeera, Al Jazeera English’s sister channel, has been criticized by the Bush Administation for having an anti-American bias. In 2006, the network fell into a sea of controversy in the United States regarding its launch of Al Jazeera English, its 24-hour English-language news and current affairs channel.

Biswas said that Al Jazeera and its English derivative are “great news sources” that are broadcast “in so many parts of the world now, but it is still so hard to get in the United States.”

Magnusson suggested that one of the reasons Al Jazeera English has been so hard to get in the United States is because of allegations that the network is supporting terrorism.

“It was an Al Jazeera reporter who got hold of [Bin Laden’s] tapes, so right away the Administration began claiming that Al Jazeera was doing the work of terrorism,” Magnusson said.

Whereas prior to September 11, 2001, the U.S. government applauded Al Jazeera for its role as an independent Middle East media outlet, U.S. officials have since been at odds with Al Jazeera’s news coverage, particularly of the Iraq War.

Both sides have criticized each other. Former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld called the quality of Al Jazeera’s journalism “outrageous – inexcusably biased,” and suggested that “it causes the loss of life.”

Yosri Fouda, the bureau chief for Al Jazeera in London, said he “can see why American and British politicians don’t like us showing these pictures,” in reference to graphic pictures shown by the network but censored by most other news sources. “They show a side of the war they don’t want projected because it may affect public opinion in their country negatively.”

Al Jazeera, and particularly Al Jazeera English, has won prestigious awards in television journalism. This summer, Al Jazeera English won the award for ‘Best 24-Hour News Programme’ at the 48th Monte Carlo Television Festival, an international television awards ceremony akin to the Emmy’s, except more news-oriented.

Part of what has led to Al Jazeera’s rise to prominence as a news channel has been its unorthodox yet accurate news coverage.

“They show images from the [Iraq] War that are generally censored in the U.S. media,” Biswas said.
Many of the war images Al Jazeera does not censor are exceptionally graphic and have no partiality toward American or Iraqi casualties. For that reason, Al Jazeera has been criticized by both the U.S. as being anti-American and by Iraqis and much of the Muslim world as being anti-Muslim.

“I have heard reports that there have been some organized efforts to keep Al Jazeera from being broadcast in the U.S.,” Biswas said.

Penrose library staff is currently keeping track of Al Jazeera English’s audience at Whitman, but Hagan maintains that the audience is “not very large.”

Though she does not suspect that many will use the stream on a regular basis, Biswas encourages students to go to the library and watch Al Jazeera as well as the already streaming international news sources such as Russia Today, Central China TV and BBC World.

This week in ASWC

The Nominations Committee is seeking four new members responsible for nominating all of the salaried and appointed positions
of ASWC. Members will advertise open positions, oversee the application process, conduct interviews and present nominations
to the ASWC Senate for confirmation. There are no stipulations on the demographics of those students, although a range of experiences, ages and campus involvement is preferable. Time commitment includes weekly meetings and attendance at interviews,
most of which take place in the spring semester. Students studying abroad this year are not eligible. Applications are available
by the ASWC office on the third floor of Reid. Due Thursday Sep. 25 at 5:00 p.m.

First-Year Senate Elections will be held Tuesday, Sep. 23. First-years should look out for an email with voting call number.
The Executive Council has started meeting weekly. Minutes are available on the ASWC website. Last week, Policy Chair Roman
Goerss held five ASWC information sessions in dorms to explicate Whitman’s student government branch.

Look out for frequent updates at whitman.edu/aswc!

This Week in Greek

Tau Kappa Epsilon
The TKE all-campus party is this Saturday, Sep. 20, from 9 p.m. until 12 a.m. On Oct. 3, the house will be organizing their biannual Red Cross Blood Drive in Jewett Main Lounge. Sign-ups are the week of Sep. 29 through Oct. 2 in Reid during lunch. Furthermore,
the TKE house is extremely pleased with their recent landscaping improvements; if the house is Narcissus then that lawn is their pond.

Beta Theta Pi
The Betas are characteristically “stoked” for their all-campus this Friday, Sep. 19 as, after a brief hiatus, the foam party is back in full force.

Sigma Chi
The Sigs are excited to announce that their hot tub is up and running. Good thing that December deep-freeze is just around the corner! Additionally, the house was very pleased with the turnout at its all-campus party. Thanks to all who attended.

Phi Delta Theta
The Phis had fifteen freshmen participate in their philanthropy rush event at Welcome Table Farm. Furthermore, the Phis were very pleased with their all-campus luau turnout.

Kappa Kappa Gamma
The Kappas are pleased with recruitment thus far. Additionally, their Education Leadership Consultant is visiting Saturday.

Kappa Alpha Theta
The Thetas are similarly pleased with recruitment, and again similarly, their Education Leadership Consultant recently paid the chapter a visit.

Delta Gamma
Last but not least, the ladies of Delta Gamma are… similarly pleased with recruitment! But alas, no visit from their Education
Leadership Consultant. There goes the hat trick, I suppose

One-woman play humanizes Middle Eastern conflict

Harper Joy Theater’s first play of the season required countless hours of memorization and work by its cast—a cast of one person.

Senior Rosie Brownlow performed in the one-woman production of “My Name is Rachel Corrie.” The show had four performances between Thursday, Sep. 11 and Sunday, Sep. 14.

“My Name is Rachel Corrie” chronicled the last few months of the life of Rachel Corrie, a 23-year-old woman from Olympia, Wash. After high school, Corrie attended The Evergreen State College. While there, she took classes that caused her to become more involved in local and world politics. She ultimately joined the International Solidarity Movement (ISM), a human rights organization that brings world-wide volunteers to the Gaza Strip. Corrie traveled to the Gaza Strip herself in early 2003.

The play is an accumulation of Corrie’s writings, pieced together from her diary entries and correspondence with her family and friends leading up to her death. It was written by  Katherine Viner and Alan Rickman and directed by Nancy Simon, Garrett Professor of Dramatic Art.

Last May, Simon approached Brownlow, a theater major, about acting in the play. Brownlow jumped at the opportunity. She spent much of the summer memorizing her one hour and 45 minutes of lines. She and Simon also traveled to Olympia together to visit many of the places where Corrie spent time, like her college, her local haunts and Capital Lake.

“I think it was really valuable just in terms of being able to be in her world,” Brownlow said of the Olympia trip.

“It’s a great reference point later when I’m looking for images, and I just have a concept of the home that was so important for her for 23 years.”

Brownlow said that she had to generate these images and strongly connect to the audience, in lieu of connecting with a physical partner on stage. It was a difficult and different experience for her, since she had never acted in a one-person show before. But she said the one-on-one attention she gained from rehearsing was invaluable.

“I feel more prepared for this play than I ever have, even though it’s so huge,” she said.

Despite the serious nature of the play, Brownlow said that humor was an important component.

“I think people come into it expecting it to be really serious, because they just sort of know it’s about this woman who died and the Middle East Palestinian conflict,” Brownlow said. “But there are definitely a lot of funny moments, and she’s a very, very funny person. Humor is really present in her writing. One of the things people are saying is that she never lost her sense of humor—never ever—even when she was in these horrible conditions. I think it was something that she really valued, being able to laugh at herself.”

While the play did produce laughter, several audience members were visibly moved by the content.
“It was very powerful,” said junior Kali Stoehr. “I actually made a point to not go into it with expectations. I knew it was about the Middle East and I was expecting something about the conflict, but that was more intense than I was expecting.”

Other audience members described the play as very thought-provoking.

“In terms of the issue it was addressing, it was trying to show something that is present in our lives but not really an issue for most people,” senior Kate Greenberg said.

Senior Ariana Rampy applauded not only the acting by Brownlow, but the reaction it caused on campus.

“I think it’s great, because I saw a lot of people coming in tonight who didn’t know how to get to the theater, which means they don’t come here very often,” Rampy said. “I think it’s great that this has created that much attention.”

Brownlow emphasized that this play does have strong political overtones and is very controversial. But the point of the play, she said, was not primarily political.

“I think if the play succeeds, it succeeds in humanizing her,” she said. “She’s just been this polarizing figure, because people have very strong opinions on the Middle East. It’s very important to just realize that she’s just human. We all are.”

Scrambles: A way to bond

On the warm evening of Aug. 28, over 100 dirty but excited freshmen sang and hopped around in sleeping bags. By the time dinner and skit night was over, it was clear that each group had become close during their weeklong outdoor orientations.

This year marked the 31st anniversary of Scrambles, and according to Scramble intern Lydia Hayes, everything went smoothly.

One hundred thirty-eight incoming freshmen and 46 leaders participated in 16 trips, ranging from backpacking or kayaking on the coast to rock climbing at Smith Rock.

This year, they were so popular that there were 70 students on the waitlist at one time.  The most desired Scramble, Bodacious Bouncing Boating, was filled within the first two days of registration, and most were full within a week.

“I UPS’ed my decision the first day,” first-year Grant Bradley, who went on Olympic Gold Gallivanting, said.
Bradley and other first years hiked on the Olympic Peninsula about 40 miles for six days, seeing such wild sights as a bald eagle flying off with a fish in its talons and a decomposed beached whale.

Other Scrambles enjoyed their time in nature. First-year Brett Konen, a Bodacious Bouncing Boater, loved rafting on the Salmon River and sleeping under the stars.

“I liked not having to work,” Konen said.

First-year Lea Gariando kayaked on Ross Lake for about a week, but she enjoyed bonding with her new friends over the beauty of the wilderness.

“It really jump-started some close friendships with people I might not have even met since we’re in different dorms and such,” Gariando said.

Konen agreed, “It’s good to know people when you get to Whitman. It helped to meet other people.”

“From my perspective, it’s cool to see freshmen come here that don’t know each other at all,” Alicia Riley, the OP rental shop manager said, “And then see them all at the skit night with all these experiences. It’s awesome.”
Sophomore Zach Morrissey, who led the Scramble to Mt. Hood, also concurred.

“Scrambles are really great because it helps freshmen network a bit before coming to school and are then able to come with a base of a few good friends before they get overwhelmed with hundreds of other new faces in the coming weeks,” Morrissey said, “Coming from the East Coast and not knowing any Whitties prior to my Scramble, it helped me ease in to a life at Whitman with a couple close friends.”

Senior Kate Levy, who led the Stellar Sawtooths Scramble, added, “Scrambles give students a safe place to ask other Whitties about campus, professors, and college life in general.  There is the outdoor component as well.  I believe that passion for the outdoors is a defining aspect of Whitman culture, and introducing students to Whitman and to the activities many Whitties adore is all a part of welcoming and introducing freshmen to Whitman life.”

These leaders were put through hours of training to be able to partake in these bonding excursions.

All leaders must possess wilderness first aid. They also all must be certified to drive a 15 passenger van, which involves taking a four hour online course, spending three hours in a classroom, and driving at least one hour behind the wheel.

“One should probably also have at least some experience in the outdoors before, as it would also probably help,” Morrissey said, “Scramble leaders then go on a leader training pre-trip, sometimes to the destination of your Scramble and sometimes not.”

With certain trips, other training or certifications are required.

Senior Luke Sanford, for example, a leader for the whitewater-rafting trip, took a six-day long American Canoe and Kayak Instructor Training class and a “swift water rescue” class.

However, the many hours spent in training and taking tests, seems worth it to these upperclassmen.
Morrissey’s favorite part of his Scramble “were the Scramblers themselves. It was an awesome group of freshman, and they didn’t put up a fuss even when we hit a couple tough situations on the trail. We did some swimming in ridiculously cold alpine lakes, and made some awesome food.”

Sanford also greatly adored leading Scrambles. He has led three in total, but he claimed the rafting one was his favorite.

“I really, really enjoy rafting,” he said, “especially when you have a good group of people to raft with. It’s just really fun to hang out with people.”

Even when rafting or kayaking rapids turns into swimming rapids, the Scramblers still enjoy themselves.
“Four of our five inflatable kayaks flipped in the same rapid because they all aimed for the feature that we tried to tell them to stay away from, but a lot of people put that as their favorite experiences of the trip,” Sanford said.

This story is just one among many that different freshmen will remember forever, and the OP is proud to organize such an amazing program.

“It’s a lot of work putting it together, but we’re looking forward to keep expanding,” Hayes said.

With the successful year of Scrambles completed, the OP is ready for the next batch of eager young freshmen to embark on journeys around the Pacific Northwest.

How To: Go on an Outdoor Program Trip

Ice climbing.  Sea kayaking. Alpine touring. Whitewater kayaking. Telemark Skiing.
Whether you’ve never heard of, tried, or not been able to stop thinking about activities as enticing as these, now is the right time to give them a shot.

Fortunately, you live on a campus that has “one of the largest, most active OPs in the country for a school this size,” according to Outdoor Program (OP) Director Brien Sheedy. Getting involved is as easy as walking down to the Outdoor Rental Shop on the lower level of Reid Campus Center.

From here, it’s simply a matter of deciding which trip looks the most exciting (perhaps the hardest part of the process), and then putting your name on a sign-up sheet.

Roughly 80% of all OP Trips are designed for beginners with no experience to speak of, whatsoever. For those who have some knowledge of their activity, there are also a number of trips offered at intermediate or advanced levels.

“It’s a mix for sure,” says OP Assistant Director Salmon Norgaard-Stroich in regards to the range of skill levels.
One of the consequences of having such an accessible Outdoor Program is that trips tend to fill up quickly; many of the trips this semester filled before classes started. This may lead to prospective participants being intimidated by long waitlists.

“Definitely get on the waitlist,” says Sheedy. “It’s not uncommon for there to be movement.” As classwork piles up, clubs are joined, and parents become antsy to have their baby bird  back in the nest for a weekend, many students are forced to remove their names from the trip roster. This often means that even someone late on the list has a legitimate shot at going on the trip. So sign up as early as possible and don’t be afraid to put your name down, even if it is a long list.

One sure way to shorten the waitlists, however, is to increase the number of trips available. A large majority of trips are student-run, so the more students the OP has working as guides, the more trips  they’ll be able to send out. Some training is necessary (skills relating to desired area, basic First Aid & CPR), but much of this is offered by the OP on campus. The OP is looking for more student guides in virtually every area: rock climbing and rafting guides are in high demand, while backpacking and sea-kayaking require relatively little time to become certified.

Try to get involved somehow. “Set priorities,” Sheedy encourages students. He contrasts setting a weekend aside for a special trip, which may only be a viable opportunity once every two years, with going to “X party,” an experience far less likely to make for enduring memories.

So head down to the Rental Shop and sign up for an OP Trip, enjoy the magnificent scenery of the Northwest, learn a new skill, and meet amazing people.

Eco-internships: from classroom to the real world

Parrot Conservation in Fiji and Mill Creek Fish Passage Improvement are now classes at Whitman, through Environmental Studies 220 Environmental Internship.

“The environmental internship consists of getting involved with something environmental whether it’s in Walla Walla or your town.  It’s to get a feel for what’s out there.”  Said Senior Environmental Studies-Geology Major Andrea Seymour.

“The internship has been an integral part of the environmental studies program for as long as I’ve been here.” Said the Academic Assistant for Environmental Studies, Amy Molitor who supervises environmental interns.

“The purpose is to give students firsthand experience with a non-profit environmental organization or environmentally focused government agency” said Molitor. “More recently we’ve had students work with people or companies that are working towards sustainability, such as an organic farm.”

The one credit course is required for all Environmental Studies majors.   It is offered in both the fall and spring, but recently some students, such as Seymour, have completed their internship over the summer.

“Summer option has added greater richness to the experience.  Students are able to get into the nuts and bolts of an organization without having to balance the internship with classes and other activities.” said Molitor.

“Though Walla Walla has a significant number of environmental agencies and non-profit organizations willing to sponsor an Environmental Studies intern, summer internships allow students to have access to a wider variety of opportunities.  Summer internships have taken students to Washington, DC, Denver, CO and as far away as the Fiji Islands.” said Molitor.

Senior Environmental Studies-Humanities major Julia Lakes sees Walla Walla as the center of her two environmental studies internships.

“Our expertise is often not shared with this community.  We have so many smart students and valuable resources. We have a duty to share this knowledge with Walla Walla,” said Lakes.

Students work closely with Molitor to find a summer internship that is right for them.

“I can provide suggestions of where to look for an internship” said Molitor, “but the process of obtaining an internship is part of the learning process.  Students have to find the internship and submit a resume and cover letter.”

During the year the process is less rigorous.  Molitor makes a list of available internships and a list of students and then matches them based on the student’s preference and the organization’s needs.    Students can also propose their own internship.  The program is meant for students to have the freedom to take ownership in their internship.

The credit requires four hours a week, but according to Molitor students often go above and beyond.  The program also provides structure to keep students accountable and make sure the internship is running smoothly.  Students keep a log of their activities.  They also do a report half way through and a final report.

Organizations and students sign a contract beforehand stating the student’s duties.  “Students develop goals and objectives with the organization to try and minimize the clerical component.

“We want students to really get their hands dirty in terms of environmental work.” said Molitor.

“I think it’s a really important program and one that is easily over looked as not being [an] integral part of the environmental studies major.   Environmentalism inherently involves community work.  The internship gives students something concrete.” said Lakes.

BSU dance brings together student community

From the classroom to the dance floor, the Black Student Union talked logistics and made final preparations for the annual hip-hop dance, predicting a high turnout to the all-campus function in the Reid Ballroom on Friday, Sep. 12. The Whitman community was buzzing with excitement while anticipating the “biggest social event on campus,” said BSU Treasurer Kiet Vo.

President Jordan Wheeler similarly expressed the magnitude of the event: “It’s so big that fraternities schedule their parties around the dance.”

Many Whitman students expressed their excitement, looking forward to a crowded dance floor, flashing strobe lights, and a night brimming with laughter and hip-hop music.

“College students want to have a good time; hip-hop brings everyone together. It is universally known and celebrated,” said BSU member Anthony Woods.

As Wheeler said, this dance “brings people together”  and helps “establish connections with all students” in an entertaining and enjoyable manner.

As the club advisor, Professor Nadine Knight, similarly expressed, the hip-hop themed event “helps demonstrate and celebrate diverse cultures and beliefs.”

The event aimed to provide release from everyday troubles. Dancing not only relieved everyday stress for Whitman students, but also provided an appropriate venue to express themselves. Whether their drop-it-like-it’s-hot moves endangered those around them or shocked the masses with awe and reverence, students expressed themselves accordingly. Universally excited for the event, the BSU members “expected a big turnout and were excited to get everyone in the same place,” said Wheeler.

Members of BSU hope that other students will take this opportunity to appreciate the organization and consider joining the club.

“Membership has diminished over the years,” said Vo, but what they offer still remains – the comforts of a home away from home in a positive atmosphere.

Having personally benefited through friendships and the auspicious vibe, BSU member David Changa-Moon, testified that “this organization provides comfort to students in need of the stability of family. College can be isolating.”

The BSU provides a “support group that helps students understand and deal with the [cultural] transition,” said  Woods.

Although this event may be the most anticipated dance of the year, the Black Student Union has sponsored a plethora of other events, such as Kwanzaa celebrations and mentoring programs. To equate this capable organization with a mere dance would prove an injustice.

Impassioned and supportive, Knight emphasized the union’s objective to  “serve first and foremost the interests of their members.” This may range from “a discussion of the disenfranchisement of Black voters in US politics [to] hosting informal soul food nights,” Knight said.

Now functioning under new leadership, the BSU is determined to eventually “establish connections with alumni, travel, and attend conferences and community outreach programs,” said Wheeler.

“We need to build a new focus and determine how we want to impact Whitman,” said Changa-Moon.

The Black Student Union has tremendous potential, stimulating the Whitman community by starting the year with the acclaimed hip-hop dance.

Shun supermarkets, shop super fresh

When we students arrive in Walla Walla in late August, wander around the Activities Fair and Poster Sale, tack pictures to our walls, stock bookshelves and complete web check-in, we are often oblivious of what goes on outside the collegiate realm.  We may venture to Staples, to the thrift stores or maybe down to one of the local favorite ice-cream spots (if you haven’t had a blackberry milkshake at The Iceberg on 9th, you are missing out), but we do not make it quite into what I’ve come to know as the heart of Walla Walla.  After spending the summer living here in town and working on an organic farm, I’ve realized that this time of year means more than Whitstock, Camp Whitman and advisor clearances.  This time of year in Walla Walla means HARVEST.  It means BOUNTY.

I come from the Bay Area, California, a sunny place where the growing season stretches almost the entire calendar year and you rarely need more than a sweatshirt and the occasional umbrella in winter.  At the end of May, after a Walla Walla farmers’ market consisting of asparagus, spinach and spring onions, I went home to California to find peaches, apricots, greens, strawberries, heads of lettuce larger than my head and even tomatoes at my local farmers’ market.  As a self-proclaimed lover of food, especially fresh fruits and veggies, I appreciate California in May, reveling in Arctic Star nectarines and plump golden apricots.  This year, however, after a few weeks at home, I zipped back up to Walla Walla to dedicate the majority of the summer to Gypsy Sally’s Produce Palace, a three-acre vegetable farm on the outskirts of town.

What I’ve learned is that although the growing season may be much shorter here than my golden state homeland, there is no shortage of incredible fresh produce.  And that’s the knowledge that I am going to try to share with you all through this weekly column, at least until the frost comes.  Here I will focus on local food and local producers to give you a sense of how easy and beneficial it is to buy food grown just a stones throw from Whitman.  I’ll share recipes, anecdotes and reflections on Walla Walla food.

So steer clear of supermarket produce aisles for the next few months.  You can find much tastier, fresher and cheaper (yes, cheaper) produce nearby.  Venture down Main Street to Farmers’ Market on Saturday morning.  Better yet, go on a little excursion to one of the many farm stands within just a few miles of town.

Now is a better time than ever to do a little taste testing. The sweet corn is on.  Renowned watermelons are carted up from nearby Hermiston, Ore..  The tomatoes here are plump and rich in vine-ripened flavor, and there’s plenty of basil around to accompany them.  Apples and pears are falling from laden limbs.  You see, there is much more than just asparagus and onions in Walla Walla.  Before the stupor of school hits you too hard and the weather turns frigid, take advantage of the bounty of goods nearby.

Fouts Center for Visual Arts opens amidst excitement, controversy

Charles Timm-Ballard, chair of the art department, stood in the second floor painting studio and pointed toward the skylight overhead.

“They made models of what the sun will be doing at different times of day throughout the year.  Each of [the skylights] is placed so that the way the light from the skylights combines with the light that comes in from the other windows and those artificial lights, there will be the absolute minimum amount of glare,” said Timm-Ballard.

At the dedication ceremony on Saturday Sep. 3, trustees, donors, students, faculty, staff, alumni and community members roamed the cement floors of the Fouts Center for Visual Arts, taking in the details of the state of the new art facility.

“I love the light.  It’s really breathtaking,” said sophomore Dana Bialeck of the $15 million art facility.
Bialeck’s sentiment was echoed by a most everyone who had toured the new building.  While a few people remained hesitant about the industrial aesthetics of the building, everyone appreciated the use of natural light and agreed the new building will be an improvement over the Olin art wing.

“I just can’t get unexcited about this building,” said studio art technical assistant, Susa Roberts.

The process of making a new art building a reality began six years ago when Timm-Ballard gave a presentation to the board of trustees and the president’s council on the need for a new art building.

Since then, there have been over three years of planning, two years of construction, a change in plans to accommodate a 30-year-old incense cedar and hundreds of hours of fund-raising all in an effort to make the building the best it could be.

Timm-Ballard and the main architect visited seven different art facilities at liberal arts colleges across the country to get ideas and feedback on what works and what doesn’t in an art building.

“[The architects] took a lot of time to understand what we did and how materials came in and flow through the building and there are a lot of things that are really right about the building; things that I would have never even thought of,” said Timm-Ballard.

While the attention to detail is apparent in everything from the gender neutral bathroom to the personal studios for each faculty member, perhaps most noteworthy is the building’s attention to safety.

Whitman brought in the top industrial hygienist in the arts from New York.  Subsequently, every part of the ventilation and waste management systems is top of the line.

“Olin was just full of dust and who knows what else.  There wasn’t really a way to suck all the stuff out that really shouldn’t have been in there,” said Roberts.  “The new building is as nice as it gets.  It’s completely state of the art.”

Yet not everything about the building has been met with unanimous praise from students.  Most notably the art display on exterior wall next to the Park Street entrance has been the topic of much discussion.

“The weird orange necklace and the David, yeah that’s really weird,” said senior Celi Schoenike of Michelle Acuff’s piece “Juxtapose.”

Not yet finished, the art on the wall was created by Whitman faculty and staff who were highly involved in the process of making the building a reality.

The pieces revolve around the theme of what goes on in the art building and the ideas of teaching and learning.  The artist statements for these pieces can be found at the main desk in the art building.  While nothing has been decided yet, the pieces may rotate in and out as faculty come and go.

“I think [the wall] is a success in that it expresses that what we do is wildly divergent in many ways and I think it’s a really exciting piece.  I think that it’s successful in expressing who we are in this building,” said Timm-Ballard. “Art should be challenging and it should create controversies.  And we aren’t just decorating things or decorating walls; we’re asking questions, and hard questions some times.”

Aside from the functional benefits of the 38,000 square foot center, the building has taken on symbolic significance of the state of the arts on campus and in Walla Walla.

“I think the community will see the scale and size of this building and they will see the lights on and the green space and they will want to check it out, to get involved,” said Mark Anderson, who majored in art at Whitman in 1978 and lives in Walla Walla.

“[The new building] puts us visually right in the middle of campus…it’s made us visually more accessible,” said Timm-Ballard.  “I think that it’s a strong statement about how important art is on campus.”

“We always have long waiting lists and I think they’re just going to get longer and I think that we’re going to have more adjuncts  and more people teaching. “

“This building is about learning to think creatively.  Whether you’re a poet or a physicist or a math major or a doctor or a lawyer you have to be a creative person and that’s what we teach here: how to think creatively, where new ideas come from, how to bring them to the surface,” said Timm-Ballard.

“It could be a different building,” said Timm-Ballard, “but it couldn’t be a better building.”

From one art to another

Last semester senior Stephen Phillips was playing soccer on dirt fields with balls that weren’t fully pumped up, and against people wearing no shoes.  On Sat. Sept. 12, he was back playing under the lights on a pristine field wearing his cleats.  The latter event was Walla Walla, last semester was Ghana.

Phillips, a co-captain of the soccer team, is a studio art major that decided to take advantage of the study abroad system and study art in Ghana.

“I knew that art would definitely be more functional there,” Phillips said.  “It would be a different type, it would be more day-to-day use.”  By day-to-day use, he means that many objects were made to carry items on your head.  An aspect that Phillips enjoyed about Ghana was that there were so many types of art in the country.

“There is both European influenced art, traditional Ghanaian art, and contemporary Ghanaian art that is a mix of both traditional Ghanaian and European art,” he said.

While studying in Ghana, Phillips spent a great amount of time studying traditional African art.  Daily life was also a drastic change for him.  The laid back lifestyle was welcome in comparison to the stressful life he lives in Walla Walla. Daily tasks were also extremely different.  “Not every shower was out of a bucket, but there were a lot of showers out of them,” Phillips said.

When it comes to art and soccer, Phillips believes that what is created on a soccer field is also an art.  “Soccer really is an art form especially when you create things as a team,” he said.  “It is a type of art and watching some of the best players in the world you notice that.”  In addition to the parallels between soccer and art, Phillips said that his interest in art has helped shape his view on soccer.  “You can watch many countries and they all have different styles that are very artful.  And just like in art some styles are more fun to watch,” he said.

Not only his coach, but teammates share Phillips’ view on how soccer is an art.  “When you are coaching 26 players you need everyone to see the same picture that you are trying to create,” Head Coach Mike Washington said.  “When you see soccer flowing like it is able to, it truly is an art.”  Brother and teammate Greg Phillips sees parallels between the way Steve plays and his art.

“I can totally see soccer like one of his paintings or murals where all of the different colors and techniques work together,” he said.  “It is not all about one individual aspect but the whole effect of different combinations.”

By being the captain of the soccer team Phillips has spent a lot of time with his teammates.  Because of this, it is sometimes hard for him to balance art and soccer.

“After four years I have committed so much to the team and you bond so much with everyone, so soccer is definitely one of my priorities,” he said.  “Soccer sometimes even comes before schoolwork.  By doing that you may have to work later or find other times to work, where you can get your work done.”  However, he has found that balance which has allowed him to thrive both academically and athletically.

Now back in Walla Walla his teammates and coaches have noticed a change in Steve.  From a soccer standpoint teammate Jasper Lipton has noticed a drastic change.

“I think that from his time in Ghana he has gotten calmer on the field, and definitely he has gotten stronger on the ball,” he said.  “He is also much more of a captain on the field, especially the way he takes control of the game.”

Off the field, Washington and Greg Phillips believe that Steve has changed as well.

“I saw in him, what I think, that travel in general does, it makes you more grateful for what you have,” Washington said.  Brother Greg saw similar things.

“He commented on how lucky and blessed we are to have the opportunities in this country, but also with our family,” he said.  “It was an eye-opener.  I feel that any time you go to a developing country you have one of those experiences.”

Sherwood displaces I.M. sports, promises bright future

The ongoing $15 million renovation of Sherwood Center is causing quite a stir in the Whitman Athletics and Intramural Sports communities.  Last year, Sherwood housed many I.M. Sports such as basketball and dodgeball, as well as the school’s climbing walls and Racquetball courts. However, with the new construction in full swing, many Varsity and I.M. Sports are having to make compromises.

Due to the buildings’ ongoing renovations many athletes are unable to use the Sherwood facilities that have been available to them in the past. At the command of the Walla Walla Fire Marshal and the Building Inspector almost all of the building has been ordered closed for the duration of the construction.  However, Sherwood will be open to the public for Varsity Basketball as well as Volleyball contests this fall and winter.

With the exception of Varsity Basketball and Volleyball players, students are only able to use the main gym during scheduled “Open Gym” times available at the Baker Ferguson Fitness Center.  These times are limited, however, to a maximum occupancy of fifty people.

These restrictions are forcing Whitman athletic officials to find alternate areas for teams to practice during the winter.  Deals are being made with other institutions in the Walla Walla area such as DeSalles High School and Walla Walla Community College to allow Whitman athletes to use their facilities.

Athletic Director Dean Snider commented on the comprises athletes will have to make given the limited space, saying, “this winter will have to mostly be focused on conditioning.”

Indoor I.M. Sports such as basketball and dodgeball are also taking a hit.  The focus will be to “do I.M. events this year that are suitable for the situation,” said Snider, which means that more emphasis will be placed on outdoor sports such as soccer, football, and ultimate Frisbee.

Also, there will be an added I.M. tennis season and outdoor Volleyball, to be played on the courts outside of Anderson Hall and the Science building.  These seasons are being re-added after having been dropped last year.

“We will not be able to do Basketball unless we find somewhere else to do it,” said Matt Morris-Rosenfeld, member of Whitman’s Intramural Sports Committee. “The problem is people are not going to want to go too far out of their way for an I.M. sport.”

This unwillingness makes it very difficult for the Committee to find suitable playing areas for I.M. teams because, outside of Sherwood, there are little or no suitable indoor spaces within a reasonable walking distance.

He admitted that they haven’t gotten around to making arrangements for other indoor I.M. sports, but the Committee will be meeting this next week to decide the best course of action. Even if they are unable to come to a reasonable conclusion, Morris-Rosenfeld said the indoor sports would not be dropped, but replaced with others so that there are still plenty of I.M. options this fall and winter.

Any changes made will only be temporary, however. The renovations being done to Sherwood are on schedule and, according to Snider, should be finished by August of 2009.

Preseason NCAA football rankings unfair, create bias

What if before each kid entered school in kindergarten, a board of teachers assessed their mental ability based on their parental lineage, their performance in preschool and the overall ability of their brain?

Then, from their assessment, the board of teachers places all the smart kids from good families into the best private schools; all the kids that are not so smart, but from good families in mediocre public schools; and the rest of the kids that are from non-BCS families in the remedial schools.

In this situation, the privileged BCS kids would end every year with the best test scores, while it would take a miracle child named Boise State to rise out of the remedial schools with any chance at all.

Unfortunately, preseason polls in college football impose this type of bias on teams each year. The week before games start can be the most important week of the season for some teams because of the unfair predestination preseason polls place on them.

However, these really important polls are based off of minimal proof. No team has played a down yet, but sports writers (not me) think that they can judge how a team is going to do based only on which players return for each team and how well they practice in the spring and the fall.

Consequently, those that are rated at the top of the preseason poll have a comparatively easy route to the national title game next to teams that are rated at the bottom of the Top 25 or even lower.

One of the main reasons that a two-loss LSU team was able to play in the national title game last year – something no other two-loss team had ever done – was because they began the season at No. 2 in the preseason polls. This high preseason ranking meant that after each of their losses, LSU didn’t have far to go to get back in one of the top two spots in the polls.

Unfortunately, this same scenario also helped Ohio State get into the national title game last year since they played easy teams in their non-conference schedule and the Big-10, while all the other teams fell around them. If Purdue had played the same schedule as Ohio State with the same results, there’s no way they would have climbed high enough to be in the title game based off of their low preseason ranking.

This is possible because the pollsters operate narrow-mindedly. Instead of reassessing how each team is playing and ranking them on that basis, pollsters often start with last week’s poll and move teams up and down based off whether they win or lose. This way teams rarely move ahead of a team that’s in front of them if both teams win that weekend.

This is the problem that Auburn faced in 2004 when they went undefeated, but were left out of the national championship game in favor of the undefeated USC and Oklahoma teams. At the beginning of the season USC and Oklahoma were rated Nos. 1 and 2 in the AP poll, while Auburn began at No. 17. As the season progressed, Auburn climbed in the polls till they reached No. 3 after the tenth week and then spent the second half of the season stuck behind Oklahoma at No. 2. Pollsters were clearly weary of moving Auburn ahead of an Oklahoma team that kept winning, despite feelings that grew over time that Auburn was the better team, playing in a better conference.

As a result, Auburn was left out of the title game and USC crushed Oklahoma 55-19 for the national championship. Clearly, Oklahoma did not deserve to be in that game, but since they started at No. 2 in the preseason polls the AP voters didn’t feel that they could move them down.

Presently, sports writers are beginning to advocate for waiting till October to rate teams, arguing that it is the fairest thing for the sport. While I think that the same east coast bias that shapes the current preseason polls would remain, I do think this is a better model that college football should adopt immediately. This way the first rankings of the season will actually be based off of play in a game and not in practice.

Sadly, until they make this change, we’ll face the same frightening possibility every season of Ohio State playing in the national championship game.

Whitman Athlete of the Week: Corina Gabbert

Corina Gabbert, junior forward for the Whitman Women’s soccer team, is the inaugural winner of the Whitman Athlete of the Week award. During Whitman’s 2-1 overtime win against St. Martin’s University, Gabbert had eight shots in the game, four of which were on goal.

In the overtime period, Gabbert hit the game winning shot in the 96th minute of the game. The goal came after teammate Libby Watkins passed the ball to Gabbert in front of the net. Gabbert shot, but St. Martin’s goalie layed out right in front of Gabbert’s feet and blocked Gabbert’s initial attempt. However, the ball rebounded right to Gabbert’s feet and Gabbert took a second to set up and then hit the game winning shot over St. Martin’s goalie.

Sheehan gallery aims to bring art to students and community

Artist Candace Nicol excitedly took the stage to the applause of students, faculty and community members. Her presentation described her journey as an artist and explained her artistic process. Nicol’s presentation is one of many the Sheehan Art Gallery hopes will accompany its exhibitions in the coming months. The gallery typically shows five to six exhibitions per year.
Nicol, an artist from Las Vegas, NV, is praised for her ability to create unique works of art by fusing a variety of different art forms together. Her process brings together printmaking, painting and digital photography, combining them in ways that add to the character and depth of each piece she creates. Her exhibit, Manifestations: The Male Nude, is being showcased alongside a collection of pieces by Jedidiah Chavez entitled This Feeling will Surely Leave You in the Morning.
Nicol’s talk was something relatively new to the Sheehan gallery.
“To keep interest in the gallery we have scheduled artist talks throughout the exhibitions,” said Kynde Kiefel, Exhibitions and Collections manager of the gallery. “Every weekend or every week there is an artist talking about their work to keep people in the gallery.”
Keeping people in the gallery is a chief concern. The gallery frequently hosts students from Walla Walla University and Walla Walla Community College; however, it has a harder time attracting local residents.
“It would be nice to have a bit more of a relationship with the overall community,” admits gallery Director Dawn Forbes. “But I think we’re working towards that.”
The gallery is actively involved with the local elementary and junior high schools, giving tours of the gallery and the exhibits. Budget cuts in the public school system, however, make these visits more infrequent.
The Sheehan Gallery is also involved in a number of outreach programs to other Whitman departments, trying to draw interest from students who might otherwise not be exposed to art. The gallery tries to find pieces of art interesting to students studying subjects like history, biology and English and then displays the pieces they find in the respective departments.
As exhibitions and collections manager, this is one of Kiefel’s many roles. She is helped by about ten students, who are employed by the gallery. The students are involved in the setup of the exhibitions, basic maintenance and even food and drink prep before an opening. According to Kiefel, the gallery wouldn’t function without them.
“This year the visual culture majors are going to do research on the pieces and work with the gallery on the design and installation of an exhibition,” said Forbes. “This sort of moves the gallery towards a more experiential learning environment which is one of the things we really want to focus on.”
The Sheehan Gallery distinguishes itself from other art galleries in the way that it treats its artists.
“We try to build good relationships with our artists,” said Forbes. “It’s interesting…the relationship between curators and artists is often adversarial. Artists are often asked to give of themselves and their artwork without compensation. Respect is often missing in gallery relationships with artists. We really work to overcome that.

Last year, I think one of the highest compliments the gallery received was virtually every artist we had on campus said that this is the first time in a long time [he/she] really felt like an artist, that this is how an exhibition should be handled.”
Many of the artists that come to the Sheehan Gallery say they like interacting with the students at Whitman.

Most give workshops in their particular medium and say they are pleasantly surprised by the intelligent questions Whitman students ask.
The current exhibit closes Sep. 28, making way for exhibits by Adnan Charara and Deborah Lawrence opening Oct. 15. Both exhibits blend together different mediums, forcing the viewer to take a second look at the world.
“The gallery brings the larger world to a small place, or bigger ideas to a smaller space,” says Kiefel. “It is a place to educate, surprise, and inform the students and community as a whole–maybe even challenge in a good way.”

Navarro steps to the plate with Mariners

Sitting in a major league dugout, meeting ballplayers, and having lunch with the president of the Seattle Mariners as one of the Mariners’ interns this summer was not what junior Melissa Navarro envisioned when she started applying for internships last fall.

“I began looking for summer internships in August and September and after not finding anything, I figured, why not work for the Mariners? I’ve always been a big fan, so I thought it would be a great idea to work for them,” said Navarro, a politics major.

As a sales intern, Navarro contributed sales ideas and assisted account executives at the Mariners’ Safeco Field in Seattle.

“When I first applied for the job, I thought you had to be a business or marketing major, but that’s not the case. I was the only person who came from a small school like Whitman. What they really look for, though, are people who have the professionalism and the critical thinking that we learn here at Whitman,” Navarro said.

Navarro attended home games, where she would help run events such as Japan Night and Day Camp Day, by distributing hats, t-shirts and other promotional items to fans. She enjoyed watching batting practice from the dugout before games and meeting players and executives, such as President Chuck Armstrong. Navarro also served as the sales department’s link to the public by talking to fans and answering their e-mails.

“Melissa’s job this summer involved working in an area that interacted directly with our fans,” said Tim Hevly, the Mariners’ Director of Baseball Operations.  “Professional sports is really a two-pronged business. On the field –wins and losses—and off the field—taking care of fans. Our fans are the lifeblood of the Mariners organization. They are the only reason any of our jobs exist, so any position that deals directly with the fans has a huge impact on the success of the organization.”

After she landed the internship with her favorite team, Navarro had to watch it cut struggling slugger Richie Sexson, fire General Manager Bill Bavasi, and maintain the worst record in the American League.

“When a team performs like that, you’re going to need a great front office working for it. All of the people I worked with were the ones who made it a pretty successful season,” said Navarro. “It was all about the fans. It was the only thing we had going for us. The CEO and COO of the organization were very hands on. They were willing to meet everybody in the office and brainstorm ideas on how we could keep fans coming to the games.”

In addition to sales, a professional sports franchise provides opportunities in several fields, including corporate sales, events, marketing, public relations, community relations, information technology and accounting, said Hevly, who graduated from Whitman in 1988.

“I want to go into sports or media law, so I thought it would be good to work with a sports team. It would definitely give me a foot in the door if I tried to work there again, and I think that goes for any internship for any organization you want to work for,” Navarro said.

“There is a lot of marketing done in sports, so a great deal of the work that can be found in any sports industry is in marketing.  That entails understanding the psychology of what appeals to people as well as creativity in writing or projecting images or items,” said Susan Buchanan, Director of the Whitman Career Center.

Students interested in the sports industry can visit the Career Center, which has books on the sports industry and includes a list of internships on its Web site,

Whitman.edu/content/career_center, Buchanan said.

Perry’s film evokes psychological themes

“Tyler Perry’s The Family that Preys” is a lightly sermonizing and heavily moralizing interracial soap opera that leaves us briefly stirred, but ultimately unsure of what to take away from the film. Perry typically makes films that are set in Atlanta, have conspicuous and predictable moralistic themes, have pious undertones, cast mainly African Americans and credit himself in the title. The Family doesn’t diverge much from the pattern, except that this time he includes a few white characters in the foreground. The cast, on the whole, is spectacular. Almost every actor deeply stirs our sympathy. The plot and directing, on the other hand, though stimulating throughout (just as a teen gossip magazine is stimulating throughout), are artistically mediocre.

The film follows the intrigues and melodramas of two families, one white and one black, with an unlikely relationship. At the head of the former is Charlotte Cartwright (Kathy Bates), the obscenely wealthy matriarch who owns the controlling share of a successful Atlanta construction company. Charlotte has a longstanding friendship with the strong-spined and selfless African-American mother, Alice Pratt (Alfre Woodward), a paragon of Christian piety who owns and struggles to maintain a small family restaurant with her daughter Pam (Taraji P. Henson). Alice is endlessly sacrificial in working to mend the relationship between her daughters Andrea (Sanaa Lathan) and Pam. Andrea, through sleeping with Charlotte’s unscrupulous son William (Cole Hauser), climbs the ladder out of her family’s social class and develops a smug and denigrating attitude toward everyone associated with her past life, especially her sister and her construction-worker husband Chris (Rockmond Dunbar). Chris, an unrealistically oblivious cuckold and one of the few wholly good-hearted characters in the film, is eventually awarded sweet revenge and a ton of cash in accordance with the simple justice typical of Perry’s films.

No one escapes Perry’s justice in this film, with the many vicious characters meeting either death or precipitous falls from power and the virtuous characters rising to wealth and liberation. The least formulaic and most morally dubious reward of Perry’s justice comes to the devoted mother Alice, whose reward consists precisely in being liberated from her devotion to her children. Having worked steadfastly and lovingly for her children for so many years, she is now allowed to “live for herself,” selling her restaurant and driving off a millionaire in a 1950s vintage convertible to Lee Ann Womack’s “I Hope You Dance.” Is that a pious message?

As this sketch may suggest, the plot consists almost solely in the sum of the busy and convoluted relationships of the characters. No character is consistent throughout. Every character changes significantly from beginning to end, and most have multiple faces throughout. There is, of course, much of interest here, but the film lacks any unifying themes, or any sign of some consistent underlying passion that inspired it, that might lend it artistic integrity. Perry timidly and briefly broaches a number of potentially interesting psychological themes, like Andrea’s insecurity and resentment over her unprivileged upbringing or the unnameable freedom that Charlotte futilely seeks from the power struggles of family and business life, but in the end we are not sure what to take away from the film. The film, lacking a core, quickly dissolves and leaves no lingering mark on our affections.