Daily Herald the Brown
vol. cxliv, no. 93 | Tuesday, October 27, 2009 | Serving the community daily since 1891
Brown top Ivy
in Fulbrights
this year
By Kate Monks
Contributing Writer
Just another workday for Robert
Kaufman ’08 is, well, not just another
workday — his office is a classroom
in Norway.
Kaufman is a participant in the
Fulbright Program, a government
sponsored fellowship that gives college
graduates grants to pursue research
and teaching projects abroad. This year
Brown ranked first in the Ivy League
and third in the nation in the number of
Fulbright scholarships received by its
graduates, falling behind only North-
western University and the University
of Chicago.
According to the Institute of In-
ternational Education, Brown has 29
Fulbright recipients pursuing projects
during the 2009-10 year, the highest
number in its history. Brown enjoyed
a 27.4 percent admittance rate into the
program this past year. The national
acceptance rate hovers around 20
percent, according to Linda Dunleavy,
associate dean of the college for fellow-
ships and pre-law.
Kaufman, who is currently a TA
at the University of Oslo in Norway,
described his Fulbright experience as
“too good to be true.” An English and
Religious Studies concentrator while at
Brown, Kaufman now teaches “Ameri-
can Civics and Politics” and is learning
Norwegian.
Kaufman was one of 106 applicants
from Brown last year. The other Ful-
bright recipients are scattered over 23
countries, including India, Peru and
New Zealand.
Congress established the Fulbright
Program, which is sponsored by the
Department of the State, in 1946 to
“enable the government of the United
States to increase mutual understand-
ing between the people of the United
States and the people of other coun-
tries.” The program offers grants to
more than 1,500 American students
each year to travel, research and work
in more than 140 countries.
Renee Ahlers ’09 is participating
in the Fulbright English Teaching As-
sistantship program in Toluca, Mexico.
She was inspired to apply by a friend
who postponed going to law school
and spent a year in Israel with the
program.
Ahlers taught English as a Second
Language for four years at Brown and
decided to continue her work through
the Fulbright Program by conducting
workshops with students at a language
facility in Toluca.
“I get to talk to them about the U.S.
culture and they get to tell me about
the Mexican culture,” Ahlers said of
continued on page 2
inside
News.....1-4
Metro........5
Editorial.....6
Opinion.....7
Today........8
www.browndailyherald.com
hunt for red o c tober Influential education
reformer Sizer dies at 77
By Sydney Ember
Senior Staff Writer
Theodore Sizer, the founding director
of Brown’s Annenberg Institute for
School Reform and one of the fore-
most advocates for national education
reform, died of cancer Oct. 21, leaving
behind a legacy characterized by his
innovative and provocative approaches
to American education. He was 77.
Best known as the founder of the
Coalition of Essential Schools — a na-
tional reform effort headquartered at John Foraste / University Archives
Brown and intended to personalize Theodore Sizer founded Brown’s
the American educational experience Annenberg Institute.
— Sizer, along with former President The gift funded the Chicago An-
Vartan Gregorian, played an extensive nenberg Challenge, a reform initia-
role in the formation of the Annenberg tive directed by then-lawyer Barack
Challenge grant, a $500 million gift Obama near the beginning of his
from the Annenberg Foundation to political career.
reform education at schools nation-
wide. continued on page 2
No different from the rest:
BioMed budget challenged
Kim Perley / Herald
Sayles Hall was shaded by a reddening maple tree Monday.
be covered by sponsored research
‘Spike’ in laptop thefts
By Brigitta Greene
Senior Staff Writer funding.
BioMed — which includes the Alpert
seen over Fall Weekend A large hit to the Divison of Biol-
ogy and Medicine’s endowment has
been offset by an increase in research
Medical School, the Program in Public
Health and the University’s five life
sciences departments — expects an
By Ben Schreckinger Long weekends tend to bring “a lot grants, but the sour economy has approximately 11 percent increase in
Senior Staff Writer of activity on campus” with many complicated some initiatives, such research funding, thanks mostly to a
students hosting guests from out- as a drive to increase financial aid new round of federal funding from the
Nine laptops were stolen from side the University, he said. for medical students, according to American Recovery and Reinvestment
eight different residence halls Porter said there is no indi- BioMed officials. Act. BioMed’s endowment and budget-
over Fall Weekend — an unusu- cation that the thefts were con- BioMed has proposed a budget of ing are managed separately from the
ally high number — according to nected. approximately $138 million for the fis- rest of the University.
Mark Porter, chief of police and “The one common theme,” cal year beginning in July 2010, accord- Though enrollment levels are ex-
director of public safety. he added, is that all of the laptops ing to Lindsay Graham, the division’s pected to remain roughly constant, the
“No question, this was a spike executive dean for administration.
for weekend activity,” Porter said. continued on page 3 About 58 percent of that budget would continued on page 4
‘Toastmasters’ brave life’s little ‘ums’ and ‘ahs’
Students practice public speaking
By Matthew Klebanoff “This club is not just about get-
Staff Writer
ting your speech right,” said Tan
Nguyen ’10, the Brown Noise’s
Every week, Barus and Holley 190 president. “You learn leadership
bears witness to a series of unusual skills. You learn to build your con-
lectures — on topics that have in- fidence. You learn how to interact
cluded toys, childhood crushes with people, and I think that is very
and a search for racial important.”
identity. FEATURE The concept of a
But the lectures Toastmasters club is not
aren’t part of any University-offered a new one. According to Toastmas-
course in Modern Culture and Me- ters International’s Web site, the or-
dia or American Civilization. They’re ganization was founded more than
just part of a typical Wednesday 80 years ago by Ralph Smedley, the
night for the Brown Noise Toastmas- educational director at a California
ters, a newly formed club that helps YMCA. Smedley noticed that many
its members improve their public Alex DePaoli / Herald
continued on page 4 Tan Nguyen ’10, president of the Brown Noise Toastmasters.
speaking and leadership skills.
News, 3 Metro, 5 Opinions, 7
Empty Laps All Wound Up Power of the Purse
A rash of laptop thefts Environmentalists are astir Will Wray ’10 thinks you
struck campus over Fall over a potential wind turbine can spend your money
Weekend site in Narragansett better than UFB can
195 Angell Street, Providence, Rhode Island herald@browndailyherald.com
Page 2 THE BROWN DAILY HERALD Tuesday, October 27, 2009

C ampus N EWS
Campus remembers reform pioneer Sizer
continued from page 1
“Sizer was a wonderful man with
a great sense of humor who loved his
students,” Gregorian told The Herald.
“All his students across the nation are
mourning him now.”
Sizer joined Brown’s faculty in 1984
after holding positions as the dean of
Harvard’s School of Education and
as headmaster at Phillips Academy
in Andover, Mass.
After Gregorian was inaugurated
as Brown’s president in 1989, he and
Sizer forged a lasting relationship cen-
tered on national school reform, the
former president said.
Their joint focus, which culminated
in the formation of the Annenberg
Institute in 1993, sparked reforms to
American high school education in-
volving radical approaches to learning
and student-teacher collaboration.
“Sizer was one of the first major
prominent educators to advocate for
educational reform,” Gregorian said,
adding it was “an act of war” against
mediocre and inadequate American
education.
Invigorated by the enthusiasm
for reform that Sizer was generating,
Gregorian said he turned to his friend
when the billionaire publisher Walter
Annenberg asked Gregorian for advice
about an unprecedented national gift
he was considering to support school
reform.
“I always consulted Sizer,” Grego-
rian said. “We were very good personal
friends.”
Annenberg Institute
In 1993, an anonymous donor gave
$5 million to the University to start an
institute dedicated to school reform.
sudoku
Several months later, the institute
received a $50 million gift from the
Annenberg Challenge grant — the
largest gift to the University at the
time — to further develop the center.
Gregorian appointed Sizer the first
director, a decision Gregorian said was
meant “to highlight the importance of
educational reform.”
“Democracy depends upon devoted
and informed citizens,” Sizer wrote in a
statement after the University received
the gift. “The secure future of a decent
America depends upon schools which
prepare such citizens.”
The Annenberg Institute has con-
tributed to initiatives involving arts and
rural education and helped provide
a platform for creating “strong part-
nerships” and “design principles” to
improve the quality of education, said
Warren Simmons, the executive direc-
tor of the Annenberg Institute, located
on Benefit Street. The Institute also
houses many of the archived files from
the Chicago Annenberg Challenge,
including a correspondence between
Annenberg and Gregorian and letters
addressed to Sizer.
“Ted has left a powerful legacy that
has really fueled the work and innova-
tion for education reform,” Simmons
said, adding that Sizer “was a powerful
force locally and nationally.”
“He wasn’t the kind of leader who
said ‘follow me.’ He was the kind of
leader who brought people together,”
Simmons said.
Sweeping reforms
In 1983, the National Commission
on Excellence in Education released a
report on American education called
“A Nation at Risk.” The report decried
the failure of American institutions
to uphold national standards in com-
merce, industry, science and education
and stressed the “rising tide of medioc-
rity” threatening the future of educa-
tional prominence. In response, Sizer
founded Essential Schools, a move-
ment based on a model for American
high schools outlined in his 1984 book
“Horace’s Compromise: The Dilemma
of the American High School.”
“Ted wanted change to come from
the schools within the schools,” said
Luther Spoehr, a senior lecturer in
the Department of Education. “The
distinct feature of Ted’s approach is
the confidence he has with people at
the grassroots.”
Sizer emphasized the concept of a
student as a worker in charge of his
own education, with teachers acting as
coaches, Spoehr said, adding that Sizer
was “taking on the given, conventional
models of conventional schools.” Sizer
also advocated smaller classes, Spoehr
said, along with helping “kids who fall
through the cracks.”
But Spoehr said Sizer never alien-
ated people who did not agree with
his proposed reforms.
“He would stand his ground in a
way that invited further conversation,”
Spoehr said. “Ted was an old-fashioned
Ivy-League liberal with a real sense of
duty to society.”
Despite Sizer’s continued efforts
— he worked for the Coalition even
after he retired from Brown in 1996 —
Spoehr said the nation’s educational
system is still focused on “top-down”
accountability — a structure aug-
mented by the No Child Left Behind
Act introduced in 2001 by President
George W. Bush.
The act emphasizes standardized
test scores and the “factory-model
school” rather than following Sizer’s
approach toward student-centered
learning for learning’s sake, Spoehr
said.
“We haven’t gotten the traction
we hoped for,” said Lewis Cohen,
executive director of the Coalition
of Essential Schools. “We have got a
ways to go.”
Even if Sizer’s reforms haven’t
taken hold, Cohen said Sizer changed
the national conversation about
schooling.
“He really got everyone thinking
about the difference between thinking
and learning,” Cohen said. “This man
was a giant.”
higher ed news round-up
by ellen cushing and sarah husk |senior staff writers
Anti-cross-dressing policy draws criticism at Morehouse
Morehouse College — a small, all-male, historically black
school outside Atlanta — has faced controversy in recent weeks
after administrators implemented a student dress code that
bans cross-dressing. Some students and critics outside the col-
lege say the policy unfairly targets queer students.
In addition to “clothing normally associated with women’s
garb,” the code — which was adopted earlier this month and
can result in academic suspension if violated — also bans caps,
do-rags and sunglasses in class, as well as pajamas and clothing
with “derogatory, offensive and/or lewd messages.”
William Bynum, Morehouse’s vice president for student ser-
vices, told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution that the new policy is
an attempt to “get back to the legacy” of the college’s founders.
Students have generally responded positively to the new rules,
Bynum told Inside Higher Ed.
The ban on women’s clothing in particular has garnered con-
troversy both on and off campus, according to various reports.
Though the school’s administration met with campus gay groups
prior to unveiling the dress code, and many students — gay and
straight — have voiced support for the policy, some have criti-
cized Morehouse for what they argue is an unfair attack on queer
students.
“I think this borders on discrimination,” Kevin Webb, co-presi-
dent of Safe Space at Morehouse, a gay-straight student alliance,
told Inside Higher Ed.
Bynum told CNN that the policy was aimed at the small por-
tion of the school’s students who do wear women’s clothing.
“We are talking about five students who are living a gay life-
style that is leading them to dress a way we do not expect in
Morehouse men,” Bynum said.
Brandeis puts museum sale on hold, facing suit
Facing a lawsuit from several benefactors of the Rose Art Mu-
seum, Brandeis University has agreed to temporarily halt plans
to sell the museum’s art collection pending its resolution, the
Boston Globe reported earlier this month.
Brandeis drew protests in January with an announcement that
it would close the Rose and auction off the museum’s contents,
citing a need to ameliorate the university’s budget crisis.
The lawsuit was filed in July by three members of the Rose’s
board of overseers — one of whom is a member of the Rose fam-
ily, whose donations established the Rose Museum.
The plaintiffs contest the legality of the university’s actions
and have argued that donations of art to Brandeis are made with
the assurance that they will remain in the Rose’s collection per-
manently, the New York Times reported in July.
After rejecting Brandeis’ request to dismiss the lawsuit, a
Massachusetts court sanctioned the Attorney General’s office to
examine whether the university’s actions constitute a breach of
intentions and has scheduled a trial for next year.
The judge did not issue an official injunction, which would
prohibit the university from selling any of its art collection, but
Brandeis has agreed to allow the Attorney General to review any
future decisions to sell donated pieces, the Globe reported.
The museum’s modern and contemporary art collection —
the largest in New England — contains over 7,000 pieces of art,
including a number of works by well-known artists such as Roy
Lichtenstein and Jasper Johns, and is worth an estimated $350
million, according to the Globe.

Brown tops Ivies in Fulbright scholars with 29

continued from page 1
her teaching experiences.
She said when she decided to apply
for the program the summer before
the following fall, graduate students at
the Writing Center help students with
their personal statements and project
proposals. Kaufman said he was es-
pecially appreciative of this aspect of
gram to “start early and really look into
the program and specific country.”
Kaufman said he believes his
years at the University prepared him
for the Fulbright Program, adding that

Daily Herald
her senior year, Dunleavy office was the University’s fellowship advising as while many American students may
the Brown
“really great” in helping her prepare he submitted 27 drafts of his personal be hesitant about going abroad and
her application. statement to the center. living on their own in another country,
Editorial Phone: 401.351.3372 | Business Phone: 401.351.3260 Dunleavy said the application pro- At Brown, students are asked to Brown students have learned “to be
Stephen DeLucia, President Jonathan Spector, Treasurer cess starts in the spring when Brown submit their applications a month be- self-reliant.”
Michael Bechek, Vice President Alexander Hughes, Secretary holds a “Fulbright fair,” in which alumni fore the mid-October deadline to allow Dunleavy agreed that there is some-
The Brown Daily Herald (USPS 067.740) is an independent newspaper serv- who have recently returned from the Brown’s Fulbright Committee to assess thing about Brown students that made
ing the Brown University community daily since 1891. It is published Monday program speak to students about their each application. The committee then them especially successful in the Ful-
through Friday during the academic year, excluding vacations, once during experiences abroad. In the following interviews applicants and offers them bright program.
Commencement, once during Orientation and once in July by The Brown Daily weeks, Dunleavy said she also offers feedback before sending the applica- “I think our students are self-start-
Herald, Inc. Single copy free for each members of the community.
POSTMASTER please send corrections to P.O. Box 2538, Providence, RI examples of successful Fulbright ap- tions on to the Fulbright Program. ers and independent learners and risk
02906. Periodicals postage paid at Providence, R.I. Offices are located at 195 plications and begins to meet with The University submitted earlier takers,” Dunleavy said. “Our students
Angell St., Providence, R.I. E-mail herald@browndailyherald.com. potential applicants. this month 96 applications for next are quirky enough that they feel like
World Wide Web: http://www.browndailyherald.com. “I talk with students about their year’s program, according to a Brown they don’t always need to go on to the
Subscription prices: $319 one year daily, $139 one semester daily.
Copyright 2009 by The Brown Daily Herald, Inc. All rights reserved. ideas with projects and kind of brain- press release. next step (immediately).”
storm with them,” she said. Dunleavy said she encourages stu- “It’s a perfect match for Brown’s
When students return to Brown dents considering the Fulbright pro- approach to education,” she said.
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
C ampus N EWS
Rash of thefts over Fall Weekend snares laptops, projector and a bike
The following summary includes
all major incidents reported to the
Department of Public Safety between
Oct. 8 and Oct. 12. It does not in-
clude general service and alarm
calls. The Providence Police Depart-
ment also responds to incidents oc-
CRIME LOG
curring of f campus. DPS does not
divulge information on cases that
are currently under investigation
by the department, PPD or the Of-
fice of Student Life. DPS maintains
a daily log of all shift activity and
general service calls which can be
viewed during business hours at its
headquarters, located at 75 Charles-
field St.
Oct. 8
12:29 p.m. Media Ser vices
employees reported that a pair of
speakers were stolen from a class-
room in Barus and Holley some-
time between 10 p.m. on Oct. 6 and
10 p.m. on Oct. 7. The speakers
were bolted to a bracket on the
wall in the room.
Oct. 9
10:05 a.m. An employee report-
ed that a data projector was stolen
from a classroom in Alumnae Hall.
Video and alarm wires were found
hanging from the ceiling where
the projector was mounted. The
reporting person stated that the
missing projector was last checked
by Media Ser vices on the week of
Sept. 4. Nothing else was reported
stolen or damaged and there were
no signs of forced entr y.
9:08 p.m. A student stated that
he left his room in Andrews Hall at
8:30 p.m. When he returned at 9:07
p.m. his laptop had been stolen.
He originally told the officers the
door was locked when he returned,
then later said it was ajar. Officers
inspected the door and found no
visible signs of forced entr y, yet
the student said he was positive
he left his door locked.
11:40 p.m. Student stated that
at approximately 11:35 p.m. she
was in her room alone and left for
about five minutes to go to the re-
stroom. Upon leaving, she left the
door unlocked and slightly open.
She stated that when she returned
she noticed that her laptop and her
roommate’s laptop were missing
from their desks. She stated that
she checked her room and found
nothing else missing.
Oct. 11
1:46 a.m. A student stated that
at approximately 1:30 a.m. he left
his dorm room in Everett House
and went to the restroom nearest to
the room. His roommate then left
the room to visit a friend and left
the room open. When he returned
THE BROWN DAILY HERALD
“Over the last two years we’ve probably recovered five laptops.”
— Mark Porter, chief of police and director of public safety
from the restroom he noticed that
their laptops were missing, along
with a set of headphones.
2:27 a.m. A student reported
that sometime between 12:30 a.m.
and 2:30 a.m. an unknown person
entered her unlocked room in Way-
land House and removed her lap-
top from her bed. Her roommate
was sleeping in the room during
this time period but did not see or
hear anything.
10:59 p.m. A student stated
that at approximately 10:30 p.m.
she was headed downstairs to
cook when an unknown subject
entered the building. She let the
subject in as he stated that he had
lost his swipe card. She asked the
unknown subject where he lived
and he stated “three.” She contin-
ued heading downstairs and the
unknown subject ran upstairs.
Approximately 30 minutes later
she and her roommate returned to
their room and noticed that a lap-
top, iPhone and debit cards were
missing. The door to the room was
left unlocked and open.
Oct. 12
11:06 a.m. Student stated that
she locked her bike to the bike
rack outside the Sharpe Refector y
with a U-lock on Oct. 1 at 6:30 p.m.
On Oct. 8 at 9:30 a.m., when she
returned to the bike rack to get
her bike, it was not there.
Open doors invite laptop thefts
continued from page 1
were taken from unlocked rooms.
“That’s why we’re always urging
students to lock their doors.”
The Department of Public Safety
originally sent out a campus-wide
notification the Friday following
Fall Weekend, indicating that an
unspecified number of laptops had
been stolen from six different resi-
dence halls.
Emily Doyle ’13, one of the vic-
tims of the recent laptop thefts, said
she returned to her room after a
night out to find her laptop missing.
Her roommate had returned earlier
in the night and gone to sleep with-
out locking the door. Both Doyle’s
roommate and other residents on
her hall reported that one or more
males had entered their rooms that
night but left immediately after open-
ing the door, she said.
DPS arrived at Doyle’s room after
Page 3
she reported the theft and told her
that reports of theft were rare in her
dormitory, North Wayland House,
Doyle said. She told the officers she
had bought antitheft software but it
had not been installed on the laptop
at the time it was stolen.
“There’s no way that you’re go-
ing to get it back,” Doyle recalled
being told by one of the officers.
DPS is continuing to investigate
the thefts, but such cases are rarely
solved, Porter said. “Over the last
two years we’ve probably recovered
five laptops,” he said.
Porter recommended that stu-
dents have their laptops engraved —
making them physically identifiable
— and purchase antitheft tracking
software.
In its community notification
e-mail, DPS counseled students to
report suspicious individuals and
to always lock their doors before
going to bed.
Page 4
C ampus N EWS
BioMed pieces together $138m budget Improving speech
continued from page 1
medical school hopes to allocate an
additional $1.2 million to financial aid,
Graham said. Maintaining a strong fi-
nancial aid program is a major goal of
the Med School as it seeks to remain
competitive with larger and higher-
profile competitors, he added.
But the financial aid budget has
posed a significant challenge to ad-
ministrators because it is closely tied
to the division’s endowment — which
lost 20 percent of its value last year.
Overall payout from the BioMed en-
dowment will fall approximately $2
million next year, Graham said.
“It’s a big problem,” Graham said.
“At a time when we’re looking to get
more competitive, we want to be able
to make incremental increases in
financial aid.”
But administrators are confi-
dent that endowment losses will not
translate to a lower level of student
support.
“It’s hard, but we’re in a good
place to break even,” Graham said.
Administrators are taking a close
look at staffing and efficiency levels
across the division in order to iden-
tify areas where funding could be
scaled back.
“That doesn’t mean it’s easy or
we’re not making compromises,” said
Philip Grupposo, associate dean of
medicine.
Though increased research fund-
THE BROWN DAILY HERALD
“I use silence more effectively and create more of an impression.”
— Tan Nguyen ’10, on the benefits of participating in a public speaking club
ing has offset endowment losses in
the short term, many grants under
federal stimulus legislation do not
extend beyond two years. At that
point, BioMed researchers may
have to scramble to maintain rev-
enue streams.
A $100 million gift by the late busi-
ness mogul Warren Alpert to the
Med School in 2007 earmarked $25
million to create an endowed fund
for financial aid, but that part of the
pledge is not slated to come in until
2016, Graham said.
Though Graham said this will “no
doubt” help with financial aid, “the
key question is with the growth in
student body — does the endowment
fully take care of the need?”
skills, one ‘um’ at a time
continued from page 1
of the young men who frequented
the Y would benefit from training in
speech. At the time, a “toastmaster”
was the person who proposed toasts
and introduced speakers at parties
and banquets, so Smedley chose it
as the organization’s name.
Anyone over the age of 18 is wel-
come to join Toastmasters groups,
which are based in universities, com-
panies and local communities, and the
nonprofit organization now has al-
most 250,000 members worldwide. It
includes among its successful alums
governors, astronauts and an Olympic
gold medalist. Especially well-known
former Toastmasters include Chris
Matthews, Leonard Nimoy, Debbie
Fields and Tim Allen.
Before each meeting, all of the
club’s members receive an agenda
— with activities scheduled down to
the minute — outlining the evening’s
events.
Each Brown Noise meeting starts
the same way: From 8 p.m. to 8:04,
the Toastmaster of the evening, who
acts as an emcee, welcomes the club’s
members and outlines the night’s
activities. Last Wednesday, Nguyen
acted as the club’s Toastmaster and
introduced the evening’s theme:
childhood.
“Fellow Toastmasters, great to
see you all back,” Nguyen said at last
week’s meeting. “I always like to start
with a quote, a really inspiring quote I
like. This quote is actually from Tom
Robbins. He said, ‘It’s never too late
to enjoy childhood.’”
After Nguyen’s introduction, a few
members launched into speeches —
some prepared, some unrehearsed
— about their pasts.
In the first type, “you actually
have time to think about your topic,
to think about how you want to deliver
it, and then you deliver it in four to
six or five to seven minutes,” Nguyen
said. In “impromptu speech, or Table
Topics … a Table Topic master will
give you a topic. Then you will have
one to two minutes to hold your own
stage.”
At the end of every meeting,
speakers receive feedback on their
speeches from other Toastmasters.
They also learn how many times they
used filler words such as “um” or “ah”
during the course of the night from
the “Wizard of Ah’s” — a Toastmaster
who keeps track of extraneous words
during each person’s speech.
“Before I joined this, I didn’t talk
much, and when I heard people say,
‘Um,’ I thought, I’m not one of those
people that use filler words,” said
Mandana Ali ’13, last week’s Wizard
of Ah’s. “But now that I’ve joined this,
and now that I do talk more, I do use
filler words. And this should really
help me to not use them myself.”
The night’s speakers included
Taylor Daily ’13, who delivered a
speech about the role Toastmasters
has played in his life up to this point
— while Daily was growing up, his
father was elected president of Toast-
masters International.
Though Daily recalls being a
bored child suffering through Toast-
master conventions and stuffing en-
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
velopes for hours to aid in his father’s
presidential campaign, he said he
couldn’t help but attend the group’s
first meeting after he read about it in
Morning Mail.
“I thought if that many people di-
rect their energy to an organization
with that much enthusiasm, there
has to be something good about it,”
Daily said.
The Toastmasters didn’t get their
start on College Hill until early last
academic year, according to Megan
Lemmerman ’12, the Noise’s vice
president of education. Jimmy Tasso
’09 and Jeff Wardyga ’08 decided to
start a chapter at Brown after they
completed a summer internship at the
defense contractor Raytheon, where
they participated in the company’s
Toastmaster club.
“I brought Toastmasters to Brown
because we had realized the bene-
fits of the program when we were
interns at Raytheon,” Wardyga said.
“Whether it’s speaking with your fam-
ily or speaking with a co-worker or at
a meeting or in front of hundreds of
people, our oral communication skills
are very important.”
Only about seven students
showed up to the first few meetings
of the Brown Noise, which borrows
its name from a South Park episode
about flatulence, said Alec Brown-
ridge ’12, the group’s secretary. It
wasn’t until the spring that the club
drew enough members to be rec-
ognized as an official organization
by the Undergraduate Council of
Students.
Though the club doesn’t have any
faculty advisers, it does have two adult
mentors: Barry Bainton ’63 and Tom
Nyzio, both members of community
Toastmaster clubs.
“As mentors, we don’t get in the
way of what they do,” Nyzio said. “We
just attend the meetings and help out
as necessary.”
Right now, one of the Noise’s main
goals is to attract new members in
order to maintain its official status
at the University, Lemmerman said.
Club officers also would like to bal-
ance the male-female ratio, which is
heavily skewed at the moment — only
a handful of Brown’s Toastmasters
are female.
Several of the club’s members
said they have noticed a marked im-
provement in their oral communica-
tion skills since joining the Brown
Noise.
“I’ve been doing interviews for
jobs since I came to Brown, and I’m so
much more confident now,” Nguyen
said. “I use silence more effectively
and create more of an impression on
interviewers.”
Many involved in the organization
believe Toastmaster clubs provide
an especially valuable opportunity
for college students to improve the
skills they’ll need to land a job after
graduation.
“The people in these clubs are
about to enter the workforce,” said
Paul Sterman, an associate editor for
Toastmaster Magazine. “And I think
when they learn leadership and com-
munication skills, it really gives them
a head start in the real world as well
as in their studies.”
Metro
The Brown Daily Herald
New program aims to
shelter abused elders
By Nicole Boucher
Contributing Writer
Rhode Island’s first program
for elderly abuse victims was
launched last week by the Saint
Elizabeth Community, an elder
care organization.
The program, known as the
Saint Elizabeth Haven, will utilize
the community’s existing nursing
homes and apartment complexes
in East Greenwich, Providence
and Bristol to house elderly in-
dividuals in need of immediate
services, said Mary Rossetti, the
director of community outreach
for the organization.
“It’s not a facility in itself, it’s
a program,” Rossetti said.
In order to be considered for
placement in the transitional, 30-
day program, an individual must
be over 60, a victim of abuse and
willing to leave home, she said.
Residents must also be referred
to the haven by a partner agency,
such as the Rhode Island Depart-
ment of Elderly Affairs.
The referring agency remains
involved throughout the victim’s
stay, Rossetti said.
“The day they come into the
safe haven, we are working to
resolve the issue,” whether it be
physical, financial or emotional
abuse, she added.
The Saint Elizabeth Haven
“adds a level of credibility to the
whole protective ser vice work
that we are doing on behalf of
older people,” said Corinne Rus-
so, director of the Rhode Island
Department of Elderly Affairs,
one of the agencies collaborating
with the organization.
The Saint Elizabeth Commu-
nity modeled the program after
the Harry and Jeanette Weinberg
Center for Elder Abuse Preven-
tion in Riverdale, N.Y. Saint
Elizabeth Community Chief Ex-
ecutive Officer Stephen Horowitz
attended a national conference
in which he heard about the in-
novative center and brought the
concept back to Rhode Island,
Rossetti said.
Horowitz then contacted sev-
eral local agencies, including the
Rhode Island Coalition Against
Domestic Violence and the De-
partment of Elderly Affairs, which
verified the need for greater sup-
port for the state’s elderly abuse
victims, Rossetti said.
“This becomes a greater need
as our population grows” and the
economy worsens, Russo said.
Rossetti said the Saint Eliza-
beth Haven fills the gap left by
general safe havens that do not
provide elder-specific support,
such as handicap accessibility.
The program is just “one little,
tiny piece of the puzzle,” in ensur-
ing safety for the elderly, Rossetti
said.
“If you build a wind turbine, what’s next? ... A cell phone tower?”
Groups challenge local wind project
By Thomas Jarus
Contributing Writer
Six local environmental groups have
voiced concerns about a plan to con-
struct a wind turbine at Black Point,
a coastal site in Narragansett that is
protected for public use.
The organizations last week sent
a letter to Gov. Donald Carcieri ’65,
questioning the site’s suitability.
According to a press release from
the letter’s signatories, then-Gov. Ed-
ward DiPrete protected Black Point
in 1987 to “prevent a condominium
development on important land with
recognized rights of public access to
the shore.”
The potential construction at the
site is part of a renewable energy
project that began earlier this year. In
February, the Rhode Island Depart-
ment of Environmental Management,
the office in charge of evaluating the
Black Point site, was allowed to be-
gin seeking proposals from energy
companies to build wind turbines on
state-owned land.
According to W. Michael Sullivan,
director of the DEM, “Black Point
is not separable from the four other
sites being evaluated.”
This process is “a joint effort”
between the department and Narra-
gansett to assess the potential of five
different potential sites in the town.
The words “ ‘assess’ and ‘potential’
have been overlooked in (the envi-
ronmental groups’) press release,”
Sullivan said.
No final decisions have been made
— Rupert Friday, director, Rhode Island Land Trust Council
Tuesday, October 27, 2009 | Page 5
about placement of the turbines, he
said.
But the six groups that united to
draft the letter to Carcieri take issue
with both the potential use of Black
Point as a wind turbine site and the
lack of transparency and dialogue in
the decision-making process.
“We’re asking the government to
consider a process whereby the state
develops a policy and a set of criteria
which would govern how conserved
land would be used,” said Jonathan
Stone, executive director of Save the
Bay, a group dedicated to protecting
Narragansett Bay.
The organizations worry that
placing a wind turbine at Black Point
would set a dangerous precedent,
said Rupert Friday, director of the
Rhode Island Land Trust Council.
“If you build a wind turbine, what’s
next?” Friday said. “A cell phone
tower?”
Paul Beaudette, president of the
Environmental Council of Rhode Is-
land, agreed. “This piece of property
was critical enough for the state to
condemn it and purchase it,” Beau-
dette said. “We’re not in opposition
to windmills ... We’re just saying that
Black Point is not the best choice.”
The Department of Environmen-
tal Management is factoring these
Thanks for redding.
Er, reading.
concerns into its assessment, Sul-
livan said.
“Two of the three signatories on
the letter were invited to sit on the
assessment team and said that they
were too busy,” he added. “We’ve
invited people to the table.”
The department has surveyed
a substantial portion of the Narra-
gansett community about renewable
wind energy and the proposed sites,
Sullivan said. The surveys found that
about 75 percent of residents favored
the plans.
“Our conclusion at this point in
time is the public has a different per-
spective,” Sullivan said.
“What (the environmental man-
agement department) is being
assaulted for is trying to walk the
walk,” he added. “There’s no deci-
sion yet.”
But the problem perceived by the
groups that wrote the letter is larger
than the establishment of a few wind
turbines, their leaders said.
“We certainly appreciate the ef-
forts of the (department) to develop
renewable wind (and) renewable re-
sources,” Stone said. “We think it’s a
very admirable intent that the state
is pursuing, but it doesn’t give the
state a free pass to develop wherever
they please.”
Editorial & Letters
The Brown Daily Herald

Page 6 | Tuesday, October 27, 2009

l e t t e r to t h e e d i to r

Think before you eat

To the Editor:
In Fatima Aqeel’s ’12 recent ar-
ticle (“For the love of animals, and
of meat,” Oct. 15), there were some
nuanced insights made about differ-
ing views on animal rights, and for
that the members of the Brown Ani-
mal Rights Club are grateful. There
were also some insinuations about
BARC which are not accurate.
Aqeel writes, rather indignantly,
that “it should be okay if I turn up to
a BARC meeting and eat a chicken
patty, as long as I am helping the
organization in another big way.”
And indeed, it is. As an omnivorous
member of BARC, I would like to
testify to the fact that BARC is not
about reprimanding omnivores or
tr ying to proselytize the saving
grace of veganism.
It is about equipping members
of the Brown community with the
knowledge they need to formulate
their own conscious views about
meat and to alter their lifestyles
accordingly.
Aqeel’s sentiment that meat
be informed about multiple, diverse
facets of an issue.
BARC was founded because too
many people weren’t making any
intentional decisions at all about
their diets. Rather, they were do-
ing what they had always done
without pausing to reflect on the
mammoth impact that their dietary
choices had on other members of
the community: namely, the “meals”
themselves.
There is an unacceptable amount
of cruelty inherent in the factory-
farmed production of animal prod-
ucts, and Aqeel is correct to point to
the philosophically uncontroversial
goal of reducing unnecessary suf-
fering.
It is this suffering which we in-
tend to bring to the forefront of the
discussion: with almost every chick-
en product you buy, you become a
financial backer of torture. ale x yuly
If you find this acceptable, then
it’s your dollar to use as you wish.
What BARC finds unacceptable, e d i to r i a l
and hopes to eliminate, however,
is the spending of this dollar with-

“tastes rather nice” is a common
one, and certainly a relevant factor
in developing any conscious diet.
But it is only one piece of the puzzle.
In order to arrive at any kind of
legitimate decision, one needs to
The sauce
out realizing the implications of the
purchase.
Allegra Pincus ’11
Oct. 22 Brown’s athletics department recently corporate sponsorships, but the same prin-
partnered with an outside company, Nelligan ciple applies: Brown should not turn down
Sports Marketing, to increase advertising free revenue, even if it comes from alcohol
sales and sponsorships. The company has sales. Alcohol is not obviously worse than

Keep ’em comin’. done well for us so far, bringing in corporate

sponsorships from Dunkin’ Donuts, AT&T,
the products sold by Brown’s other sponsors.
From a health perspective, the obesity caused
letters@browndailyherald.com Domino’s Pizza and Taco Bell. Sponsorship in part by companies like Dunkin’ Donuts,
funding for the year has already surpassed Domino’s and Taco Bell, is as problematic as
the previous fiscal year’s total. These early alcohol consumption.
successes are encouraging, and will hopefully We understand that the University may
t h e b r o w n d a i ly h e r a l d
mark the beginning of a profitable partner- want to discourage underage drinking, but we
Editor-in-Chief Managing Editors Deputy Managing Editors Senior Editors
ship (the University has not yet broken even believe that a ban on alcohol sponsorship is
Steve DeLucia Michael Bechek Nandini Jayakrishna Rachel Arndt
Chaz Firestone Franklin Kanin Isabel Gottlieb on the five-year deal). the wrong way to address that concern. In the
Michael Skocpol Scott Lowenstein We were somewhat perplexed, however, event of a sponsorship, drinks would still not
editorial Business by the University’s criteria for sponsors. In be sold at sporting events. This makes it all
Ben Hyman Arts & Culture Editor General Managers Office Manager
Sophia Li Features Editor Alexander Hughes Shawn Reilly an inter view with The Herald, Director of the more unlikely that increased advertising
George Miller Metro Editor Jonathan Spector Athletics Michael Goldberger said Brown for alcohol would increase student demand for
Joanna Wohlmuth Metro Editor
Seth Motel News Editor
would never partner with alcohol or gam- alcohol. At worst, it might help them choose
Directors
Jenna Stark News Editor Ellen DaSilva Sales bling companies. The restriction on gambling between brands. The University could take
Andrew Braca Sports Editor Claire Kiely Sales makes sense, given the University’s interest a more prudent approach by encouraging
Han Cui Asst. Sports Editor Katie Koh Finance
Alex Mazerov Asst. Sports Editor Jilyn Chao Asst. Finance in discouraging betting on sports games. We moderation. All advertising for alcoholic bev-
Katie Wood Asst. Sports Editor Christiana Stephenson Alumni Relations urge the University to reconsider its stance on erages at Brown events could, for example,
Graphics & Photos Managers
sponsorship deals with alcohol vendors. carr y warnings to drink responsibly.
Chris Jesu Lee Graphics Editor Kelly Wess Local Sales
Stephen Lichenstein Graphics Editor Kathy Bui National Sales The University’s refusal to consider al- The University should make ever y rea-
Kim Perley Photo Editor Alex Carrere University Sales cohol companies as potential sponsors is sonable effort to increase its funding base,
Max Monn Asst. Photo Editor Matt Burrows Credit and Collections
Jesse Morgan Sports Photo Editor misguided for several reasons. First, the even if that involves resorting to untraditional
production Opinions policy is hypocritical given the background means. In flusher times, the University could
Ayelet Brinn Copy Desk Chief Alyssa Ratledge Opinions Editor of Brown’s largest benefactor. Sidney Frank, be pickier about its athletic sponsors. In the
Rachel Isaacs Copy Desk Chief Sarah Rosenthal Opinions Editor
who contributed over $120 million to the midst of the Great Recession, this is a luxury
Marlee Bruning Design Editor
Jessica Calihan Design Editor Editorial Page Board University, made a fortune as a liquor tycoon it can no longer afford.
Anna Migliaccio Asst. Design Editor James Shapiro Editorial Page Editor selling Jagermeister and Grey Goose. The
Julien Ouellet Asst. Design Editor Matt Aks Board member
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Post- magazine Zack Beauchamp Board member in particular, benefited tremendously from rial page board. Send comments to
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Opinions
The Brown Daily Herald
A sense of humor no one likes
BY BRIAN JUDGE
Opinions Columnist
So in case you pizza-eating, Mac-using, lecture-
going bourgeois rabble haven’t heard, there
is this really funny blog/book called “Stuff
White People Like.” The premise of it is that
if some clever guy in horn-rimmed glasses can
describe things you like as being cliche, then
you aren’t a unique snowflake after all. How
many of you like dogs? What about Netflix?
Mos Def? Shorts?
Gotcha, I’m afraid. I just put you in a box.
And if there is one thing that white people hate,
it’s being put in boxes. But if there is one thing
that white people love, it’s self-loathing.
Let’s see how the shoe fits on the other
foot. I hereby present for the consumption of
all hypocrites, capitalist/chauvinist pigs, etc.:
Stuff that Brown students who write “Stuff
that Brown Students Like” like:
1. Being witty: Let’s be honest, who doesn’t
like feeling smart? I’m looking at you, Mr.
“Leather Attache.”
2. Dramatic monologue: Let us go then,
you and I, Mr. Leather Attache, to our mystical
land of gratuitous cliches. We can go to the
Modern Culture and Media meadow and visit
the brook of Hysterical Realism, or go to the
Gender Studies grove and take a bite of the
apple of hegemony.
3. Allusion: Honey, I shrunk the student
body’s dignity!
Undergraduate Central Planning Board
BY WILL WRAY
Opinions Columnist
Clerestory, Issues, Jug, VISIONS, Ziggurat,
Catalyst, Journal of World Affairs, Water-
shed, Contemporar y, Awaaz, African Sun,
the Round.
Can you identify more than a few of these
student published magazines? You should
be able to: You are paying for them.
Ever y year, $170 of your tuition goes
towards a “student activities fee.” Many of
you won’t see a dime of this money, except
in the form of a friend recounting his all-
expenses-paid trip to a debate tournament
in Thailand, or, as with the above examples,
as a glossy literar y arts compilation that
entertains you for the 30-foot walk from
where you picked up the magazine to the
nearest recycling bin.
The million dollars of student activities
fees is allocated by the Undergraduate Fi-
nance Board, a 12-person council (elected
by only a fraction of Brown students) whose
blandly bureaucratic name conceals a more
controversial purpose: spending your money
better than you can. Every week, according
to an unpublished policy manual, UFB dis-
tributes the student activities fund to groups
that present funding requests.
The most obvious problem with this sys-
tem is that it leads to concentrated benefits
and diffuse costs. Many groups receive dis-
proportionate funding for a small group of
students. How many students do you know
Got something to say? Leave a comment online!
Visit www.browndailyherald.com to comment on opinion and editorial content.
4. Hedy Lamarr: Because who doesn’t think
that “(their) mind is a raging torrent, flooded
with rivulets of thought cascading into a wa-
terfall of creative alternatives?” I know “my
mind is aglow with whirling, transient nodes
of thought careening through a cosmic vapor
of intention.”
5. Hating hipsters: The surest symptom of
hipsterdom is a hatred for all things hipster.
Does being counter-counterculture make you
cultured? I didn’t think so either.
I hereby present for the consumption of all
hypocrites, capitalist/chauvinist pigs, etc.: Stuff
that Brown students who write “Stuff that Brown
Students Like” like.
I think you get the idea. Petty and stupid,
right? Right. Or maybe left. Like left wing.
Like Brown students. Derp.
Can it be cool to be earnest again? Pretty
please? Irony and sarcasm as the only authen-
tic way of being spells T-R-O-U-B-L-E. Ironic,
right? See, you would have expected irony to
be spelled I-R-O-N-Y. This is the mess we’re in.
So far in this column I have tried to be ironic
about being ironic. Unfortunately, being ironic
about being ironic is just annoying, and not
on the Brown Ballroom Dance team? You
should ask them for a thank-you note: Every
year, UFB dishes out more than 1 percent
of the student activities fund for them to
buy costumes, travel to colleges across the
countr y for competitions and hire a coach
at the cost of more than $8,000 a year to
us students.
VISIONS, an Asian literar y arts maga-
zine, doesn’t even bother with the facade
of ser ving the entire Brown community:
They deliver their magazines directly into
the mailboxes of Asian students.
I am not suggesting that we shouldn’t
Here’s how it could work: At the end of each
school year, every student would log into his or
her account, see a list of category three groups,
then allocate $170 as he or she sees fit.
have 17 literar y arts magazines, or that the
ballroom dancing team is useless. I cannot
tell which group best serves Brown students
or boosts our reputation any better than UFB
can. All I suggest is that no student group
has the right to spend your money unless
you give it to them. We could ensure that
the greatest number of Brown students is
best served by distributing our own student
activities fee.
Here’s how it could work: At the end of
each school year, ever y student would log
into his or her account, see a list of category
actually substantive.
So I will try to be substantive. Socrates said,
“It would be better for me to have a lyre or a
chorus which I was directing in discord and
out of tune, better that the mass of mankind
should disagree with me and contradict me,
than that I, a single individual, should be out of
harmony with myself and contradict myself.”
In other words, it’s better to be unpopular than
ironic and sarcastic. So in this spirit, I will
try to revise the original list of Stuff Brown
Students Like.
Macs: Because spending a couple hun-
dred dollars more on a better, more reliable
computer that you will use for 90 percent of
your school work is a sensible economic de-
cision.
Oatmeal: Breakfast food in the Ratty is not
very good and you can’t screw up oatmeal.
Saying you’ll go to lectures: Most people
are interested in learning, but also have a lot
going on.
three groups, then allocate $170 as he or
she sees fit. There would not be less money
going to student groups; it would simply be
more fairly distributed.
I can already imagine the protests from
the small but vocal minority of students who
receive more than $170 from the student
activities fund, from obscure groups and
redundant publications insisting that their
vital contributions to the community would
be eliminated in such a system. “Common
good!” would be their rallying cr y.
Is the “common good” invisible? If a
group could not find anyone to fund its ini-
tiative voluntarily, then why should it be
entitled to take money involuntarily? If we
distributed our own student activities fee,
the only way to get more funding would be
to have more students active and involved in
the group, to come up with a better product
and to have more people on campus recog-
nize the group’s impact.
This would not signal the death of culture
at Brown. Many students who do not write
for the Brown Noser would fund it out of
appreciation for its laughs; I am not a Janus
Forum member but would support it for the
Tuesday, October 27, 2009 | Page 7
Ruth Simmons: It is nicer to think that the
president of Brown is competent and trustwor-
thy than thinking the man is out to get you, but
saying that outright would be uncool.
Saying you’ll explore Providence: You rec-
ognize that Brown is a bubble of privileged
kids, but it is easier not to think about that
fact all the time.
Being disappointed with President Obama:
Most Brown students had some kind of invest-
ment in getting him elected and are disappoint-
ed that more progress toward his campaign
promises haven’t been made.
Celebrity children: It is a weird, slightly
reassuring feeling that the most recognizable
people on the planet are actually real people
with kids and are not just very convincing
CGI animations.
Let’s try to speak honestly, simply and
sincerely in an effort to prevent ourselves
from talking about everything sarcastically
and denigrating everything we actually value
in the process.
Oh, real clever, guy. It’s oh-so-original to
criticize something you think is dumb, offer a
plausible alternative and close with something
you think is meaningful. You know who else
liked dialectics? Hegel and Marx. How passe.
Like using French words. We’re living in a Po-
Mo world now, broski. All right, I’m done.
Brian Judge ’11 hopes he didn’t offend
anyone, he was just trying to make
a point.
intellectual diversity and interesting conver-
sations it engenders on campus. Admittedly,
we may see fewer taekwondo club members
dropping hundreds of your dollars on plane
tickets to national competitions.
There is little to no accountability in how
groups are allowed to spend UFB-allocated
money and plenty of incentives to engage
in creative accounting — ever wonder how
your group’s parties get free alcohol? — and
dip deeply and frequently into the common
funds.
If we eliminate UFB, we eliminate the
tendency of groups to request unnecessar y
funding. Each group would be limited to the
amount it was allotted by members and ap-
preciative Brown students, and group funds
would be spent as wisely and responsibly
as possible in order to ensure continued
funding the following year.
The principle underlying UFB is that 12
undergraduates and an unpublished policy
manual have the “common sense” to fund the
right groups at the right time for the right
reasons. Is there such a thing as “common
sense” at Brown?
To those aggrieved UFB members who
are undoubtedly fond of their positions as
central planners, I apologize. If your hobby
is spending other people’s money in the way
that you deem best, with no other reference
for the community’s value or investment
returns than your own opinion, then may I
suggest a run for Congress?
Will Wray ’10 is going to allot all $170
to Brown Ballroom Dancing. Sorry.
 Today 2
to day to m o r r o w
Just say ‘no’ to dresses and skirts?
The Brown Daily Herald

Protecting R.I.’s elderly

5
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
58 / 45 55 / 43
Page 8

when is a door not a door ? o c to b e r s k y

1
c a l e n da r
Today, OCTOBER 27 tomorrow, october 28

6:15 p.m. — Internships in Journal- 12 P.M. — Panel Discussion: “EU

ism with Prof. Tracy Breton, Mac- Enlargement and European Identity”
Millan 115 Joukowsky Forum, Watson Institute

7 p.m. — Prof. Wendy Schiller: “Women 7:30 p.m. — “Bet You Didn’t Know...
in Male-Dominated Fields,” List 120 Female Health in College,” Arnold
Lounge

menu
Sharpe Refectory Verney-Woolley Dining Hall

Lunch — Fried Clam Strips on a Bun Lunch — Buffalo Chicken Wings with
with Tartar Sauce, Quinoa and Veggies, Bleu Cheese Dressing, Cauliflower Au
Asparagus Spears Gratin, Coconut Crescent Cookies

Dinner — Vegetable Frittata, Mari- Dinner — Chicken Helene, Curried

nated Beef, Pound Cake with Strawber- Couscous, Noodles Alfredo, Chocolate
ries and Cream Oatmeal Squares

crossword Kim Perley / Herald

comics
Cabernet Voltaire | Abe Pressman

Dot Comic | Eshan Mitra and Brendan Hainline

Hippomaniac | Mat Becker