t h e o n l i n e b e a c o n . c o m

Student Newspaper of Massachusetts College

of Liberal Arts

North Adams, Mass.

Volume 75Issue 1

ThursdayFebruary 2, 2012

Final vote tonight XMALIA at MCLA!� e Board will vote on whether or not to arm the Public Safety o� cers tonight at 5:30 in Sul-livan Lounge. Managing Editor Andrew Roiter responds.

� e extinction of species is the topic in this mixed-media performance from last week.

Commentary, page 14 Arts and Entertainment, page 6

The BeaconBEACONMCLA

THE MCLA BEACON ONLINE

IN THIS ISSUE

News 2-4World 5A&E 6-8Sports 9-11Science 12

Campus Comment 13Letters to the Editor 14Commentary 14Comic & Games 15Photo Essay 16

Pilot program to lend bikes

A� er many months of research and planning, the bike share pro-gram is getting ready to take o� .

In March, there will be a so� opening ceremony for the cam-pus community to test the bikes, as well as to learn about bicycle safety and the rules of the pro-gram.

“� e bikes are multi-purpose and very sturdy so there won’t be a lot of maintenance,” said Caro-line Scully, Chair of the Green Team and the Berkshire Environ-mental Resource Center sustain-ability coordinator.

“� ey will be equipped with baskets for shopping and, be-cause they will be available over-night, they will have lights.”

About � ve to seven bikes will be purchased with department

donations on campus from Berk-shire Out� tters, a bike shop in Cheshire.

� e bike share program will al-low students, faculty and sta� to check out bicycles for recreation, exercise, shopping, community service, employment, intern-ships, or exploring downtown without the expense of carbon output.

According to Scully, the o� cial opening ceremony will be held in late April, weather pending. Once operational, the program will allow students, faculty and sta� to check out a bike from the library with an MCLA ID for up to 24 hours.

“Having Student A� airs run the program is really what’s making it happen. It will be running di-rectly out of Spencer’s o� ce and it wouldn’t be possible without him,” said Scully, referring to Spencer Moser, who serves as co-ordinator of the Center for Ser-vice and Citizenship in Student A� airs.

Moser said the program began as a strategic plan to help stu-dents get into the city as easily and environmentally as possible. “It’s a service that many colleges o� er. It’s a massive team e� ort,

with tentacles across the whole campus,” he said.

“Glenn Lawson and the library have really stepped up. � ey will oversee the check-out log book for the bikes which will be out-side the library,” Moser added. He is also grateful for Public Safety, Facilities, and the Out-doors Club, which has agreed to help store the bikes and work on repairs as necessary.

According to both Scully and Moser, Charlotte Degen, Dean of Students, did a lot of work to get the program up and run-ning. Degen decided the best way to determine the success of the program was to declare it as a pilot program, which means this spring will be a trial period to see how the MCLA community re-sponds to the program before it is declared o� cial.

Last fall, senior Dan Celentano and Environuts President Jason Brown worked as interns for the program. As interns, they gath-ered information and worked on logistics for the program with the help of Degen.

By Jess GamariSenior News Editor

Beacon Archive A pilot bike share program, to be introduced this spring, will allow students to check out a bike, a lock and a helmet at the Freel Library for up to 24 hours.

Students, faculty and sta� will

be able to borrow a bike

by April

BIKES, continued on page 3

Governor Deval Patrick re-leased his annual budget recom-mendation for 2013 last week. � e $32.3 billion recommenda-tion proposes a 2.98 percent in-crease in spending over last year.

“[Governor Patrick] billed it as an education budget...I think it’s not a hugely funded education budget, but given the constraints of his revenue sources, it is sig-ni� cant,” Robert Bence, a political science professor at MCLA, said.

� e budget puts an increased e� ort towards education, with special emphasis on K-12 and

community colleges. $4.1 bil-lion would be allocated to K-12 Chapter 70, the state’s primary program for distributing funds to K-12 schools, a $145 million in-crease over last year.

“It’s not much of an increase, but it’s a signal that he wants to increase education,” Bence said.

� e College’s response to the recommendation was critical of the funding for the Department of Higher Education, which re-mained unchanged from last year.

BUDGET, continued on page 3

Governoremphasizeseducation in new budget

Beacon archiveGov. Deval Patrick, seen here with College President Mary Grant, and State Rep. Gail Cariddi, realeased his budget recom-mendation last week.

By Andrew RoiterManaging Editor

2.98 percent spending increase over 2012, increases funding for K-12.

Women’s basketball wins against Salem Trailblazers knock down Salem State with 72-51 victory

Sports , page 9

Thursday, September 22, 2011 News2

The Beacon is published Thursdays during the academic year and is

distributed free to the College com-munity. The Beacon is funded by the Student Government Association, the English/Communications department

and from ad revenues.

Mission Statement The Beacon strives to provide timely

and accurate news of campus and local events.

Editorials Policy Unsigned editorials that appear on these pages reflect the views of The

Beacon’s editorial board.

Signed columns and commentaries that appear on these pages reflect the

views of the writers.

Letters Policy The Beacon welcomes Letters to the Editor. Deadline is noon on Mondays

for that week’s newspaper.

Letters should be kept to 500 words or less and are subject to editing for

grammar and content. The Beacon will not publish anonymous or libelous

letters.

Letters must be signed by the writer and include a phone number. Letters may be dropped off at the office or

e-mailed toBeacon@mcla.edu.

Contributions Policy The Beacon accepts stories, photos and opinion pieces for publication. Submissions should be dropped off at the office by Monday at noon or

e-mailed to Beacon@mcla.edu.

Advertising Policy The Beacon reserves the right not to publish any advertisement it deems

to be libelous, false or in bad taste. For questions regarding ads, call the

business line or email us.

Editor-in-Chief Edward Damon

Managing Editor Andrew Roiter

Senior News Editor Jessica Gamari

Sports Editor Brendan Foley

A&E EditorMary Redstone

Copy Chief Jessica Wright

Business Man-ager Jennifer Smaltz

Ad ManagerDylan Glaser

Web Editor Caleb Hiliadis

Staff WritersAmy CubelloJessica GamariAndrew HodgsonTano HolmesHolly JohnstonKayla KoumjianSkyla SeamansNora Weiss

PhotographersWill CaseyAaron CrawfordTakeya LeeCarly SamachSerina StimsonMarissa Zelazo

Copy Editors

Megan CooneyEmma FarleyKristen Rubano

VideographersKen RodriguezKyle SerinoAriana Tourangeau

CartoonistAurora CooperAdvisers

Chris Goodell Stephen Kilduff

Ad Reps

James CourchaineAaron CrawfordRoz CummingsJessica FratusJacob McCall

Design Editors

Jenifer AugurGillian JonesPeter Seward

SGA BriefsMonday Jan. 30

– SGA tabled the previous week’s minutes (Jan. 23) be-cause of grammatical errors. – Foy reminded everyone about the Board of Trustees meeting today at 5:30pm in Sullivan Lounge, where they will vote on the arming of campus police. Foy said he hopes to see as many student leaders there as possible. – Senator Jason Brown, Sus-tainability Sommittee chair, told SGA the development of a bike share program is in “full swing.” He and Senator Sarah DiMarino are both interning this semester to help develop the program. – Last Thursday, Student Trustee Jaynelle Bellemore and President Foy traveled to Quinsigamond Commu-nity College in Worcester for a statewide Student Advisory Council meeting. The council, made up of students from ev-ery public college in the state, works to advocate for higher education. On March 8, rep-resentatives from all over the state will participate in a lobby day.– Advisor Jennifer Craig spoke about “Wet Feet Week,” a chance for students to learn about clubs on campus. A club fair will be held Thursday, Feb. 9 from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. in the Marketplace. There will also be a showcase for performance clubs. – Treasurer Peter Swain pre-sented two supplemental budget requests submitted to the Budget and Finance Com-mittee (BFC). Black Student Union (BSU) and Nexxus have both requested additional funds for events this semes-ter. BSU is requesting $6,420 for a trip to a Broadway show, Black History Month, and an end of the year barbeque. The Budget and Finance Commit-tee is recommending $1,400, as unforseen events held by BSU shifted funds away from events they had originally re-quested money for. Nexxus is requesting $1,284.90 for van drivers to their competi-tion at Williams, Teach Our Campus How to Step Day, and uniforms. The BFC is recom-mending $100 for van drivers, since the club has $2,216 out of the $2,550 they received for this year.– SGA approved to give $100 to Health Services and Athlet-ics for a student-faculty eating disorder seminar. Williams, Southern Vermont, Berk-shire Community and Simons Rock College are working with MCLA to fund the training sessions. SGA also approved $75 to the Berkshire Towers Advisory Board to help spon-sor the Annual Valentines Gala.

Contact usEmail: Beacon@mcla.eduNews desk: 413-662-5535Business line: 413-662-5404www.theonlinebeacon.com

Location:Mark Hopkins Hall, room 111

Sunday 1/1510:15 pm - Public Safety was

called to the Amsler Campus Center for a report of Larcency/Forgery/Fraud, Report was filed.

Monday 1/165:11 pm - Public Safety re-

sponded to an alarm trouble in the Flagg Townhouses. The alarm was accidental.

Tuesday 1/1710:52 am - Public Safety was

called to an incident of Larceny/Forgery/Fraud at Cumberland Farms on Ashland St. A report was filed.

6:37 pm - Public Safety investi-gated a fire alarm trouble in the Flagg Townhouses.

Wednesday 1/181:55 pm - Public Safety respond-

ed to a Medical Call in the Brewer Perkins Lot and referred them to an outside agency.

Friday 1/201:29 pm - Public Safety respond-

ed to a Medical Call from Hoosac Hall and transported the party to the hospital.

11:17 pm - Public Safety investi-gated reported suspicious activity on Ashland St.

11:39 pm - Public Safety re-sponded to a medical call in Berk-shire Towers, but no action was required.

Saturday 1/212:09 pm - Public Safety respond-

ed to an alarm in the Flagg Town-houses. The alarm was false.

5:35 pm - Public Safety respond-ed to a fire alarm in the Campus Center. The cause of the alarm was unknown.

Sunday 1/221:13 am - Public Safey respond-

ed to a disturbance in the Campus Center Sullivan Lounge but no action was required.

2:26 am - Public Safety respond-

ed to a disturbance in the Flagg Townhouse Phase One court yard but no action was required.

2:34 pm - Public Safety respond-ed to a report of Disturbing the Peace in the Flagg Townhouses. The subject was warned.

Monday 1/2310:34 am - Public Safety re-

sponded to a fire alarm in the Campus Center. The alarm was found to be accidental.

11:41 am - Public Safety inves-tigated suspicious activity in the Bond St parking lot .

12:18 pm - Public Safety investi-gated a notification of emergency in Eldridge Hall.

8:25 pm - Public Safety rendered their services to an incident of Larceny/Forgery/Fraud.

Tuesday 1/249:39 am - Public Safety filed a

report concerning an incident of Larceny/Forgery/Fraud in the Flagg Townhouses.

Wednesday 1/251:59 pm - Public Safety trans-

ported a party to the hospital in response to a Medical Call from the Campus Center.

Thursday 1/262:59 pm - Public Safety re-

sponded to suspicious activity at 277 Ashland St. The subject was warned.

Friday 1/271:34 pm - Public Safety respond-

ed to a disturbance in the Flagg Townhouses. The incident was referred to another agency.

11:30 pm - Public Safety re-sponded to a Medical Call in the Brewer Perkins lot. The party was transported to the hospital.

What do students need to know to be better writers? Starting this month the College will begin a formulative assessment on stu-dent writers.

MCLA and BCC were awarded a grant under the Board of Higher Education called the Advancing a Massachusetts Culture of Assess-ment (AMCOA) project and will introduce new criteria to reevalu-ate the curriculum across both colleges.

“BCC is a feeder school, which means more students come to MCLA from this community col-lege than any other. It is impor-tant to let them know what they need before entering,” Associate Dean of Assessment and Plan-ning Kristina Bendikas said.

English-Communications Pro-

fessor David Langston, also a member of AMCOA, articulated that any evaluation taking place should not arrive from an exter-nal source.

“We already know how to as-sess,” he said. “The problem that needs addressing is how the valid-ity is communicated to an exter-nal audience.”

Bendikas assured that meet-ings would be held to take a look at rubrics that already exist, and to determine what the standards should be.

“We are taking a broader look at how students fair as writers. We will support faculty work on student writing and have indi-vidual professors submit samples of student writing that will be [analyzed]. All samples will, of course, be scrubbed of names,” she said.

The first meeting for this writing

assessment will be held today, Feb. 2, 2012. This semester, samples will be turned in and the assess-ment will begin. Bendikas said by the end of May they should have the results of the project, and all should be wrapped up.

Stuart Fransman, a senior and English/Communications major felt the assessment was unneces-sary.

“The student-professor relation-ship is so subjective that it makes no sense to do an overall evalua-tion,” Fransman said.

Another English/Communi-cations student and senior, Mi-chael Lattanzio said, “I feel that curriculum on every level will always be assessed for some sort of improvement.” His insights on the issue largely echo Professor Langston’s.

“You can get a decent class eval-uation by looking at your final

paper at the end of the semester. Add more evaluating to class-rooms, and you clog up the whole process,” Lattanzio said.

Bendikas strongly made the point that this assessment cannot do anything but improve existing curriculum.

“It is a course embedded as-sessment. There is nothing extra or new being added and we are working with what we already have,” Bendikas said, “this month writing expert, Kathleen Yancey will be working with faculty.”

“We want every student to know what the expectations are of [him or her], and at what level they should be writing at. The proj-ect will be assessing sophomore through senior years, “she added.

Bendikas has a positive outlook on the assessment saying, “We ex-pect greater writing after this.”

Colleges given grant to begin assessment on student writers

MCLA and BCC recieve grant to introduce new criteria to reevaluate the writing curriculum

By Holly JohnstonStaff Writer

Thursday, February 2, 2011 News 3

FINANCIAL AID ANNOUNCEMENT

IT’S TIME TO APPLY FOR 2012-2013 FINANCIAL AID!

MARCH 1ST PRIORITY DATE!

* Log onto www.mcla.edu/aid and click on Application Forms for the links to complete the

Institutional Application for Financial Aid and for the FAFSA.

REMEMBER TO CHECK YOUR FIRST CLASS COLLEGE EMAIL FOR ANY REQUESTED

INFORMATION FOR YOUR FILE!!

* Mark your calendar for the free FAFSA Workshop on campus

on Feb. 1st, 6-8pm in Murdock 108; bring your and your parent’s PINs and tax

information with you!

FILE EARLY AND DON’T MISS OUT ON MONEY!

MARCH 1ST PRIORITY DEADLINE!

� e Student Government Association (SGA) will hold special elections on February 15 to � ll vacant spots on the student sen-ate. Todd Foy, senior and current SGA president, said that when there are six to seven seats open, SGA calls a special elec-tion.

“We had a few Senators drop out last semester due to academic and extracur-ricular obligations,” said Foy.

Nomination papers were due yesterday, February 1, but every matriculated student who has paid their student activity fee is en-couraged to vote. Polls open on February 15 in Bowman Hall at 11am and close at 7pm.

Natasha Dalton, junior and current Parliamen-tarian, has been a� liated with SGA for three years. She said the seats avail-able include two Senate-At-Large seats, two Class of 2012 Senate Represen-

tative seats, two Class of 2013 Senate Representa-tive seats, one special rep-resentation seat for the Greek seat and one Class of 2014 Treasurer.

“� e results will be post-ed on the SGA bulletin board outside of the SGA o� ce, which is located on the third � oor of the Cam-pus Center,” said Dalton.

Jacqueline Nash, a se-nior and Coordinating Vice President of SGA, adds that the transition of “bringing in newly-elected members to SGA will only help us � ourish.” Nash added, “As elected members, we are all there for the sole purpose of making student life better. We are open to healthy debate and new ideas, as this semester SGA hopes to succeed just as much as the past.”

� e students who are voted into SGA will hold their current position for the rest of the Spring 2012 semester.

SGA Special Elections will � ll eight positions

By Amy CubelloSta� Writer

Attention MCLA Clubs!

Free Ad!Did you know that � e Beacon o� ers you a

That’s right! Each semester, your club or organization is eligible to run one free advertisement in

The Beacon!

Want to gather interest and bring in more members?Looking to spread the word for an upcoming event?

For more information, contact Dylan Glaser on FirstClass

BIKES, continued from page 1

Two additional interns, Sar-ah DiMarino and Peter Swain, were added this semester to handle marketing and imple-mentation, respectively. Scul-ly will serve as the advisor for the interns.

“I think [the program] is a unique way to get students to explore North Adams and the surrounding community,”

DiMarino said. “If we encour-age students to explore other ways of transportation, then we can get them active in try-ing to reduce their own car-bon footprint. We want com-munity members and local businesses to be involved so we can all work to bring the students and the community together.”

� e school recently received a letter from Mayor Alcom-bright giving his full support

toward the bike program. In the future, MCLA hopes to work with the mayor to make North Adams a more bike friendly area. Moser and Scully agree that if the pro-gram is received well, addi-tional bike racks and storage facilities will be added for stu-dents to bring their own bikes to the school.

Bike share program at MCLA moves forward

BUDGET, continued from page 1

“Obviously, we feel very strongly that higher education is an investment and we would like the state to invest a little bit more in us,” College Vice President of Administration and Finance James Stakenas said. “More state appropriation means that the state is picking up a larger share of our oper-ating costs and it means that students would be picking up a lesser amount of our operating costs…so we’d like it certainly to be more.”

Both Stakenas and Bence said they found it unlikely that there would be a signi� cant dif-ference between the governor’s recommendation and the � nal budget passed by the Mass. Houses of congress.

“I think that the governor has a good understanding of rev-enue and the legislature will o� en look at revenue before they come out with the bud-get, but I think that in the last two or three year the governor’s

proposal, the senate’s proposal, and the house’s proposal have been very close,” Stakenas said. “But keeping in mind, that’s my opinion.”

“� e legislature has always felt that they’re at least equal partners in the budget process, and some governors have been more successful than others in persuading the legislature to accept their [budget] re-commndations,” Bence said. “I think now, during di� cult economic times, that the legis-lature is less likely to change the budget [recommendation]...they would prefer the governor take the blame for cuts.”

� e budget contains a series of proposed cuts from public services. � e largest of which are $30 million from Mass. Ex-ecutive branch resulting in 400 layo� s, $15 million from the Mass. Department of Trans-portation. � e closure of the Bay State Correctional Facility in Norfolk will save the state

$8.9 million. “� e closure is consistent

with sentencing reform, the Administration’s larger Correc-tions Master Plan and e� orts to strengthen the state’s correc-tions and community super-vision programs. Sentencing reform will ensure the savings can be achieved without in-creasing overcrowding in other facilities,” the Patrick-Murray administration said in an o� -cial press release.

� e recommendation pro-poses several alternative rev-enue sources to help balance the budget: $61.5 million from removing the tax exemption of candy and soda, $62.5 million from increasing the cigarette tax by 50 cents, $10.4 million from increasing taxes on cigars and smokeless tobacco, and $22 million from expanding the bottle bill.

For more budget details, go to www.mass.gov/budget/gov-ernor

Thursday, February 2, 2011 News4

Thinking of Renting in the Townhouses?

If you REALLY REALLY REALLY are determined to spend the amount of money it will cost to rent a room in a townhouse, we can help... But.....

At that price, we wouldn't feel right unless we added more things to your much, much larger room at the Boardman.... And frankly, you'll need them, because you'll have a LOT more space here to fill... ;)

Here are the extras just in your bedroom . .....

▪ A DOUBLE bed

▪ A 32” flat screen HDTV

▪ Premium Cable w/ sports

▪ A mini-fridge.....

▪ a bureau with mirror...

▪ a nightstand...

▪ a desk with side shelves....

▪ An executive chair to study (or fall asleep) at your desk

That's in addition to the 42” HDTV in the living room …High Speed Wi-Fi …a dishwasher (other than you or your roommates) ...and, of course, winter break is included!!

We also have room plans that will cost less than a townhouse room and give you lots more living space still with many extras.

Boardman (RIGHT ACROSS FROM THE MCLA LIBRARY) 664-9400

Singles or Any Size Group First to come has first choice of Apartments

Financial Aid Depends on the Credits you take and is the same on or off campus

Press Release

NORTH ADAMS, MA – Mas-sachusetts College of Liberal Arts’ (MCLA) Green Living Seminar Series will o� er a lecture on “Medicinal Plant Conservation” by Dr. Emily Mooney, assistant professor of biology at MCLA, on � ursday, Feb. 2, at 5:30 p.m. in Murdock Hall room 218.

� e lecture, which is part of the spring semester Green Liv-ing series at MCLA, “Saving Bio-diversity: Protecting species in Berkshire County and beyond,” is free and open to the public.

� e aim of the series is to in-form both students and commu-nity members about local and larger-scale e� orts to protect species from extinction. � is presentation is the second in a 12-week series that will consider issues of local and global biodi-versity conservation.

Mooney’s research seeks to answer the question, “Why do we have a green world?” She is interested in the interactions between plants and their con-sumers, which includes human

harvesters. In the summer, she is stationed at the Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory in Crested Butte, Colo., where she serves as their coordinator of undergrad-uate research. Mooney holds a Ph.D. from West Virginia University.

� is spring series will continue on � ursdays through May 3. For more information, go to [ http://www.mcla.edu/greenliv-ing ]www.mcla.edu/greenliving or contact Elena Traister at (413) 662-5303.

Every semester, MCLA’s Green Living Seminar Series hosts lectures by local, regional, and national experts organized around a central theme related to the environment and sustain-ability.

� e Green Living Seminar Series is sponsored by EOS Ventures, Inc. and Jiminy Peak Mountain Resort and is a pre-sentation of the MCLA Environ-mental Studies Department.

Professor’s research topic of today’s Green Living Seminar

Series focuses on Art and CommunityPress Release

NORTH ADAMS, MASS. – � e College’s Berkshire Cultural Resource Center announced its “Tricks of the Trade” series for February will focus on “Integra-tion of Art and Community,” in particular the relationship between local politics, the arts and the larger community.

� e next installment of this series will take place Feb. 7-9, with three seminars to be held throughout Berkshire County. � e events are free and open to the public. All seminars begin at 6:30 p.m.

Attendees will have the op-portunity to participate in round table discussions with local poli-ticians, state representatives and professionals. Questions to be addressed include, how do com-munities engage and embrace art and culture? What are the ben-e� ts? What are the downfalls? How do our local politicians and community leaders view the role of art and culture in their com-munities? How bene� cial art can be for a community and how to make the community aware of those bene� ts?

Panelists will discuss real-ized projects, as well as possible

future ones. � ey will talk about obstacles that may occur, such as community reluctance, as well as bene� ts and tangible improve-ment of public engagement and participation. All are encouraged to bring their own questions, thoughts and ideas.

In North Adams on Feb 7 at Gallery 51, a panel moderated by Jonathan Secor will focus on North Adams and Northern Berkshire community. Panelists include Mayor Richard Alcom-bright; city councilors Nancy Bullet, David Bond, and Keith Bona; Christine Dobbert, Florida town administrator; and Ve-ronica Bosley, director of North Adams O� ce of Tourism.

On Feb. 8, at Ferrin Gallery in Pitts� eld, the series will high-light aspects of integration art and community in the City of Pitts� eld and in the Southern part of the County. � e panel will be moderated by Helena Fruscio, Massachusetts Creative Economy Industry director and former executive director of Berkshire Creative.

Panelists include newly-elected Dan Bianchi, mayor of Pitts� eld, state Sen. Ben Downing and state Rep. Tricia Farley-Bouvier.

On Feb. 9, at IS 183 in Stock-

bridge, a conversation among professional of the art and com-munity � eld will be facilitated by Megan Whilden, director of the O� ce of Cultural Development in Pitts� eld. Panelists include Susan Cross, curator at Mas-sachusetts Museum of Con-temporary Art (MASS MoCA); Kate Merrigan, UNITY program coordinator of Northern Berk-shire Community Colation; and Sandra Newman, founder and executive director of Community Access to the Arts.

Tricks of the Trade is presented by Berkshire Cultural Resource Center and co-presented by Fer-rin Gallery and IS183 Art School. � is program is made possible with support by Appelbaum-Kahn Foundation, Excelsior and the Massachusetts Cultural Council.

For a full schedule of the monthly Tricks of the Trade workshops or to download a free brochure, visit [ http://www.mcla.edu/BCRC ]www.mcla.edu/BCRC.

For more information, (413) 664-8718. To register, contact Valeria Federici, BCRC program coordinator, (413) 663-5253 or valeria.federici@mcla.edu.

By Skyla SeamansSta� Writer

Education Professor Dale Fink will be presenting on “Recess as Contested Ter-rain” Friday, Feb. 3 for the � rst Brown Bag Lecture of the semester.

His lecture will take place in Sullivan Lounge at 3 p.m. and is open to the public.

Last summer, Fink complet-ed interviews with children from ages 9-12 to understand why recess is important to them and what their perspec-tives are when teachers use recess as a reward or take it away as a punishment.

“I think the most exciting part of my research has been conducting interviews with children from elementary grades,” Fink said. “� ere cur-

rently is no published research in which the voices of children appear on this topic.”

Other research on recess that Fink will summarize as part of the lecture includes how recess relates to obesity, bullying, ADHD, and if recess should come before or a� er lunch.

“� e children I have talked with have had such powerful words to say about why they have lost recess,” Fink said. “I will be sharing these pro-found insights at the lecture and I hope my � ndings will promote more thought and discussion about the impor-tance of recess and indepen-dent play.”

If anyone wishes to share their experiences on this topic, Fink encourages students to e-mail him via FirstClass.

Professor to speak on importance of recess

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Thursday, February 2, 2011 National/World News 5

COCOA, Fla. (AP) _ Newt Gin-grich is promising to establish a permanent base on the moon by 2020 if he’s elected president.

Gingrich, the former House speaker, told an overflow crowd gathered on Florida’s space coast Wednesday that he wants to de-velop a robust commercial space industry in line with the airline

boom of the 1930s. He also wants to expand exploration of Mars.

The pronouncements appeared to thrill the crowd of roughly 700 people. Florida’s space coast is still suffering from a recent round of federal cuts to the space program.

But how would Gingrich pay for it?

The Republican presidential contender says he wants to offer prizes to help stimulate invest-ment by the private sector.

Associated Press

Gingrich vows to establish colony on the moon by 2012

NEW YORK (AP) _ High school senior Fiona Lowenstein is not known for a lack of self-confidence – after all, she once approached federal lawmakers for a sixth-grade paper on wom-en and politics.

But running for student body president of Calhoun School in Manhattan last spring was a whole other matter.

“It was very, very nerve-wrack-ing to put myself out there,’’ said the 18-year-old, who won the of-fice. “I had these fears – will I be laughed at? Made fun of?’’

According to a study released Tuesday of how girls view the concept of leadership – com-missioned by the Girl Scouts of the USA and conducted by GFK Roper – Lowenstein is far from the only girl to want to be both a leader and feel uncomfortable putting herself forward at the same time.

Through the survey of 1,001 girls ages 8 to 17, a portrait emerges of how young women see enduring barriers to their ability to assume leadership op-portunities in a country where government and businesses are still dominated by men.

Among the key findings are that 3 in 9 girls think that while women can succeed in business, they rarely become corporate ex-ecutives; and many believe they are more burdened by family than men as they try to succeed in their careers.

The results of the study were released as the Girl Scouts an-nounced that it was throwing its clout behind a new campaign to cultivate the female leaders of tomorrow, saying too many girls are dropping out as contenders to be the next corporate executives or cutting-edge scientists.

The aim is to create equal repre-sentation of women and men in all leadership sectors of society within a generation.

Anna Maria Chavez, the orga-nization’s chief executive officer, said girls are ready to lead but of-ten don’t have the confidence to step up.

“We see that they have the po-tential to step into leadership roles,’’ she said. “They just cur-rently don’t have the support system in place to take the next step.’’

The campaign is kicking off with a 12-month awareness cam-paign – including $76 million in contributed media – that will include a website, www.togeth-erthere.org, as well as public ser-vice announcements on posters and television.

In some of the advertisements, a girl is shown in a boardroom sur-rounded by middle-aged white men or depicted as a police chief sitting at her desk.

The Girl Scouts also has set a $1 billion fundraising goal for pro-grams to support leadership de-velopment for girls.

The new campaign comes as the organization works to reverse a 14 percent decline in member-ship between 2006 and 2010. Last year saw the first increase since 2003, from 3,182,142 to 3,193,502 in 2011. There are about 25,000 Girl Scouts in New York.

Chavez said the campaign was not a membership drive.

“It’s really (about) changing the dialogue around the perception of girls and what they can accom-plish,’’ she said.

The paucity of female leadership at the top of corporations – par-ticularly in science, engineering and technology fields – has been well documented. For instance, last year’s Study of California Women Business Leaders by the University of California-Davis

found that women held 9.7 per-cent of top executive and board jobs at 400 of the largest publicly held companies in California, home of the tech engine of Sili-con Valley.

“Most women at the highest ranks of leadership are faced with a choice of whether or not to put their family or work first. It’s al-most impossible to do both well,’’ said Rachel Simmons, the co-founder of the Girls Leadership Institute and author of the book “The Curse of the Good Girl.’’

The government picture was no brighter in 2011. Accord-ing to The White House Proj-ect, a national women’s leader-ship advocacy organization, the U.S. ranked in 72nd place below Rwanda and Cuba in women’s political representation.

Lowenstein, who attended Sim-mons’ Girls Leadership Institute and blogs for the organization, is keenly aware of the challenge fac-ing women seeking political of-fice, whether at the student body level or on the national scale.

She said that during the 2008 presidential election, she was disheartened by the way Hillary Rodham Clinton was portrayed, while at the same time inspired that a woman was being taken seriously for the country’s high-est office.

“Hillary was often pegged as frantic or almost too invested in some sense or too emotional,’’ she said. “I feel like men are very rarely questioned in that way.’’

Catherine Steiner-Adair, a clini-cal psychologist and author of “Full Of Ourselves: A Wellness Program to Advance Girl Pow-er, Health and Leadership,’’ said those images can be particularly powerful shapers of how girls view leadership.

“Every child, every girl, watches very carefully how women are re-ally treated,’’ she said.

Associated Press

Girl Scouts launch leadership campaign for girlsOrganization aims to give girls confidence, create equal representation of men and women in leadership roles

LONDON (AP) _ Lawyers for a retired British businessman ac-cused of plotting to sell missile components to Iran said Tuesday that he will ask a European court to rule on his appeal against being extradited to the United States.

Christopher Tappin, 64, faces charges in Texas over allegations that he offered in 2006 to sell spe-cialized batteries for Hawk mis-siles for $25,000. He didn’t know then that his contacts were under-cover U.S. agents, not Iranians, U.S. authorities say.

Tappin faces up to 35 years in jail if convicted in the United States, but he denies the charges and says he was the victim of a sting operation.

Two other men have been sen-tenced to prison in Texas for try-ing to buy and export the batter-ies, according to court records.

Tappin has unsuccessfully fought his extradition in Britain, where a judge ruled against him last year and two High Court judges said Tuesday that he lacked the legal basis to take his fight to the U.K. Supreme Court.

Lawyer Karen Todner said Tap-pin will instead lodge an appli-

cation with the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, France, within a few days, and will ask the court to halt extradi-tion proceedings until his case is heard.

Another Tappin lawyer, Edward Fitzgerald, had argued that under European human rights legisla-tion, Tappin should not be extra-dited because he had to care for his sick wife.

U.K. judges have ruled that the severity of the charges against Tappin outweighed his right to not be extradited, but Todner said that the British government had agreed not to begin extradition proceedings for 14 days, to give Tappin time to lodge the Euro-pean appeal.

Tappin’s case is the latest to ex-pose trans-Atlantic tensions over the exchange of criminal suspects.

Lawyers complain that under ``fast track’’ extradition proce-dures introduced after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, the U.S. is not required to offer substantial proof of an allegation when seeking to extradite a suspect from Britain.

But in October 2011, a judge-led review in the U.K. found that ex-tradition agreements between the United States and Britain are fair and unbiased.

Associated Press

Suspect in Iran missile plot to appeal to European court

Obama wants small business tax, investment breaksWASHINGTON (AP) _ Flesh-

ing out a year-old initiative, the Obama administration wants Congress to enact or expand tax breaks for small businesses and remove barriers to startups, seiz-ing on some existing bipartisan proposals that could win support even in the polarized climate of an election year.

White House officials say Presi-dent Barack Obama will call on Congress on Tuesday to pass leg-islation that, among other mea-sures, would eliminate tax rates on capital gains for investments in small businesses and extend for a year the ability of all businesses to immediately deduct all of the costs of equipment and software pur-chases.

The legislative package, which will be part of Obama’s 2013 bud-get proposal later this month, also would include a new 10 percent tax credit for small business that add jobs or increase wages in 2012. In addition, the legislation would make it easier for new startup companies to raise money and to go public. It also would expand a government small business invest-ment program from $3 billion to $4 billion.

“The president has made small businesses and particularly start-ups a key aspect of his economic growth agenda because he under-stands how much the newest and fastest-growing small businesses drive job growth in our economy,’’ said Gene Sperling, director of the White House National Economic Council.

The proposals borrow from past Obama initiatives and from bi-partisan legislation that has either already passed in the House or is being proposed in the Senate. Obama’s package includes propos-als offered in the Senate by Dem-ocrat Chris Coons of Delaware and Republican Marco Rubio of Florida, and another plan by Re-publican Jerry Moran of Kansas and Democrat Mark Warner of Virginia.

White House officials would not disclose the total cost of the presi-dent’s package, but Sperling said it would be more than covered by proposals to reduce tax expendi-tures and by closed loopholes the administration will call for in its 2013 budget.

With the presidential election set to become the main political

preoccupation of 2012, the White House initiative is designed to take advantage of cooperative attempts by Republicans and Democrats to find modest remedies to spur the economy. Most of those ef-forts have been overshadowed by congressional bickering, the Re-publican presidential primary and Obama’s growing attention to his re-election.

The proposals come a year af-ter the administration launched a consolidated effort to spur new startup businesses with a high-profile White House event featur-ing scores of entrepreneurs, some of whom offered testimonials to the job creation possibilities that new businesses can bring to the economy.

Besides the tax breaks, a central element of the Obama package

is to assist new entrepreneurs by making it easier for them to raise money, reducing taxes on their startup expenses and removing securities barriers for new compa-nies that have gone public.

“Our small business agenda has a specific focus on removing the bar-riers that have for too long blocked startups and entrepreneurs from getting the financing they need to accelerate their growth and hir-ing,’’ Sperling said.

One of the Obama provisions would increase the amount of money that can be raised through small public offerings that don’t require companies to undergo an extensive Securities and Exchange Commission registration process. The limit for such “mini public offerings’’ would increase from $5 million a year to $50 million.

Associated Press

Thursday, February 2, 2011 A&E theonlinebeacon.com6Blues and Funk Fest Returns North Adams

It’s lucky number seven for MCLA Presents’ annual Blues and Funk Festival. The festival is expanding two nights for the first time this year and is branching beyond the campus borders.

The festival starts tomorrow at the downtown restaurant and bar Public Eat and Drink at 9 p.m. The College’s Jazz Band will open for Misty Blues, featuring members from the Berkshire area. This will kick off the night, paying homage to some of the greatest female blues and jazz musicians throughout time.

“We kick it off old school style with Gina Coleman and Misty Blues, channeling the great women of the blues – from the great Etta James, who we re-cently lost, to Bessie Smith. Gina and the band will bring their in-terpretations of the great women who have signified the blues,” Jonathan Secor, director of spe-cial programs at the College, said in a press release.

Saturday night brings the fes-tivities back to campus. At 7:30 p.m., Venable Gym will host Blitz the Ambassador, a Ghana-born, New-York-City-based MC, com-poser, and producer. He blends both musical style and language in his performance, from old-

school hip-hop to funk, and from English to West African.

“He is truly an amazing per-former,” Secor said. “With a lightning-fast mind, the politi-cal boldness of Chuck D and the sixth groove sense of Fela Kuti, Blitz the Ambassador calls on old school hip hop and shifts between English, West African and Ethiopian jazz, never stum-bling over his words and mes-sages. You don’t want to miss this party.”

Opening for Blitz, at 7:30 p.m. will be the MCLA Jazz Band, MCLA’s Allegrettos and The Smokey Wambas.

For single-night tickets, general admission is $10, alumni cost $8, faculty and staff cost $5, and it is free for MCLA students and MCLA Presents! members. A special price of $15 is offered for tickets to both nights for general admission.

To purchase tickets, call 413-662-5204. To become a member of MCLA Presents!, call Jocelyn Merrick at 413-662-5193.

For more information about the event, contact Jonathan Se-cor through email at jonathan.secor@mcla.edu or by phone at 413-664-8718. More information can also be obtained from www.mcla.edu/About_MCLA/Com-munity/bcrc/mclapresents/

By Mary RedstoneA&E Editor

Two-day festival starts Friday at PUBLIC Eat and Drink and continues Saturday at MCLA’s Venable Gym

Photo Courtesy of Jonathan SecorNew York based MC Blitz the Ambasador will be performing at the Blues and Funk Fest on Sat night in Venable Gym.

Visions from the Edge exhibit put together by MCLA’s Arts Management students

A barrage of colors greets visi-tors to Gallery 51 as the MCLA Arts Management class, taught by Professor Tony Gengarelly, pres-ents Visions from the Edge.

“This gallery represents a full se-mester’s worth of work by the stu-dents,” Jonathan Secor, director of special programs at the College said.

Visions from the Edge is an art exhibit that opened last Thursday and will be open until Feb. 19. It displays the artwork of 11 dif-ferent artists, all of whom are af-filiated with Pure Visions Arts, an art gallery and studio based in the neighborhood of Chelsea which is in Manhattan, New York.

The Arts Management class took a field trip last semester to Pure Visions Arts to determine which art would be displayed at Gallery 51.

“We got to meet some of the art-ists, and there was such a large

selection of artwork at Pure Vi-sions Arts,” said Jessica Atanas, a student in the Arts Management class. “It was cool because Pure Visions Arts is not just an art gal-lery, but an operational studio as well, where the artists often come to work. We researched all the artists as well as their work and came together to decide which ones would be displayed here.”

“This is one of my favorite ex-hibits [the Arts Management class] has had here,” Laura Petten-gill, a junior and an employee of Gallery 51 said. “I like that there is a lot of untitled work, which for me is more art for art’s sake, as op-posed to art with a message. For me it’s more personal.”

The gallery contained a variety of artwork, including an extreme-ly intricate piece by Barry Kahn. The piece had geometric shapes in a wide variety of colors, as well as human faces worked into the pat-terns.

The gallery’s main contributor

was Jessica Parker, an honorary graduate of MCLA and a Wil-liamstown resident. She has an eight-year-old relationship with the College. She also has a book written about her work called Ex-ploring Nirvana: The Art of Jes-sica Park, which was published by the College in 2008.

There were more socially-mind-ed works featured by c\various artists in Gallery 51. One artist in particular was Leon McCutch-eon, an African American paint-er whose main influence is jazz music. His works on display in-cluded African Americans in dif-ferent situations in America, such as southern African American women going to church in fancy attire, or the face of a black man with the words ‘poor,’ ‘city,’ and ‘black’ written around him.

Many paintings created an in-teresting contrast of images by incorporating urban landscapes, especially New York, and country landscapes together.

By Tano HolmesA&E Writer

Photo by Carly Samach/Beacon StaffFreshman Denis Sinclair views one of the paintings on display at Gallery 51’s student-curated exhibit Visions from the Edge.

MCLA students curate Gallery 51

WJJW is streaming online!Head to audio.mcla.edu for

Listening linksand Programming Schedule

Thursday, February 2, 2011 A&E theonlinebeacon.com 7Comedy Stop’s first event a successJohnny Cardinale entertained students last Thursday night in Sullivan Lounge

Johnny Cardinale stood in the center of a temporary stage in Sul-livan Lounge last Thursday night and asked that fearful question of the audience – how many of you are graduating, and do you know what you want to do after you graduate? He looked right at me. I had never actually been put on the spot by a comedian before.

“Well, I’m a writer,” I told him. He asked what I write. “Anything really,” I responded. I saw a look in his eyes that could only mean one thing: I was about to be part of a joke.

“I’m sure that will look great on your resume´,” he said. “What do you write? Anything? Alright, here’s a menu; show me what you’ve got. ‘Extra cheese, fifty cents.’ Brilliant!”

No one was off-limits during Cardinale’s hour-long comedy set, from the students in the au-dience to the founding fathers to his oddly accurate impression of Channing Tatum. Not even the setting of Sullivan Lounge was safe from Cardinale’s sharp com-mentary.

“Is that a high-tide mark?” Car-dinale asked as he pointed to the two-toned pillars in the room. “And they even found curtains to match!”

Cardinale found a seemingly endless string of jokes in the topic of Italians, from their gestures to the way they speak. Being Ital-ian himself, he drew upon actual family members and experiences such as the unfamiliar feeling of not feeling obligated to clean his plate.

Like many comedians before him, Cardinale opened his act with jokes about North Adams. Later, he mentioned the hip-hop genre and asked the audience, “You guys have hip-hop out here, right? Has it made it this far west yet?”

Cardinale then recommended that people go back and revisit terms for “drunk” that haven’t seen the light of day in quite some time, citing The Drinker’s Dic-tionary for terms that should be brought back.

“The thing about drinking though,” he said, “is that if you say anything with enough enthusiasm you can use it to talk about being drunk. ‘Dude, I drank so much last night, I was reupholstered!’”

He joked for a while about men and women, and how he thinks women have it so much easier than men.

“You see a lady bug and think how cute it is,” he said, “if it was a man bug you would be terrified.”

For the last portion of the eve-

ning, Cardinale took out his gui-tar. While comedians like Dimi-tri Martin write funny songs to be played on the guitar or other instruments, Cardinale used his guitar to make fun of music.

He explained how all guitar players need to do to impress girls is to play on two certain strings and sing with an airy voice and use only vowels. To illustrate his point, he began singing a satire of Snow Patrol’s hit song “Chasing Cars.”

He made fun of Nickleback as well, singing one of their songs in a nasally whine and then ex-plaining that he sang exactly that way at a karaoke bar and received nothing but compliments.

As his final bit, he revisited a joke about tattoos that he had made earlier. He asked audience members if they had tattoos, and what they were. I reluctantly raised my hand.

“Oh, the writer has a tattoo,” he joked. “Just what are you writing anyway?”

“I’m covering this for the school paper,” I said.

“Oh, that’s awesome. I thought you just weren’t paying attention and were writing poetry or some-thing based on my act.”

By Mary RedstoneA&E Writer

Photo by Carly Samach/Beacon StaffJohnny Cardinale entertained students last Thursday night in Sullivan Lounge. His routine included straight-forward jokes, impressions, and jokes on his guitar making fun of other songs and musicians.

Neil Young: Steve Jobs listened to vinyl

DANA POINT, Calif. (AP) _ Legendary rocker Neil Young has taken his campaign for higher-fi-delity digital sound to the stage of a technology conference. He says a giant of technology was on his side: the late Steve Jobs.

Young says the Apple co-found-er was such a fan of music that he didn’t use his iPod and its digitally compressed files at home. Instead, Young says, Jobs listened to vinyl

albums, which are well-known to have better sound.

Young told the ``D: Dive Into Media’’ conference Tuesday that he spoke with Jobs about creating a format that has 20 times the fi-delity of files in the most current digital formats, including MP3.

He speculated that if Jobs had lived longer, he might have tried to create a system that used this higher-quality format.

Colbert’s PAC raises over $1 million

NEW YORK (AP) _ Stephen Colbert’s sway in the U.S. presi-dential election might be a joke, but he’s got some real financial muscle.

The comedian disclosed Tues-day that his Americans for a Bet-ter Tomorrow ``super’’ political action committee has raised a staggering $1.02 million. PACs were required to submit their fi-nancial reports to the Federal Election Commission on Tuesday.

In a letter to the commission, Colbert was quoted as saying, ``How you like me now, FEC?’’

Colbert raised the money by asking for donations from viewers of ``The Colbert Report.’’ He has used the PAC to highlight what he considers the absurdity of cam-paign finance law and, in particu-lar, the 2010 Supreme Court rul-ing that allows corporations and unions to raise limitless money to run campaign ads.

``We raised it on my show and used it to materially influence the elections _ in full accordance with the law,’’ Colbert said in a press release. ``It’s the way our found-ing fathers would have wanted it, if they had founded corporations instead of just a country.’’

When Colbert earlier flirted with running for president, he legally transferred control of his

PAC to Jon Stewart of ``The Dai-ly Show,’’ as the so-called super PACs are supposed to remain in-dependent of the candidates. On Monday’s ``The Colbert Report,’’ he elaborately hunted down Stew-art to regain his PAC presidency.

Colbert said Tuesday that the PAC is considering yet another name change to: John Colbert Cougar Super MellenPAC.

On ``The Report,’’ Colbert has portrayed every turn of the screw in the life of a political action committee, going through the law with his attorney, Trevor Potter, former Federal Election Commis-sion chairman.

Thus far, his PAC has created a handful of television ads, includ-ing an over-the-top negative ad against Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, and an anti-players ad during the NBA lockout.

Tuesday’s FEC filing also re-vealed the donors who gave more than $200 to Colbert’s PAC. Among them are Gavin Newsom, lieutenant governor of California (who gave $500), Bradley Whit-ford of the ``The West Wing’’ ($250) and ``Hot in Cleveland’’ star Laura Sangiacomo ($250).

Colbert is yet to say what else he intends to do with the money.

After surgery, Adele to perform at the Grammys

NEW YORK (AP) _ Adele is nominated for six Grammys, and she’ll be on deck to collect any-thing she wins: The 23-year-old singer is set to perform at the awards show.

Adele had surgery on her vocal cords last year, and the Grammys will be the first time she has per-formed live in five months, The Recording Academy announced Tuesday.

Her sophomore album, ``21,’’ has sold more than 6 million cop-

ies in the U.S. It is nominated for album of the year and best pop vocal album. The CD has three singles that have hit the No. 1 spot on the Billboard chart, including ``Rolling in the Deep,’’ which is up for record and song of the year.

The Grammys will air live Feb. 12 on CBS from the Staples Cen-ter in Los Angeles.

Adele will also perform at the BRIT Awards on Feb. 21.

Thursday, February 2, 2011 A&E theonlinebeacon.com8

Mary RedstoneA&E Editor

We’re gonna need a bigger

boatI have always been a fan of testing

things out before comitting to buy-ing them. Free sample of ice cream at Cold Stone before I order? Yes. Trying on clothes before buying them? Of course. Watching trailers and clips of a movie before renting the DVD? Absolutely.

I like to take the same approach when dealing with music too; if someone mentions a band to me or I read about an up-and-coming band and I want to check them out, I’m not going to blindly buy their album and risk having them be something I absolutely hate.

This is honestly the main reason why I love the internet. There are so many ways to discover new mu-sic and check it out before buying the album. However, the increas-ing threat of bills like SOPA could potentially kill this method of lis-tening to bands before you buy them.

Most recently, music streaming website Grooveshark.com has c ome under fire for potentially in-fringing on copyright laws. They are being sued by major labels Sony, Universal Music, and War-ner Music.

However, Grooveshark claims that they are protected by the Safe Harbor Provision in the Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA) which states, “service providers are not liable for the storage of material, at the users’ di-rection, that resides on a network or system operated or controlled by the service provider.” This is based also on whether the server had knowledge of the illegal con-tent, the server received any finan-cial gain directly from this content, and upon notification the server removed the content immediately.

Currently, Grooveshark is indeed protected under this provision, unless the courts decide to use two anonymous blog comments post-ed a few days ago. The comments claim to be from an employee of the website and state that they were encouraged to upload music themselves. If these are accurate, Grooveshark would no longer be under protection of the DMCA.

They have options however; they can obtain a license similar to that of Pandora or pay a flat fee to ac-count holders of copyrights. These are actually options they could have used all along, and why they didn’t is a mystery.

I use Grooveshark nearly every day, and I in fact pay $3 a month as a premium user. If they end up having to shut down, I can con-fidently predict a drop in musi-cal awareness and profit on ma-jor labels. Without websites like Grooveshark and YouTube, where else can you discover great music you’ve never heard before?

XMALIA informs and entertainsC. Ryder Cooley brought attention to the disappearance and death of animals using music, video images, and theatrical performances.

MCLA Presents! started this se-mester off with another encapsu-lating performance: “XMALIA.” It’s a word that is hard to pro-nounce, never mind understand. However, professional artist C. Ryder Cooley brought definition, as well as beauty to the stage in Venable Gym last Wednesday as she performed a tribute to the multiple species who have met an unfortunate demise.

Pronounced “zi-mahlia,” Cooley and her crew portray the devasta-tion of many species of animals that have gone extinct over time, from specific kinds of sheep to gi-ant deer. Cooley presented music, video images, and intricate aer-ial work. With ropes and sheets hanging down from the ceiling, Cooley swung in slow motion over the audience, playing her small guitar with animal heads at-tached to her shoulders.

Yes, animal heads.“XMALIA’s” goal was to bring

attention to the disappearance and death of so many animals; animals that posed no threat, but still were brought to a very bitter end. Cooley brought the audience to a haunted still as she flew above them all in remembrance of the dodo, giving a noble tribute to the bird many are so quick to label stupid.

“It’s kind of chilly,” said junior Laura Pettengill. “The show has

this eeriness about it, but it was meaningful. She [Cooley] is let-ting people know animals are be-ing harmed.”

The emotional message of Cool-ey’s performance was just that; to remind people that despite the

increasing trends of veganism, vegetarianism, and animal rights, many creatures are still in danger. Some harm is being done by hu-mans, but there is inevitable harm through changes within nature and how it transforms through-out the years. Yet Cooley does not call for immediate change, or despair in hopelessness. Instead, she causes those who see her fly through air to be grateful for what they can experience, for tomor-row those wonderful things may not be there anymore.

“I have a good relationship with Ryder,” expressed senior Shannon Costello, an arts management student who interned this past summer with DownStreet Art. Costello helped to manage a gal-lery dedicated to Cooley’s visual

art. “It’s really interesting to expe-rience her multiple talents, as she is an inter-disciplinary artist.”

MCLA Presents! has a full schedule for February, including the 7th Annual Blues and Funk Festival, a two-night extravaganza of modern blues, jazz, and hip-hop. The first night takes place this Friday, Feb. 3 at Public Eat & Drink on Holden Street featuring local artist Misty Blues to give jazz a modern twist. Saturday night highlights African-born, New York-based rapper and producer Blitz the Ambassador spitting out politically-fueled rhymes with an old-school flow. For more in-formation, check out www.mcla.edu/presents and get acquainted with some entertainment.

By Nora WeissA&E Writer

Photo by Serina Stimpson/Beacon StaffC. Ryder Cooley brought extintion to life on the stage in Venable Gym last Wednesday night.

Photo by Serina Stimpson/Beacon StaffC. Ryder Cooley brought an awareness of animal extintion through art, performance, music, and moving images.

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Thursday, February 2, 2012 Sports theonlinebeacon.com 9Men’s basketball drops to Salem, ends three game winning streakCurrently rank third in MASCAC conference with 4-3 record as season enters home stretch

By Ariana TourangeauStaff Writer

After starting the season off with five straight losses a champion-ship for the Trailblazers seemed far-fetched. That is, until they beat the first place team, Bridge-water State, during a home game on Jan. 25th.

Although it was a rough start for the team, each player stepped for-ward and started playing for the win.

“We got great chemistry now and we all got one goal and that is winning conference,” senior Tyrell Mosely, who plays the posi-tion of guard said.

The Trailblazers finished their last six games on top with four wins and two losses. On Jan. 10 the team played Salem State, lost the game with a final score of 76-101. Vernon Cross, a junior and forward, scored a high 17 points and Jamal Brown, a senior and forward, with a high of nine re-bounds.

The Trailblazers came for the win against Worcester State with a score of 76-65 at a home game Jan. 14. Jamal Brown had 19 points and 11 rebounds.

The Trailblazers then fell short at home against Westfield State with a score of 68-70 on Jan. 17. Senior Guard Michael Young took the highest points of the game with

15 points and also tied with Jamal Brown for the highest rebounds with 7 rebounds.

At Framingham State the Trail-blazers won with a score of 68-

59 on Jan. 19. Jamal Brown lead the team again with a high of 25 points and 14 rebounds.

Basketball, continued on page 10

The Trailblazers finished thier last six games on top with four wins and two losses.

Photo by Will Casey/Beacon StaffChris Harris charged by Bridgewater during Wednesday’s 85-80 victory. The Trailblazers are 4-3 in conference play this season.

Women’s basketball knocks Salem State down with 72-51 victory

By Andrew HodgsonStaff Writer

The MCLA Women’s Basketball team sits in third place currently in the MASCAC with a record of 11-9 (4-3 conference). The team is coming off two big wins against Sage and MASCAC rival Salem State. When asked about the teams recent success in an email interview, coach Holly McGovern said, “Our players caused disrup-tions of Sage’s offense through de-fensive pressure and rebounding.”

Last Saturday Sage was un-able to crack MCLA’s defense for most of the game. The frustration was visible throughout the gym as Sage struggled in both a half-court offense and had any hopes of transition points smothered by the constant pressure by MCLA defenders.

Although in the second half they were able to push the tempo more, once the Trailblazers established their half-court defense the game crawled as Sage attempted over and over to get good shots from inside the paint. With Jen Wehner

and freshman Tashari Rainwa-ter disrupting traffic through the middle, Sage’s offense could only be described as stagnant.

McGovern explains this impor-tant aspect of the team’s game, “We go into our games wanting to determine the tempo of a game. Our players have the ability to change from an up-tempo style of play, into a half court setting with-out becoming disorganized.”

On the offensive side Sage was overwhelmed by the Trailblaz-ers offensive rebounding. In the second half Sage tried a 3-2 zone look to disrupt the Trailblazers of-fense.

In response, the Trailblazers hit a handful of three-pointers to fur-ther extend their lead.

Photo by Will Casey/Beacon StaffJen Wehner stretched to try and claim the rebound while teammates rushed to help.

“We go into our games wanting to determine the tem-po of a game.”

WOMEN, continued on page 10

Thursday, february 2, 2011 Sports theonlinebeacon.com10

Men’s basketball struggles for conference leadBASKETBALL, continued from page 9

At a home game on Jan. 21 against Fitchburg State, the Trail-blazers took another win with a score of 84-79. Brown led once again with the highest points and rebounds of the game with a total of 22 points and nine rebounds.

The team took a strong lead of 11 points to Bridgewater state on Jan. 25. Jamal Brown converted a turn around jumper with 19 seconds left, tying the game, and bringing the team into overtime. He led the team to a victory of 85-80, scoring a total of 26 points and 10 rebounds. This victory brought the Trailblazers back from a rocky start and into a four-way tie to hopefully end strong with a comeback season.

“We tend to get down on our-selves when things aren’t going well and we can’t afford to do that,” coach Jaime Morrison said. “Our failures in the first semester are what are helping us now in the second semester. We are a little mentally tougher now and we know that we can do it.”

The team now stands at a 4-3 re-cord in conference and a 7-13 re-cord overall. With six more games left and a total of eight seniors, the team will need to maintain this confidence and energy to come out on top.

“We have more confidence. We can play with anyone in the

league,” Morrison said. He added that he believe in his eight seniors as leaders, “We’ll go as far as our seniors take us. If our seniors play well then we’ll do well and if they don’t then that’ll hurt us.”

The team may be led by those seniors, but Morrison also stated that the team is a “collective ef-fort.” With three juniors, three sophomores, and one freshman the men’s basketball team has what other teams may lack: depth.

“The younger guys are coming around,” says Morrison.

Each player contributes his own strengths. Tyriq Rochester, a sophomore and forward, brings energy and leadership to the team.

“I am a good rebounder,” Roch-ester said, “and I work hard to help us be better as a team.”

Rochester finished five games with the highest rebounds and has a total of 82 rebounds this season.

The positive energy from the fans is also a contributing fac-tor to the Trailblazer’s success.

With a huge turnout from fans at games, the team feeds off of the energy from the crowd.

“We’re playing at home a lot with great crowds, and that al-ways helps,” Morrison said.

Now in a four-way tie for first

place with Bridgewater State, Sa-lem State and Westfield State, the Trailblazers have one thing on their minds: winning.

The men’s basketball will next play on Saturday, travelling to Worcester State. Their next home

game will be on February 11th, when the team will find them-selves going up against Framing-ham State.

Photo by Marissa Zelazo/Beacon StaffTyrell Mosley was all focus as he flew by Bridgewater defense on Wednesday’s victory.

Senior captain Chris Harris leads Trailblazers through the good and the bad

By Kayla KoumjianSports Writer

Few collegiate athletes have been key players in turning an athletic program around within their four years at MCLA.

This is not true for Chris Harris, captain and senior forward of the men’s basketball team.

“He’s been here for four years, he was a part of a bad team, but then the next years team kept improv-ing,” explained teammate Ray Vi-ches, a sophomore.

“Chris was a key role in the team improving every year,” Vi-ches said. Harris played in all 24 games, and started in 23 of them his freshman year. He averaged about 30 minutes per game and lead the team in steals during his first season.

During Harris’ freshman year, the men’s basketball team’s overall season record was 1-24. Instead of giving up on his team, Harris strived to make it better.

Now, the men’s basketball team is 7-13 overall and 4-3 in the MASCAC conference. “We have really turned the program around since then,” said Chris Harris.

Harris has always had a pas-sion for basketball. He has never played another sport competitive-ly before.

He started playing at the age of seven, but it took him a few years

before he became competitive. “I really started to improve my

skills once I hit the seventh grade,” explained Harris.

He went to high school at John D. O’Bryant in the Boston area. During his time there, he played on the varsity basketball team for three years.

While in high school, Harris tore his ACL the summer going into his senior year.

“I still played my senior year,” Harris explained. “But after the season was over I had surgery and started rehab for my knee,”

Because of his injury, Harris wasn’t positive if he would play at MCLA or even at college at all.

“Coach Morrison called me but I wasn’t sure if I wanted to play because I was still recovering,” Harris said.

Luckily enough for the MCLA’s men’s basketball team, Harris eventually decided to play for the Trailblazers and has worked to become the team’s top scorer and captain.

Harris is also a leader to many of his teammates.

“He’s a good captain. He doesn’t lead vocally, but he leads by ex-ample,” Viches said.

Last season Harris averaged just less than 13 points, and over five rebounds per game. He also start-ed 25 of the team’s 27 games, lead the team in steals, was the second leading scorer, and was second in

assists. This season, Harris has started

every game for the Trailblazers so far and is averaging more than 10 points, and almost five rebounds per game.

He also leading the team in as-sists, along with leading the team in steals. Harris has lead the men’s basketball team in steals every year he’s played.

During this present season, Harris achieved the high accom-plishment of scoring 1,000 points total during his career.

Harris felt great when he scored his 1,000th point.

“It felt amazing, he said. “It shows that hard work pays off.”

His teammates were also very proud.

“I was happy for him,” Vi-ches said. “He was very humble and modest when he scored his 1,000th. He didn’t boast about it.”

For this season, Harris’ main goal for him and his teammates is to win their conference title.

“In order to achieve our goal we have to continue to play good de-fense and play together as a team,” Harris said.

The men’s team plays their next game at Worcester State on Sat-urday, February 4 and their next home game is against Framing-ham St. on Saturday, February 11 at 3:00 p.m.

Photo by Will Casey/Beacon StaffChris Harris recently scored his 1,000th career point for MCLA.

“We have more confidence. We can

play with anyone in this league,” says Coach Morrison.

Thursday, February 2, 2011 Sports theonlinebeacon.com11

salembridgewaterwestfieldMCLA worcesterframinghamfitchburg

bridgewater salemMCLAwestfieldworcesterfitchburgframingham

Standings(As of Press Time)

Men’s Basketball

Women’s Basketball

13-711-813-87-136-148-1310-9

6-26-25-34-33-52-61-6

All Conf

13-69-12 11-911-109-1214-511-9

7-15-34-34-43-52-52-6

All Conf

Brendan FoleySports Editor

Women’s Basketball

2/4 @Worcester 3:30 p.m.2/7 @Westfield 5:30 p.m.2/11 Framingham 1 p.m.2/14 @Fitchburg 5:30 p.m.2/18 @Bridgewater1:00 p.m.

Men’s Basketball

2/4 @Worcester 5:30 p.m2/7 @Westfield7:30 p.m.4/11 Framingham 3 p.m.2/14 @Fitchburg7:30 p.m.2/18 @Bridgewater 3:00 p.m.

Lady Trailblazers improve MASCAC standings The team never looked back,

cruising to a 23 point lead.The success of the team’s starters

has allowed younger players to get some experience on the court.

Toward the end of the first half the Trailblazer’s star point guard Alie Dobrovolc, who led the team with 26 points and 12 rebounds, quarterbacked for the second squad while stars like Jen Wehner and Lucy Tremblay cheered on their teammates.

On Tuesday Jan. 31st the Trail-blazers went head-to-head with Salem State. Both Wehner and Dobrovolc put up double-doubles to lead the Trailblazers to the win.

This win was particularly grati-fying for the Trailblazers as Salem State had beaten MCLA in the MASCAC opener, 76-87.

MCLA’s defense was once again the trump card for the team, hold-ing Salem State to a dismal 27.5 field goal percentage. The Trail-blazers offense was able to exploit the Salem defense, they shot 42 percent including three 3-point-ers from Lucy Tremblay.

On Saturday, the Trailblazers will travel to Worcester State in hopes of extending their win-ning streak to three games. The last time the team had put three wins in a row, was back in early December. That winning streak was followed by an ugly four loss streak.

February will prove if the Trail-blazers defense-first philoso-phy can pay off. In February the Trailblazers play five games, all of which are MASCAC games and four of which are road games. If the Trailblazers can make a run to end the season, they could eas-ily climb the MASCAC rankings though Bridgewater sits with a commanding lead atop the MAS-CAC with a 7-1 conference re-

cord.If the Trailblazers can continue

to play stifling defense and con-tinue to improve, the end of the season could prove to be an excit-ing and successful one.

“We have put an emphasis on

our on-ball defending and con-testing more shots in the last few weeks. We still need more devel-opment in those areas,” McGov-ern said about the recent team focus.

WOMEN, continued from page 9

Photo by Marissa Zelazo/Beacon StaffStrong defense has allowed the Trailblazers to compete with the top teams in the MASCAC conference.

The 2012 Beacon Staff ’s Super-Duper Super-Accurate Super Bowl PicksEd Damon: Liverpool: 101 Manchester United: 100

Andrew Roiter: Giants: 24 Pats: 17

Mary Redstone: Giants: Forever fumbling Pats: ALL THE POINTS

Jessie Wright: [insert sports team here] will beat [insert other sports team here]

Chris Goodell: Pats: 34 Giants: 24

Brendan Foley: Pats: 31 Giants: 21

Jennifer Smaltz: Pats: 45 Giants: 34

Amy Cubello: Pats: 27 Giants: 24

Skyla Seamans: Pats: 42 Giants: 0

Stephen Kilduff: Giants: 12 Pats: 3

Gillian Jones: Pats: 24 Giants: 36

Megan Cooney: Patriots win in a close one

Paul LeSage: Patriots by 9

Dylan Glaser: Giants: 27 Pats: 20

Super Bowl

When the Patriots won their first Super Bowl title, I was just eleven years old. I remember that season very well, with Brady’s im-possible emergence as a power-house quaterback dominating ev-ery conversation, whether it was in school hallways, friend’s houses or hockey lockerrooms. It was an incredible moment, even moreso if you were one of the older gen-eration who had suffered through decades of the Patriots bringing up the rear in conference stand-ings.

That season was like the Prom-ised Land, the glorious payoff for the lifetime of devotion and wait-

ing.The world has changed in ten

years, and one need only look at the New England Patriots to see just how drastic a decade’s influ-ence can be. Where ten years ago the Patriots were a pack of under-dogs struggling to even be taken seriously against the big bad Rams, they’ve evolved into foot-ball’s version of the Yankees.

But it goes deeper than that. The 2002 Super Bowl meant some-thing, in a way that Sunday’s game, however entertaining and involving it may be, could never hope to ever equal it.

Because the 2002 Super Bowl was one of the first truly ‘normal’ moments in the days after the 9/11 attacks. For one day at least, it seemed like the craziness of the past four months could fade into background and we could simply celebrate two teams giving their all for the right to be called cham-pion.

And then there was that Half Time show. U2 came out, and when they launched into their classic “Beautiful Day,” I think that was the moment when 11 year-old me started to believe that things could be OK again, that maybe, just maybe, we could pass through these bad times and find something good again. That was the moment where I started to think that America could be America through anything, any storm, any trouble.

Or something like that. I mean I was 11 and it was late. Ten years is a long time.

What will this Super Bowl mean, if anything? When we watch sports, we ascribe our own values and problems onto the teams on the field and see their battles as our own.

What does it mean to be a Patri-ots fan in 2012? Or a Giants fan? I know what the teams are playing for, but what are we watching for?

Thursday, February 2, 2011 Science12

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) _ The American Civil Liberties Union of Indiana’s top lawyer said Thurs-day that a bill pending that would allow schools to teach creationism in science classes clearly violates the U.S. Constitution and invites legal challenges.

U.S. Supreme Court precedents “going back many years’’ have es-tablished the unconstitutionality of teaching creationism in public schools, Ken Falk said.

“The idea that somehow our state legislature can trump the Constitution just doesn’t make sense,’’ Falk said in a news release issued by the ACLU. “When law-makers propose legislation they clearly know will end up in the courts, it wastes valuable time and resources, disrespects the legisla-tive process and confuses an al-ready complicated issue.’’

The Senate Education Commit-tee voted 8-2 Wednesday to send the bill before the full Senate de-spite experts and even some sena-tors saying teaching creationism likely would be ruled unconstitu-tional if challenged in court. The bill’s prospects for advancing to the House weren’t certain Thurs-day. Next Wednesday is the dead-line for bills originating in the Senate to win approval from the full chamber.

Falk said the U.S. Supreme Court in its 1987 case Edwards v. Aguillard struck down a Louisi-ana statute that required instruc-tion on evolution to be accom-panied by teaching on “creation science.’’ The court found that the Louisiana statute had no identifi-able secular purpose, but that the “pre-eminent purpose of the Lou-isiana Legislature was clearly to

advance the religious viewpoint that a supernatural being created humankind.’’

In committee debate Wednes-day, Sen. Scott Schneider, R-Indi-anapolis, said there are legitimate questions about the theory of evolution and that many scientists agree with the concept of intelli-gent design, the theory that life on Earth is so complex it was guided by an intelligent higher power.

“What are we afraid of? Allow-ing an option for students includ-ing creation science as opposed to limiting their exposure?’’ Schnei-der said.

Senate Education Chairman Dennis Kruse, R-Auburn, said he knew of nothing in state law that prohibits public schools from teaching creationism. He said he sponsored the bill because he believes creationism should be taught among the theories on the development of life and that the proposal wouldn’t force any changes in schools teaching evo-lution.

Some committee members suggested that they would sup-port amending the bill in the full Senate to instead encourage schools to teach about the world’s religions in literature or history classes. Sen. Luke Kenley, R-No-blesville, voted in favor of the bill even though it called its current form a “lawyer’s dream.’’

Falk said that since public school curriculum must always serve a secular educational pur-pose, religion can be taught if the purpose is to examine religion’s role in history, art, literature, so-ciety or other secular subjects. He said religion can only be taught in an objective, unbiased manner that does not promote or criticize any particular religion or set of beliefs.

Associated Press

ACLU says teaching creationism is unconstitutional

WASHINGTON (AP) _ The Obama administration says new rules to manage nearly 200 mil-lion acres of national forests will protect watersheds and wildlife while promoting uses ranging from recreation to logging.

The new rules, to replace guide-lines thrown out by a federal court in 2009, are set to take effect in early March. Agriculture Secre-tary Tom Vilsack announced the rule change on Thursday.

Vilsack said in an interview that the rules reflect more than 300,000 comments received since a draft plan was released last year. The new rules strengthen a re-quirement that decisions be based on the best available science and recognize that forests are used for a variety of purposes, Vilsack said.

“I think it’s a solid rule and done in a collaborative, open and trans-parent way,’’ he said.

The guidelines, known as a for-est planning rule, will encourage forest restoration and watershed protection while creating oppor-tunities for the timber industry and those who use the forest for recreation, he said.

Vilsack, who has pledged to break through the logjam of po-litical conflict over forest manage-ment, said the new regulation’s emphasis on science and multiple uses should allow it to stand up to likely court challenges from envi-ronmental groups or the timber industry.

“I am hopeful and confident that it will stand scrutiny,’’ he said.

Forest Service Chief Tom Tidwell said the guidelines would allow land management plans for individual forests to be completed more quickly and at a lower cost

than under current rules, which date to the Reagan administra-tion.

Several attempts to revise the 1982 planning rule have been thrown out by federal courts in the past decade. Most recently a Bush administration plan was struck down in 2009. Environmental-ists had fought the rule, saying it rolled back key forest protections.

The Obama administration did not appeal the ruling, electing to develop a new forest planning rule to protect water, climate and wildlife.

Under the new rule, forest plans could be developed within three to four years instead of taking up to seven years, as under current guidelines, Tidwell said.

“We really can protect the forest at lower cost with less time,’’ he said.

The new regulation also should give forest managers more flex-ibility to address conditions on the ground, such as projects to thin the forest to reduce the risk of wildfire, Tidwell said.

“We’ll be able to get more work done _ get more out of the forest and create more jobs,’’ while at the same allowing greater recreational use, Tidwell said. Recreational use of the forest has grown exponen-tially in recent years.

Like Vilsack, Tidwell said he is optimistic the new plan will stand up to scrutiny from environmen-tal groups and the timber indus-try, both of which have challenged previous planning rules in court.

“I’m optimistic that folks will want to give it a shot,’’ Tidwell said.

The 155 national forests and grasslands managed by the Forest Service cover 193 million acres in 42 states and Puerto Rico. Balance between industry and conserva-

tion in those areas has been tough to find since the existing rules went into effect three decades ago.

At least three revisions of the rules have been struck down since 2000.

The planning rule designates certain animal species that must be protected to ensure ecosystems are healthy. However, the rule became the basis of numerous lawsuits that sharply cut back log-ging to protect habitat for fish and wildlife.

Meanwhile, the timber industry has continued to clamor for more logs, and conservation groups keep challenging timber sales, drilling and mining projects.

Tom Partin, president of the American Forest Resource Coun-cil, a timber industry group, said his members will review the final rule to see if it follows a federal rule to manage forests for a diver-sity of plants and animals _ not in a manner that places a single use or species above all else.

Jane Danowitz, U.S. public lands director for the Pew Environment Group, said national forests are the source of drinking water for one in three Americans, are home to fish and other wildlife and are an economic engine for local communities across the West.

“Faced with unprecedented threats from industrial develop-ment, these national forests need strong national protections,’’ she said, adding that the new frame-work for forest management ap-pears to reflect comments from scientists, the business commu-nity and conservation advocates.

“The plan now has stronger safe-guards than what was originally proposed. That said, the true test of this plan will be how it’s imple-mented on the ground,’’ Danowitz said.

Associated Press

Obama administration says new national forest rules protect watersheds, wildlife

Associated Press

BURTON, Mich. (AP) _ A Flint-area teenager and leukemia sur-vivor has been suspended from school for growing out his hair to donate to cancer victims.

Officials at Madison Academy, a charter school in Burton, say J.T. Gaskins’ reason for growing out his hair is admirable. But his hair is in direct conflict with school policy that requires it to be “off the collar, off the ears and out of the eyes.’’

The 17-year-old senior has al-ready missed 51/2 days of school.

“This is something I want to do, and I feel very strongly about it,’’ Gaskins told The Flint Journal, referring to his plan to eventually cut his hair and give it to Locks of Love, which makes wigs for kids

who have lost hair. He needs 10 inches.

Gaskins was diagnosed with leukemia as an infant but has been cancer-free since age 7. His mother, Christa Plante, said the school should allow long hair if boys pledge to get it cut and do-nate it.

“We’re not asking them to dis-miss the policy. We’re not asking them to do away with the dress code. We were simply asking for a compromise,’’ Plante said. “We could turn this into such a posi-tive learning experience.’’

Madison Academy referred calls to Will Kneer, executive director of the Romine Group in Utica, which manages the school. He said the school board considered the issue Monday but decided to keep the policy for now.

Gaskins’ hair isn’t very long yet. Kneer said he proposed Gaskins use styling gel, put the hair in cornrows or simply comb it to comply with rules.

“I need his hair out of his eyes and off the collar,’’ Kneer told The Associated Press on Friday. ``I really want this boy to be back in school. I feel like combing his hair wouldn’t be a big concession. He doesn’t have hair down the mid-dle of his back. It’s an inch over his collar.’’

Kneer said the school has been sending work to Gaskins’ home while he’s away from classes.

As a cancer survivor, Gaskins said he shouldn’t be told he can’t grow his hair when he’s trying to help others with the disease.

“Self-confidence,’’ he said, “is really what you need to beat the disease.’’

Cancer survivor suspended from school over long hairstyle

Center for Science and Innovation construction update

In Friday’s “Notes and News,” President Mary Grant said the next phase of construction on the Center for Science and Innovation will begin in February. The Administration expects the pouring of the building

foundation and footings, but specific dates will be deter-mined based on the weather.

Web cams are capturing the construction progress. To see time lapse photos from three different spots on

campus, visit www.mcla.edu/CSI.

Thursday, February 2, 2011 Commentary 13

“Well being an employee, you can interact with people more whereas the info booth and where it was, there was no traffic.”

- Lola Francisco ‘15

“I really like the marketplace and the info booth is really helpful. The Starbucks is ok.”

- Thamar Jean Federstin ‘14

“I personally like the new Campus Center. The architecture is really unique. The structure is conve-nient however the quality of the services is the same.”

- Unique Burton ‘13

“I think the facilities is better but not the food. Hopefully when Subway comes,food will be better.”

- Alex Jamal ‘14

“I do like the new Campus Center however I think the cafe should be bigger. It seemssmaller than last year.”

- Maria Perez ‘13

“I think it looks really nice. And Starbucks is better than Green Mountain.”

- Haley Costen ‘15

Ed DamonEditor in Chief

The Women’s Center’s first event of the semester was a screening of a fabulous docu-mentary, which was featured at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival and aired on the Oprah Winfrey Network.

More than 70 people shuffled into Sullivan Lounge to watch the Women’s Center’s screening of the documentary Miss Repre-sentation on Tuesday, Jan. 24.

By the end of the film, the audi-ence was livid.

Stories from teenage girls and interviews with activists, enter-tainers, journalists, and politi-cians were weaved with strong statistics to unveil the way media portrays women.

Journalist Katie Couric was one of the many stars featured in the film.

“I worry about how much pres-sure my daughters feel in a so-ciety that features anorexic ac-tresses and models and television stars,” Couric said to the camera. “We get conditioned to think this is what women should look like.”

The media’s bombardment of distorted images of women de-picts one narrow idea of beauty, which has led young girls to be-lieve the most important quality of a woman is how she looks.

According to the documentary, 53 percent of teen girls say they are unhappy with their bodies and depression among women and girls has doubled from 2000 to 2010.

Jennifer Pozner, the founder of

the advocacy group Women in Media and News, talked about the consequences of overly sexu-alizing and exploiting women.

“The fact that media are so de-rogatory to the most powerful women in the country,” she said, “then what does it say about me-dia’s ability to take any woman in America seriously?”

While women make up 51 per-cent of the population, they only hold 17 percent of positions in Congress, according to the film. While 2,319 men have served as governors, only 34 women have held the same title.

“When girls look to the media for models they can achieve in the real world, they see news-papers and TV anchors talking about female politicians’ haircuts and fashion choices,” Pozner said. “And then they turn to reality TV, where they are told that the only route to power is through beau-ty and humiliation. So what are girls to think about what’s pos-sible for them?”

During a post-film discussion facilitated by Psychology Profes-sor Maria Bartini, senior Hawa Umarova said she knew there was an issue with media’s representa-tion of women but never realized how serious and negative it was.

“I think it is ironic how the countries we are at war against have more female leaders than we do,” Umarova said. “We are trying to teach them how to be a democracy when we should be learning from them instead. I think another women’s move-ment is well overdo.”

The United States is ranked 90th in the number of women who hold governmental posi-tions compared to other coun-tries around the world.

“Change needs to start with each individual person first,” Umarova said. “We need to boy-cott shows that negatively ste-reotype women and we need to think before we say something harmful about another person. By educating others on these is-sues, we can begin to change how the media presents women.”

Sophomore Kodi Sullivan talk-ed about the backlash men re-ceive when they show emotions other than what is deemed mas-culine. If men show sadness or if they cry, they are seen as weak. Media misrepresentation affects men as well, he said.

“Girls are just as tough as boys are,” Sullivan said. “Until the world begins to see this, our me-dia will not change.”

What do you think of the Campus Center renovations?

Well, here we are again with a whole new Beacon staff. And once again, we have an Editor-in-Chief writing their inaugural column. I’m as excited as you are. (I prom-ise next week will be more exciting.)

The Beacon has set a bunch of goals for the semester. Our executive board wants to do more breaking news coverage. With our web site, we can do this. It makes it so much easier to distribute news this way.

We also have four Twitter accounts. Follow our main one, @BeaconMCLA. You can also follow my musings under my Twitter handle, @BeaconMCLA_EIC. To hear from our Arts and Entertain-ment editor Mary Redstone, follow @BeaconMCLA_AE. To follow managing editor Andrew Roiter check out @Andrew_Roiter

When we say we welcome letters to the editor, we mean it. The Beacon has a limit of 500 words, but any con-structive, civil commentary is welcome regardless of length. Did you see some-thing this week that you dis-agree with? Write in and tell us. Did we make a mistake? Let us know. I know I’ve made mistakes before, and appreciate it when people let me know so I can learn.

And I can’t forget one of the newest features of our web site – the Beacon Submit-a-Tip form. Do you know a hot story The Beacon should cover? Something that we haven’t covered that we may not have heard? Use this form to tell us, anonymously if you wish.

The Beacon is the student voice of the campus. By us-ing every medium available, we hope to accomplish this. These mediums make it pos-sible to reach out to the cam-pus community, and keep a constructive dialogue going about people are intersted in.

Skyla SeamansColumnist

Campus Comment

Do have know a hot story The Beacon should cover?

Submit a Tip online anonymously!theonlinebeacon.com/storytips

My column each week will feature a feminist issue I feel

needs to be brought to the attention of readers. I am an

office assistant at the Susan B. Anthony Women’s Center and my columns will help bridge

the gap between students and the topics we are tackling as a staff to bring about gender

equality.

Thursday, February 2, 2011 Commentary14

Andrew RoiterManaging Editor

Given that this is an elec-tion year, anyone reading this has been told thousands of times some version of what I am about to say. Regardless, I will continue to stomp my feet and holler until someone takes this seriously. Your vote, and even more basic than that, your voice is a right in this country. And while most people certainly haven’t forgotten this fact, the cynical tendencies within us have downplayed the importance of getting out there.

And I can understand, I re-ally can.

While there are many students who come from the four corners of the planet, and some who hail from battleground states, the majority of the students here come from states that have, since 1992 (aka, most of our lives), voted Democrat in the presidential races, the excep-tion being New Hampshire which voted for Bush in 2000. So anyone who voted Repub-lican or Independent may feel that they wasted their time.

I’m not going to try to convince those who feel nationally disenfranchised that they’re not. Nor am I going to harangue the Elec-toral College system. I am simply going to stress the importance of involvement in local political matters. On a smaller scale, each voice is louder and more likely to be heard.

You are one of 2000-some-odd voices at this institution. I implore you. I beg you. Come to the MCLA Board of Trustees meeting tonight at 5:30 in Sullivan Lounge.

Tonight the Board will have their final vote on whether or not to arm the Public Safety officers with firearms. Show up in numbers they can’t ignore. Fill the room to ca-pacity and line the hallways. Give your opinion. Say it there, say it later, or post it to Facebook, Twitter, or Tumblr. Write in to the Beacon about it.

If you agree with their vote, regardless of what it may be, cheer, get excited, do some-thing to show that you care. If you disagree with their vote, please stay calm, but you sure as hell voice your disaproval.

You have a voice. Demand that it’s heard.

Every once in a while, MCLA and its faculty of-fers a truly unique learn-ing experience for its students. Professor Dan Shustack’s Environment of South Florida class, which took place over the course of nine days during win-ter break, was one of these rare opportunities.

Though not an Environ-mental Studies major my-self, I had the good fortune to possess a love of travel and nature, a most thirsty thirst for knowledge, and some financial aid refund money that was just beg-ging to be spent on some-thing other than the nor-mal gamut of rent, bills, and crack cocaine. Food. I meant food.

So I ponyed up the cash and, instead of spending the rest of my break eating leftover Christmas candy and catching up on Game of Thrones like I was plan-ning to, I went with eight relative strangers to camp and road trip through a

state known for mosqui-toes, theme parks, and more mosquitoes. It was kind of like The Breakfast Club with less detention and whining and blatant stereotypes and more alli-gators.

I hate to sound so (to coin a term)… Hallmalarkey, but it was the best decision I’d ever made. I did things I’d always wanted to do, and things I’d never dreamt of doing. From snorkeling in open water to canoeing alongside alligators in the Everglades and everything in between, I was taken completely out of both my element and my comfort zone. It was exhilarating.

Dan had been planning this class since Spring 2009, and it showed. Imag-ine if every professor had this much dedication to teaching? Or, even better… if we students showed as much dedication towards being taught? How awe-some would that be?

I’m sure you’ve had this said to you countless times, (whether you’re the greenest freshman around

or, like me, a grizzled vet-eran), but taking this class really drove it home to me: your college experience is what you decide to make it.

I hear so many people complain that MCLA sucks and I can’t help but wonder: “Maybe you’re the one that’s sucking?”

I mean, if you don’t put any effort into learning or having a good time dur-ing your four-to-six years here… well, then you are not going to learn any-thing, and you’re certainly not going to have much fun.

Anyway, Dan Shustack will hopefully (fingers crossed) be offering Envi-ronment of South Florida again in another two years. For those of you who will still be here at this fine es-tablishment, I wholeheart-edly recommend it with every single fiber of my be-ing. It will change your life.

The Beacon welcomes letters to the editor. Submit your letter to the Editor to MCLA Beacon

Mailbox on FirstClass or beacon@mcla.edu.

Letters can be up to 500 words.See our policies on page 2.

Letter to the Editor Fellow Students:

Tonight the Board of Trustees will convene to dis-cuss the topic of arming the Campus Police. I extend a personal invitation to each and every one of you to at-tend tonight at 5:30 p.m. in Sullivan Lounge.

As the Student Trustee, I promise to whole-heartedly make your voice heard and represent you to the best of my ability.

I would like to thank all of you for putting forth the ef-fort to be educated, actively involved in and for partici-pating in the referendum vote. With an astounding 455 votes and SGA taking an official stance, I could not

be more honored to repre-sent you, the student body, for taking these initiatives.

Last, but most certainly not least, I extend my thanks to Chief Charon and his team for dedicating countless hours of their time to this issue.

See you all tonight.

Sincerely,Jaynelle Bellemore, 2012Student Trustee

EditorialPart of the front page

of our first issue is an update on the bike share program at MCLA. In case you missed it last semester, several stu-dents began working with Dean of Students Charlotte Degen, the Sustainability Com-mittee and Center for Service in researching this program.

The seeds of this idea were planted a few years ago, when a group of seniors proposed a pos-sible bike share program as a service learning project. The idea didn’t get off the ground right away, but it wasn’t for-gotten.

That a trial period of the bike share is coming

to MCLA is a perfect ex-ample of what students can accomplish. Some-times, a plan isn’t ini-tially realized. Whether it be because of lack of funding or not enough immediate interest, it may take a while for a project to get into mo-tion.

The Beacon would like to applaud those who put hours of research and planning into the new bike share pro-gramming. We’d love to see more student-run initiatives sprout up around the campus in the future.

Jessie WrightColumnist

Environment of South Florida class a great opportunity

Thursday, February 2, 2011 For Fun 15

Comic by Aurora Cooper

This Week in MCLA History

Courtesey sudoku.au.com

Sudoku

Fill in the empty cells, one number in each, so that each column, row, and

region contains the numbers 1 through 9 exactly once.

Aries: March 21-April 19The most important relationship in your life is the one you have with yourself, and that becomes clear at the start of the week -especially if you find yourself projecting disowned parts of your own life onto people around you.

Taurus: April 20-May 20Try your best to boost your feel-ings of security today, no matter how down you may be this morning. The good news is that you can feel better about money, love or almost anything else with just a little effort!

Gemini: May 21-June 21Do you have a budget? Can you stick to it? Now is the time to find out – you’ve got to stretch every dollar, even if you feel rich. Money is tighter than you think, so find a way to hold onto it.

Cancer: June 22-July22Your energy levels are through the roof today, so get out there and tackle some new projects. You ought to be able to take care of almost anything you put your mind to. Enjoy the boost!

Leo: July 23-August 22You are feeling a strong urge to do something new – but you can’t figure out why. It’s a good time to let your subconscious mind take over and guide you the rest of the way to your goal.

Virgo: August 23-Sept. 22You need to exercise your social energy today – which could mean anything from hitting a party to finding a new friend at the train station. You feel more connected to others.

Libra: Sept. 23-Oct. 22Try not to worry too much if things don’t go the way you want them to – you’re just in a weird stage right now, but you should be able to get past it as long as you can find a way to keep your cool.

Scorpio: Oct. 23-Nov. 21You may find yourself even more driven than usual – which is re-ally saying something! It’s a great time for you to step up and make sure that your people are all on your side and doing their part.

Sagittarius: Nov. 22-Dec. 21You need to get in deeper with your friends or loved ones today – your energy doesn’t let you tolerate superficial nonsense. Try to get your people to engage with you on a more intense level.

Capricorn: Dec. 22-Jan. 19Your home needs some better stuff – or maybe just some TLC. Your energy is just right for making your living space into something sweeter, so spend the time and money to make it so.

Aquarius: Jan. 20-Feb. 18Get over the latest round of problems – it’s all just details, re-ally – and move on to something bigger and better. Just because today isn’t all that great, that doesn’t mean you have to suffer tomorrow!

Pisces: Feb. 19-March 20You’re feeling the urge to put on a show or host a party – so get to it! Your emotional energy is per-fect for getting people together and making them see how great life can be.

Horoscopes courtesy of Yahoo.com

Horoscopes

February 4, 1988

A bill that would bring a Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art (Mass MoCA) cleared the House and made its way to the Senate. The bill was eventually passed and brought the world’s

largest contemporary art museum to North Adams.

February 4, 1993

The Board of Trustees approved a plan to purchase property on the corner of Blackinton and Church Streets. According to Thomas Jones, vice presi-dent of Administration and Finance, these brick

buildings would be used “to move the Admissions Office and also for apartments for married couples

or faculty that need a place to live.”

February 3, 2000

A former Dean’s list student at MCLA was found guilty of assault of another student and sentenced

to two-and-a-half years in prison. The assault took place in the firelane by the Flagg Townhouse

Complex after one student insulted the former girlfriend of the other. The victim was struck in the face with a shod foot and suffered several lacera-

tions, a broken nose, and a broken eye socket.

Thursday, february 2, 2012 Photo Essay theonlinebeacon.com16

Campus Center Marketplace Is Complete

Returning and new students of MCLA sit on benches, walk to and from classes and hang out relishing in the sunny day a� er a few days of rain.

e newely renovated Marketplace in the Campus Center is open a� er being closed-o for several months.

ARAMARK employees operate the school’s new Starbucks kiosk.

Returning and new students of MCLA sit on benches, walk to and from classes and hang out relishing in the sunny day a� er a few days of rain.

Photos by: Aaron Crawford

e building’s newly reovated bookstore.

Windows now enclose the former patio, which was expanded into the Marketplace.

An open-spaced balcony area occupies where the staircase once was. e addition boasts � nely cra� ed wooden � xtures and lighting, as well as new seating areas down below.