1000 items found for your search. If no results were found please broaden your search.
(09/12/19 10:04am)
So, you want to be a Broadway star? For a few chosen Middlebury students, this dream becomes a reality each summer with the Potomac Theatre Project.
The Potomac Theatre Project, or PTP/NYC, is a Middlebury Theatre Department program that allows undergraduate students to be a part of the professional theatre world while still studying at the college. The project was founded in 1987 by Professors Cheryl Faraone, Richard Romagnoli and Boston University Professor Jim Petosa who were “determined to establish a dynamic and provocative company that would also provide a bridge to professional theatre for aspiring young students,” according to the company’s website. Students work alongside Actor’s Equity professionals and professors on two different productions that run in an Off-Broadway theatre in New York City for five weeks throughout the summer.
This program is unique to Middlebury and cannot be found at any other liberal arts college. Students are able to see what the “real world” of professional theatre is like while working with established actors and learning from their professors. Many of the Actor’s Equity professionals are Middlebury alumni who were originally students at PTP.
Students audition for the two summer productions at the college in a more personal setting than others in the industry. Zachary Varricchione ’21 said this was a major draw for him to do the program because he knew how other students had to deal with “huge cattle-call type auditions” to work in professional theater. The addition of having the program led by Middlebury professors made his decision even more clear. “To have a program that’s run by your own professors with intimate auditions is almost unheard of,” he said.
Madeline Ciocci ’20, who has been a part of PTP for two summers, says that the special connections between students and Equity actors are also what make the program so impactful. “It’s really exciting to get to know them, their craft, and their process, to learn from them.”
Varricchione said that observing the professionals at work contributed to “some of the biggest artistic growth I had this summer...[they] really inspired me to do my best and take some of their habits to raise my work to a higher caliber.”
Students at PTP are incorporated into every facet of the production, not just performing onstage. The entire cast and crew work together to help with marketing, business planning, and even set and costume design.
This deep-dive into the intensity of the Off-Broadway world is eye-opening and exciting for students who have been involved in theater previously. “I’ve been doing theatre for almost my whole life, but not until I did PTP did I understand not only how much emotional work theatre can be, but also how exhausting it can be in a physical sense,” Ciocci said. “It’s a life that’s totally and completely exciting, but also one that takes a wild amount of constant energy and commitment.”
The added responsibilities involved in being a member of the company is more realistic to what the professional world is like, which Varricchione appreciated coming from a college theater setting. At shows at the college, cast and crew members often have their designated roles with not that much overlap. PTP is more the “classic theater company experience, where the actors are in charge of run crew, and building sets, and everything else,” said Varricchione.
This season, the company put on two productions, “Dogg’s Hamlet,” “Cahoot’s Macbeth,” two plays often performed together by Tom Stoppard and “Havel: The Passion of Thought,” written by Harold Pinter, Václav Havel and Samuel Beckett. “Dogg’s Hamlet” is a play where three young boys try to confuse a driver by speaking “Dogg,” a language that is comprised of English words that mean the opposite of what speakers are used to. The play then turns into a 15-minute interpretation of “Hamlet.” The same cast also performed “Cahoot’s Macbeth,” which consists of actors performing Macbeth in a controlling state while under surveillance by a hidden government agent.
The other cast performed “Havel: The Passion of Thought,” which is composed of five one act plays that expose the challenges living in an oppressive Communist state. These plays were once considered so controversial that they were banned in Czechoslovakia, leaving actors to perform them in private homes and distribute them illegally.
This season’s choice of plays is in line with PTP’s focus on art that critically examines the world outside of the theater. On their website, the organization states how since its inception, PTP’s work has “addressed the necessity and difficulty of art, homelessness, censorship, pornography, AIDS, totalitarianism, apartheid and gender wars -- always in passionate, deeply human terms.”
When asked about what he wanted audiences to take away from “Dogg’s Hamlet” and “Cahoot’s Macbeth,” Varricchione said that the cast hoped that “the audience would think about how their actions have been complicit and how they have been resistant to oppressive systems today.”
Ciocci, a member of the “Havel” cast, felt that when she was “working on this set of plays that investigates resistance and dissidence under an oppressive regime, it’s impossible to not think about how timely the content feels.”
She elaborated on a specific moment in the play where a character, Stanekova is forced to decide whether or not to protest a fellow artist’s incarceration because of his activism or to “continue to subtly fight while existing within an unethical system.” She felt that this crisis when deciding which way to act against oppression to be relevant in today’s world where “it’s not clear which actions will yield the best results, and which actions you’ll be able to live with and respect yourself for.”
PTP co-founder, co-artistic director, director of “Dogg’s Hamlet,” “Cahoot’s Macbeth” and Chair of the Theatre Department Cheryl Faraone stated in the season’s introduction video that these plays are “the best kind of theatre; it makes you think, and it makes you feel, which has been kind of a PTP mantra for most of our 33 years.”
(09/12/19 10:04am)
The 2019 Middlebury field hockey team returns to the hunt this September, seeking to replicate their success from last season as defending NCAA Champions. They are currently ranked No. 1 amongst all Division III Field Hockey teams.
Fortunately, the Panthers return most of their productive players from last season. Junior midfielder Erin Nicholas ’21, who earned Nescac Player of the Year in 2018, led last year’s team in goals (17), assists (11) and points (45). Should Nichloas continue her output from last year, the Panthers will have a lethal contributor on both ends of the field. Senior midfielder Marissa Baker ’20 should also make an impact this season after having been named First Team All-Nescac.
Lastly, one of the most important components to the Panthers’ success doesn’t score goals, attempt saves, or dish out passes; Coach Katharine DeLorenzo, the 2018 NESCAC Coach of the Year, looks to implement her expertise in bringing squads to championship form.
DeLorenzo emphasizes forgetting past successes and having a short-term perspective.
“Some of Coach DeLorenzo’s things are focusing on one game at a time, not talking about winning, and not talking about last season,” Nicholas said.
The Panthers’ offensive strategy follows a similar philosophy: the team makes adjustments and doesn’t cling onto what made them successful previously.
“Last year, we’d work the ball on the outside a lot. Now, we’re working to transfer through the midfield a lot more and really utilize our central players,” Nicholas said, when asked about what improvements the team was hoping to make.
Such adjustments appear to be working.
The Panthers began their season on a roll, having already shutout Wesleyan 7–0 on the road on Sept. 7. Their matchup the very next day, however, proved to be trickier. The Panthers produced just two goals against University of New England in the first three quarters. Thankfully, they gained momentum in the last quarter, ultimately emerging victorious, 5–1.
(09/12/19 10:03am)
Anyone strolling past Middlebury’s noticeboards is bound to come across the saturated posters of the Hirschfield International Film Series. Highlights from prominent film festivals and other critically acclaimed films will be screened free of charge in Dana Auditorium beginning on Saturday, September 14 at 3 and 8 p.m.
“The key qualifier of films is to bring in films that otherwise wouldn’t be screened at Middlebury,” said Film and Media Professor Leger Grindon.
Per its title, the Hirschfield International Series has sought to represent every language taught at Middlebury. Language departments are encouraged to submit titles and co-sponsor screenings, an offer that the French department has reportedly been especially prone to take up. Screenings can be used as an educational activity for foreign language students.
Curation was previously led by the chair of the Film and Media Studies Department with input from professors, yet since 2018 student and staff representatives have sat on the committee. After reaching out to distributors, two members of the committee watch the promotional “screeners” of films in the catalog. To keep selections up to date, the committee transitioned to adding new titles to the programme in chunks, rather than scheduling a year’s worth of screenings at once.
The series, which has included pre-release screenings and films that went on to become box office successes, has typically obtained screening rights at discounted prices because of its affiliation with the college. Media Production Specialist Ethan Murphy, who sits on the programming committee, declined to share exact costs, citing ongoing negotiations.
In an article published in the Campus in 2013, then Catalog and Acquisitions Associate Sue Driscoll priced the rights at $200-750, with an average cost of $450-550 per film. According to Driscoll, these figures are still accurate today.
The Hirschfield endowment is separate from that of the college. In addition to screening rights, it finances marketing and external speakers. For the screening of “Children of Men” earlier this year, organizers invited Burlington-based screenwriter and Academy Award nominee Hawk Ostby to Middlebury to share his thoughts on the film and his writing process.
More than 30 years after its inception, the Hirschfield Series retains an underground character.
“In a way [the series] has been around for so long that it’s taken for granted,’’ Murphy said.
According to Professor Grindon, the department often struggles to get its own students to attend screenings. Streaming services like Netflix and Hulu have become the default scapegoat for the declining popularity of movie theaters, yet recent research shows otherwise. A 2018 study by Ernst & Young’s Quantitative Economics and Statistics group showed that “those who attended movies in theaters [...] also tended to consume streaming content more frequently.” In other words, people who enjoy film will most likely enjoy it through more than one medium.
The Hirschfield Series does not attempt to compete with these services, and instead promises a unique viewing experience. According to Murphy, the technical features of Dana Auditorium alone create an unrivaled environment.
“There are many films that depend more on composition, as opposed to plot, that can’t really make an impact on your computer [screen]. There’s a division in what kind of experience you’re looking for,” Grindon said. “If you take the time to go to a particular screening (...), you’re going to be more patient in watching the film. It gives more challenging films a chance to make a greater impact.”
The 2019-2020 season will launch with “Monos,” a Colombian “survivalist saga” directed by Alejandro Landes. The film is Colombia’s official selection for Best International Feature Film at the 92nd Academy Awards.
(09/12/19 10:03am)
[gallery ids="45827,45826,45825,45824,45823,45822,45819,45818,45817"]
Seventy-five Shannon St. is a lot like an Ikea dresser. If you unpacked and assembled a piece of the Swedish brand’s furniture in your dorm last week, you’re already partly privy to what the building’s construction looked like for Project Manager Tom McGinn.
“The pre-engineered building manufacturer designed it, engineered it, manufactured the parts and sent it to us,” he said. “And we took it off the truck, stood it up and bolted it together.”
Unlike a “Kallax” shelf or a “Poäng” armchair, the new steel-framed building – which the college is calling “75 Shannon Street” or the “interim academic space,” but which some faculty refer to as the “Middlebury Ikea” – measures in at 22,000 square feet. The first floor is dedicated almost entirely to offices for Sociology, Anthropology, Religion, and Political Science professors displaced from the construction on Munroe Hall, although “offices” may be too strong a word. They’re more open-air cubicles, equipped with shelves and desks.
Seven “meeting rooms” stemming off from the main work space offer a more private alternative for office hours and small conferences. Those are fitted with small circle tables, television monitors, and white noise machines, to keep chatter from seeping through.
Upstairs, things are a bit roomier. Fourteen computer science faculty and staff have moved into full-sized offices from their previous quarters in Bicentennial Hall, to accommodate the department’s growing need for more space. There are also four research labs, much like those in BiHall, and four classrooms.
Each floor has its own kitchenette and common study space, and on the first day of classes, students are already plugging away at homework there between classes. Natural light pours in through large mountain-facing windows, some of the space’s most distinctly modern features.
Commenters on last year’s newsroom article about the building voiced fears that its modern style would clash with the college’s quintessential grey-stone architecture. But McGinn said that the building’s physical location on campus permitted more creative freedom.
“Because we’re on the edge of campus, we thought that we could do something a little different,” he said. “And we could do it for a lower cost than what you would spend for a central campus building,” he added.
The building’s modernity extends past the aesthetic realm. While Munroe was an energy “sieve,” the new space is well-insulated and lit with LED lighting, and there’s a bike rack out front for sustainable commuters. The bathrooms are gender neutral, an intentional upgrade to Munroe’s single-gender toilets.
By June 1, 2020, the Munroe staff will move back into their new(ish) digs. At the same time, the college will empty out Warner Hall and repeat the process with that building’s staff. Then the same with Johnson Memorial Building and the Adirondack House, with other renovations to be determined.
There’s no definitive cap date for the CS department’s occupation of the space, and McGinn is unsure whether the college will even need to build another space.
“We haven’t reached the point where we think a new academic building is needed to accommodate the college,” he said. “We have other projects that are taking priority over a new academic building. Those are what we’re working on now.”
The college lists its future projects on page nine of the 2008 Master Plan. The construction of Munroe marks the first phase of that plan.
(09/12/19 9:59am)
Any member of the Atwater first-year class can clearly recall move-in day. A group of A-teamers is lined up in front of Allen Hall, wearing a matching set of funky Hawaiian shirts (a homage to their beloved dean, Scott Barnicle). The residential life team introduces you to your own sector of campus, one that feels unique and welcoming.
During my first few months as an Atwater first-year, I quickly began to notice the things that made my commons a special place to live. Our faculty head, Sandra Carletti, encouraged us to study Italian because many of the Atwater first-years were placed in a first-year seminar about Italy. Already, it seemed we had begun the cultural exploration promised by our liberal arts education-- one that would allow us to become more inclusive, responsible global citizens. With Dean Scott Barnicle closely mentoring residential life staff, he was able to play a pivotal role in getting to know students, learning about the ways in which they excelled, and issues that they may have struggled with as they adjusted to life at the college.
[pullquote speaker="" photo="" align="center" background="on" border="all" shadow="on"]The residential life team introduces you to your own sector of campus.[/pullquote]
At Middlebury, I learned that deans were not solely punitive figures, but rather, they genuinely cared about our growth as individuals. That touch of humanity allowed me to realize that my college experience differed from my peers at other institutions. It felt second-nature to wave to the faculty of our commons while crossing the street with a group of friends. We entered college with a brand new sense of family. No matter the situation, our commons coordinator, Debbie Cousino, was always available if we ever needed to run downstairs from our rooms and ask for guidance. This structure was something that I greatly benefited from, and my admiration for how our commons supported students is what encouraged me to apply to be a residential life staff member during my sophomore, junior and now senior years. With changes being made to our commons system - from the removal of commons coordinators to the likelihood of its dissolution - I’d like to express why I think the commons should be here to stay.
While living in Atwater was never a utopia, things worked well. By the time I was a junior, I rarely entered Atwater dining hall without seeing a familiar face. As members of Atwater, our sense of community is strong. Because of our close proximity to a dining hall, a dean who promotes authenticity above everything else, and a smaller number of students, we have built a support network that I have been proud to be a part of during my time as a residential life staff member. As a senior within Atwater commons, I have witnessed the way incoming first years have benefited from the system.
[pullquote speaker="" photo="" align="center" background="on" border="all" shadow="on"]Middlebury should be working to maintain and improve our current commons system.[/pullquote]
During my tenure as a first-year counselor, I could not imagine what I would have done if I was not able to run downstairs to my commons coordinator for advice about everything ranging from purchasing art supplies for a hall activity to navigating a crisis. I do not know if my residents would have willingly met with their dean to receive necessary support if they had not gotten to know him on a surface level beforehand.
Middlebury should be working to maintain and improve our current commons system. We should not rid ourselves of one of our most defining features. Each commons should have a close association with its own dining hall and commons-related events should be encouraged to connect our different pockets of campus with one another. In recent years, the Intercommons Council has fallen flat due to a lack of funding and lack of support from faculty members who are enthusiastic about reinventing the commons vision. If students across various commons felt as if there was a renewed sense of vibrancy in their residential communities, and perhaps if more of our college’s resources were allocated towards supporting commons development, it is likely that more students would identify strongly with their commons affiliation. The lack of student pride within the commons system stems from years of abandonment -- during which commons-specific and inter-commons events, as well as plans to improve and solidify each community -- have dwindled. While this and several other factors have led to the commons system decline, I do not find any of them convincing enough to dissolve a system that countless people have spent years crafting. It is an act that would vastly change campus culture in a way that feels, quite honestly, like we are losing something special.
It breaks my heart to envision a Middlebury without the commons system and without the commons that I have called home these past four years. When we lose the commons, we not only lose something that makes us different from a large state school; we lose a layered support system that was crafted with creativity and personality-- one that gave people a sense of immediate community and identity, that lent to friendly competition and a way to connect worlds across a campus where various residential buildings are far from one another. I am lucky to have spent my four years at Middlebury as a member of Atwater commons. It saddens me to know that future students may not be able to enjoy the community and sense of family provided a robust, fully developed commons structure.
(09/11/19 10:37pm)
To begin their fall season, the women’s golf team will compete in the St. Lawrence Invitational at the Oliver D. Appleton Golf Course in Canton, N.Y. on September 7 and 8. There they will contend with Nescac rivals such as Hamilton, and also out of conference teams such as Vassar and New York University.
The team will attempt to make improvements from last season, when they had difficulty finishing above third place in any of the tournaments, only doing so with a second place finish at the St. Lawrence Invitational almost exactly a year ago. Led by the ever improving Chloe Levins ’20, this year’s team will look to crack their way to a top spot.
Senior captain and last year’s Nescac Player of the Year, Levins will be instrumental in the team’s push for a top spot.
“It’s important for me to enter this season without expectations,” she said. “I’m really looking forward to learning more about myself, building on the competitive base I’ve established over the past three years, and mentoring the four first-years on and off the course.”
Levins can be counted on to finish in the top 10 of any tournament she participates in, and is also coming off a victory in the Vermont State Women’s Golf Invitational. Under her leadership, the team is well positioned to see positive change.
Levins sees a great season in the making, which will be aided significantly by the size of the team.
“In past years, we’ve been limited by our size but with 10 experienced golfers on the roster this year, we’re looking forward to having a great season,” she said. “The depth of our team will be our biggest asset.”
Another potential key contributor on the team is classmate Blake Yaccino ’20. Yaccino participated in all but two events, finishing outside the top 10 only once and never surpassing 79 strokes. Yaccino was an All-Nescac Second Team honoree in 2016 and 2017, and finally became a First Team honoree last year with five top-four finishes.
Coach Bill Mandigo, who is entering his 12th season atop the program, should have a great deal of talent and depth on his roster and looks poised for a great season. With Levins and Yaccino at the reins, this year’s Panthers look to not only improve upon their performance last year, but to make a strong push for the NESCAC championship.
(05/26/19 9:58pm)
Ashland, Virginia — While the 90-degree weather proved to be hot, the Panthers were even hotter, as the third-ranked Middlebury women’s lacrosse team defeated the seventh-ranked Salisbury Sea Gulls 14-9 in the NCAA Division III championship. This is the team’s seventh national championship title in program history and first since 2016, having previously capture the title in 2004, 2002, 2001, 1999 and 1997. After defeating Wesleyan 16-8 the previous day in the semifinals, the Panthers’ winning streak of 22 games is the longest in the nation and is tied with their 2016 record for the most wins in a single season.
Middlebury reached the semifinal against Wesleyan with their opponents having knocked off 2018 national champions Gettysburg in a surprise 10-7 upset. Emma McDonagh ’19 led the game’s scorers, with five goals. Jane Earley ’22, Henley Hall ’19 and Jenna McNicholas ’19 scored two goals each. Julia Keith ’20 spent all 60 minutes in goal with 5 saves to add to her already impressive record of 98 saves so far and a 6.39 goals-against average.
The team’s appearance in the Final Four was the third time in the last four years and the 25th time since 1994. Last year, the Panthers’ run for a national title was cut short with a narrow 11-9 defeat against Gettysburg. This was Wesleyan’s first appearance in the Final Four, having knocked out previous national champion Gettysburg 10-7. Middlebury entered the Final Four with 300 goals and having previously defeated Wesleyan 11-6 in the regular season over spring break.
Seventh-ranked Salisbury reached the NCAA tournament through an at-large bid and a record of 15-2 in the regular season, losing only to Middlebury and Washington and Lee. The team defeated Tufts 14-11 in the second semifinal of the day.
Middlebury showed their dominance right from the beginning, with Casey O’Neill ’19 winning the first draw control and passing the ball to Erin Nicholas ’21 (a previous national championship winner this past fall in field hockey). The first two goals were scored by two-time NESCAC Player of the Week Earley and Gracie Getman ’21, both off free position shots. McDonagh, Hall and Nicholas contributed to the team’s success in the first half, with Salisbury tallying another two goals. The Panthers were at an 8-4 lead in the first half with Keith having deflected five shots.
Salisbury picked up their scoring in the beginning of the second half, having put in three goals in an eight-minute span after Earley scored first less than a minute in the period. Halting their streak, McDonagh scored her second goal of the game, bringing the score to 10-7. Kirsten Murphy ’21, McDonagh and Hall scored another four goals combined, while the Sea Gulls’ Courtney Fegan score her second goal of the game. With just over three minutes left in the second half, both teams retired indoors for a 90-minute lightning delay with Middlebury on a six-goal lead. In the final three minutes, Salisbury’s Emma Skoglund scored her second goal of the game, but Middlebury held possession in the final minute as the Panthers won the title game 14-9 to a cheering set of fans and parents on the sidelines.
Head Coach Kate Livesay '03, named NESCAC Co-Coach of the Year with Tufts’ Courtney Shute, achieved her second win as head coach, with her team having previously won the national title during Livesay’s first season coaching. Additionally, Livesay coached the 2012 Trinity team to a NCAA Division III championship during her time there and won championship titles in 2001 and 2002 as a student-athlete under legendary coach Missy Foote. She earned her 200th career win earlier this spring with a victory over Bates in the NESCAC Quarterfinals and was named NESCAC Coach of the Year four times at fellow NESCAC school Trinity.
In a press conference following the game, Livesay praised the team's first goal scored by Earley. "Today's game was a battle," she said. "I do think we came in really composed, started out the game strong, took an early lead which really set us at ease."
Keith spent all 60 minutes in goal with nine saves to add to her current total of 107. "I think that all those saves are credited to the entire defense," she said. "It’s just awesome to be part of a defense that you can completely trust."
Rising star Earley, the team's second-highest goal scorer with 51 goals on the season, said that winning a national championship was a dream come true. "Our seniors this year were so welcoming and led us by example," she commented. "I want to do it again."
McDonagh and her fellow senior teammates were among the 2016 national championship squad. "I’m just so happy that this team gets to experience it," she said. "Everyone on this team is so impactful."
Former captain Georgia Carroll ’18 commented on the team’s incredible season. “After our loss to Gettysburg last year, watching Middlebury win the national championship feels like the closure of a year-long wound,” she said. “I feel so proud to be part of the Middlebury lacrosse family — today and every day.”
At the end of the championship game, McDonagh was recognized as the tournament's most outstanding player, while captain Sara DiCenso '19, Keith and Earley earned spots on the all-tournament team.
The Panthers finished their season with a 22-1 overall record and a total of 330 goals, a new program record. 85 days prior to the national championship victory, the team experienced their only loss of the season, falling to Bates 11-10 in double overtime. Since then, the team has won all their games across tough NESCAC conference competition and some nationally-ranked teams over spring break. This record-breaking season included the most goals in a single season in program history.
This year, Livesay was assisted by Katie Ritter for her second season and Amy Patton for her first season. "All of the classes bring something special," Livesay said. "It just felt like a lot of things came full circle today." In her eyes, Coach Patton "invigorated us and gave us a new confidence in ourselves and in hard moments." With her coaching staff, Livesay felt that her players were poised to walk away with the national championship trophy. “There are ups and downs but this is a really resilient crew that I just knew I could count on showing up and giving their best.”
This story will continue to be updated.
(05/09/19 10:05am)
One afternoon last October, the four students studying abroad in Middlebury’s school in Yaoundé, Cameroon, received a cryptic message from the program’s director, asking them to meet for dinner at the home of one of their host families.
The puzzled students assumed that the director, Ariane Ngabeu, wanted to discuss some change to the semester’s academic programming. They nearly discounted the possibility that the meeting had anything to do with Cameroon’s contentious presidential elections, which had taken place nine days earlier on Oct. 7, and whose results were slated to be announced within the next week.
“In our wildest dreams it was something about the elections,” said Emily Ray ’20, one of the students in Cameroon last semester. In Yaoundé, the country’s bustling but tranquil capital city, the notion that the election results could unleash a wave of political violence was unthinkable.
But while the students were waiting for Ngabeu to arrive for dinner, they received an email from Nicole Chance, an assistant director for Middlebury’s international programs and a liaison for the Cameroon school. It contained a startling announcement: Middlebury had decided to relocate the four students to Morocco, fearing that electoral violence could sweep Cameroon and shutter its airports. The group would be put on flights to Rabat, Morocco just over a day later, with no guarantee that they would be able to return to Cameroon to finish their semester.
“It was traumatic,” Ray said.
Ultimately, the trip proved to be successful — and also unnecessary. The four students, along with Ngabeu, spent a pleasant week in Morocco before returning to Cameroon, which had remained almost entirely peaceful after the election results were announced.
During the hectic, stressful period immediately before the trip to Morocco, and in the months since, people involved have raised questions about how the decision to relocate was made, whether Middlebury applies standards to its African programs that it would not apply elsewhere, and how Middlebury makes judgments about its faraway programs from a campus in rural Vermont.
MESSAGES FROM MIDDLEBURY
Middlebury’s decision to relocate the students in Cameroon came as the nation, historically one of the stablest in Central Africa, entered a period of relative instability. Within the last two years, peaceful protests by the country’s English-speaking minority against the largely French-speaking national government turned violent after government forces cracked down on protesters. This growing “Anglophone crisis” has caused increased opposition to President Paul Biya, who has led Cameroon since 1982. But Yaoundé is located well within the country’s peaceful Francophone region, and last semester’s students detected little unrest as they navigated the city each day.
“I remember my host mom saying, ‘Oh, Cameroonians don’t go out in the streets, so no one’s going to protest it,’” Ray said. “No one thought that anything bad would happen in Yaoundé.”
Other educational programs operating in Cameroon have had varying responses to the country’s fraught political situation. A program operated by the SIT Graduate Institute hardly altered its plans that semester, Ngabeu said. On the other hand, Dickinson College suspended its long-running program in Yaoundé in December, citing risks posed by the Anglophone crisis.
The first signs of Middlebury’s discomfort came the morning of the elections, when Ngabeu received an email from Liz Ross, Middlebury’s associate dean for international programs, containing a link to a New York Times article published the day before. The article described Cameroon as being “on the brink of civil war,” asserting that the upcoming election was “escalating an already volatile situation” in the country.
“I was surprised,” Ngabeu said. “Because if anything is happening in Cameroon, I’m the first to know about it.”
After asking around, Ngabeu said she learned that the images in the New York Times article were out-of-date photographs of the conflict in the Anglophone region, with little bearing on the city of Yaoundé or on the upcoming elections.
Still, several days later, the message from Middlebury had grown more urgent: Chance asked Ngabeu where she would be able to travel with the students, in the event that Yaoundé became unsafe following the announcement of the election results. Ngabeu told Chance she would spend the next day putting together a plan.
Ngabeu reached out to an acquaintance who worked at the Belgian embassy in Yaoundé, asking whether any arrangements had been made to help Belgian nationals stay safe. The employee dismissed her concerns, noting that the embassy was located in Yaoundé’s upscale Bastos neighborhood.
“They told me, ‘No no no, you’re in Bastos! It’s already safe. If you’re afraid, look for a hotel in Bastos,” Ngabeu said.
So Ngabeu wrote back to Middlebury, proposing that she wait out the election results with the students from a hotel in Bastos. But Middlebury staff said this failed to address their main concern: the possibility that Cameroon would close its borders and airports, trapping the students inside the country.
“We were afraid that if [violence] did spread out, that it would be too late for us to make a decision about what to do with the students,” explained Carlos Velez, the dean of international programs, in an interview with The Campus.
Within a day of Chance’s urgent message to Ngabeu, the two of them, along with Velez and Ross, had agreed on Morocco as a destination. Middlebury’s existing program there would provide the infrastructure needed to host the visitors. The only problem was that Ngabeu, a Cameroonian national, needed a Moroccan visa which would take five days to arrive — and the group was set to leave in just two days.
So Ngabeu visited the Moroccan embassy and bribed an employee to expedite the process. Soon after, she sat with the students as they reacted incredulously to the news.
“I said, ‘Don’t ask any questions, because I am not capable of answering them,’” Ngabeu said.
Unsure whether they would ever return, students spent the next day hurriedly packing all their belongings, saying goodbye to their host families and traveling around Yaoundé, buying souvenirs to bring back to the United States. Ngabeu left her two young children at home in Yaoundé, presuming that Middlebury would not pay for their travel to Morocco.
“That’s the proof,” Ngabeu said. “I left my children and I went away, because I knew there wasn’t any violence.”
Although Ngabeu was skeptical, she said she suppressed her doubts. “When they say it’s for safety, what can I say? I can’t say with certainty that nothing bad will happen,” she said.
Velez said the Middlebury staff were certain their precautionary steps were the right ones. “Nobody could assure us that nothing was going to happen,” he said. “Even if somebody had, I’m not sure if I would’ve believed it.”
CLAIMS OF UNEQUAL TREATMENT
On Oct. 22, the students watched from Morocco as the incumbent Biya was re-elected Cameroon’s president, earning a suspiciously resounding 71% of the vote. The expected result was received calmly in Yaoundé, and within two days, the students found out they would return to Cameroon. The trip to Morocco had lasted one week.
The trip itself had been enjoyable, Ray said, but the stress caused by the departure did not seem to be fully acknowledged after the group returned. And as the months have gone by, Ray said she has begun to think more critically about Middlebury’s decision to evacuate the group.
“It just makes me mad,” Ray said. “There’s already so many different hurdles and obstacles that the Cameroon program has to go through, because it’s a program in Africa. There’s so much unfounded fear.”
Ray is not the only one troubled by the excursion to Morocco. Nadia Horning, a professor of political science who serves on a faculty committee that oversees the Cameroon program, said she was taken aback when Velez and Chance first notified the faculty committee about the trip — just hours after the decision to evacuate had been made.
“I didn’t take it particularly well,” Horning said. A native of Madagascar who studies African politics, Horning said the incident in Cameroon was the latest in a succession of cases in which the continent has received unequal treatment at Middlebury. She pointed to an effort by faculty several years ago to convince the college to offer Swahili at its summer language schools. After receiving a verbal commitment from an administrator that Swahili would be chosen as the schools’ newest language, Horning said she found out abruptly during a speech by an administrator that Korean had been picked instead.
“That did bother me personally,” Horning said.
When it came to Cameroon, Horning said she understood administrators’ desire to take safety precautions, but still felt the college applied unreasonable standards. “I’m not pro-recklessness and anti-safety,” she said. “But I’m definitely anti-exception. I’m anti-standards for Africa that don’t apply elsewhere.”
Ngabeu suggested that students studying in Asia or Europe would not have been relocated in similar circumstances. “They wouldn’t have done anything,” she said. “People would have stayed where they were.”
Moreover, she worried about the precedent the relocation may have set. “Middlebury really has to reflect on its strategy," Ngabeu said. “Because if every time there's an election, we have to send people to the opposite coast — that's nonsense.”
Velez disputed the idea that any double standard had been applied. “If I fear there will be widespread violence anywhere, I would take more drastic measures,” he said.
Still, many involved with African Studies at Middlebury tell anecdotes about biases and unfounded fears they have encountered on campus. Ngabeu recalled instances in which parents of students interested in the program asked her how their children would drink water or receive medical care in Cameroon, presuming the country did not have hospitals.
One first-year at Middlebury, interested in studying in Cameroon, told The Campus that a French professor recently tried to dissuade her from going and urged her to study in France instead.
“When I asked him why, he discussed African accents, meaning it would be really hard for me to understand an African accent and that when I came back from Cameroon, I would have an African accent,” said the student, who was granted anonymity so she could speak freely about the exchange. “He implied that that wouldn’t be good for my future career prospects,” she recalled, adding that the professor “made a face” as he discussed African French.
Seeking to expand Middlebury’s curricular offerings outside of Francophone Europe, Charlotte Cahillane ’19.5 and Zorica Radanovic ’19 — both alumnae of the Cameroon program — wrote an op-ed in this week’s Campus, advocating that the French Department create more courses that venture “beyond the geographic boundaries of France.”
For those involved in the October evacuation, meanwhile, the heart of the problem seems to lie beyond Middlebury’s campus. Ngabeu, for her part, says she cannot blame Middlebury staff for the decision they made, given that they had to account for Americans’ general prejudices towards Africa.
“It’s a question of how Americans look at us,” she said. “It’s not that Middlebury wanted to do this, it’s that Middlebury wants to show to other institutions, to parents, to Americans — ‘You know that our kids are in this country, and we’re taking care of them.’”
“The problem is distant,” Ngabeu said. “Middlebury only acted to respond to what others were thinking.”
(05/09/19 10:00am)
This week, Middlebury is entering the final stages of its yearlong workforce planning process. On Tuesday, the college finalized employees’ acceptances of voluntary buyouts, which the college terms Incentivized Separation Plans (ISP), marking the end of a process that has been ongoing since early February.
Although an overview of which positions were eliminated and how each department is being affected has not yet been made available, the college has indicated that it is on track to meet its goal of reducing employee expenses by 10%, or about $8 million. The college plans to make an announcement about workforce planning after the Board of Trustees meeting in May, according to college spokesperson Sarah Ray.
President Laurie L. Patton notified faculty and staff on Feb. 4 that the college had identified 150 staff positions to be eliminated, while an additional 30 new positions would be created and filled as a result of the workforce planning process. Of the 150 positions identified for reduction, though, about 100 were already vacant through attrition and restrictions on re-hiring over the last few years. Around 50 occupied full- and part-time staff positions, including roughly 42 full-time positions, were set to be eliminated over the next few years, according to an email sent the following day to faculty and staff.
Because many staff share job titles, the college sent buyout applications to 80 employees on Feb. 8, although only 42 of their positions needed to be eliminated. Those employees had until March 11 to submit if they wished to receive a buyout. Staff members in affected positions were notified by their supervisors before receiving a buyout application from the college.
All employees eligible for buyouts were also granted access to a private job portal where they could apply to thirty new positions, which had been created as part of the workforce planning process, before they were made broadly available. This was part of the college’s effort to reduce the workforce and eliminate staff positions, while ensuring that the separation process was voluntary.
The second week of March, a few days after applications for buyout packages were due, official offers were sent out. In accordance with state law, employees had 45 days, or until April 29, to accept the buyouts. The exact contents of the package varied depending on salary and duration of employment at Middlebury. Following the April 29 deadline, staff were entitled to a seven-day period during which they could rescind their acceptance.
Although administrators will not know definitively until after accepted separation offers are finalized on May 7, college communications so far suggest that there will be no need for involuntary layoffs, which had been mentioned as a possible last resort if not enough employees took buyouts. Most recently, a March 15 email to faculty and staff said that the 47 buyout applications “put us on track to achieve our goal” of reducing employee compensation by 10%.
For some staff members, especially those already planning to retire, the buyout was a welcome opportunity. For others, the process has been draining, especially when paired with the implementation of Oracle, a new online financial platform that some staff complain is difficult to navigate.
“I’ve worked here for 18 years, and right now stress levels are the highest I’ve ever seen them,” said Missey Thompson, a staff council representative and box office coordinator at the Mahaney Center for the Arts.
Some staff who received separation offers but did not want to leave the college were able to find new positions, either within their old department or in a new one. Others have had more trouble.
One employee, who wished to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation, currently holds a position slated to end in June. “I have been here over 31 years, and I cannot afford to take the buyout,” she told The Campus. The staff member, who applied to three newly created positions through the private portal, has been rejected from one and never heard back from the other two. Despite repeated assurances from the college that “individuals who are offered the incentive and do not take it will remain employed at Middlebury,” some staff are faced with terminated positions and limited options in the coming year.
Still, many staff appreciate the intentionality that has gone into this process, especially compared to staff cuts the college undertook in past years, which left crucial positions unoccupied or left longtime employees abruptly out of work. Nonetheless, the communication (or lack thereof) from leadership throughout the months-long process added an additional layer to an already nerve-wracking process.
On more than one occasion, staff learned details about the progress of workforce planning from media reports before receiving any communication from the administration. The all-staff email announcing that letters would arrive within the week notifying staff their position had been terminated, along with a buyout offer, was not sent until Feb. 4, five days after a Jan. 31 Addison Independent article containing the same news. And many staff had been unaware that up to 40 new positions would be created through workforce planning until The Campus reported that fact in February. That figure was eventually lowered to 30.
Staff also report experiencing limited communication across departments. Since each department had its own restructuring plan to eliminate 10% of personnel expenses, much communication about buyouts was left to individual department leaders — a decentralized approach that led to miscommunications and confusion as staff heard about reductions and changes in other departments through word of mouth.
Tim Parsons, the president of staff council, says this has contributed to a lingering anxiety among staff. “With differing levels of communications by department, the process did not go as smoothly as we had hoped across the institution,” Parsons told The Campus. “We’re still waiting to hear what the future state will be.”
The “future state” Parsons referred to is how work will be redistributed following the departure of those who accepted buyout offers. But without knowing exactly how responsibilities will be allocated, many departments are concerned that they will be expected to do the same amount of work with less staff. While the administration has repeatedly assured staff that this will not be the case, the lack of clarity on a future state has left some department heads and managers on edge. Staff hope the finalization of buyout offers this week will finally provide a clear picture of the composition of workforce planning going forward.
(05/09/19 9:59am)
I am a 2017 graduate of Middlebury and will matriculate at Harvard Law School in the fall. While at Middlebury, I co-led the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) club that invited Dr. Charles Murray to speak, and I was one of the two students heckled on stage by anti-Murray protesters during the event. As a future attorney and accidental free-speech advocate, I have been particularly concerned by Professor Kevin Moss’s recent false attacks on political science professors in the fallout from the Legutko lecture cancellation. What I read sickened me, not only for its inaccuracy, but also for what it showed me about the troubling state of intellectual life today.
[pullquote speaker="" photo="" align="center" background="on" border="all" shadow="on"]With fact-checkers like this, who needs fake news?[/pullquote]
Moss’s op-ed of April 25 was not the first time that he has played the polemicist in our student newspaper. Moss has not published an academic book in 20 years, but he has made time to criticize members of the Middlebury community. In 2017, he attacked Middlebury alum Professor Paul Carrese ’89 for stating the obvious: that Charles Murray was prevented from speaking at Middlebury. Moss, pointing to the inaudible live stream held in a private locked greenroom, “corrected” Carrese, and claimed that Murray was not prevented from speaking. With fact-checkers like this, who needs fake news? In 2016, Moss wrote in to scold a Christian student organization at Middlebury regarding its theological requirements that its leaders not support gay marriage. In 2007, The Campus reported on his failed effort to get the College to reject a two-million endowment in the name of the Chief Justice of the United States. Moss objected because he did not agree with the Chief Justice’s legal opinions. This sad and embarrassing attack on political diversity earned a sharp rebuke from then-President Liebowitz, printed in these very pages. Liebowitz wrote that Moss’s resolution “misrepresents and distorts the record of Justice Rehnquist.” That rebuke should not surprise anyone who has followed Moss’s recent contributions to campus discourse.
Moss’s attacks on members of the community are not confined to the pages of The Campus. On April 17, Moss created a bizarre meme calling for “a few poli sci professors” to “be fired.” This was set against a backdrop of fire. How clever. After Moss posted this online for dozens of faculty and alumni to see, it made the rounds with recent alumni, students, and other members of the Middlebury community. It was also mentioned in the Addison County Independent. This was a stunningly public and childish act.
In his op-ed of April 25, Moss offers the same kind of unsupported claims and distortions that earned his 2007 resolution a rebuke from President Liebowitz. First, Moss expresses surprise at Professor Callanan’s statement, in his open letter of April 15, that some of the Legutko quotations circulating campus were doctored or taken from context. As an alum with a deep interest in free speech, I kept a close eye on the campaign against the Legutko lecture. It is clear to me that Callanan’s characterization was entirely correct. Take for example the use of square brackets in the second quotation pictured in “College Braces for Right-Wing Speaker Accused of Homophobia,” published in The Campus on April 16, 2019. Compare this doctored version of the quotation to the original as it appeared in context in the Polska Times. In the original, Legutko was referring to same-sex marriage in context, not LGBT rights as a general class. The quotation was distorted through the insertion of inaccurate supplied words in order to make it more inflammatory. If a lawyer used square brackets in this manner in a submission to a court, he could face reprimand.
[pullquote speaker="" photo="" align="center" background="on" border="all" shadow="on"] Moss’s op-ed trafficked in mischaracterizations and libelous ad hominem attacks.[/pullquote]
Another example is in the student protesters’ open letter itself. Although this letter only draws on a few of the many quotations put in circulation, even here they do not get them all right. Protesters insert the phrase “communist and liberal-democratic artists” as the antecedent of “they” in one of the pull quotes. Anyone who reads the sentence carefully can see that the letter’s authors got the antecedents of “they” wrong. The letter chops off the first half of the sentence, which makes clear that the antecedents of “they” are the various themes, tropes, and figures which function similarly in liberal-democratic and communist art. The protesters’ insertion completely distorts the meaning and context. There are other examples from emails circulating from the week of April 15.
After reviewing his writings, many will take issue with some of Legutko’s beliefs. When you set out to turn an entire campus against a visiting scholar, however, you had better be impeccably accurate in your presentation of the evidence.
Moving beyond his inaccurate discussion of the quotations, Moss further claims that Callanan’s letter contained “much more false information.” Unfortunately, Moss does not tell us what that information is. This is not because he will not, but because he cannot. In a world in which “fake news” is becoming more common, these types of attacks only serve to further degrade the situation.
It would add a great deal to the debate surrounding what happened to Professor Legutko and the larger issue of free speech on campus if Professor Moss actually presented an argument on the issues. That, however, was not in his interest, as it is harder than creating digital art or attacking someone’s character in a newspaper. Moss’s op-ed trafficked in mischaracterizations and libelous ad hominem attacks in order to assassinate the characters of people he cannot meet in open argument.
Moss’s attack on professors of great integrity and intellect was completely unwarranted. The proliferation of character assassination has made American society sick with the cancer of angry partisanship. No one is immune to its charms. It is all too easy to turn to when one cannot or will not address ideas. The result is that we are losing what makes us unique as human beings. What is clear is that Middlebury needs to take a closer look at its problems. The trustees should start seriously asking why Middlebury has not yet joined institutions such as Princeton University and Claremont-McKenna College in endorsing the Chicago Principles of Free Expression. Middlebury’s Trustees should endorse the principles at their upcoming meeting and incorporate them into the Handbook. Parents, alumni, faculty, and students should demand nothing less.
(05/09/19 9:58am)
Please take a moment to consider and appreciate what you are reading — not this specific op-ed, but the larger newspaper or website of The Middlebury Campus. This is the product of student journalism, created by a team of unpaid reporters, editors, photographers, and managers who spend hours each week working exceptionally hard to produce quality journalism on top of their regular academic obligations, activities, jobs, and personal lives.
We live in a historical moment where journalists are regularly disparaged and slandered as “the enemy of the people” by some political leaders, and even those of us who appreciate journalism are less apt to praise and pay for this work. So why would Middlebury students spend their scant free time doing journalism? We do not have a journalism major here, so working on The Campus is always going to be in addition to, and rarely integrated into, academic studies. While every student journalist has their own particular motivations, they are all committed to the shared mission of informing and engaging the Middlebury community around the issues that matter to us. They are working for us—and we should not take that for granted.
I serve as the faculty adviser for the The Campus, which is even more of a hands-off role than you could imagine — I only “advise” on the rare instance where a question of institutional policy emerges and I never engage in editorial decisions or priorities, functioning primarily as a required name on MiddLink. The Campus is one of Middlebury’s most robust sites of peer education and leadership, where cohorts of students learn from each other, passing along wisdom by training the next generation who will take their place on the masthead. For us faculty who often struggle to devise group projects where students can successfully collaborate independently and reconcile their differences to create a product better than the sum of individual contributions, The Campus is a model to emulate.
Longtime members of the Middlebury community should recognize that The Campus has recently embraced a different attitude toward its own journalism and relationship to the institution. Especially over the past three years, the paper has tackled some of the most difficult moments in Middlebury’s modern history with a dogged commitment to accurate reporting and investigation, and at times an adversarial attitude toward the powers that be. This year the paper has taken on big projects, producing exceptional special issues on the November election, staff anxiety in the wake of workforce planning, and last week’s Zeitgeist survey on student attitudes. They have covered controversies that have reverberated far beyond Vermont, always with a firm commitment to ensuring that no matter what our differences in opinion and perspective might be, we must have a shared understanding of relevant facts and contexts. In many instances, they have greatly outperformed the work of professional journalists.
For these many reasons, I urge you to take a moment to read the bylines and the masthead, identifying the people behind the words and images you’ve consumed this year. If you know any of these student journalists, let them know that you appreciate their efforts (and feel free to offer constructive critique too!) — I want to particularly acknowledge and give thanks to the graduating seniors who have led The Campus this academic year: Will DiGravio, Nick Garber, and Rebecca Walker. And if you’re a student with years left at Middlebury, consider joining this fine roster of journalists working to keep our community informed and engaged.
(05/09/19 9:57am)
A committee of faculty, staff and students proposed a new college protest policy at the April 26 faculty meeting. They developed the new policy collaboratively in response to the unpopular draft protest policy published online last November. While the initial draft policy, written by General Counsel Hannah Ross, was criticized for its ambiguity, the new policy aims to be as clear as possible in upholding the three pillars of the college’s academic mission: academic freedom, respect and integrity.
“How do we experience freedom and express respect and have integrity simultaneously?” asked Michael Sheridan, associate professor of anthropology and a member of the policy committee, in an interview with The Campus. “By definition, protest is disruption.”
The committee is not attempting to define the right way to protest, Sheridan said, but is trying to reduce ambiguity through the creation of a space for things to be done right.
The goal of the draft policy is to determine what happens when the conflict mechanisms of non-disruptive protest are unsuccessful. The committee, led by Amy Briggs, professor of computer science, considers development of institutional mechanisms and protocol regarding policy enforcement to be a necessary next step, but sees it as something beyond the scope of the committee’s designated task.
Sheridan said the student members — Ami Furgang ’20, Lily Barter ’19.5, Taite Shomo ’20.5 and Grace Vedock ’20 — drew inspiration from out protest policies from Brown University and Colorado College, which they saw as especially “interesting and compelling and useful.”
The committee set out to “work through what a Middlebury-centric policy would look like, trying to capture the kind of clarity and the kind of issues that were in those other policies,” Sheridan said.
The modified draft that the committee developed after receiving feedback, and plans to present at the May meeting, is organized beneath five headers: “Protest and demonstration are rooted in our educational mission,” “Public speech must be consistent with academic freedom, integrity, and respect,” “Peaceful protest and demonstration are important forms of activism,” “All students and employees can engage in non-disruptive protest and demonstration,” and “Disruptive behavior will be subject to sanction.”
Though the committee’s new draft is more concise than Ross’s, it is still much longer than Brown’s twelve-sentence policy. Rick Bunt, professor of chemistry & biochemistry, said at the faculty meeting that the Brown policy was “pithy,” able to convey a lot of information in few words. He questioned whether shortening the new draft could make it even more effective.
Renee Wells, director of education for equity and inclusion, was the only staff member on the committee. Following faculty questions about what might be considered “demeaning” speech, condemned alongside hatred in the draft policy, Wells said that the goal was not to prohibit speakers or ideas, but to prevent speech that targets people.
The faculty cannot approve or reject the policy at the May meeting, but their vote will be considered representative of the collective faculty opinion on the proposal moving forward.
(05/09/19 9:54am)
In by far the most exciting game of the year, the Middlebury Panthers were outlasted by Tufts University 14-13 in the NESCAC semifinals. On a day full of ups and downs and twists and turns, the Panthers left it all out on the field. Despite the loss, Midd held their heads high and were proud of how well they played throughout the game.
Simply put, the first quarter was wild. After Tufts opened up the scoring early in the first, the Panthers answered with three goals of their own. Contributions came all from different players, including sophomore Pierce Frick, his second of the year. The teams really just answered one another right away, with Tufts scoring twice again. However, Midd answered with three more goals of their own, two from sophomore Will Brossman. It was exciting to see all these new guys step up to the challenge and really balance out the team dynamic. At the :34 second mark left in the first, Freshman Jack Sheehan got on the board in big spot to put the Panthers up 7-5. On a firing shot in the latter seconds, star Chase Goree netted one to take a pretty sizable 8-5 lead going into the second. The second quarter was not like the first. As the defense began to settle in and goalies started to feel more comfortable in net, the scoring came to a halt. Each team netted two of their own, pretty evenly dispersed throughout the quarter. First-year phenom, Tyler Forbes scored one of his own, while Brossman added to his total for the game. Going into the half, Midd maintained a sizable 3 goal lead.
The Panthers came out firing in the third quarter. Jack Sheehan scored from a good distance away to open up what was a great quarter for the Panthers. Tyler Bass made some great saves in goal, while the Panthers got two more goals from Goree and Feldman. In a quarter completely dominated by Middlebury’s attack, the Panthers had a demanding 13-8 going into the last stretch. However, the Jumbos knew what had to be done to avoid the upset.
Unfortunately, Tufts showed what they were really capable of in the fourth quarter. By really going on the attack and playing aggressive, stifling defense, Tufts was able to hold the Panthers scoreless, while scoring five goals of their own. The heartbreaker was a goal in the last five seconds of the game to force overtime. In overtime, it really was anyone’s game: first goal to score wins. While Middlebury played great defense throughout, the Jumbos found a way to put it in the back of the net, again in the late seconds.
Contributions came from many new faces in the game. Brossman led the scoring with three goals, Jake Madnick had 14 ground balls on the game, and Bass had 12 saves on 26 shots. It was a fantastic effort by the Panthers and a sad way to end their season, but it was a quite impressive showing on their part. The Panthers end their season at 8-9 and miss the NCAA tournament.
(05/02/19 10:36am)
Columbus Day may soon become Indigenous Peoples’ Day in Vermont, thanks to a bill (S.68) passed by the Senate on April 17. The bill was met with resounding approval, and will become a permanent change once it receives Gov. Phil Scott’s signature.
For several years, Scott has signed the executive proclamation changing the holiday’s name, just for the day. Former Gov. Peter Shumlin also supported the measure from 2016 to 2018. This year’s legislative action, however, will enforce the change as state law.
Several other states are in the process of renaming Columbus Day to Indigenous Peoples’ Day, including Alaska, South Dakota, Oregon, Minnesota and Hawaii. New Mexico and Maine recently established the switch in official state law. Among cities and towns, popular opinion is leading to similar change on a local scale.
John Moody, an active member of the Abenaki community in Hartford, Vermont, noted the amount of support from the state government and residents in renaming the holiday.
“This came from the governor’s office and general consensus. The Hartford town vote was 55 percent to 45 percent in favor,” Moody said. “The process in town was remarkably civil and quiet considering the continued carnage in nearby New Hampshire over the same issue,” Moody said, citing the fact that at least half of Hartford’s population identifies as Native American as a possible reason for this civility.
Led by Republican Governor Chris Sununu, New Hampshire’s Senate rejected the bill. Although the vote was a success in Vermont, there was a fair amount of opposition from 24 Vermont Republicans, who voted against the change.
Republican representative Scott Beck believes Indigenous Peoples’ Day should be celebrated as a separate holiday. “Columbus is one of the great discoverers of all time. He is what really led Europeans over here, he was a big part of that,” Beck commented in an interview with VTDigger.
According to Middlebury College American Studies Professor William Hart, however, changing the name of a holiday, building or landmark doesn’t affect the underlying history. Instead, it dismantles the European narrative, addressing repressed elements of history.
While changing the name of the holiday can’t change the “five-hundred-year history of disease, enslavement, displacement and conquest,” explained Hart, what it can do is “de-center the story; it takes away from reaffirming Columbus as the [only] history in the Americans and in the West.”
Columbus Day was initially observed with church, festivals and feasts before becoming a national calendar holiday in 1937 and currently represents a symbol of American national identity for some. However, what Columbus Day fails to address is how, for the first 200 years of early U.S. history, European settlers were not only the minority among those Native peoples already living there — but the European settlers were also guilty of mass genocide and colonization of those peoples.
“Our governing institutions, Constitution and principles of liberty come from Great Britain, so that is the link that Americans make to their past and to their heritage,” Hart said. “That is the story that gets amplified and centered in this pageant of American history. Changing Columbus Day to Native Peoples’ Day or Indigenous Peoples’ Day is a way of embarking on this vast early American perspective.”
According to Hart, making this change would contribute to a de-centering of Europeans and a re-centering of Native peoples, forcing us to consider who lived here and “made this history possible.”
“Enslaved Africans play a central role in this America as well. Without enslaved labour, this nation would not have been able to build itself as it did from 1600 to 1790,” he said.
By reframing the historical narrative, this change contributes to a movement among early American scholars, who are shifting their ways of teaching and understanding American history. The change helps bring non-Europeans to the forefront of American Studies, so that they are no longer an alternative topic, tangential to the European narrative.
“I think curriculum changes are already beginning here at Middlebury; you see lots of changes that address the diversity of the U.S. culture, literally, historically, and so forth,” he said, bringing the broader cultural shift in education to a more local context.
“Now it’s changing,” Moody said. According to Moody, people with indigenous blood are engaging with their Native American heritage and connecting across societies. “Vermont seems like the whitest state in the union,” he said. “But there’s a tremendous amount of people with native blood.”
(05/02/19 10:34am)
Last September, 100 people from all over Vermont gathered at the Bread Loaf campus in Ripton to discuss their visions for their state’s future. Activist Fran Putnam led the charge, with Middlebury College Economics Professor Jon Isham acting as a moderator for the event. Today, these Vermonters have formed Vision for Vermont, a grassroots group working “to try to help bridge the divisions that have come to the surface in our country and in Vermont in the last several years,” according to their website.
Although the first meeting was held in 2018, Putnam dates the organization’s origin back to the 2016 election. After Trump was elected, Putnam and several others from the Middlebury area participated in the Women’s Marches in Montpelier and Washington, D.C.
They decided they wanted to continue this work to “move forward with turning this country [into] what we want to see rather than how divisive it [was] and still is.” So, they formed “Huddlebury,” a group that has met every two to three weeks since January of 2017. The group has been “trying to find ways to move forward, both locally and regionally,” Putnam said.
Huddlebury members began by reading climate activist Naomi Klein’s book “No Is Not Enough.” In it, Klein encourages Americans to have a particular vision rather than simply saying ‘no’ to everything. “That book was very inspirational to us,” Putnam explained.
Next, the group read George Lakey’s “Viking Economics” and attended several of his lectures in March of 2018. In April, Middlebury College Food Studies Professor Molly Anderson invited Lakey to campus to speak. Lakey described Nordic countries’ visions and how they were able to transform their governments and societies.
Putnam and her cohort asked themselves, “How can we do this in Vermont?” and decided on a vision summit, inviting people from all over the state to come together last September at Bread Loaf.
Isham became involved through, as he described, a serendipitous moment: he ran into Putnam and Anderson early last summer at the Natural Foods Co-Op. When they mentioned they were looking for a facilitator for a summit in September, Isham volunteered himself.
Isham has kept up with the groups since September and has “loved following their progress.” Through the fall, he worked with Putnam on developing a project for his Environmental Studies senior seminar class.
Over the course of the spring semester, Isham’s class has been working on a podcast for the Vision for Vermont website. Students have interviewed Vision for Vermont members and other Vermonters, including teachers, farmers, indigenous people and people of color.
Isham emphasized the importance of students looking at people a generation before them who were trying to affect change. “It’s helpful to see what worked for them, what didn’t, what their frustrations were, what they wish they had done differently,” he said.
One goal of the students’ project has been bringing more diversity to Vision for Vermont. The senior seminar is “trying to reach different demographics … to learn from these folks,” Isham stated.
Putnam expressed gratitude for the students’ work. “We’re trying to reach out to people whose voices are often not heard … we want to talk to people feeling disgruntled or angry, or that no one is listening to them, or that their voice doesn’t count,” Putnam said.
In addition to his senior seminar class, various other students have worked with Putnam on the project, including those involved in the Sunday Night Environmental Group (SNEG); Bayu Zulkifli ’21 designed the website while Leif Taranta ’20.5 and Cat La Roche ’21 have also collaborated with the group.
Over the course of the summit and following meetings, the group drafted a vision statement, published on their website. The statement addresses issues ranging from healthcare and food security to affordable housing and a strong and fair economy. It imagines “a future where Vermonters care for each other, their communities, and the earth; where the issues that matter to all of us are resolved in a way that protects our environment and combats further climate change; and where access to health care, and economic, racial and gender equity are assured for everyone.”
Putnam discussed the importance of the positivity and optimism of the group and vision statement. “The news is so bad every day … if I can get a group of people together moving forward and looking ahead to something more positive, it makes me and everyone around me feel better,” she said.
“Social change is [a] hard thing to steer, to understand and to manage,” Isham said. He believes starting with conversations is essential. “Think of churches in [the] civil rights movement, or college campuses in fights for women’s liberation and gay rights.”
La Roche believes people’s ideal worlds are not so different between parties, and that the vision statement is getting at these universal core values. People want the same things, “they just disagree on the methods to get there.”
Ultimately, the group hopes to finalize their vision statement and then start sharing it with politicians, activists and others. They plan to “meet with state representatives and senators, and perhaps organize a teach-in or rally,” La Roche said. However, they are in no rush; project members are “just letting the vision statement come together,” La Roche added.
“When enough people support [the vision], you can take it to the government and show them we want big changes, not little actions,” Putnam explained. “We’re not exactly sure where it’s going to end up, we’re just going to see how far we can go with it.”
Next on the group’s agenda is a gathering with George Lakey on May 9, followed by a second summit on Sept. 14. Students are welcome to attend both, Putnam emphasized.
“It’s easy to get caught up on individual issues,” La Roche concluded, so “to have in your mind what the future you would like to live in looks like is really useful.” The vision statement transcends the challenges of the present and looks towards an idealistic future.
(05/02/19 10:00am)
More than 200 students answered the question: “What makes you feel othered at Middlebury?” Responses addressed socio-economic status, race and ethnicity, athletics, sexuality and other subjects, shedding light on the ways in which cultures and demographics at the college impact students’ sense of belonging.
!function(e,t,s,i){var n="InfogramEmbeds",o=e.getElementsByTagName("script")[0],d=/^http:/.test(e.location)?"http:":"https:";if(/^\/{2}/.test(i)&&(i=d+i),window[n]&&window[n].initialized)window[n].process&&window[n].process();else if(!e.getElementById(s)){var r=e.createElement("script");r.async=1,r.id=s,r.src=i,o.parentNode.insertBefore(r,o)}}(document,0,"infogram-async","https://e.infogram.com/js/dist/embed-loader-min.js");
Roughly one in three students feel othered at Middlebury.
Highlighting certain demographics paints a clearer picture of who feels othered at the college. Students of color, recipients of financial aid, members of the LGBT community, those who feel their political views diverge from the norm and others whose identities do not match the dominant demographics of the college were more likely to report sentiments of otherness.
Money was the most commonly cited cause of feeling othered at Middlebury. Respondents who indicated feeling othered expressed frustrations with the high level of wealth on campus, the challenges faced by first-generation students and other financial factors. 45% of respondents indicated receiving need-based financial aid. 30% of the written responses explaining why students feel othered at Middlebury attribute these feelings to socioeconomic status.
The influence of wealth on campus culture is not surprising; data from 2017 showed that Middlebury had a greater proportion of students from the top one percent than most other schools in the country. 76% of students came from families with household incomes in the top 20%, according to the 2017 study.
“The tremendous wealth of the students here makes it easy to feel like an outsider,” one respondent wrote.
Another student wrote that their feeling of otherness stems from the fact that they did not come from a privileged background like many of their peers. “I have to work twice as hard to get half of what is given to these people.”
65% of respondents who chose to write about feeling othered indicated receiving financial aid. This is disproportionately large compared to the 45 % of total respondents who said they received financial aid. Many students cited not graduating from private high schools as the reason they feel isolated by wealth culture. Dozens more described not being able to take part in the same activities as wealthier students, which has led to feelings of social exclusion.
!function(e,t,s,i){var n="InfogramEmbeds",o=e.getElementsByTagName("script")[0],d=/^http:/.test(e.location)?"http:":"https:";if(/^\/{2}/.test(i)&&(i=d+i),window[n]&&window[n].initialized)window[n].process&&window[n].process();else if(!e.getElementById(s)){var r=e.createElement("script");r.async=1,r.id=s,r.src=i,o.parentNode.insertBefore(r,o)}}(document,0,"infogram-async","https://e.infogram.com/js/dist/embed-loader-min.js");
Roughly half of those who receive need-based financial aid feel othered at Middlebury, while only 20% of those who do not receive aid feel the same way.
!function(e,t,s,i){var n="InfogramEmbeds",o=e.getElementsByTagName("script")[0],d=/^http:/.test(e.location)?"http:":"https:";if(/^\/{2}/.test(i)&&(i=d+i),window[n]&&window[n].initialized)window[n].process&&window[n].process();else if(!e.getElementById(s)){var r=e.createElement("script");r.async=1,r.id=s,r.src=i,o.parentNode.insertBefore(r,o)}}(document,0,"infogram-async","https://e.infogram.com/js/dist/embed-loader-min.js");
Equally striking is the relationship between race and otherness at Middlebury. Of all racial groups, white students were the only group in which respondents did not overwhelmingly report feelings of otherness.
A campus climate assessment released last week by the Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion revealed that only nine percent of students of color believe Middlebury is inclusive to members of their race.
Of the 78 respondents who cited race or ethnicity as an othering factor, more than half described not fitting into the white majority as the primary cause. The other students who mentioned race listed it alongside additional reasons, most commonly socioeconomic status, gender and the many challenges posed by the college’s social and academic environment.
“Middlebury’s whiteness and affluence makes me feel othered,” one student wrote. “De facto segregation everywhere I go,” another said.
“Sometimes I become a token in class. When I speak, I feel I have to do so in a way that validates my intelligence,” a third student said.
A student identifying as Latino wrote, “Sometimes I feel dumb when I forget to code switch to the white man's vernacular and they look at me as if I am speaking a foreign language.”
Another student, who specified being a white-skinned Latino, said, “I fear that my skin will make people identify me solely as a white person … I have had negative comments addressed to me based off my skin color, or people laughing at me because of the way I pronounce my name.”
“I am white but I am international,” one student said. “I don’t fit in with the American majority at all but am often labelled that way because I am white.”
!function(e,t,s,i){var n="InfogramEmbeds",o=e.getElementsByTagName("script")[0],d=/^http:/.test(e.location)?"http:":"https:";if(/^\/{2}/.test(i)&&(i=d+i),window[n]&&window[n].initialized)window[n].process&&window[n].process();else if(!e.getElementById(s)){var r=e.createElement("script");r.async=1,r.id=s,r.src=i,o.parentNode.insertBefore(r,o)}}(document,0,"infogram-async","https://e.infogram.com/js/dist/embed-loader-min.js");
Sexual orientation also factored into feelings of otherness.
“Middlebury is a very heteronormative space,” one respondent who identifies as lesbian said.
Others mentioned feeling isolated from the queer community on campus: one student attributed feelings of otherness to “not fitting stereotypes of the LGBTQ+ community.”
The SGA’s Thirteen Proposals for Community Healing, developed by the student body and sent to the administration following the cancellation of Legutko’s lecture, aim to enhance students’ say in administrative decisions and expand inclusive spaces on campus.
Students who do not identify as cisgender overwhelmingly report feeling othered on campus. “Middlebury fosters a sometimes hostile environment for non-binary individuals,” one student said “I feel pressure to “dress straight” and accommodate the outdoorsy — and hyper masculine — campus culture.”
Students on both ends of the political spectrum described Middlebury as hostile and unforgiving toward people whose views do not align with the norm.
“If you express an opinion that does not align with the majority,” one wrote, “then somehow, they will come after you.”
Another respondent said that the same students who “pride themselves on being liberal and open … are often the most judgmental.”
Many students indicated that Middlebury lacked spaces for discourse where dissenting opinions could be shared and respected.
“I don't like to ignore another person's opinion just because I don't agree with it,” said another. “I prefer to address it and find out where we differ in opinion and why. Many students here don't seem used to that. They are very scared of having a different view and stating their reasons.”
As one student put it, “I’m too woke for some and not woke enough for others.”
While several religious students said they feel alienated because of their religious beliefs, most said they felt othered for being religious, rather than their religion itself.
!function(e,t,s,i){var n="InfogramEmbeds",o=e.getElementsByTagName("script")[0],d=/^http:/.test(e.location)?"http:":"https:";if(/^\/{2}/.test(i)&&(i=d+i),window[n]&&window[n].initialized)window[n].process&&window[n].process();else if(!e.getElementById(s)){var r=e.createElement("script");r.async=1,r.id=s,r.src=i,o.parentNode.insertBefore(r,o)}}(document,0,"infogram-async","https://e.infogram.com/js/dist/embed-loader-min.js");
More than 70% of respondents reported feeling lonely at least once a week. Almost 20 percent said they feel lonely every day.
!function(e,t,s,i){var n="InfogramEmbeds",o=e.getElementsByTagName("script")[0],d=/^http:/.test(e.location)?"http:":"https:";if(/^\/{2}/.test(i)&&(i=d+i),window[n]&&window[n].initialized)window[n].process&&window[n].process();else if(!e.getElementById(s)){var r=e.createElement("script");r.async=1,r.id=s,r.src=i,o.parentNode.insertBefore(r,o)}}(document,0,"infogram-async","https://e.infogram.com/js/dist/embed-loader-min.js");
Students who feel othered also report higher occurrences of loneliness: 28% are lonely every day — almost twice as likely as the 16% of students who do not feel othered. Among the less than 7%of students who said they never felt lonely, three-quarters said they did not feel othered at Middlebury.
Loneliness appears frequently in written responses, too, often alongside mentions of cliquiness, frustration about not being outdoorsy or “crunchy” enough and dissimilarity of interests compared to peers, especially regarding weekend activities such as campus drinking and hookup culture.
One student described feeling pressure to never feel lonely. Another said that when they chose not to express traditional femininity or engage with the party scene, they were treated like an outsider.
“I don't hang out with friends or party often,” wrote another. “This is fine literally anywhere else in the world, but I feel lonely and abnormal at Midd.”
A student who does not drink said the decision “makes it challenging to find friends and meet new people, so I spend most of my weekends alone.”
19 comments reported feelings of cliquiness in relation to the divide between athletes and non-athletes.
One former athlete said that their otherness stemmed from not being a varsity athlete anymore. A non-athlete said student athlete culture left them feeling ostracized by varsity teams.
Another student said being involved in athletics is incompatible with being a minority. “These two identities cannot be expressed at the same time,” they wrote.
!function(e,t,s,i){var n="InfogramEmbeds",o=e.getElementsByTagName("script")[0],d=/^http:/.test(e.location)?"http:":"https:";if(/^\/{2}/.test(i)&&(i=d+i),window[n]&&window[n].initialized)window[n].process&&window[n].process();else if(!e.getElementById(s)){var r=e.createElement("script");r.async=1,r.id=s,r.src=i,o.parentNode.insertBefore(r,o)}}(document,0,"infogram-async","https://e.infogram.com/js/dist/embed-loader-min.js");
Though mental health only appears in a handful of written responses, knowledge about on-campus mental health support systems corresponds to feelings of otherness. Nearly all respondents said they would know where to go for mental health services. But almost half of the respondents who disagreed, and the majority of those who strongly disagreed, said they felt othered at Middlebury.
Mental health was not named by any students as their sole cause of othering, but was listed in several responses, including one that said the issue was with their “decision to prioritize mental health over academic success.”
!function(e,t,s,i){var n="InfogramEmbeds",o=e.getElementsByTagName("script")[0],d=/^http:/.test(e.location)?"http:":"https:";if(/^\/{2}/.test(i)&&(i=d+i),window[n]&&window[n].initialized)window[n].process&&window[n].process();else if(!e.getElementById(s)){var r=e.createElement("script");r.async=1,r.id=s,r.src=i,o.parentNode.insertBefore(r,o)}}(document,0,"infogram-async","https://e.infogram.com/js/dist/embed-loader-min.js");
Nearly all students feel like they deserve to be at Middlebury — despite the prevalence of feeling othered, roughly 90% of students agree that they have earned their place at the college.
According to respondents, Middlebury’s culture and demographics contribute significantly to the sense of otherness felt by minority groups on campus.
“There are very few spaces at Middlebury where students of color feel welcome,” one student wrote. “Yes, the [Anderson Freeman Center] exists, but if that is the only space dedicated to diversity at Midd, then we need to do better.”
A few students wrote that “everything” about the college culture and community makes them feel othered. “My identity in all spectrums,” one of these students wrote.
“This world wasn’t made for me,” said another.
(05/02/19 9:58am)
The Middlebury men’s lacrosse team entered the past weekend as the seventh seed in the NESCAC Tournament. After closing the regular season at 7-8, the Panthers were still confident they could make some damage in postseason play. Heading to second seed Wesleyan University on April 27, Middlebury showed just exactly what they are capable of. In a huge upset and the biggest win of the season, the Panthers won 11-7.
Tyler Forbes ’22 showed up to play once again, opening up the scoring at the 13:48 mark of the first. After winning the next faceoff, the Panthers regained possession and senior Luke Peterson netted a goal of his own in the next 40 seconds. Defense remained quite strong throughout the entire game. Wesleyan was able to get two back on the board in the first, but after junior Chase Goree’s goal, the game was 3-2 in Middlebury’s favor.
Wesleyan opened up scoring in the second quarter, but Middlebury’s offense was able to rebound quite quickly. Fans were quite impressed with the constant attack by the Panthers, who scored the next four goals of the half and took a demanding 7-3 lead into the second half. A.J. Kucinski ’20 added two of his own, while Forbes and Will Brossman ’21 netted one each on rifling shots.
In the second half, the Panthers proved just how good they were in the net and on the defense. It wasn’t until more than halfway through the third quarter when Wesleyan scored their first and last goal of the quarter. Middlebury followed with two goals of their own, again by Forbes and Kucinski. The Panthers could start to taste the victory but remained strong to close out the game on the attack. They did not let Wesleyan, fifth in the country, gain momentum. Wesleyan scored at the 11:19 mark, but Middlebury answered minutes later. Trading goals was simply not enough for Wesleyan to come back. After the Cardinals closed within three goals with four minutes to go, Goree put the icing on the cake with a great goal at the 2:26 mark.
The Panthers proved just how well-rounded they can be when their season is on the line. Sophomore Jack Hoelzer, who has played a decent amount throughout the season for the Panthers, praised how solid their team depth is. “We had a bunch of young guys stepping up to the plate and older guys leading us on Saturday. We played a really solid game and put together a solid 4 quarters,” Hoelzer stated.
A.J. Kucinski led the scoring with four goals and two assists, Forbes followed with three of his own. The man in goal earned a lot of praise this past weekend. “Tyler Bass [’21] played an amazing goal in net and with the help of the defense only let in seven goals 24 shots against the defending nationals champs,” Hoelzer said.
The Panthers will continue their postseason run as they head to tournament-host Tufts on Saturday to take on the Jumbos at 12:00 p.m.
(05/02/19 9:58am)
After a two-week period in which an offensive chemistry exam question came to light and a problematic cartoon was shown in a geology class, increased attention has been focused from students, parents and faculty on the sciences — specifically on the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry — to address how classes in those departments could be more inclusive.
Many students said that in the midst of this renewed focus, they did not want the discussion to start and stop with specific incidents. Rather, students hope the conversation will shift toward the deeper-seeded issues within both the chemistry department and the STEM program that make certain students feel unwelcome, especially women and students of color.
The Curriculum: An Ethos of Erasure
Many students said that the way knowledge is framed in science classes does not do enough to address the harmful history that often accompanies scientific research, which can leave women and students of color feeling ignored or unseen in the classroom. While several students framed their experience in the context of the Chemistry Department in light of recent events, they also spoke about a wider culture that spans multiple academic departments.
“There is an overwhelming sense in STEM classes that what we do is scientific and logical and based in reason, and so it has nothing to do with diversity, inclusivity and what people view as more social issues,” said Vee Duong ’19, a comparative literature major who also completed the pre-med track. “There’s very little sense that we as students and professors in STEM have some sort of stake in creating more inclusive environments. And there’s very little conversation about what that inclusive environment might look like.”
Duong said that some professors highlight women and people of color who have contributed to scientific advancement, but not every professor takes the time to acknowledge the work of those who are often overlooked. She also pointed out that in her experience this problem is not unique to science classes but rather occurs in all academic programs.
According to Duong, the decontextualized environment in the sciences puts pressure on students of color to achieve at high levels and defy stereotypes.
“There’s this sense that in the classroom I need to prove myself and perform well and be different,” she said. “When you feel like you need to meet objective standards that are really not objective because they have been created to marginalize certain communities it becomes a really tough mental personal battle to assert yourself and build a space for yourself in that classroom.”
Another student, who asked to be referred to as Kayla, said that this struggle to assert yourself can cause students to drop out of the sciences, which perpetuates a larger issue of underrepresentation. Kayla spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retribution from faculty.
“There’s already a lot of widely documented evidence and studies showing that students of color from low income backgrounds who come from underfunded public high schools have higher rates of getting out of STEM, even if they come in studying STEM,” she said.
Rachel Hemond ’19.5, a molecular biology and biochemistry major, pointed out that these concerns relate to the student-led movement to decolonize the curriculum, which has gained momentum this spring. That initiative asks professors to change which perspectives are actively taught in their classes.
“We never talk about where our knowledge comes from in STEM, and in other disciplines, that is so unacceptable pedagogically and epistemologically,” she said, adding that she believes many professors have this knowledge but may be unsure of how to integrate it effectively in their curriculum.
“There’s this idea you can separate the subjectivity of history from the objectivity of scientific knowledge and that’s not the case. Everything is situated,” Hemond said. “It doesn’t surprise me that BiHall has issues with prevalent and systemic sexism and racism and classism because the very disciplines of science that they are professing to teach us are filled with those things and fundamentally built on them.”
Kayla agreed that in STEM classes professors do not always incorporate discussion that puts knowledge in context.
“There’s a history in science of people from more privileged backgrounds claiming and taking credit for other people’s work,” Kayla said. “And we never talk about that in class because we’re always focused on the hard science and getting through what you need to to get into medical school and PhD programs and the next thing you’re going to do in lab.”
Bob Cluss, the chair of the Chemistry and Biochemistry Department, said that the 12-week semesters make it hard to incorporate social issues into the curriculum to the extent that some professors would like to.
“If we had a 14-week semester and we were still covering the same topics, we would be able to integrate social issues better, we would be able to use contemplative practices, we would be able to do a lot things we’re not doing now,” Cluss said.
Cluss, who has been chair of the department for two years, said he believes it is deeply important to make space for discussions that contextualize scientific knowledge, but that it has to be done correctly, which requires both time and proper training for professors.
“If we’re talking about something that is difficult then we all need to have the time to look at all the nuances that connect to it,” he said. “But I think that’s what we should do. Science is a part of society and we really should be connecting these things, not pulling them apart.”
Problems With Professors
Many students also reported that one professor — Steve Oster, who teaches the organic chemistry lab sessions — creates an environment that favors some students over others and often makes women and students of color feel uncomfortable. Oster is the only lab professor for those courses, which are required or recommended for many STEM majors and the pre-med track.
“He’s someone who shamelessly makes it obvious to the class who his favorites are, which is usually a very predictable demographic, and he always directs his attention to validate them in the classroom,” Kayla said. “This can imply that some students’ educations are valued over others in a classroom and that can get internalized by students who are being ignored, making them think that they don’t matter and that they don’t belong in STEM.”
Kayla, who identifies as a student of color, said that Oster’s behavior often goes beyond favoritism.
“It is very intimidating being in a classroom where the professor is a white male joking about things that are often racist or sexist and expecting you to laugh along, and if you don’t laugh along he just walks past you and doesn’t bother to have a conversation with you,” she said. “I have particularly had experiences where he has called me by another brown girl’s name and doesn’t bother to get to know who I am but does get to know everyone around me who is not a person of color.”
Duong had a similar experience of feeling marginalized in Oster’s class.
“He never engaged with the students of color in the same way that he engaged with white students,” she said. “When he was going around to introduce himself to everyone in the class, he would go to everyone’s laboratory hood but he completely skipped over mine. I could tell, I could see him looking at my name, and he didn’t know how to go about saying my name, I guess, so he just skipped over mine and went on to the next person.”
For many students, especially women, Oster’s reputation preceded him because older female students warned them about his behavior before they took his class. This was the case for Charlotte Cahillane ’19.5, who said that she went into Oster’s class on alert because of what she had been told. Still, Cahillane said she believed she would have been uncomfortable in Oster’s class regardless of any preconceived notions she brought with her.
“I’ve heard he might not have this anymore, but he used to just carry around this golf club and just stand behind students with it over his shoulders, waving it around, sort of wielding it in a way that made you feel moderately threatened at the same time that you felt confused. Why would you have a golf club in a chemistry lab? There’s so many breakable objects, people break objects without golf clubs, you don’t need a golf club in there,” she said. “In general, he doesn’t make me feel comfortable as a professor. I wouldn’t want to be alone with him in a room talking about chemistry. Especially with the door closed. Not because I think he’s going to do something, but because I know I would not feel 100 percent in control.”
Other students cited their frustration that Oster’s bias also seemed to extend into his grading as well.
“You could take two lab reports that basically have the same things written on them, almost always the guy will get a higher score than the girl,” Maggie Phillips ’19 said. “It feels like he’s always standing over the women to make sure they know what they’re doing but lets the guys do their own thing.”
Phillips said she worries about the impact that Oster’s attitude toward women has on her fellow students.
“I think that a lot of people know that he’s outrageous and don’t take him seriously, but when you’re watching women and students of color be treated differently, you’re subconsciously going to think that they’re dumber or more inept,” she said. “I’ve noticed in my upper level classes that I’ve been talked down to by my male classmates and I wonder how much of that has been learned by seeing faculty members treat women and people of color differently. And I would almost argue that’s more damaging.”
Cluss said that he cannot speak to specific personnel issues, and he pointed out that different students have different experiences in the same classes. He also reiterated the department’s commitment to making their classes welcoming spaces for all students.
“There are a range of student opinions about faculty. That said, we want all students to feel that they’re welcome in a class and that they’re treated fairly. That’s really critical. We’re more committed to that than ever,” he said. “If there are students that feel that certain students were favored or certain students were marginalized, that’s never a good thing. And that needs to be attended to.”
Oster did not respond to the The Campus’ request for comment.
All of the students interviewed for this article who mentioned they had issues with Oster said that they left comments in their course response forms at the end of the semester that reflected their negative experiences with Oster, but that nothing seemed to change.
Course response forms can be viewed by the professor who taught the course, the chair of the department, and the dean of faculty, as well as by the the Promotions and Re-appointments Committees for any faculty member under review.
“Course response forms are intended to provide students with an opportunity to give feedback — positive and negative — on their experience in a course,” Dean of Faculty Andi Lloyd told The Campus, adding that the forms did not originate as a way for students to report serious concerns or problematic behavior, nor are they used that way now.
“That’s not to say that there would not be follow up on something reported in a course response form, but, depending on the situation, there might be better or more effective ways for someone to raise a concern,” she said.
Lloyd recommended department chairs, program directors, advisors, Commons faculty heads and Commons deans as good options for students to report a specific concern. However, many students said they did not have a clear idea of who they should approach with these concerns while they were in Oster’s class.
Several also mentioned their complaints to other professors, but were unsure what other options were open to them.
“I talked to faculty members about him but I didn’t know I could do more than that other than complain about him on my course response forms and talk to my advisor,” Phillips said. “When I would bring it up to faculty they would say I know, this is a problem, we’re addressing it. But then nothing would really happen.”
Kayla echoed this, saying that the faculty she spoke with also seemed aware of the issue.
“All of them said that this was a known problem in this department and that they also did not like the way this professor carried himself around, but it didn’t seem like there was any foreseeable way to have him do something to change,” she said.
Despite the negative experiences that students have with aspects of the STEM program, they cautioned against the assumption that STEM classes are the only academic spaces on campus with a bias problem.
“I actually don’t think that BiHall is the worst on this campus by any means. I think that it gets a lot of publicity because people expect to see it there and I think that’s also problematic,” Hemond said. “I think that BiHall is a microcosm of this campus as a whole.”
Kayla agreed.
“There’s always micro-aggressions everywhere,” she said. “That’s not unique to STEM, that happens everywhere.”
Upcoming Changes, Ongoing Conversations
In light of recent events, Cluss said his department has been engaged in a lot of conversations about how to respond to recent issues.
“There’s a lot that’s been happening in a very short period of time at a very busy time of the year,” he said. “I feel like we’re doing everything we can right now, and we need to. This is a very important issue.”
The week after the all-school email about the offensive chemistry test question, the faculty held a meeting to gather feedback from their majors. Phillips, who is a Chemistry and Dance double major, was one of the students at that meeting, and decided to organize a sensitivity training for chemistry professors through her connections in the dance department.
“I went to talk to dance professors Lida Winfield and Crystal Brown to ask if they could potentially do a training with all the science faculty and students who would be interested and they said yes, and that they had actually been doing a bias training with all of the Addison County elementary school students and we could do the same thing for the science faculty,” she said. “I think a lot of faculty are open and wanting to make a difference but they just don’t know how. And I think a lot of faculty are busy and it doesn’t seem important.”
The training was set to occur on Wednesday, May 1, after the print deadline for this article.
The STEM Pedagogy Group, a group of about 60 STEM faculty and staff who want to implement better and more inclusive teaching practices, also recently sent out a survey, which they had been working on for about a year and which they hope will help them get feedback from students.
Associate Laboratory Professor in Biology Susan DeSimone, a founder of the STEM Pedagogy Group, said that the goal of the survey is to collect accurate data about how students in STEM feel about their classes.
“Our conversation over the semester last spring made us realize that one of the things we really needed was to understand how our students perceive our environments,” she said.
DeSimone said the survey was sent to the roughly 1,800 students who took a STEM class during this academic year on April 24.
“The goal is to collect data to address the question and not presume that we know what is or isn’t happening in our students’ experiences,” she said. “One of the things the group really wants to do is to create more inclusive pedagogies and more inclusive spaces, and so this survey could be used for us to develop practices to potentially look for grant funding to do that.”
Cluss said these new discussion come in a long line of cultural shifts he has observed in the community since he has been here.
“This is a very different place than it was even five years ago,” he said. “I think our community throughout is more diverse. I think everyone’s voice really needs to be heard and in some instances it almost takes a critical mass of people for that to happen and I think we’re there in our community. And that’s good, that’s important.”
“We have a heightened awareness of this now,” he said. “Sometimes you need to shine a very bright light on things but we’re learning from it. This has been really, really hard for our community, but these are the times where we learn and grow, too.”
(05/02/19 9:55am)
Just minutes after Professor of Political Science Matthew Dickinson announced his decision to take a hiatus from his weekly politics luncheons, a group of students who regularly attend the lunches created a group message with the aim to continue them in his stead.
The luncheons, which occur every Tuesday in the Robert A. Jones ’59 House, serve as public forums for discussing recent political events in the United States that may also connect to the Middlebury community. Middlebury students and “older students,” as Dickinson has dubbed community members who attend the luncheon, have a diverse range of viewpoints about the topics, which range from controversies in Congress, to race relations, to the Trump presidency.
“The college is having a discussion on academic freedom in the classroom,” Dickinson told The Campus, regarding his decision to allow students to take over the luncheon during his hiatus.
This week, seasoned luncheon attendees Maggie Joseph ’20 and Abbott LaPrade ’21 gave a presentation entitled “Uncle Joe and the Impending Resignation of SGA.”
“I think it’s a really great place to engage in current news topics,” LaPrade said. “Overall, Dickinson has done a really good of job of making sure all views are welcome and challenged.
Joseph began by summarizing the SGA’s “Thirteen Proposals for Community Healing,” a list sent to administrators and the entire student body outlining various structural demands to college policy. Two students came with prepared statements articulating opposing arguments.
Molly Gallagher ’22 said that SGA’s proposals are representative of student concerns and that some of the proposals are culminations of long-term student considerations. Nate Blumenthal ’21.5 voiced concerns about the third demand, which requires organizations or departments that invite speakers to complete a “due diligence form” to determine if the “speaker’s beliefs align with Middlebury’s community standards.”
LaPrade then examined former Vice President Joe Biden’s recent entrance into the 2020 presidential race, his third time running for the presidency. LaPrade analyzed the age divide among support for Biden, with far more support coming from older voters than younger voters. When one student in the room questioned the ambiguity of Biden’s platform, former Governor of Vermont Jim Douglas, who was in attendance at the luncheon, responded that Biden’s campaign is based in electability.
The luncheons provide an opportunity to bridge the generational gap between college students and the older students.
“We’re there to provide an important space for discussion and the broader community who attends these luncheons,” said Joseph. “If there’s anything that these past two weeks have shown, it’s that students want to engage in tough conversations and do want a space to air their opinions. It’s a great place for mutual understanding.”
The student-led luncheon left more room for discussion, whereas Dickinson — an expert on the presidency, Congress, and presidential decision making — often lectures for a bit longer. He prepares for the luncheons the same way he does a class, researching the topics and putting together a slideshow.
“Having it conducted by peers made it feel a bit more like a conversation than Dickinson’s typical lecture-style situation,” said Abigail Judge ’21, an attendee who frequents the politics luncheons, in an email to The Campus. “I also think that there was a fun dynamic between the more elderly lunch-goers and the students today, which was cool to observe — the questions and conversations after the more formal lecture of information and charts felt really engaged among [and] between the different demographics, which I really appreciated.”
Dickinson is unsure if he will continue the politics luncheons next year, but believes they create a valuable space to engage with a wide array of opinions.
“The luncheons are an opportunity to educate students of all ages about politics,” he said. “The idea is not to tell them what to think but instead to give them the tools and a forum for making up their own minds. The luncheons provide a safe space where students with different views can engage civilly, knowing they won’t be criticized for holding a particular viewpoint, even if it is unpopular with some — perhaps even most — people.”
(05/02/19 9:53am)
There’s something about dumping leftover food on dining hall carousels and watching it slide out of sight that just makes it seem to disappear. A new student-led initiative, sponsored by the SGA Environmental Affairs Committee, is trying to change that by assessing and publicizing data about quantities of food waste that students left behind in Proctor Dining Hall last week. From Monday through Friday, Middlebury dining staff weighed all uneaten food at the end of each lunch period and reported the results back to students Ryan Guttheil ’22 and Jiaqi Li ’22, the forces behind this year’s Weigh the Waste campaign.
The project, sponsored by SGA’s Environmental Affairs Committee, originally started in 2013 by Cailey Cron ’13.5 and Molly Shane ’13.5, is part of a broader effort in cooperation with dining to increase student awareness of food waste. According to an article published by The Campus in 2013, the college was reporting approximately 300 tons of food waste annually, but did not produce data on how much came from students who still had uneaten food on their plates. In the first collection, the campaign found nearly 140 pounds of edible waste in Proctor Dining and 160 pounds in Ross.
Guttheil first proposed a revival of the campaign to Head of Dining Operations, Dan Detora, in Winter Term, after growing tired of seeing students who simply “weren’t hungry anymore” continue to throw away uneaten food.
“Food waste has always been something that bothered me because it is so avoidable,” Guttheil said.
Detora, who agreed to handle logistics, left the design of the campaign primarily up to Guttheil and Li. They then emailed Head of Proctor Dan Boise to devise a way in which to make excess food waste more visible to the student body.
To better discern how much edible waste students are responsible for, they agreed to weigh all excess food coming into the conveyor belt at the end of each lunch period, beginning on Monday, April 15. On the first day, they reported a total of 106 pounds of waste. Before dining staff weighed the waste on a scale, they put it through a pulper to extract excess water and break the components down to prepare the waste for composting.
While composting has promising environmental benefits of its own, composted materials still release greenhouse gases as they decompose. And the campaign organizers believe holding consumers responsible for their actions may better address the underlying causes of food waste, while composting might only ameliorate its environmental consequences after the fact.
“Even though we compost, it’s a matter of not wasting the resources that have been put into making the food,” Guttheil said. “It took a lot of water, a lot of sun energy and a lot of time energy for that food to be made only for it to go to waste.”
Guttheil, Li and Detora discussed the manner in which to best increase visibility of student-generated waste at length. While the previous Weigh the Waste campaign put clear plastic buckets on display into which students dumped their waste, Guttheil said that Detora wanted this campaign to cultivate awareness of the community’s contributions, rather than to “waste-shame” individual students.
Results showed a gradual decrease in the amount of excess food waste as the week progressed. Tuesday’s data reported 119.5 pounds of waste, Wednesday saw 102 pounds, Thursday saw 92.5 pounds and Friday saw 63 pounds. It is unclear, however, how much of this decline can be attributed to student initiative, as Guttheil pointed out that dining was processing a lot more volume than usual that week due to the influx of prospective students during Preview Days.
“We would have liked the numbers to go down in a way that was more clear,” Guttheil said. “Unfortunately, there was not as much of a behavioral change as we had hoped, but the goal was mainly to bring awareness to the issue.”
To balance out the quantitative weight of the campaign, members of the Environmental Affairs Committee and the Green New Deal Town Hall tabled outside Proctor all week to discuss the results and their potential implications. After each day, Guttheil printed signs of the results to hang outside Proctor to encourage students to aim for better results the next day.
Gutheil said that even slight changes to our eating habits, such as “taking less food on your first trip in, or making sure that you are actually going to eat what you take,” could have substantial economic, environmental and community benefits. For next year’s Weigh the Waste campaign, Li and Guttheil hope to implement a sort of friendly “competition” between Proctor and Ross to increase incentive.
The results of this year’s project can be accessed in more detail at go/weighthewaste.
