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(01/24/18 10:03pm)
The Alpine Ski Team opened up their season last weekend at Sugarloaf Mountain in Carabassett, Maine. High winds cancelled the first day of the Colby Carnival, but the Panthers got on the mountain this past Sunday.
The women’s side finished in a tie for first place with Dartmouth, finishing with 226 points in the Giant Slalom. Leading the way was Caroline Bartlett ’19 who posted a day-best 1:00.81 in her first run. Bartlett followed that performance by crossing the line at 1:03.5, giving her a second-place finish on the day. The other top-10 finishers for the Panthers was Jackie Atkins ’20, who finished in 2:07.15 overall, good for sixth place. Lexi Calcagni ’19 was just behind at 11th place with a 2:08.16 time.
Calcagni noted the terrain was tough because of some wind and ice but, all in all, the team was glad to start the season off on such a high note.
“I don’t think we could have asked for a better start to the season on the women’s side,” said Cacagni.
With 130 points in the giant slalom, the men’s squad finished the day in sixth place. Riley Plant ’18 was the first Middlebury man to finish. His two-run time of 2:03.62 placed him 16th.
Davon Cardamone ’18 and Justin Alkier ’21 were the second and third Panthers to cross the finish line, posting times of 2:03.77 and 2:05.97. While the men’s side did not achieve their hoped-for results, the season is young.
Plant talked about how Sugarloaf poses challenges.
“[Sugarloaf is] one of the most difficult hills we compete on,” said Plant. But the Panthers viewed the challenge as an opportunity to improve.
“During inspection and minimizing preventable mistakes during our race runs” is especially where the team can focus on getting sharper, said Plant. “We can achieve that by relaxing pre-race; this will be easier now that the first-race-jitters are out of the system. With the slalom race postponed to next weekend, we’ll make sure to hammer the slalom training this week in preparation for the St. Mike’s Carnival.”
On the Nordic side, Cate Brams ’18 backed up the high expectations for her this season. Brams crossed the line second in the women’s 5K Classic with a time of 13:15.85, a career best, on the first day of the St. Michael’s Carnival in Hinesburg, Vermont.
Katie Feldman ’18 placed sixth for the second consecutive week after completing the course in 13:46.25. Sophia Hodge ’20 had the best placement of her young Middlebury career, crossing 23rd in 14:20.84. Overall, the women’s team registered 103 points to come in third.
Meanwhile, the men’s side racked up 103 points — also good for third place.
Evan Weinman ’18 paced the Panthers with a 24:58.03 in the 10K Classic, placing fifth individually. Two spots behind Weinman was Peter Wolter ’21, with a time of 24:59.24. Adam Luban ’18 and Sam Wood ’19 placed 20th and 21st, with times of 25:52.07 and 25:53.41.
Day 2 opened with the women’s 10K Freestyle, where Brams once again led the Panthers by crossing the finish line in 29:56.3 for seventh place. Annika Landis ’20 was the other Middlebury athlete to place in the top-20, as she finished 19th by crossing the line at 30:34.1. The women’s squad once again collectively captured the bronze, this time with 81 points.
“It was great to see us build on what we put together at Colby, and it gives us a lot of confidence in the work that we’ve put in all year,” Brams said after last weekend’s competition. “We were so excited about what the men’s team put together — great to see a huge team win. On the women’s side, we have a pretty young team that is still adjusting to college racing, and I’m incredibly proud of their confidence and drive this weekend. We’re all excited and hungry for more.”
The men’s squad also surged forward as they won the 15K Freestyle event with 123 points. This was their first on-day win since 2009.
This time Wolter led the pack, continuing his hot start from the previous day. He earned his best-ever finish with a second-place tally by crossing at 38:31.7.
Three other Panthers finished in the top-ten: Lewis Nottonson ’19 (fifth, 38:47.9), Wood (sixth, 38:56.2) and Luban (ninth, 39:19.2). Nottonson and Wood also garnered their best finishes of their respective careers, while Luban tied his career-best finish.
“Saturday’s course was highlighted by a long gradual downhill section on the front of the course and a gradual climb back up towards the stadium,” Nottonson said, describing the layout of the course. “Sunday used a partially overlapped lower loop that extended another kilometer downhill from the previous day’s course and had an additional switchback climb added onto the upper end of the course.”
The Nordic squad will be back in action on Feb. 2nd at the Vermont Carnival in Stowe, Vermont, while the Alpine team is in action this weekend in Jeffersonville, Vermont, at Smuggler’s Notch, where they will take part in the St. Michael’s Carnival.
(01/24/18 9:59pm)
At the end of December and beginning of January, the men’s basketball team (14–3) seemed a little bit lost, losing three out of five games after starting the season 6–0. But two wins last weekend, a 70–66 defeat of Nescac rival No. 11 Williams on Friday, Jan. 19, in Pepin Gym and an 87–62 win at Pine Manor on Sunday, Jan. 21, extended the No. 10 Panthers’ winning streak to six games and vaulted them to the top spot of the Nescac standings.
The Williams game set-up as monumental rematch of last season’s Nescac championship, which Middlebury won 84–62, and the NCAA Sectional Finals, which Williams won 79–75 at Pepin Gym. The matchup also held important implications for this season’s Nescac standings, since the teams entered the contest tied for second place along with Tufts at 3–1.
Williams built a 21–13 lead early on, but then went cold as Middlebury went on a run to go ahead 25–23 with a little under two minutes left in the half. Tied at 28 on the last possession of the first half, Jack Daly ’18 hit Matt Folger ’20, who sank a three to give the Panthers a lead they would never relinquish.
Ahead 43–38 just over four minutes into the second half, the Panthers started to run away from the Ephs. Their lead grew to as many as 17 points, 66–49, around the seven-minute mark. But then the Ephs fought back and got the deficit to 68–58 with 1:23 left in the second half. Off a missed free throw, Williams’ Bobby Casey hit a three with 53 seconds left, and then Griffin Kornaker ’21 committed an offensive foul to give the Ephs the ball back. Casey hit another three off the ensuing inbounds play, and Middlebury led by just four with 50 seconds remaining.
The Ephs fouled Daly, who missed the front end of a one-and-one. Casey knocked down a two-point jump shot inside the paint to make the score 68–66 with 24 seconds. Williams pressed on the inbounds, trying to deny Middlebury the basketball, but Eric McCord ’19 slipped behind the press and Daly found him for a layup and a 70–66 Middlebury lead.
Williams had two more chances to cut into the lead but missed two threes, and Middlebury held onto a 70–66 victory for a crucial Nescac victory over its heated rival.
“Sometimes when you’re down 10 at the end of a game you have more confidence shooting contested threes like they did,” said team captain Nick Tarantino ’18 after the game. “Coach Brown told us to value the basketball and close out hard on their threes. Williams could have given in but they’re a proud and talented team.”
Hilal Dahleh ’19 and Joey Leighton ’20 stepped up to lead the Panthers in scoring with 16 points apiece, for players who averaged just under nine and six points-per-game entering the contest. It was a career-high for Leighton, who came off the bench to hit seven of his 10 shots from the field in 22 minutes. The pair provided needed production from the wings, Middlebury’s most unproven spot on the court.
“With Jack returning at point and the four bigs also coming back, the biggest question mark for us entering the season was who would fill the minutes on the wing,” said Tarantino. “Hilal and Joey have really grown this year and were vital to beating Williams. We become a dangerous when they catch fire from deep and bring intensity on defense.”
Daly scored seven points and assisted on 11 buckets, while McCord added eight points and five rebounds. Folger scored seven points, grabbed eight rebounds, and blocked four shots.
Defensively, Middlebury held Williams under 36 percent from the field, and the Ephs shot below 40 percent in both halves. The Middlebury bench outscored Williams’ 32–16, and the Panthers controlled the painted area, outscoring the Ephs 40–24 in there.
Tarantino believes the team’s defensive effort against the Ephs was the best it has been all season.
“We communicated very well and really made them work hard to get off open looks,” Tarantino said. “Coach Brown gave us a defensive game plan that we focused on the majority of last week’s practice.”
Brown’s gameplan, coupled with the Panthers’ effort on defense, forced Williams into its worst shooting game of the season.
With the win, along with Hamilton’s 75–49 loss to Amherst and Tufts’ 77–75 defeat at the hands of Bates, Middlebury moved into sole possession of first place in the Nescac at 4–1.
Middlebury was back in action the next day, Sunday, Jan. 21, when it travelled to Pine Manor in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts. The Panthers did not waste any time getting ahead against the Gators, as they raced out to a 12–2 lead within the first five minutes. They continued to add to their advantage and led 44–31 at halftime.
The Panthers came out firing on all cylinders once more in the second half, and their lead ballooned to 27 points at the 15:12 mark in the second half. The Gators cut their deficit in half over the next five minutes, but Middlebury came right back to put them away. The Panthers led by as many as 29 points on the way to an 87–62 road victory.
Daly led scored 18 points, corralled 11 rebounds, and handed out seven assists, all game-highs. With 150 assists this season, Daly is well on his way to breaking his own program record for assists in a season, which he set last year when he handed out 183 helpers. He is currently third on Middlebury’s career assist leaderboard, needing only 30 more to break Jake Wolfin ’14’s record of 553.
Folger added 12 points, five rebounds and four assists for the Panthers, while Jack Farrell ’21 tallied 11 points on four of five shooting.
With the two weekend wins, the Panthers extended their winning to six games, tying their six-game streak to start the season. Tarantino thinks the team is putting the pieces together as it gets deeper into Nescac play.
“We’re starting to see the team hit its stride as the younger guys are feeling more comfortable and older guys are filling their roles,” said Tarantino. “We’ve played quality opponents all this month, and sometimes it takes some bumps in the road in order to learn what it takes to beat a very good team. We’re feeling confident now and are looking forward to closing out our Nescac schedule.”
Middlebury has two more away games in the next week, when it travels to Trinity this Sunday, Jan. 28 and Keene St. on Tuesday, Jan. 30. To stay atop the Nescac, the Panthers will have to beat the Bantams, who are in a three-way tie for sixth in the standings at 2–2. However, Trinity has had one of the stingiest defenses in the conference thus far, allowing the fewest points per game as a team overall and the third fewest in Nescac play.
(01/24/18 9:33pm)
The Women’s basketball team managed to recover from their back-to-back losses against Bates and Tufts last week by beating Williams in Massachusetts on Jan. 20, 57–54. On Monday Jan. 22, when they hosted Smith in a non-conference bout, the Panthers suffered their first home loss of the season, losing 60–45.
Middlebury looked to dominate the Ephs last Saturday evening when they confined Williams to just one point at the 5:40 mark of the opening quarter. With less than three minutes to play, the Panthers found nine of the final 12 points coming from guard Kira Waldman ’20, who scored three from beyond the arc.
With Middlebury leading 25–11, Williams responded by making the second quarter a more tightly contested matchup. After seven and a half minutes of buckets being exchanged by both teams, Williams closed out the second quarter with a 9–2 run, outscoring the Panthers 16–8.
The Panthers built on the half-dozen-point lead, 33–27, that they took into halftime straight away in the second half as they opened with a 6–0 run that saw a pair of free throws converted by forward Maya Davis ’20. As the Ephs answered back with a 6–0 spurt of their own, the Panthers defense allowed them to tack on some additional points in the last two and a half minutes of play. Heading into the fourth quarter, the Panthers comfortably led 48–35.
The game seemed to be tucked away as the Panthers found a three from Sarah Kaufman ’20 less than a minute into the final quarter. However, the remainder of the quarter was dominated by Williams as they went on a 14–4 run and only trailed 55–51 with 90 seconds on the clock. When Amanni Fernandez of Williams drilled a three with 20 seconds left, the Panthers’ lead was down to just two points, 56–54. In the final four seconds, Williams was unable to find the bottom of the net from downtown, allowing the Panthers to narrowly escape with a victory.
Davis had a team high 12 points and game high eight rebounds while Waldman scored 11 off the bench for the Panthers, which included sinking three of the five shots she took from beyond the arc.
On Monday, the Panthers hosted Smith and got off to a shaky start. The first half of the first quarter saw Smith score seven unanswered points. As the clock approached the four minute mark, the Panthers managed to cut the lead down 7–6. However, the Panthers were unable to contain the swarming Pioneers who went on a 10–2 run to end the first quarter with a 17–8 lead.
Finding themselves down 22–10 in the second quarter, the Panthers went on an 8–2 run. Five of the eight were scored by guard Sabrina Weeks ’18, who finished with a team high 13 points. With the deficit then down to four points, 24–20, Smith scored five of the half’s final points to lead 33–24 heading into halftime. Both teams scored 16 in the second quarter.
Smith seemed to slow down when they came out for the third quarter thanks to some Middlebury halftime adjustments. The Panthers managed to hold Smith to just seven points as they ended the final the 90 seconds of the third with a 6–0 run. Behind threes from Weeks and Davis, the Panthers refused to go away and headed into the final quarter down 40–36.
The Panthers looked to even the score or take the lead when Davis converted a layup immediately into the final quarter. With the lead cut to two, the Pioneers chipped away at the Panthers, outscoring them 14–3 over the next six and a half minutes. With less than three minutes left, Middlebury trailed 54–41. Down 13, the Panthers did not have enough time to get back into it, and fell at home for the first time this season.
A short stint of quick turnarounds this past week-plus has tested the Panthers’ endurance. After suffering their first home loss, they still boast an impressive 13–5 overall record while being 3–2 in conference play.
The Panthers return to action in Pepin for a game in Nescac play as they will host Trinity this Sunday, Jan. 28, at 2 p.m.
(01/17/18 11:17pm)
The college admissions team released the first round of early decision acceptances on Dec. 9. Of the 650 applicants, 326 students were accepted, putting the admissions rate at just over 50 percent. Those students accepted early decision are bound to attend the college.
The average number of students accepted early decision tends to be a little over 300. This year’s number was lower than last year, when 343 students were accepted as part of the early decision one process.
In addition to the 326 acceptances, 39 applicants were deferred to the regular decision pool, and the remaining students were rejected. 300 of the accepted students will start in September, while the remaining 26 will begin in February.
The final size of the combined classes of 2022 and 2022.5 is expected to total around 715 students. The 326 already accepted students make up about 45 percent of that total. Feb classes generally total around 100 people, which means that only about 25 percent of the class of 2022.5 has been admitted.
Twenty-three percent of the admitted class consists of students of color, and 11 percent are the first person in their family to go to college. Diversity is down from the 28 percent of last years class that consisted of students of color.
The accepted students are from 32 states plus Washington, D.C., and 20 countries. 29 international students are among the 326. Other than the United States, the most common countries that students come from are Canada, China, and the Philippines. The best represented state is New York, followed by Massachusetts, California, Connecticut, Illinois and Vermont.
30 of the admitted students were a part of the Posse Foundation, an organization that helps public school students who display academic and leadership potential to access elite schools that might otherwise overlook them. The admitted students are part of three 10 person teams from Los Angeles, New York and Chicago.
The early decision process has been criticized in the past for favoring wealthy applicants who do not have to be concerned with financial aid packages. The binding nature of early decision applications means that students do not have the opportunity to compare financial aid packages from different schools.
This criticism led to some schools, including Harvard, Yale, Princeton and Stanford to replace early decision with single-choice early action. This system allows students to apply to one school in the early admission process without being bound to that school.
The ED2 decisions will come out in February, before the final round of admissions decisions are released in April.
(01/17/18 11:03pm)
The phrase “grocery store” does not encapsulate the dynamic environment of the Co-op. Founded in the 1970s, the space has been a pillar of the Middlebury town for both college students and locals. For members, there are constant deals on ever changing products, and for all shoppers the selection of items continually rotates. From prepared foods to household objects, the Co-op carries products that incorporate aspects of environmental protection and social justice. Certifications of “fair-trade” and “organic” are ubiquitous at the store, representing the store’s core values. Furthermore, these qualities attract high membership involvement and partnerships with various Vermont based companies. These strong relationships have led to the transformation of the Middlebury Co-op.
An 8-month-long endeavor has increased the physical size of the space from 5,000 to 9,000 square feet, strengthening the presence of the Co-op. Middlebury locals witnessed the beginnings of the renovation this past summer. Many individuals have remarked on the improved flow and movement within the space. The larger entrance, increased number of aisles, expanded seating areas, and growth of the prepared food section have allowed the space to flourish. The community aspect of the Co-op has only been augmented by its renovation, creating more spaces for people to congregate with friends and family.
In addition to strengthening relationships, the expansion has allowed the Co-op to bring more healthy, sustainable, food to town members. The additional space allows the store to find creative, cutting edge products for its shelves. New features include an aisle devoted to alcoholic beverages as well as the enlargement of the kitchen area. In addition to the cheese section, more available ‘to-go’ options have provided customers with an experiential way to taste items from around the world.
The Co-op has also brought in local producers of items like granola bars to offer tastings for shoppers. In doing so, they not only support the local economy but also bring the individual closer to what they consume. Many have remarked that the Co-op has dramatically changed their interaction with food.
Blake Yaccino ‘20 explained that the cheese selection has provided her with an educational experience to learn about the various types, processes and locations of producers and gain knowledge about the importance of the dairy industry in Vermont. When asked what words come to mind when she thinks of the Co-op Yaccino stated, “healthy, wholesome and welcoming.” She is very happy to see that the new renovations, in particular the indoor seating area, have made it a more spacious environment.
Regular customers hope the Co-op continues to bring in additional food entrepreneurs in the coming year as healthy eating remains a staple to the town community and the state of Vermont. Supporting community initiatives through grocery shopping exists as the crux of the Co-op’s mission statement. Interaction with local business owners enables shoppers to learn more about what they are eating as well as develop relationships with the creative, hard-working, minds behind the store’s products. Furthermore, shoppers at the Co-op are able to personalize certain products such as items from the salad bar, smoothie counter and prepared food section. The store always has many options for any individual, regardless of dietary restrictions.
The Co-op transcends the label of your average store by bringing various foods and community members together. By acting as a bridge between consumers and products, the Co-op possesses the agency to improve our communal food system, guiding the food movement in Middlebury for years to come.
(01/17/18 10:52pm)
While other colleges and universities close offices and cancel classes in honor of Martin Luther King Day, the college chose to host a series of events to commemorate his legacy, ultimately presenting the student body as well as the community with a unique opportunity to learn about the important practices and beliefs Dr. King championed throughout his life.
One of the MLK featured events this past weekend attracted a substantial crowd in Wilson Hall at the McCullough Student center, as the event held honored Dr. King’s commitment to non-violence. Through the support of various departments, the founders of the Holistic Life Foundation from Baltimore came to speak to students, faculty, staff and community members Sunday afternoon. Opening remarks made by a representative from the Scott Center for Religious and Spiritual life placed the talk within the context of spirituality and history by sharing a moving quote of Dr. King’s.
“In a real sense all life is inter-related. All men are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be, and you can never be what you ought to be until I am what I ought to be...This is the inter-related structure of reality,” said Laurie Jordan, quoting one of Dr. Martin Luther King’s letters from a Birmingham Alabama prison.
On that note, Ali Smith, Atman Smith, and Andy Gonzalez began their discussion. Their work teaching contemplative practice in underserved schools in Baltimore is reducing disciplinary problems among students. Before delving into the founding of the Holistic Life Foundation the speakers set the tone of their talk with a group meditation.
“This is a love and kindness practice,” Smith said. According to Smith, the meditation practice was inspired by human nature’s penchant for loving other people before serving oneself.
In guiding the crowd through a ten-minute-long meditation in which audience members were encouraged to focus on breathing and expelling all negative energies, Smith united the audience and established a space conducive to conversation.
Following the group meditation, the leaders reflected on the path that led to their roles as facilitators of mindfulness through mediation and yoga, sharing personal stories that connected with students on a very real level.
“Our love of hip hop and beer was what brought us together to form the holistic life foundation” said Smith, jokingly recalling the early days of their journey into the realm of philosophical exploration and mindful practices when they studied together at the University of Maryland.
But it was when the Smith brothers and Gonzalez were in Baltimore together post-graduation that the evolution of their personal relationships into one of mutually encouraged intellectual exploration ultimately took place.
“We saw a lot of suffering. We saw a lot of pain” Ali Smith said, on a more serious note. The Holistic Life Foundation founders felt that despite being college-educated adults, their lessons and degrees fell short of answering the questions that really plagued them. The more research into contemplative practices and various schools of philosophical thought that their curiosities led them to, the more questions they felt they had.
Wrestling with dilemmas testing the limits of the human experience, and living in one of the most dangerous neighborhoods in Baltimore then granted the soon to be founders of the Holistic Life Foundation with a rare opportunity, the chance to transform inner-city America through contemplative practice.
Today, they have achieved great success. A feature in Mindful Magazine revealed how their work is reducing disciplinary problems among students in underserved schools in Baltimore. The foundation is delivering an assortment of after school, mentoring, environmental education, and leadership training programs. The talk was extremely well received and speaks to the value of pursuing paths to community healing via contemplative practice.
(01/17/18 10:30pm)
Irish playwright Martin McDonagh made his directorial debut with “In Bruges” (2008). That movie told the story of two affable hit men hiding out in Bruges after a killing gone wrong. Four years later, he followed it up with “Seven Psychopaths” (2012) about a screenwriter roped into an odyssey of malice and idiocy surrounding a stolen dog and an angry mob boss. These films are characterized by gorgeously wrought dialogue interspersed with scenes of often stunning violence filled out by leads who have none of the noble or restrained characteristics of your average protagonist. They are foul-mouthed, foul-tempered and violent, a step beyond simple anti-hero. McDonagh revels in human imperfection and does not shy from the complexity of emotion. “In Bruges” and “Seven Psychopaths” both did wonderful jobs of conveying this, but in his newest film, “Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri” (2017), he seems to perfect it.
The film tells the story of Mildred Hayes (Frances McDormand), who rents out the eponymous billboards to put pressure on the local police department led by town celebrity Chief Willoughby (Woody Harrelson). Mildred thinks they have failed to aptly investigate her daughter Angela’s (Kathryn Newton) violent rape and murder because nearly a year after the event no arrests have been made. The billboards, in bright red and black, read “Raped while dying. / And still no arrests? / How come, Chief Willoughby?” Her billboards have the desired effect, bringing Willoughby and his second-in-command Officer Dixon (Sam Rockwell) to attention. The billboards divide the small town of Ebbing, Missouri, many feeling that it is unfair towards Willoughby, who is dying of cancer. Life in Ebbing seems to center around one main street, where the advertising agency that owns the billboards sits across from the police department. Apart from the gift shop where Mildred works, the billboards, and her home, we see her nowhere else. But the town intrudes to offer their opinions. Father Montgomery (Nick Searcy), the town priest, comes to Mildred, telling her: “Everyone’s on your side about Angela. No one’s on your side about these billboards.” However, he is wrong about that. The film unfolds just as Dixon characterizes it, as a “war” between Mildred, who refuses to allow her daughter’s death to fade away, and those who would rather it be stricken from the public eye.
In this sense, “Three Billboards” is at its core a brilliant character study that centers on Mildred. She is motivated by a pure fury that is equaled only by her grief, and we empathize in a profound way with this image of a mother who wants nothing more than justice for her daughter. Yet, Mildred has the general disposition of sandpaper, grating and irritating almost everyone and everything she comes into contact with, employing a rather majestic lack of restraint. She is the character we needed in 2017: a woman who refuses to take shit from anyone and who will follow her gut through any debris that may fall in her way. McDonagh writes for Mildred some of the most affecting lines he ever has, and she is brought to life by Frances McDormand.
McDormand is, in my eyes at least, the single most talented actress alive today. Looking at her filmography, from “Fargo” (1996) to “Moonrise Kingdom” (2012), she has never turned in a bad performance, whether she sits at the center of the plot or as a supporting figure. She disappears into her roles, mastering different accents and physical ticks to accentuate each character. Here, decked out in a red bandana and a blue jumpsuit for most of the film, she seems a direct dismissal of the classic ‘leading lady.’ Even at a dinner date later in the film she stays in this outfit, presenting a clear message to the town and the viewer: this woman cares little for what you may think of her, only concerned with delivering the justice her daughter deserves. When Father Montgomery delivers his criticism in her kitchen, she leans in the doorway and delivers what may be the finest speech McDonagh has ever written about the culpability of Catholic priests, and how little right he has to criticize her. It is deft, measured, and somehow, hilarious. McDormand finds the core of McDonagh’s writing, giving the performance of her career.
All of this is filmed with an elegance and beauty that gives the film the sheen I would imagine William Faulkner’s novels would look like if brought to life. The mountains that rise above the billboards convey a sense of scope and sadness with the mist rolling from their peaks, a range of crying giants with their gazes fixed on Mildred’s grief. McDonagh alternates between breathtaking long shots of the town and landscape and close ups of the people that populate them. We see them and the town as they see each other, up in their faces with little ability to stretch out and look away. This makes the interspersal of medium shots that much more of a punctuation. Mildred awaiting Willoughby’s interrogation at the police station stands out to me as one of the most beautiful shots in the film: light filters through the drawn shades while she sits behind a beige desk, arms crossed, defiance radiating from her every pore. McDonagh picks his images carefully, staging two pivotal conversations about Angela’s death with Mildred sitting beside Willoughby first, and Dixon second, on a set of swings. McDonagh focuses our attention on the innocence suggested by the swings, an instrument of childhood, and then contrasts it with the gut-wrenching description of the crimes committed and what has been done to investigate them.
‘Stagey’ or ‘theatrical’ have often been treated as dirty words when it comes to movies. No director wants their movie to seem like it’s just a play that has been photographed, but I think the blanket statement misses the intricacy of theatrics. McDonagh is primarily a playwright, and I believe it is this sensibility that makes his movies so well constructed. There is not a wasted word in his script, and within the composition of each scene his motifs and focus bring our attention right where he wants it. You have such limited visual ability on stage that you must be quite precise about what you fill the space with. It is this theatrical intuition that makes Three Billboards so effective; each image, word, and detail seems to have been considered with such attention that they fit together in nearly flawless fashion. It makes me wish that McDonagh would increase his output, giving us more than one movie every four or five years. But, then again, if each of them is as good as this, it’s well worth the wait.
(01/17/18 10:09pm)
The men’s and women’s swim and dive teams hit the road to face Colby in Waterville and Bates in Lewistown last weekend in Maine. The women’s squad came away with a victory at Colby, earning 202 points to Colby’s 96, while the men’s team lost to Colby 183–111 before both teams lost to Bates. In Lewistown, the women’s team lost in a close call 152.5–141.5, while the men’s team struggled and fell 170–118.
With their win at the Colby meet, the women’s team earned their second victory of the season. The formidable pair of Panther sophomores, Maya Gomez ’20 and Frances VanderMeer ’20, had their fingerprints all over Middlebury’s success in the Colby meet.
VanderMeer and Gomez were on the 200-yard medley relay team with Erin Kelly ’21 and Steph Andrews ’18 that touched the wall almost six full seconds before the second-place group that consisted of Sarah Bartholomae ’18, Lisa MacCowatt ’19, Kelly Delane ’18 and Angela Riggins ’19 . Middlebury’s B team (Bartholomae, MacCowatt, Delane and Riggins), however, finished 1.3 seconds ahead of Colby’s A team. Middlebury’s winning A squad registered a time of 1:50.45, the B squad a time of 156.06 and Colby’s A team finished with a time of 1:57.39.
VanderMeer won the 200-yard freestyle heat by finishing a full two seconds ahead of the second place finisher from Colby, Maria Armillei, and that was even in light of VanderMeer easing up in the last half lap.
The 50-yard backstroke was the closest heat of the day, but the Panthers came out on top in that event as well. Bartholomae touched the wall at 29.75, just under a tenth of a second before Colby’s Emily Ambeliotis. Meanwhile, in the 50 yard breaststroke Gomez took another top finish by edging out two teammates, Erin Kelly (32.04) and MacCowatt (32.57), as she registered a time of 31.15.
In both the men’s and women’s meets, Middlebury diving continued its run of great success. On the women’s side, Kacey Hertan ’20 won the 1-meter event with 230.85 points and Elissa DeNunzio ’18 captured the 3-meter event title with 241.35 points. On the men’s side, Mike Chirico ’20 won both diving events, racking up 271.87 points in the 1-meter event and 267.45 in the 3-meter event.
While the men’s team did not win the Colby meet and Chrico led the way from above the pool, they did have several notable performances in the water. One of those was Zack Einhorn ’21’s performance in the 200-yard freestyle, which he won by just north of four-tenths of a second over Colby senior Hugh Jacobsen by touching the wall at 1:49.28.
The other highlight was the first-place finish of the 200-yard freestyle relay team. Cory Jalbert ’21, Brendan Leech ’19, Connor McCormick ’18 and Keegan Pando ’21 allowed the day to end with a bang as they finished with a time of 1:29.84, about half a second before Colby’s A team.
After the Colby meet, the teams got on the bus and travelled southwest to Bates, where they both fell to the Bobcats. The women’s team made it close, while the men’s team struggled, although they improved their team total from the Colby meet.
VanderMeer and Gomez once again were highlights for the Panthers in the pool, and Elissa DeNunzio impressed on the boards.
VanderMeer claimed the title for the 100 yard freestyle in 53.59, 50 yard freestyle in 24.47 and the 100 yard butterfly in 59.02. VanderMeer has consistently overcome the competition in her events throughout the season thus far.
Gomez also carried over some of the previous day’s momentum, as she touched the wall first in both the 200 yard (2:29.63) and 100 yard (1:06.82) breaststroke events.
DeNunzio won both of her diving events to close the gap between the Panthers and Bobcats. DeNunzio scored 244.05 points in the 1-meter event, while also pulling out 260.03 points in the 3-meter competition. MaryCate Carroll ’21 finished second in the 1-meter diving event with a score of 216.9 and the previous day’s winner in the 1-meter, Hertan, finished third with 210.63 points.
Chirico continued his dominance as he again placed first in both the 1m and 3m diving events. In Lewiston, he racked up 286.87 points in the 1m and 293.55 in the 3m.
In the pool, the Panthers had less luck. McCormick and Jack Dowling ’19 did pull out victories in their events though. McCormick finished first in the 400 IM by touching the wall at 4:18.01, a little over two seconds before the second place finisher from Bates, Alexander Ignatov.
McCormick also posed a second place finish in the 200 breaststroke (2:12.95) and 200 free (1:46.67).
After winning the same event in the Colby meet, Einhorn finished second in the 200-yard butterfly against Bates with a time of 2:01.01.
Other good performances came from the efforts of Santoro, who finished second in the 200-yard backstroke with a time of 1:59.66, and Will Pannos ’20, who finished the 100-yard butterfly 54.09 which was good for second place.
Leech, Robert Cheng ’20, Jalbert and Alex Smith ’18 also placed second in the 200 medley relay with a time of 1:39.42.
This Saturday, the Panthers face Union at the Natatorium 2 p.m.
(01/17/18 10:04pm)
The women’s squash team has been on top of its game since the turn of the calendar year to 2018. With a busy J-term, their rigorous practice schedule seems to be paying off. With a recent weekend sweep, the Panthers now hold a 1–0 conference record and 6–2 mark overall. They were 15th in the College Squash Association rankings heading into winter break and, with their recent results, they should maintain that spot.
Middlebury started the new year off with a tough loss to 14th-ranked Williams. Anne Glassie ’20 got the team’s only point as she won a five-set match over Williams’ Ananya Mahlingam-Dhingra in the fourth slot, with the score of 11–8, 11–9, 9–11, 4–11, 14–12. With her team down 8–0, Glassie’s win allowed the Panthers to walk out of Williams’ Simon Squash Center on a positive note.
After a 7–2 victory over No. 16 Amherst, the Panthers hit the road last weekend and stayed the weekend in Maine. That evening, the Panthers came out on top in one of their tightest matches of the season against Bates in a teeth-clenching 5–4 victory. Bates grabbed an early lead with a win at No. 3, but Lily Bogle ’18 quickly tied the match with a 9–11, 11–8, 11–4, 11–2 victory over Katie Bull at the bottom of the ladder.
After Bates took another match to go up 2–1, Mira Chugh ’20 brought the match to 2–2 with an easy straight-sets victory in the eighth slot (11–1, 11–3, 11–2).
Once again, the Bobcats regained a narrow edge after Kristyna Alexova defeated Bostwick in straight-sets in the second slot, but Emily Beinkampen ’21 tied it up for the Panthers with a straight-sets victory of her own in the seventh slot (11–7, 11–5, 11–5). Natalie Madden ’21 earned a hard-fought, four-set victory to give the Panthers the momentary lead. After dropping the second set 9–11, which tied things up at one set apiece, Madden pulled off back-to-back 12–10 victories over Katie Manternach in what was the match and performance of the day. After Bates evened things up, it set up a rubber match situation with Glassie still left to complete her match in the fourth slot. She did so in intense straight-set fashion, beating Maeve O’Brien 11–7, 13–11, 11–8.
The No. 15 Panthers took on No. 22 Colby the next day. In a complete sweep, the Panthers were led by Lowitt at the bottom of the ladder, who eased past her opponent with scores of 11–4, 11–1, 11–7, the recently-returned-from-abroad No. 3 Alexa Comai ’19 who won 11–6, 11–8, 11–7 and Beinkampen in the sixth slot who won by scores of 11–7, 11–4, 11–4. The second wave of wins came from the top-half of the ladder as Virginia Schaus ’21 won in the fifth slot 11–7, 13–11, 11–5, No. 2 Bostwick (14–12, 11–7, 11–4) and No. 4 Madden (11-6, 11–7, 11–4). Beatrijs Kuijpers ’19, who also recently returned from a semester abroad, won in the first slot 11–4, 11–8, 11–5, No. 7 Chugh won 11–4, 11–9, 11–5 and, finally, closing out the 9–0 sweep was Bogle who earned a victory in the eighth slot by scores of 11–6, 11–9, 11–7.
The Panthers rounded out the Maine trip with another complete sweep against Bowdoin on the same day. Middlebury quickly took a 3–0 advantage with another dominant performance at the bottom of the ladder from Lowitt (11–0, 11–0, 11–2), an almost equally dominant victory from Beinkampen in the sixth spot (11–2, 11–5, 11–2) and a four-set win by Comai in the third slot (7–11, 11–4, 11–5, 11–2). Chugh surrendered just eight points in the seventh spot (11–4, 11–0, 11–4). Bostwick tallied the eighth point with a four-game win at No. 2 (11–7, 8–11, 11–6, 11–4), and the No. 1, Kuijpers, concluded the scoring at No. 1 (11–2, 11–8, 11–6).
Yesterday afternoon the Panthers took on Trinity, who is coming off suffering its first loss of the season to Princeton. This weekend the Panthers will be playing Franklin & Marshall and Cornell at the squash center.
(01/17/18 9:59pm)
The men’s basketball season can be split into three phases. The first ended with the team’s 91–76 win over previously undefeated No. 16 Skidmore on Friday, Dec. 8. Its second phase occurred over the break, when the Panthers experienced their first road bumps of the season and lost their first three (and only) games so far. Now, the team is in its third phase as they have experienced a resurgence since the beginning of J-term, including Nescac victories over Bates 82–76 on Friday, Jan. 12, and Tufts 78–63 on Saturday, Jan. 13. After this stretch of nine games, Middlebury stands at 12–3 overall and 3–1 in the Nescac, good for a three-way tie in the conference with Tufts and Williams and a half-game behind undefeated Hamilton.
In its final game before winter break, Middlebury travelled to Skidmore and managed to recover from a 38–34 halftime deficit with a monstrous 57-point second half that propelled them to a 91–76 defeat of the Thoroughbreds.
The Panthers’ starting-five led the way offensively, scoring 82 of the team’s 91 points. Jack Farrell ’21 tallied a career-high 22 points, while Nick Tarantino ’18 added 20 and a career-high 17 rebounds. Entering the game, the Panthers ranked second nationally, behind only undefeated Whitman.
After final exams and returning home for break, Middlebury returned to campus for a couple days of practice, before heading south to play in the Washington & Lee Holiday Tournament. In their first game of the tournament, the Panthers faced their second-consecutive undefeated opponent in No. 25 York (Pa.) on Friday, Dec. 29. Down 70–60 with only 4:16 remaining in regulation, the Panthers reeled off a 14–2 run to take a two-point lead with 36 seconds left. York responded with a late layup to tie the game and force overtime.
York jumped out to an eight-point lead in overtime, but Middlebury came right back with an 8–2 spurt to get within two points with 10 seconds left. York then turned the ball over, but Middlebury gave it right back and York sank one free throw to take a three-point lead. Farrell had a look to tie, but his three bounced off the back of the rim. The Panthers lost their first game of the season in overtime to York, 90–87.
Middlebury’s starting five once again did most of the scoring, tallying 73 of the team’s 87 points. Matt Folger ’20 and Jack Daly ’18 led the pack with 22 and 20, respectively.
The Panthers rebounded from its first loss of the season in the consolation game of the Washington & Lee tournament, handling Clarks Summit 81–58. Daly was the only Middlebury scorer in double digits with 16 points on an efficient five-of-eight shooting from the field. He added eight rebounds and six assists.
The following Tuesday, Jan. 2, No. 4 Middlebury returned home to host No. 12 Swarthmore. The Garnet built a 47–32 halftime lead that the Panthers could not recover from, as the visitors came away with a 91–75 victory. Folger scored 21 points and grabbed eight rebounds, and Daly and Eric McCord ’19 both added 12 points in the Middlebury loss.
Middlebury took a 7–2 record into Nescac play when they travelled to Connecticut for games at Connecticut College on Friday, Jan. 5, and at Wesleyan on Saturday, Jan. 6. The Panthers doubled the Camels’ first half total to take a commanding 46–23 lead into the locker room, and cruised to an 82–60 win in their first conference game. Folger led the way again with 16 points, while five other Panthers scored at least eight points.
In a back-and-forth affair, No. 12 Wesleyan outlasted Middlebury the following night 80–70. Daly scored a game-high 21 points, grabbed a season-high 15 rebounds, and assisted on eight baskets. However, the Cardinals got to the line far more often and shot 28 more free throws in their 10-point victory.
Two days later, on Monday, Jan. 8, Middlebury had another non-conference game at home against Morrisville State. The Panthers won 85–64 with a balanced scoring effort, as Hilal Dahleh ’19, McCord and Adisa Majors ’18 all scored 12 points. Daly made only one shot from the field, but handed out a career-high 14 assists.
On Friday, Jan. 12, Middlebury played its first home Nescac game against Bates. The Bobcats built the largest lead of the contest in the first half when they led 43–31. However, the Panthers scored the last four points of the first half and extended their run into the second half, tying the score at 48. Middlebury went ahead by as many as seven two times, but Bates cut the lead to one, 71–70, with 2:32 left. Folger and Daly closed the game out by scoring Middlebury’s last thirteen points and leading the Panthers to a 82–76 victory.
A game after recording his career-high in assists, Daly scored a career-high 26 points, along with nine rebounds and eight assists. In coming from behind in the second half, Middlebury shot a blistering 64 percent from the field to outscore Bates 47–33.
The next night, the Panthers came from behind once more in Pepin Gym to knock off Tufts, who was previously undefeated in the Nescac, 78–63. Tufts led by as many as ten points in the first half, and took a 38–36 lead into halftime. Middlebury led 52–51 at the 13-minute mark, before going on a 14–0 run to put the game out of the Jumbos’ reach. The Panthers secured a 78–63 win by outscoring Tufts 42–25 in the second half, holding the visitors to only 24 percent shooting in the final twenty minutes.
Middlebury dominated on the boards, out-rebounding Tufts 70–41 and grabbing 33 offensive rebounds. McCord retrieved a career-high 15 rebounds and added 13 points, while Daly scored 16 and Folger tallied 15.
On Jan. 15, Small College Basketball released its Top 100 Watchlist for the 2017–18 Bevo Francis Award, given to the best player from Division II, Division III, the NAIA, USCAA, and NCAA men’s basketball. Daly was named to the watchlist, after averaging 16.4 points, 8.8 assists, and 8.6 rebounds per game in Middlebury’s first 14 contests. Daly also recorded what is believed to be the first triple-double in the program’s history. He is also leading the nation in assists per-game with 8.8.
On Tuesday, Jan. 16, the Panthers fell behind in their third straight game, this time to Albertus Magnus in Pepin Gym. At halftime, the Falcons led 36–34. Middlebury took a 57–47 lead with 8:37 left in regulation, and led 64–56 with just under five minutes. But Albertus Magnus scored 10 out of the last 12 points in regulation, including two free throws with 20 seconds left to force overtime.
Tied at 71 with a little over one minute remaining in overtime, Daly scored on a fastbreak layup to put Middlebury ahead for good. The Panthers scored the last six points of the game to outlast Albertus Magnus 77–71.
Daly scored 22 points to lead the Panthers, while Folger, Dahleh, and Joey Leighton ’20 all added nine. With nine assists, Daly brought his career assist mark to 503, becoming the third player in program history to record 500 assists.
Middlebury returns to the court on Saturday, Jan. 20, when it hosts Williams in an anticipated matchup between Nescac rivals. Last season, Williams beat Middlebury in the regular season, Middlebury got revenge in the Nescac championship game, but the Ephs got the last laugh in the NCAA Quarterfinals. Their rankings once they come out and records. On Sunday, Jan. 21, the Panthers travel to Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts, to face non-conference opponent Pine Manor.
(01/17/18 9:55pm)
In two games away on the road, Middlebury suffered its first Nescac loss of the season Friday, Jan. 12, to Bates by a narrow margin of 60–57. The Panthers were unable to bounce back from the loss as they also fell to Tufts Jumbos 61–45 the next day, Saturday, Jan. 13.
With just a one-point lead at the end of the first, Middlebury and Bates were exchanging well. Neither team secured a lead larger than three. The two teams went on to continue the back-and-forth with Middlebury holding a 28–26 lead after the first half.
Within the first minute of the third quarter, Bates was able to gain a 31–28 lead with baskets coming from Melanie Binkhorst, and a three-pointer by Emily Fredland. The Panthers fought back, managing to lead twice, but were unable to maintain a comfortable lead trailing 44–40 heading into the fourth.
With the score at 49–44 three minutes into the final quarter, the Panthers rallied a 5–0 run with Sarah Kauffman ’18 scoring a layup. Bates responded with a run of their own, breaking the deadlock and eventually gaining a 57–51 lead with around a minute remaining. Forward Betsy Knox ’20 managed to convert a three-point play with 37 seconds on the clock to cut the Bobcats’ lead to three. Bates managed to get a quick three-pointer to extend their lead to 6 down the stretch, to which Kaufman responded with a three-pointer of her own.
Kauffman led the Panthers in scoring with 15 and forward Maya Davis ‘20 had a game-high eight rebounds. The Panthers seemed to have done everything right, having fewer turnovers, out rebounding the Bobcats 33–30, and the bench pouring in a 15-point performance compared to Bates’ six.
In its second game, Middlebury were down eight to Tufts 14–6 after the first quarter. A 10–2 run halfway into the second quarter enabled the Panthers to be within two with 3:27 before the half. Knox led the way during the run with six points before Tufts grabbed a bucket to solidify a 25–21 lead entering the second half.
Roughly three minutes into the third quarter, Davis pulled off a three-point play to give the Panthers a 27–25 advantage. Just as the Panthers were going to close in on the lead, the Jumbos ran rampant with a 16–2 run for the next five minutes. With the score at 41–29, Middlebury scored eight of the next 13 to make the score 46-37. Sabrina Weeks ’18 scored four during the 8–5 exchange.
The Jumbos went on a 7–0 run midway into the final quarter to give themselves a comfortable lead of 56–39 with just over three minutes to play. After a few more exchanges, Tufts secured a solid victory over the Panthers, 61–45.
Knox led the Panthers in three statistical categories with 12 points, six rebounds, and two assists.
Middlebury will take on Williams on Saturday, Jan. 20, in Massachusetts before returning home Monday Jan. 22, to host Smith College.
(12/16/17 4:53am)
We are done! (For now.)
Last week, we published our final issue of the semester and I could not be more proud of our team and their work. Since our first issue of the semester, members of our editorial board and writing staff have worked hard to make our paper better each week. I am grateful for their hard work. I would specifically like to thank the members of our editorial board who will be leaving us next semester: local editors Rebecca Walker and Bridget Colliton, features editor Sarah Asch, and news editors Nick Garber and Kyle Naughton. Best of luck as you go abroad! We will see you next fall!
Now, please enjoy some fabulous work by our team! (Since we only publish once in Dec., I have included that issue as part of this post.)
Preface: It is my hope that our readership will use this monthly post to both rediscover old stories and find new ones they may have missed. Of course, most months I will probably leave out a piece that should have been included. It is important to note that I will be selecting stories more or less from memory, so I apologize in advance if I leave anyone out! I'm open to suggestions both before and after the post is published. Feel free to comment or email me at wdigravio@middlebury.edu. Also, there may be times when stories by me appear in this post. In those instances, I will have already reached out to another editor(s) to confirm that it belongs. If you disagree, also feel free to email me or comment! Also, a selection of an opinion piece does not imply endorsement of said piece.
NEWS:
“Proctor Performance Satirizes Patton Administration”
By SABINE POUX
“Before Leaving the Administration, Katy Smith Abbott Looks Back”
By ELIZABETH SAWYER and NICK GARBER
“Cryptic Email Invites Community to Off Campus Speech”
By WILL DIGRAVIO
“Faculty Question Investigation & Diversity Practices”
By ELIZABETH SAWYER
“Pulitzer Winner Walter Mears ’56 Discusses Career, Journalism in Trump Era”
By NICK GARBER
“Allison Stanger Opines in Hearing on C-SPAN”
By ELAINE VELIE
“Violent Imagery Drawn on Classroom Chalkboard”
By ETHAN BRADY
“SGA and President Patton Develop Common Agenda”
By KYLE NAUGHTON
LOCAL:
“Congressman Peter Welch Discuss GOP Tax Plan”
By AMELIA POLLARD
“Burlington Telecom Deal Near Joint Venture”
By AMELIA POLLARD
“Vermont Tackles Shortage of Addiction Treatment Specialists”
By SADIE HOUSBERG
“Chili Fest Suspended, Citing Construction & Fatigue”
By REBECCA WALKER
“Werner Christmas Tree Farm Gears up For Holidays”
By AMELIA POLLARD
“Vergennes Boys and Girls Club Undergoes Major Renovations”
By ALLY MURPHY
OPINION:
“Middlebury Dies in Darkness”
By THE EDITORIAL BOARD
“Don’t Be Fake”
By NIA ROBINSON
“Letter: Katy Smith Abbott’s Deanship”
By VINCENT RECCA
“Pregnant in Middlebury, Vt.: Fake Abortion Clinics and the Right to Accurate Information”
By TORIA ISQUITH
“Observations of an Outsider”
By LINH MUELLER
“Sharp Left: When Dissent Is Distracting Hypocrisy”
By TEVAN GOLDBERG
“Open Letter to President Patton”
By MATT GILLIS
“For the Culture: On Misogyny”
By JOSH CLAXTON
“I Cover the Waterfront: On Finding Bibles”
By WILL DIGRAVIO
ARTS & SCIENCES:
“NPR’s Siegel Talks Trump, Role of Media”
By CONNOR SLOAN
“Perspectives on Student-Led Public Art on Campus”
By APRIL QIAN
“Professor Examines Generation of Consciousness”
By CAROLINE JASCHKE
“Guest Lecturer Talks About Maternal Attitudes”
By JORDAN HOWELL
“A Cappella Group Sings for Global Unity”
By SARAH BOYLE
FEATURES:
“Special Feature: Mindfulness Efforts on Campus”
By ELIZABETH ZHOU
“Amor y Memoria: Celebrating the Life of Juana Gamero de Coca”
By SARAH ASCH
“Students Question Administrators at Tense Town Hall”
A transcription and video of the event.
A follow up article by Sarah Asch and James Finn.
“Poetic Justice, 10 Years Later: Parini Reflects on the Destruction”
By BEN FREEDMAN
“Dead Parents Society Offers Students Support”
By BENJY RENTON
“Women Leaders Club Hosts Mentorship Luncheon”
By EMMA PATCH
SPORTS:
“Field Hockey: The Exit Interview”
By ROB ERICKSON
“Inside Midd Football Players’ Decision to Kneel During Anthem”
By WILL DIGRAVIO
“Field Hockey Wins Third National Championship”
By HEATHER BOEHM
“Women’s Squash Returns Strong Core, Adds New Faces”
By EMILY BIAN
“Women’s Basketball 7–0 for First Time in 16 Seasons”
By IMRAN GANDA
“From Midd to Cleveland, Koby Altman ’05 Rises to GM of Cavs”
By ANDREW RIGAS
“Men’s Basketball Wins Middlebury Tournament”
By ANDREW RIGAS
“Women’s Hockey Wants to Host Final Four”
By SEBASTIAN SANCHEZ
“Cross Country Teams move onto NCAA Championships”
By JORDAN HOWELL
(12/07/17 12:39am)
It was not until “The Star-Spangled Banner” began to play that Ian Blow ’19 decided to take a knee. Of course, he had thought about it before — a lot, ever since Colin Kaepernick first did so in August of last year.
After almost kneeling at the Middlebury football team’s Oct. 7 game at Amherst, Blow, who is black, planned to protest the following week. Before doing so, he wanted first to share his plan with his teammates. However, in the midst of a hectic, midterm-filled week leading up to their Oct. 14 game against Williams, the chance to open up a conversation never came. As he sat in the locker room prior to kickoff, Blow, a defensive end, decided to wait another week.
“I didn’t go through the steps beforehand to be respectful of my teammates, so I decided I wasn’t going to take a knee,” Blow said in an interview with The Campus.
But as he stood on the sideline just before kickoff and the national anthem came over the loudspeakers, something changed. Blow caught sight of a banner promoting Green Dot, a program that trains members of the community in bystander intervention to help prevent instances of power-based personal violence. That day, Blow and his teammates were wearing green dots on their helmets to show support for the program. He said Green Dot has been incredibly important to him and, in that moment, the banner served as a reminder of the need to take action.
“In that situation, I thought, ‘nobody is a bystander,’ ” he said. “You are either part of the solution, or you’re not. I saw that Green Dot banner and I thought, ‘I have the option here to either be part of the solution today, or not be part of the solution today.’”
After that realization, he got down on one knee, ignored his surroundings, and focused his eyes on the woman singing the anthem.
“Going in, my focus was on playing and winning the game, but for that moment I was also making that stand and I wasn’t worried in that moment," he said. "I was sure of what I was doing as I did it.”
Blow was then joined by one of the team’s running backs, Diego Meritus ’19, who is also black. The two had been linking arms during the anthem throughout the season, and had previously discussed the possibility of taking a knee.
Meritus did not respond to an interview request.
As the two players knelt on the sidelines, first-year running back Charlie Ferguson ’21 stood beside Blow and placed a hand on his teammate’s shoulder.
“Diego and Ian are standout guys. I have a great amount of respect for them both,” Ferguson said. “When they took a knee I fully supported the statement they were making and wanted to show my support. In the moment I figured the best way for me to do this was [by putting] my hand on their shoulder.”
From there, they took to the field and focused on football. After the game, Blow and Meritus discussed their decision with coach Bob Ritter, who, according to Blow, supported their right to express themselves in this way, but wished they had let him know prior to kick-off.
“I definitely agree with him there. The best way to have gone about it would have been to have a conversation first and then done the protest,” Blow said. “I didn’t apologize for kneeling. I admitted that I could have done it in a better way, but I did what I thought was right.”
“I respect their decision to kneel during the national anthem,” Coach Ritter told The Campus. “They wanted to make a statement about race and inequality, and they made it clear to their coaches and teammates that they weren’t protesting the military, our country, or the national anthem.”
According to Blow, his teammates were understanding of his and Meritus’ decision, and even those who disagreed did so in a way that did not tarnish friendships, or affect the team. Ritter agreed.
“We have always tried to foster an atmosphere of respect and inclusivity on our team. Although some of our players expressed various viewpoints on this subject, our discussions were thoughtful and respectful, and our players were supportive of each other,” he said.
Earlier in the year, during the team’s preseason, the coaching staff asked the players to gather in small groups and answer the question, “What do you think of when you listen to the national anthem?” Blow used that time to reflect.
“I feel incredibly proud to be a part of a nation that gives us so many opportunities and freedoms that we take for granted every single day. At the same time, I acknowledge that we also live in a flawed nation, where there is a lot of injustice,” Blow said. “And that’s why I felt sure I was doing the right thing because that’s what I think every time I hear the anthem. And I feel like taking a knee is part of that progress towards a better United States.”
Blow emphasized his deep respect for members of the military, and that his decision to protest is meant to highlight systemic, racial injustice, not disrespect those who serve.
For the rest of the season, Blow and Meritus continued to protest. The following week, they played and protested at Bates without incident. However, the following week, at an Oct. 28 home game against Trinity, someone in the stands began heckling Blow and Meritus, telling them to stand up and respect the flag. The tirade ended with the man using a racial slur.
“He yelled, ‘n–gger.’ Initially, when he started heckling, I was a little flustered,” Blow said. “But as soon as he said, ‘n–gger,’ I was immediately sure of what I was doing.”
For Blow, the incident showcased the kind of bigotry that he and others who protest are trying to expose.
“Racial hatred and discrimination [exist]. And it’s in our community,” he said. “That’s what taking a knee is all about — facilitating a discussion and making you see that there is a racial undertone to our politics and our policing that negatively affects black people.”
The team’s final game against Tufts took place on Nov. 11, Veterans Day. As he prepared for the game, Blow grappled with how to protest in a way that could not be perceived as disrespecting those who served. After researching how to properly salute a member of the military, he came up with his plan. On game-day, as the national anthem played, Blow did not face the flag, opting instead to stand and salute a member of the military who was in attendance.
Blow said he does not tend to seek the spotlight, which is why he waited more than a month to talk on the record for this article. But he is interested in engaging in conversations with members of the Middlebury community about issues related to race.
His and Meritus’ decision to protest comes at a time when issues of race have dominated not only national discussions, but also those on campus. Events like a student’s alleged incident of racial profiling, racially charged vandalism and the aftermath of the student-led protests of Charles Murray have sparked campus-wide conversations about race and class, and systemic problems that many feel the college has failed to address.
“I see problems happen on campus and I look at them through a societal lens,” he said. “I see things happen and I’m not upset with Middlebury or the Middlebury community, I’m just recognizing even more that there are problems in our society that we have to deal with.”
“In a way, me kneeling for those societal issues, is me kneeling for those problems we face at Middlebury,” he said.
(12/07/17 12:23am)
While some see opportunity for self-reflection amidst nature and solitude among Vermont’s idyllic landscapes , others see entirely different opportunities. This December marks the ten-year anniversary of the destruction of Robert Frost’s historic cabin in Ripton. In 2007 a group of high school students threw a party at the cabin, which is located on a plot of land that now belongs to Homer Noble Farm.
According to current Public Safety Investigator and former Police Sergeant Lee Hodsden, the idea for the party came from a seventeen-year-old employee of the college, who asked an older friend to buy five thirty-racks of beer for the occasion. Word spread, and close to fifty teenagers arrived at the cabin, colloquially called “Frost Farm,” on a cold winter evening. As the night progressed, the party grew out of control, resulting in broken furniture, urine and vomit on the carpets and an estimated $10,000 of damage.
Hodsden responded to the case after a hiker called the police about the damage when passing through the farm.
According to Hodsden, the students had shown a fair amount of determination in getting to the cabin: they had parked at the bottom of the hill by the Robert Frost Interpretive Trail and walked all the way up to the cabin through the snow. In the frigid winter weather, one vehicle had gotten stuck in a ditch near the Interpretative Trail and was left behind by its owner. Hodsden ran the license plate number and linked it to a high school student. Through that individual, Hodsden was able to identify many of the people who had attended the party and pieced together what had happened. Nearly thirty teens were charged with trespassing.
According to a Washington Post article published at the time, the prosecutor in the case had an unusual idea for a potential punishment, which the judge supported. They contacted Jay Parini, a professor of English and creative writing, and asked if he would teach the partiers a course on Frost’s poetry.
Parini, who himself had lived in the cabin when he taught at Bread Loaf in the summer, felt a personal stake in the issue and accepted the job.
“I remember being quite upset when I heard, first on the radio, that the Frost House had been overrun by high school kids who had been partying there and caused quite a bit of damage and nearly burned the place down,” he said.
Every student accepted the deal and enrolled in Parini’s special course. Parini said he met the students for several weeks in a public building and tried to get the students to reflect on how Frost’s poetry may be applicable to their own lives. For instance, one of Parini’s lessons involved an analysis of “The Road Not Taken.”
“[I] suggested to them that they stood at a crossroad in their lives, and that this is not uncommon, and that we’re always making choices that will affect us, often in ways we can’t foresee,” he said.
Not everybody in the community was on board with this non-traditional sentence. Edward Brown, an innkeeper at Bread Loaf during the School of English, had his doubts about the efficacy about the punishment. “I, for one, didn’t like the idea of having writing as a punishment because it taught them that writing is something you do when you’re bad or wrong,” he said. Brown also noted that the cabin’s destruction led to fundraising efforts by the college and Paul Muldoon to endow the property and help restore it.
Despite some pushback, however, Parini said that he thinks that this restorative justice practice was effective. He notes that before his class, some of the perpetrators did not know who Robert Frost was. He also remembers being surprised by the amount of press coverage his class received at the time. “I was a bit startled by the presence of reporters, who sat at the back of the room and spread the story. On the Associated Press wire it went around the world,” he said. “I think it was a big human interest story. Even the New York Times ran an editorial about this event.”
For Parini, though, his role in teaching these students about the importance of Frost and his poetry was personal.
“For me, the Frost House and cabin on the property are a sacred place. I wrote a biography of Frost, and continue to read and teach Frost every year,” he said. “I live in his poetry, which informs the world around me here in Vermont. So the fact that Frost lived here, and was part of Middlebury, where I’ve been teaching for nearly four decades, means a great deal to me.”
(12/07/17 12:19am)
The women’s basketball team (7–0) defeated Rensselaer (5–3) on Thursday, Nov. 30, 64–54 and Colby-Sawyer (4–1) the next night in overtime by a score of 66–59. On Tuesday, Dec. 5, Middlebury beat Plattsburgh St. 60–33 to move to 7–0, its best start since the 2001-2002 season when the Panthers won their first nine games.
Thursday’s night opener was a special one, as the Panthers’ first home game of the season. The Engineers were firing on all cylinders in the first quarter, taking a 9–2 lead within the first five minutes. The Panthers quickly adjusted their defense and were able to find an offensive spark from Betsy Knox ’20, who finished the quarter with eight points on three of three shooting.
At the start of the second quarter, it was clear that the Panthers were dictating the tempo, finding stops on the defensive end and continuously feeding the ball to Knox, who continued her scoring streak. Unselfish plays by guard Alex Huffman ’19 and Sarah Kaufman ’18 set Knox up to convert three consecutive layups. The Panthers ended the first half with a comfortable six point lead, 29–23, over the Engineers, while Knox finished the half with 17 points.
The halftime talk in their locker room lifted the spirits of the Engineers as they looked more tenacious on the defensive end at the beginning of the second half. The Panthers were a bit overwhelmed as they struggled to space the floor and scored only six points in the third. Rensselaer ended the quarter on a 6–0 run, gaining their first lead since the start of the first quarter. Jumpers from Sabrina Weeks ’18 and free-throws by Maya Davis ’20 kept the score tight. Going into the fourth quarter, Rensselaer led 36–35.
The fourth quarter was huge for the Panthers as they outscored the Engineers by 11, including three consecutive three-pointers — one by Huffman and two by Weeks. A 16–5 run ensued for Middlebury, and the Engineers had no choice but to force the Panthers to line. The Panthers converted nine of their ten free throw attempts in the fourth, securing a comfortable 64–54 win in their first home game. Knox finished with a game high 23 points and Huffman tallied all 13 of her points in the fourth quarter.
Back on the road the next day, the Panthers travelled east to New Hampshire to take on the Chargers of Colby-Sawyer. The Chargers finished the first quarter with a 7–2 run to take an 18–10 advantage. Within the first few minutes of the second, Colby-Sawyer established the game’s biggest lead by either side at 13, with a 25–12 lead. Then the comeback began, spurred purely by Middlebury’s offensive tenacity as the Panthers went on a 15-4 run to cut the lead to 29–27 at the halfway point.
The third quarter saw a flurry of exchanges from both sides with neither side gaining a lead larger than four points. Entering the fourth quarter with a narrow 44-42 point advantage, Davis hit a three and Kaufman nailed a jump shot to give the Panthers a seven point lead. After a few scoreless possessions with the score tied at 54, Davis gave the Panthers a two-point lead with a layup with less than a minute remaining. The Panthers forced up a three-pointer with less than 20 seconds on the clock. The Chargers rebounded the basketball and managed to push it up the court, where Tianna Sugars hit a game-tying jumper with just .9 seconds on the clock. With Middlebury unable to find a shot off the inbounds pass, the bout was scored in overtime.
The Panthers went on to dominate the overtime period, outscoring the Chargers 10–3. Knox opened the scoring with a 3-pointer and Huffman provided another from downtown later in the period. The threes, along with some free throws, iced the game for the Panthers, who took home a 66–59 win.
Davis had a career-high in both points and rebounds with 14 in each statistical category. Her aggressiveness on the boarsd with nine offensive rebounds helped Middlebury outscore Colby-Sawyer on second point chances 15-8. The eight additional rebounds over the opposition proved to be crucial in Friday’s win.
On Tuesday night, Middlebury squashed Plattsburgh State at home 60–33. In the second and third quarters, the Panthers outscored the Cardinals 40–14. Davis led the way with 16 points and eight rebounds, while Emily Wander ’21 and Kira Waldman ’20 both scored seven off the bench. The Panther defense held the Cardinals below 22 percent shooting from the field.
Middlebury returns to the court tonight when it hosts Sage at 7 p.m. Then, the Panthers will travel to Skidmore tomorrow night, Friday, Dec. 8, to play the Thoroughbreds in their final game before final exams.
(12/07/17 12:14am)
Re “Response to 'Response to Setting the Record Straight’” (online, Dec. 1)
The academic department at Arizona State University that I direct — the School of Civic & Economic Thought and Leadership (SCETL) — received an email from Middlebury faculty member Kevin Moss, inviting our school to “correct” the putative falsehoods he describes in his Campus posting about a February event at ASU with Middlebury professor Allison Stanger and a Reed College professor, on controversies about speech and speakers on college campuses.
We are accused of “distort[ing] the record” of the Charles Murray events at Middlebury in March 2017 and “play[ing] into the dominant narrative used to defame the college.”
Professor Moss may not realize that the director of this ASU School happens to be a 1989 Middlebury College graduate; that I returned to the College as a faculty member from 1996 to 1998; that I have stayed in touch with Middlebury mentors and friends in the 20 years I have lived out west; that I am grateful to have visited my alma mater occasionally; and that my wife and I encouraged our two children to apply to Middlebury.
It is true that as a proud alum, and professor, I have followed the news and commentary about the Charles Murray episode and its aftermath with greater care than the typical American academic might have done. Nonetheless, our school’s February event with professor Stanger was not my idea, but was proposed to us by a professor from ASU’s Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communications; and he did so without knowledge of my deep Middlebury connections.
The topics that professor Stanger and Reed professor Lucía Martínez Valdivia will address are of national interest. Further, this event is part of a series our school has organized — with co-sponsorship from ASU’s O’Connor College of Law and the Cronkite School — on “Freedom of Speech and Intellectual Diversity in Higher Education and American Life.”
We have assembled a range of viewpoints, from those who advocate restricting speech and speakers to those holding a more traditional First Amendment view about latitude and protection for campus discourse. Information about the series, including a two-day conference, is on our school’s website under “Events” — and a reasonable observer would conclude that we seek civil debate in an academic setting, open for anyone to attend, about these important national issues.
One more point of context: Fairness requires disclosure that I have publicly stated my views about the significance of the Charles Murray episode, and the college’s response to it, in an opinion essay I co-authored with five other Middlebury alums who became professors in various academic fields. That essay appeared in RealClearPolitics on June 1 and is readily available. At least half of the authors would consider themselves politically liberal or progressive; and it would take quite sophisticated efforts to discern therein any intent to defame or polemicize.
Finally, to the accusations: While I respect, as a Middlebury alum and friend of the college, the professor’s concern about accurate representations of the college and events there, we will have to agree to disagree about the many matters of interpretation involved. I would not retract a word of the brief description our school provided to advertise this dialogue event about the Murray episode and its aftermath.
That description obviously is not the final word on these events and their significance. That said, there is nothing false or distorting about it, even if it necessarily compresses a complicated episode.
The fundamental facts about this episode, evident in many journalistic and eyewitness reports — and in investigations by the college and the town police that followed — are that a speaker invited through normal college procedures was forcefully prevented from speaking in the originally invited venue; that similar use of force and noise continued in an effort to disrupt the backup venue provided to the speaker and professor Stanger; and finally that these preliminary episodes of force led to open violence later in the day.
It is odd to accuse our school of distorting the record when the alternative account would omit the fundamental fact about forcefully preventing a scheduled speaker event from unfolding as invited and as originally planned.
One of the prerequisite conditions for higher learning is civility in expressing disagreements about ideas, whether abstract and theoretical or practical and political. I understand that there are disagreements about the meaning and reasonable interpretations of the Middlebury events at issue. However, unreasonable accusations of the sort proffered here don’t sustain or replenish the civility needed at Middlebury and all other serious places of learning.
Paul Carrese ’89 is an author and academic.
(12/07/17 12:12am)
In their only game of the week, men’s basketball ran past Plattsburgh State 92–68 on Tuesday, Dec. 5. The Panthers, who climbed up to second in the national poll, moved to 5–0, entering their matchup with No. 16 Skidmore on Friday, Dec. 8.
Middlebury took an early 15–4 lead in the first ten minutes of the first half on Tuesday, led by stout defense and some cold shooting by Plattsburgh State. The Cardinals made only two of their first 17 shots. The Panthers extended their first half lead to as many as 14 points when they took a 37–23 lead with 1:58 left, but Plattsburgh St. ended the half on a 7–1 run to cut the deficit to eight.
The Cardinals continued to creep closer to the Panthers out of the break, scoring the first four points to make it a four-point game. Middlebury responded with a 21–3 run to put the Cardinals in a hole they could not climb out of. After a tough first half when he made only two of his eight shots from the field, Matt Folger ’20 heated up in that stretch, going on a 9–0 run of his own.
The Panthers extended their lead to as many as 27, but the game remained pretty even and ended in a 91–68 Middlebury victory.
Middlebury got going from deep and hit nine of their 18 three-point attempts in the second half, including three from Griffin Kornaker ’21. Kornaker made his first appearance in the blue and white, after suffering a preseason injury and sitting out the first four games of the season.
He was one of five Panthers in double figures on Tuesday, finishing with 11 points, while Daly and Folger both scored a game-high 14. Daly added nine assists and eight rebounds, and Folger tallied his second double-double of the season with 11 rebounds. Jack Farrell ’21 scored a career-high 12 points on five of six shooting, and Hilal Dahleh ’19 tallied 13 points on five of seven shooting.
Next up for the Panthers is the Skidmore game on Friday, Dec. 8 at Saratoga Springs, New York. The Thoroughbreds have proven to be a tough challenge in year’s past. Last year, Middlebury eked out a 72–71 victory, but the season before, Skidmore won 82–77. Three season ago, Middlebury won by one as well, 57–56.
This season, both teams enter the matchup undefeated, Middlebury at 5–0 and Skidmore at 6–0.
(11/30/17 12:22am)
On Wednesday, Dec. 6, Showing Up for Racial Justice (SURJ) and Middlebury’s Marquis Theater on 65 Main Street will present the second installment of “Seeing Color/Seeking Justice,” billed as “a racial identities/racial justice film series.”
The screenings, which take place on the first Wednesday of every month at 4 p.m. and 7 p.m., aim to educate Vermonters and visitors about current and historical injustices done to black Americans and people of color and how these manifest in the local community, while raising funds to support local anti-racist organizations.
Next week’s film, “Loving,” delves into the history of interracial marriage in the U.S. It is a fictionalized story of the relationship between Richard and Mildred Loving, plaintiffs in the 1967 Supreme Court case (Loving v. Virginia), which overruled state laws that prohibited interracial marriage. This year marks only the 50th year since this landmark Supreme Court decision. In a recent New York Times movie review, “Loving” is described as “startling” due to its “insistent, quotidian quiet” — “it was the absolute ordinariness of their love that defined them [Richard and Mildred], and that made the fight for it into an indelible story of this country.”
“Rumble,” shown in November as the first film of the series, is a documentary about how Native Americans of Canada and the U.S. influenced rock ’n’ roll in America. The proceeds from the screening went to support the effort led by the Vermont Abenaki Tribe to replace Columbus Day permanently with Indigenous Peoples’ Day in the state.
“We have a two-pronged mission,” said Joanna Colwell, one of SURJ’s Middlebury organizers, “to educate white folks in our community about how white supremacy and bigotry harm everyone, and to funnel money toward Black Lives Matter and Migrant Justice.”
SURJ Middlebury is a chapter of a national network of groups and individuals organizing white people for racial justice. According to the 2010 Census, Vermont is 95.3 percent white, making it one of the whitest states in the country.
As Bernie Sanders’ home state, Vermont is considered by many to be “a liberal, progressive state,” as Colwell said, “but liberals and progressives have a tremendous amount of work to do to understand [our] own privilege and begin to dismantle racist ideas in our own minds, as well as in our communities. We will not succeed in uprooting institutional racism without making an effort to understand it.”
Colwell also addressed the current challenge on the college’s campus of getting people who would not otherwise self-select to show up — faculty, staff, students and administrators alike — engaged in the push for racial justice.
SURJ Middlebury hopes to tackle this “crisis of empathy,” as Colwell labels it, and acknowledge the truth of racial inequity and violence in our country. This film series provides one means of doing what Colwell aims to do.
“I feel like great films can be a powerful way to increase empathy,” said Colwell.
Ben Wells, owner of the Marquis Theatre, reported in the Addison County Independent that “seeing movies brings us together as a community and can show us aspects of ourselves that may have been hidden [to us].”
Wells, Colwell and fellow SURJ organizer Kathy Comstock chose the films for the series after putting on multiple showings of “I Am Not Your Negro” in March of 2017. SURJ and The Marquis Theater are promoting this year’s film series through local papers, faith communities, social media and flyers around town and on campus to achieve maximum attendance.
“We hear the voices on campus (students and faculty of color) who feel like Middlebury has not been an inclusive or welcoming environment, especially after the Murray fiasco. We are always looking for ways to listen better and amplify those voices,” said Colwell. The SURJ organizer acknowledged that the group’s efforts are imperfect. They welcome input about how they can do better.
SURJ Middlebury emphasizes the recognition of past injustices and the lived experiences of people of color in order to build a society free of discrimination and racial violence. The racial justice film series attempts to create a wider audience for this mission.
The recommended contribution for moviegoers is $10. The funds donated at the screening of “Loving” will go in part to the Rokeby Museum in Ferrisburgh, Vermont, which presents “Free & Safe: The Underground Railroad in Vermont,” an exhibit tracing an important story of two slaves battling for freedom in the decades leading up to the Civil War. Though there will not be a screening in January, the film series at the Marquis will continue in February with “Whose Streets” (2017), a documentary showcasing the Ferguson uprising and the global movement responding to the killing of 18-year-old Michael Brown. The film, directed by activists Sabaah Folayan and Damon Davis, draws attention to police brutality in St. Louis County and the greater U.S.
In March, the documentary “Step” (2017) will be shown. Director Amanda Lipitz follows the lives of three seniors of the first graduating class at the Baltimore Leadership School for Young Women and their struggles to get to and graduate from college. The stories of the individuals in this documentary intertwine through their participation on their school’s step dance team in the wake of the death of Freddie Gray.
In April, the project will show “Dolores” (2017), the story of a lesser-known activist in U.S. history: Dolores Huerta. Huerta is a feminist and, along with Cesar Chavez, cofounder of the first farmworkers’ union. At 87, she is still fighting for racial and social justice. “Dolores” illustrates the challenges she faced in her fight for social equity in the 20th century.
The final movie in the series, “Little Boxes” (2017), will be shown in May. Despite comedic overtones, the movie touches on themes relevant to life in Middlebury, given that Vermont is one of the whitest states in the U.S. The film tells the fictional story of a biracial family who moves from Brooklyn to Rome, a predominantly white town in rural Washington, exploring the family’s difficulties adjusting to a different living situation and social context.
Students interested in this project should be on the lookout for advertisements for upcoming screenings.
(11/30/17 12:18am)
Last March, student-led protests of Charles Murray garnered nationwide media coverage, much of which fell into an ongoing debate over the state of free speech on college campuses. Of particular note was “Free Inquiry on Campus,” a statement of principles first published in The Wall Street Journal in March and signed by over 100 Middlebury faculty, which emphasized a commitment to free speech and condemned the protests as “coercive.”
In the weeks that followed, however, another faculty group emerged, which framed the debate in decidedly different terms. A caucus of several dozen faculty members, calling themselves the Middlebury Faculty for an Inclusive Community, first announced its formation in a May op-ed in The Campus, which outlined the group’s principles.
The statement includes a call for “active resistance” against discrimination, and a defense of civil disobedience as “a necessary means to reorganize and redefine the values and relationships that make up a community.” While stressing the importance of both freedom of speech and inclusivity, the caucus asserts that “such freedom comes with the obligation that it be exercised responsibly, especially when offering the platform of our campus to outside speakers who may undermine our culture of inclusivity — symbolically or otherwise.”
The group has since submitted two additional op-eds. The first, in September voiced support for Addis Fouche-Channer ’17, following a report by The Campus into her racial profiling claim against a Public Safety officer. The second condemned the racially-charged imagery found on a chalkboard in Munroe Hall earlier this month, and called upon senior administrators to apologize to Fouche-Channer and withdraw the September finding by the Title IX office that a preponderance of evidence indicated she had attended the Murray protests.
Today, the caucus exists primarily in the form of an email list, which comprises roughly 50 faculty members. Jason Mittell, a professor of film and media culture who serves as a spokesman for the group said that many members shared a belief that the dominant narrative unfairly portrayed the protests as an unqualified violation of free speech.
“People started gathering into an affinity group of faculty who were concerned about students, and were dismayed by the PR push to frame everything as a free speech issue,” Mittell said. “That began a series of emails which then turned into an email list which then turned into more of an organization.”
The Free Inquiry statement published in the Journal was a particular cause of dissatisfaction. Some faculty nicknamed the document “The Loyalty Oath,” because of what they viewed as an unfair assumption that a decision not to sign constituted an ideological statement against the principles of free expression.
“The way many in the college community understood that statement was either you sign it, or you’re actively not signing it,” Mittell said. “A number of us, myself included, were really put off by that, not necessarily because there was anything wrong with the principles in the abstract, but in the practicality it felt like that was not the right response,” Mittell said.
“The events of March 2 were multifaceted,” said Maggie Clinton, a history professor also on the caucus. “As many have noted, they were as much about race and power on and off campus as they were about free speech, but the free speech aspect has received by far the most national attention.”
In that vein, the first active step taken by the caucus was to successfully oppose a motion introduced at a faculty meeting in April to add a “Freedom of Expression Policy” to the College handbook — a step viewed by members of the caucus as premature.
“I think most of us thought this was way too soon — it was forcing things and it was really a divisive wedge,” Mittell said. “I think that’s when this group formed into something more than just a series of dispersed emails, and [instead] said collectively, ‘Can we come up with a strategy to push back against this?”
Of the 50 faculty members on the caucus’s email list, only 23 are listed on the group’s website, which can be accessed at go.middlebury.edu/inclusivecommunity. Mittell believes that some members are hesitant to state their involvement because other faculty have discouraged them from getting involved.
“There have been instances where we know of untenured faculty members who have gotten pressure from colleagues being told not to be too outspoken about political issues on campus,” he said.
While Mittell is not aware of explicit threats concerning tenure, he thinks the nature of the system forces faculty to be careful in this regard.
“Part of the whole tenure system is it’s a gauntlet that you have to run, and depending on your department and who’s on the college-wide tenure committee, there can be a sense of risk aversion,” he said.
The caucus plans to pursue a multifaceted approach by working with faculty, students and the town of Middlebury to achieve its aims.
“This isn’t just about what happens on our campus. This is about what’s happening to faculty, staff and students in town,” said Shawna Shapiro, a professor in the linguistics program who is a member of the caucus.
“We’ve been having some discussion about how to work with groups like SURJ [Showing Up for Racial Justice], which is a community-based group focused on racial justice, to think about ways for us to more directly talk with the town about issues of concern… instead of expecting the college to be our spokesperson,” she added.
The caucus is also considering offering a variety of events on campus next semester.
“There’s talk of doing a teach-in in the spring, there’s talk of sponsoring a series of lectures or more of a symposium event,” Mittell said.
“And maybe doing some more vocal protests that might involve students, or something more public to galvanize the energy and focus the discussion.” Shapiro added.
The caucus took what Mittell describes as its first “proactive” steps on Nov. 3, by presenting recommendations to the administration in a motion entitled “Moving Forward On Diversity Practices.” The motion passed with 113 faculty voting in favor, eight against, and one abstaining.
“Behind the scenes, members of our group had met with members of the administration and student groups, had done things to try to provide support and engage issues, but that was our first attempt to say these are four concrete things that we believe can be done which we think will help move us forward,” Mittell said.
“While statements of support and denunciation remain important, we have to go beyond words,” said Usama Soltan, a professor of Arabic, and another caucus member. “In the absence of clear and tangible progress on such issues, statements eventually start to ring hollow.”
As a result of the motion’s passing, the recommendations went to the administration for review and potential implementation. Given the stated support of several administrators, multiple caucus members expressed an expectation that the administration will pursue all of the components.
(11/30/17 12:14am)
The women’s and men’s cross country teams capped off their seasons at the NCAA Championships on Saturday, Nov. 18, hosted by Principia College in Elsah, Illinois. In fields of 32, both teams finished in the top half of the competition. The women’s team finished 11th with a score of 400 points, and the men’s team 15th with a score of 416.
The top three teams in the women’s championship were new national champion, Johns Hopkins, with 96 points, Wisconsin–Eau Claire with 191 points, and Washington University with 202.
Abigail Nadler ’19 led Middlebury with a time of 21:00.9, only 21 seconds off the pace set by the top finisher. Nadler’s time earned her a seventh-place finish in a race of 279 runners, as well as All-American honors for the third straight season.
Rory Kelly ’19 crossed the line in 22:09.3 and Katherine MacCary ’19 came in at 22:20.7. Meg Wilson ’20 and Read Allen ’18 rounded out Middlebury’s scoring with respective times of 22:47.9 and 22:50.
On the men’s side, North Central were crowned the new national champs as they finished with a team score of 57. North Central was followed by Wisconsin-LaCrosse which recorded 196 points, and Christopher Newport with a score of 221.
Ascencion Aispuro ’18 led Middlebury by crossing the finish line in 32nd-place out of 279 runners with a time of 24:54.26. Aispuro earned All-American honors for his finish.
“Earning All-American was a perfect way to go out as a senior,” said Aispuro. “Coming from an immigrant family, this honor means a lot for my family and me. I am a first generation college student and first generation American so reaching an honor this high makes my parents’ sacrifices beyond worth it. It’s a great payoff for countless miles, hill repeats, and hours in the gym.”
Next up for Middlebury were Matt D’Aquila ’21 and Theo Henderson ’20 who finished with respective times of 25:26.91 and 25:45.33. Then came Harrison Knowlton ’19 with a time of 25:47.48. Knowlton was followed by the team’s last scorer, Miles Meijer ’19 who finished in 25:49.55.
“Everyone on the team did very well,” Aispuro said. “We’ve been progressing all season and nationals was a good cap to it all. Everyone stepped up, especially with an alternate change with less than an hour to go to start time. The women went hard, literally bleeding through the race after a spiking incident. Everyone was in a good mood and we were all happy to end the season improving our position from last year’s result.”
However, Aispuro also showed how the team is making sure to look ahead and stay motivated.
“Overall we did very well, there is always room for improvement. We simply can’t be content,” said Aispuro. “The first-years on the team are very energetic and I hope they keep that up for their entire careers. We’re a young team so our future really depends on them.”
