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(11/14/19 6:03pm)
Hidden among the grey folds of the Freeman International Center — a bunker-like building known for its brutalist exterior — the YouPower spinning studio might just be a quintessential “diamond in the rough.” The blacked-out 1500 square foot studio has everything you’d expect in a fully-functioning “soul-cycle”-esque pain-cave: riders in bright lycra uniforms, massive speakers, racks of spin shoes, colored dumbbells, folded towels, floor candles, and, in the middle of it all, 22 well-oiled spin bikes.
“Once you get to the studio, the instructors do everything,” said YouPower co-president Anna Hubbell ’19.5, who teaches classes on Monday afternoons and Tuesday mornings. YouPower offers over 19 cumulative hours of instructor-led spin sessions every week, an activity that promises enough EDM and sweat to last you the entire semester.
However, the YouPower of today is unlike what is used to be. The idea to turn the Freeman International Center space into a spin studio was conjured after the organization’s original concept came to fruition — a project to increase energy awareness on campus. In 2012, a group of Middlebury students received money to create a spin-bike system that stored energy in a generator. At the time, YouPower leadership led events like Watt-a-thons, where participants tried to produce as much power as possible in a session. After a few years, however, this initial experiment died out, as the power-generation component of the studio became less of a focus. YouPower’s advisor, Franklin Dean-Farrar, cited that the spin bikes were able to generate an underwhelming amount of energy, which led to disinterest. The studio then became, in essence, a satellite workout room where students could spin when they wanted to without trekking to the athletic center.
“The YouPower room really provided, and still provides, a workout space across campus,” said Dean-Farrar, who has been involved with the organization since its founding. Both Dean-Farrar and Hubbell stressed the importance of the studio being across campus from the athletic center.
“The founders thought it would be a good idea to keep it on the other side of campus as an alternate space for people who didn’t feel comfortable going to the gym or for people who live far away from the athletic center,” Hubbell said.
YouPower was still undergoing drastic changes when Hubbell and co-president Andi Evans ’19.5 became involved with the organization. It was moving towards a more organized form of spinning, one that involved instructor-led classes, loud music, and a brand that focused on personal development and well-being. This is the YouPower of today.
INCREASING POPULARITY
In the last few years, YouPower ridership has increased significantly.
“YouPower has become more of a household name across campus,” Hubbell said, citing the increased number of riders and instructors involved since she came to Middlebury College. “It’s been really exciting seeing a ton more students walk in through the day, and seeing full and waitlisted classes. YouPower is definitely on peoples’ minds as a way to work out during the day.”
Isla Bowery ’20.5 said that she started spinning her sophomore year, and since has regularly attended YouPower sessions multiple times a week.
“There was a learning curve [at first],” she said, “but you just have to jump into the deep end.” Bowery said that even though she felt a little intimidated at first, she enjoys the fact that in the studio you can still concentrate on your own performance. “Everyone is so focused on their [own riding]; you’re not in a spotlight like you are in the weight rack in the gym,” she said.
One reason for YouPower’s increased success as a spin studio has been the recent efforts by leadership to decrease financial barriers to entry. Recently, YouPower’s $17,000 annual budget has been used to buy new spin bikes and buy equipment for participants to use. In the summer of 2018, the studio received a donation of around 40 pairs of spinning shoes.
“As presidents, Andi and I have tried to make YouPower accessible for everyone on this campus,” Hubbell said. To further increase accessibility, YouPower has tried to get their name out into the campus community as a fully-equipped spin-studio free of charge. The group started going to club fairs in the fall of 2018, which Hubbell said has been a successful advertising strategy.
“When I started it wasn’t uncommon for less popular time-slots to only have three riders in the class,” she said, citing early morning and later afternoon classes as the most popular. “Now we are seeing those [unpopular] timeslots frequently fill up.”
Another reason for the popularity can be attributed to the collective and peer-to-peer nature of the activity, something the Dean-Farrar has witnessed as Assistant Director of Athletics for Operations and Events.
“What people are looking for is a lead-bike in the front of the room, loud music and an actual spin instructor leading the class,” Dean-Farrar said. He said there is something about group-led exercises, like YouPower, Middlebury Crossfit and yoga classes, that are popular at the college. “[Andi and Anna] have done a tremendous job with the organization,” Dean-Farrar said.
SPINNING CULTURE
YouPower has been acknowledged by some students for being intimidating, due to the fairly homogenous demographic that attends spin classes. Bowery said that she has seen more men attend classes recently, in an activity that is dominated by women. In October, the Local Noodle ran a satirical article that jokingly described YouPower as an organization that idolizes “super-hot blondes.” The Local Noodle declined to comment when asked about the motivation behind the article.
Hubbell stressed that inclusivity is one of YouPower’s top priorities.
“I want YouPower to continue to be a comfortable and welcomed space on campus, and this is something that can be constantly developed and thought about,” she said.
This year, nine instructors, or about 40% of YouPower’s leadership, will graduate, leaving a large opening for new initiative. Hubbell and Evans hope that new instructors will get involved and continue the club’s trajectory of the past several years.
“I want [YouPower] to continue to foster an environment where people feel welcome and supported and comfortable trying something new,” Hubbell said.
If there is anyone that would convince you to go to a YouPower spin session, ask Hubbell. As soon as she arrived to campus in the February of 2016, Hubbell began attending spin sessions in hopes of picking up a new athletic endeavor in lieu of tennis and field hockey, two sports she played in high school.
“After I went to a bunch of YouPower classes, I quickly realized I wanted to be an instructor,” she said. “I feel like I have a group of people to rally behind in place of being on a sports team.” As for getting new students to attend classes, she is really enthusiastic about spin. “Spin is the best workout you can ask for on a college campus,” she said. “All you have to do is get yourself there.” Likewise, Bowery praised spinning as a form of escapism. “Middlebury can be such a pressure cooker,” she said. “YouPower is very efficient and a very effective form of exercise.”
To sign up for spin classes, visit mindbody.io.
(11/14/19 11:02am)
“Hey guys, my name is Destini.”
“And my name is Megan.”
“And we are two black girls, at a predominantly white institution; trying to survive, at a predominantly white institution; and here’s the latest tea, at a predominantly white institution.”
This is how each and every episode of BLCKGRLMGC, a podcast started by Destini Armstrong ’21 and Megan Job ’21, begins. The podcast has a light-hearted tone, often filled with laughter and relatable commentary from Job and Armstrong. Alienation, inclusivity and sense of belonging — issues common to women of color at a predominately white institution (PWI) like Middlebury — are among the important themes of the podcast.
The two hosts started the podcast two years ago, during the spring of their first year on campus. Both hail from New York City, making the transition to rural, predominantly white Middlebury a uniquely challenging experience.
The podcast originated from an idea that Job’s friend had, and eventually the two decided to use podcasts as a platform to tell their stories at the college. Job believed that the value of the podcast lies in using storytelling to show the potential challenges that students of color face at a PWI. “What does it come down to? I want to talk about those tiny things that people don’t mention, such as how intimidating a group project may be and how it makes you feel so small.” Armstrong shared a similar sentiment in an interview. “I think it’s nice to know that we can put something out there that can help other people because we have heard that a lot of people are relating, that is all we want to do.” Job was glad that people find their podcast helpful. “Giving comfort to other women of color in similar situations is such a good feeling,” she said.
Armstrong and Job pick their topic through a variety of means. Sometimes topics arise from the hosts’ personal experiences. “Megan might come back and be like, ‘oh my god this made me so frustrated [and] I can’t accept it’,” Armstrong said. Other times they hope to use the platform to address underclassmen specifically because they may need more advice and help to feel more at ease on campus.
The majority of the podcast’s audience is Middlebury students, including people who are abroad. Other listeners include Armstrong and Job’s friends from home. Armstrong initially presumed that there are more people of color listening because the themes seemed more immediately relevant. She added, however, that “a lot of white students come up to us and they’re like ‘we listened to your podcast, it’s such an eye-opener.’” Associate Professor of Writing and Rhetoric Hector Vila sometimes suggests topics, and many others also pitch topics to Armstrong and Job directly.
They are open to anything as long as the topic is related to the general theme of their podcast. Some of the interesting topics the podcast has covered include interracial dating culture on campus (“Episode 5 — White is Right?”), how professors teaching to the majority of classroom leaves students from underprivileged high schools at disadvantages (“Episode 25 — Mind The Gap”) and struggles with natural hair (“Episode 12 — Hair’s the Latest Scoop”).
Their hard work has garnered much recognition. After two years, they have produced 38 episodes, and on Apple Podcast, 71 ratings give them 5/5. Further, in April 2019, Armstrong and Job were awarded The Angels Award, which honors a sophomore woman of color who demonstrates leadership, scholarship and activism. To both, it was a recognition of their excellent podcast project. “It was exciting and humbling to know that people actually listen. We went in not knowing who is going to listen but people can actually relate which we found awesome,” Armstrong said.
The production process of the podcast has changed very little over the course of the past two years. When they first started, Armstrong and Job recorded every episode with GarageBand in either person’s room and took turns editing the recording. Armstrong is currently in a class about podcasting and is learning about new methods and techniques that could improve the quality of the podcast. “But it’s always been just talking into a laptop or mic and see what comes out of that,” she said.
[pullquote speaker="Destini Armstrong" photo="" align="center" background="on" border="all" shadow="on"]When you first come to college you have this idea of what college is. You are very much hopeful that you’re going to be part of that imagination. And then it became clear that we weren’t. It was very hard to transition out of that mentality.[/pullquote]
The breadth and depth of the podcast has developed. Topics grew to cover more diverse narratives by including the voices of individuals of different races and genders, and the tone, though still passionate, comes with more sangfroid, and demonstrates their composure under circumstances and topics that can often be emotionally trying. “When you first come to college you have this idea of what college is. You are very much hopeful that you’re going to be part of that imagination. And then it became clear that we weren’t. It was very hard to transition out of that mentality,” Armstrong said when asked about the reason behind this shift in tone.
Indeed, underneath the surface of jokes and anecdotes in the first few episodes there was embedded frustration. “When we first made it in spring of freshman year, we hated it here,” Armstrong continued, “But as semesters go on, you begin to adapt to the environment and you become more accepting. As I got older, I’m handling a lot better. Acceptance gets stronger.”
As the podcast went on, the hosts took a step back to look at the bigger picture, and invited their friends to speak about their experiences. While the show is still centered on the experiences of women of color, it expanded its discussion of the themes encountered in these experiences by including a wider variety of perspectives. Specifically, they invited their white friend who transferred from Dartmouth to Columbia because of the unbearable frat culture at the former to tell her story, which raised the important question of the true meaning of fitting in (“Episode 30 — It’s Not Just Us”). “Once you realize that this is just a foundation you have and you can do so much more [beyond college], you start to really develop,” Armstrong said.
This year, as Job is studying abroad in Brazil, the traditional dynamic of the production is challenged for the first time. When asked about the future of the podcast, Armstrong and Job seemed unsure. “I think it’s definitely one step at a time,” Armstrong said, “like Meg being abroad was definitely a transition, and I will be studying abroad in China in the spring, so we don’t really know the bigger picture yet.” However, they are open to leaving the podcast to the college as a platform for people to utilize and develop upon.
“I definitely have anxiety so I can’t look at the future like that,” Job said. “But I feel like Destini and I are becoming older and we are getting more and more preoccupied with our careers. I definitely would love to keep it going, because it’s a journey that is very important.”
(11/14/19 11:02am)
Over three-quarters of Middlebury faculty come to the college with a partner. But inadequate college policies for employing these partners and integrating them into the Middlebury community have led some faculty to consider leaving, according to a survey conducted by the Faculty Council Working Group on Partner Inclusion in March.
In response to the group’s report summarizing the survey results, President Laurie Patton announced at the Nov. 8 faculty meeting the creation of a new half-time five-year position that will be specially dedicated to improving partner inclusion policy and practice.
Partner inclusion, while mainly focusing on employment, also encompasses concerns about helping partners feel part of the Middlebury community.
“Partners are not, contrary to popular belief, looking for a handout in the form of a tailored job,” wrote Sarah Laursen, assistant professor of history of art and architecture, in a 2018 internal report to the Faculty Council. “They are simply people who moved here with their partners in hopes of a better life but are continually faced with disappointment and rejection in the job search.”
Of the faculty who responded to the March survey, 90% said that an institutional partner hiring policy was important to them, and 76% came to Middlebury with a partner. Of these, there was a roughly evenly split between academic and non-academic partners.
The college’s current partner employment policy states, “Middlebury will strive to attract and retain the best faculty and staff. While doing so, Middlebury will also strive to increase the number of women and persons of color on its administration, faculty and staff.”
However, due to the lack of a robust partner inclusion policy, 18% of faculty reported that they are actively looking for other employment, according to the report. When accounting for faculty members passively searching for employment or those who have searched in the past, hypothesized the report, this figure is likely much higher.
“We moved from far away, into an isolated place with no network — a common story here — and so job hunting was difficult without having any college support,” wrote one faculty member in response to the survey. “[It] was a big letdown. The longer I’m here, the more I feel like my experience is not unique, and the college really doesn’t care about this at all.”
Issues of partner inclusion disproportionately affect female faculty, who, according to the 2008 Report of the Task Force on the Status of Women at Middlebury College, face uneven challenges in this area due to societal norms.
The report found that gender discrepancies among associate professors were due in large part to Middlebury’s partner inclusion policy, since female faculty were more likely to leave before achieving tenure if they did not think their spouses would be employed by the college or in the area. Between the fall of 1997 and the spring of 2008, 60% of departing female faculty cited spousal employment as the main reason for their resignation, while the same was true of only 10% of departing male faculty, according to the report.
Under the current policy, the dean of faculty informs new hires that they can contact Human Resources for assistance in partner employment. However, 92% of the respondents to the survey said that they did not receive any support, though many tried.
Another respondent to the survey expressed dissatisfaction with the way their partner was treated when he applied for a job at the college after the respondent was hired.
“When my partner did apply for a position that he was well-qualified for, he was treated poorly by the HR process — long delays between app submission and first interview, and then before the second interview, with little communication in between, and long lag before final rejection,” the faculty member wrote. “We are not alone. A colleague in my area had a similar experience with her partner. Neither partner has any interest in reapplying to Midd.”
The lack of partner inclusion affects faculty morale, creates problems in drawing talented prospective candidates and takes a psychological toll on both faculty and their partners, according to Assistant Professor of Environmental Studies Merrill “Mez” Baker-Medard. Baker-Medard is a member of the Faculty Council Working Group on Partner Inclusion.
“Every day, we faculty come home from our dream jobs to our demoralized partners, and we feel miserable that our success comes at the cost of their self-worth,” wrote Laursen in the 2018 internal report to the Faculty Council. “The constant job search and the stress of trying to survive on less income … puts a strain on our relationships, and we come to resent the College too.”
The lack of prospects for faculty partners causes heightened turnover of faculty and can also deter new professors from taking jobs at the college. This creates extra work for hiring committee members and causes financial waste within the hiring process, according to Kristina Sargent, another member of the Faculty Council Working Group on Partner Inclusion and Assistant Professor of Economics.
“I find it ironic that the school is so obsessively cutting budgets while they spend who knows how much on recruiting to replace faculty who would have stayed if their partners could have found even marginally satisfactory employment nearby,” responded one faculty member to the working group’s survey.
According to Baker-Medard, faculty have raised concerns about the college’s faculty partner inclusion policy for the last 25 years with little to no change resulting.
“While my experience was over a decade ago, it looks like little has changed,” responded one faculty member to the survey.
“The people we are hiring as professors today are not the same as 30 years ago when the model was originally set up,” said Sargent. “The world is just different, so the policy should be different.”
Following the group’s report and its presentation to the faculty in September, Patton negotiated with a donor to secure funding for the new five-year position. The Faculty Council Working Group on Partner Inclusion hopes to work with administration and faculty to design the job description for this role and finalize the hire by the end of this academic year, according to Baker-Medard.
“The person who had this task before, it was one of many, many other things they did, so having a dedicated person is a big win,” Baker-Medard said. “I think it gives us a little bit of momentum. Maybe that person can also help us think about the no or low cost things we can do as well as the things we want to invest in financially in the future based on our recommendations.”
The creation of this new position addressed just one of eight recommendations from the working group’s report. These recommendations included having Human Resources proactively reach out to new hires about partner inclusion, offering courtesy interviews and introductions to partners to help them find local employment outside of the college, creating a formal process for two-year visiting appointments for partners, and creating better channels into staff positions for non-academic partners.
According to the report, “Partner employment is not just an opportunity for partners, it is also an opportunity for the College. Faculty partners are often highly skilled and readily employable.”
The working group also recommended that Middlebury put more effort into including partners in college activities and events, “revise existing partner employment guidelines into a clear and transparent partner inclusion policy” and continue allowing the Faculty Council Working Group on Partner Inclusion to address these issues.
“There’s definitely interest and a willingness and openness around these other requests, but nothing’s been concretized yet,” Baker-Medard said. “I think the Dean of Faculty as well as other administrators, including President Patton, are aware of the issue and thinking about it in new ways due to this report.”
(11/14/19 11:01am)
“The devil had my soul, I can’t lie,” proclaims Kanye West in “On God,” the fifth track of his long-awaited ninth studio LP, “Jesus Is King.” It is this acknowledgement of past mistakes and creative follies that underscores the thesis of West’s most recent work, the realization of his salvation as a Christian, an international superstar and a human being, just like the rest of us.
No stranger to experimentation with genres other than his native hip-hop, Kanye explores the themes, harmonies, instrumentation and lyricism of gospel music in “Jesus Is King,” taking multiple musical and lyrical risks in the meantime, albeit with mixed results. For everyone from diehard Kanye stans to those disenfranchised by his problematic outbursts (and, shall we say, political alignments), the release of this album served as a chance for Kanye to rectify his recent disappointments and serve as a reminder of his everlasting standing in the canon of modern musical greats. On some accounts, “Jesus Is King” achieves these objectives. On others, it falls short.
The album opens with “Every Hour,” the most traditional gospel song on the record, one that includes no vocals from Kanye himself. West’s Sunday Service choir provides a bright, uplifting entrance, quickly followed by a simple, yet percussive piano providing accent to the already- piercing vocals. The canon-like choral arrangement is impressive and jives for the entirety of the track, yet ends up standing in stark, even off-putting, juxtaposition to the second track, “Selah.” The transition between the two comes off as abrupt and confusing, a trend that continues as the record progresses. “Selah” enters with an ominous organ, almost reminding the listener of the darker side of church music and of Kanye’s spirituality itself.
Here, in Yeezus-like fashion, Kanye expresses his frustration with stardom, professing “I ain’t mean, I just focused.” The song builds with heroic splendor, as the gospel choir enters with a Hallelujah chorus that falls nothing short of epic.
“Follow God,” the third, and arguably most digestible, track on the record follows, opening with a sample of Whole Truth’s 1969 “Can You Lose By Following God,” specifically on the lyric “Father, I stretch my hands to you,” an allusion to West’s 2016 mega-hit, “Father, Stretch My Hands.” “Follow God” is a minute and a half of rhythmic excellence with few shortcomings other than its short length and lack of tonal evolution, not unlike many other tracks on the album. Other highlights of “Jesus Is King” include “Everything We Need,” a tour de force of harmonic production, and “Use This Gospel,” an unorthodox yet tantalizing construction of one of Kanye’s catchiest hooks, a mesmerizing Kenny G saxophone solo and the first Clipse reunion in ten years.
As “Jesus Is King” progresses, Kanye continues to incorporate elements of his past records in the production and lyrical construction of his new release. One can hear the pitched-up soul of “The College Dropout,” the resplendent orchestration of “Late Registration,” the popified techno-inspired synths of “Graduation,” the auto-tuned melancholic outbursts of “808’s and Heartbreak,” the deep, spiritual introspection of “My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy,” the rashness of “Yeezus,” the gospel of “The Life of Pablo” and the direct, seemingly unfinished nature of “ye.” It’s all there. In fact, these incorporations might be the most impressive aspect of “Jesus Is King,” as Kanye quite successfully builds on virtually every element of his impressive discography while simultaneously taking his music in a completely different direction. Very few artists can make that claim.
However, “Jesus Is King,” like virtually every Kanye project, is not without glaring flaws, the most significant of which lies in the song order. Although the album stunningly provides the listener with a fully-fledged, ever-interesting spiritual journey over the course of only 27 minutes, the majority of transitions from song to song come off as precipitous and inconsistent.
The final track, “Jesus Is Lord,” arguably the most impressive song on the album, is a masterpiece of orchestration, but one that leaves the listener begging for more. Why Kanye chose “Jesus Is Lord” to finish the album, and not open it, is confounding. Furthermore, just like his past few releases, “Jesus Is King” appears to be drastically unfinished, riddled with flagrant errors of rhythmic execution, muddled production and painfully cheesy lyrics. Kanye’s attempts at conveying his spirituality to a broader audience falls short due to his insistence on associating his faith in Jesus Christ with the collective “we,” a choice that is sure to alienate his non-Christian listeners.
Kanye’s perplexing and often exasperating antics over the past year have rendered him as an artist virtually drowning in a sea of public scrutiny, just as he was ten years ago, upon his drunken interruption of Taylor Swift’s acceptance speech at the MTV Video Music Awards. In response to that scandal, West dropped “My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy,” an album considered by most to be his magnum opus. “Jesus Is King” is emphatically not that album nor that attempt at redemption, as it falls victim to many of the inconsistencies that have plagued Kanye, both musically and personally, over the past few years. However, while it lacks the meticulous construction of his best works, “Jesus Is King” is filled with moments that remind us of the musical excellence that have escalated Kanye to the status he remains in today, arguably the most successful artist of the current century, and it is in those very moments where my gratitude lies.
(11/14/19 11:00am)
You’ve probably seen the posts: you’re scrolling through Facebook or Twitter, and a status or tweet pops up letting you know that so-and-so is “canceled.” More often than not, the statement is all you get; there isn’t any explanation as to why that person is canceled or what that might entail. Still, cancelations travel fast. In the wake of the #MeToo Movement, actors seen as problematic disappeared from Netflix shows. Comedians’ tours were postponed or scrapped altogether. In response to the R. Kelly scandal, Spotify even created a feature which allows listeners to “mute” specific artists (ensuring that they no longer appear in playlists, libraries or recommended mixes).
In short, cancel culture seems to have hit an all-time high.
On a basic level, canceling someone means refusing to engage with them. It means announcing, effectively, that someone’s beliefs and actions are beyond repair — and, as a consequence, you’re calling for their removal. This was the broader culture that came under fire recently from former President Obama, who, in an interview about youth activism, urged our generation to rethink how harshly we judge others. To clarify: in his interview, Obama criticized “call-outs” rather than “cancels,” which are a little different. “Calling out” connotes drawing attention to problematic beliefs or statements without providing a course of action for moving forward. Often, calling out is a step on the way to canceling (which, as it effectively removes any hope of moving forward, is decidedly more extreme). According to our former President, “calling out” isn’t activism.
We disagree. At least, partly. We endorse a more nuanced understanding of “calling out” and “canceling.”
Calling out and canceling aren’t inherently bad. They also aren’t all that new — in many ways, the impulse underlying call-outs or cancels is the same one behind boycotts, strikes or walkouts. By not showing up, literally or figuratively, to make space or provide a platform for certain issues and figures, you send a message. In this way, canceling can be incredibly activating; it allows you to punch up, to reclaim lost agency in the face of enormous, dehumanizing corporations and celebrities worth billions of dollars. And, more often than not, the harshness or extremity behind those cancelation statements is what lends those upward punches their very power.
Still, it’s worth interrogating the different, subtle ways that social media transforms the cancelation impulse. Online, canceling becomes all too easy: You can cancel someone or something in the time it takes to rattle off a couple of words and click “post.” The result is that, for many, canceling has become reflexive. And that reflex has extended beyond the internet and into the way that we interact with others in our day to day lives. Even in person, we’re quick to call people out. In a matter of seconds, we shut them down.
[pullquote speaker="" photo="" align="center" background="on" border="all" shadow="on"]Canceling has become reflexive. And that reflex has extended beyond the internet and into the way that we interact with others in our day to day lives.[/pullquote]
Those shut-downs become a lot more complicated at a place like Middlebury. Here, we aren’t canceling far-removed, top-tier celebrities (who, as far as most of us are concerned, only exist in the form of tweets or television guest spots). If and when we cancel at Middlebury, we’re canceling our classmates, the people we belong to clubs with or pass on College Street.
That kind of cancelation calls for a little more thought.
The last few years have seen a rise in cancelation efforts at Middlebury. We regularly call out or cancel students, professors and staff members for comments made in class or actions taken around campus. Over the past couple of years, a number of controversial speakers have been — pardon the pun — quite literally canceled. And, in December 2018, a list of “Men to Avoid” was released on Facebook (a divisive, broad-reaching cancelation effort now simply referred to as “the list”).
We’re not saying you should or shouldn’t cancel at Middlebury. That’s your call. As we’ve said, sometimes canceling can be OK, even constructive. Canceling can constitute an important form of self-defense or an attempt to send a message when other institutions fail (the “list,” for instance, was largely released in response to the administration’s inadequate efforts to address sexual assault on campus). Other times, students’, professors’ and staff members’ repeated, obvious unwillingness to uphold values of tolerance and inclusivity leave us little choice but to cancel. At a place like Middlebury, where harassment, discrimination and abuse can go woefully unaddressed by the college, voicing cancelations often forms a vital, tangible tool for change.
Still, we’d caution you to think twice before transplanting virtual cancelation impulses into your immediate, everyday lives. At Middlebury, online or in-persons cancels can have immediate, even irrevocable impacts on the way that students inhabit the college’s very small, very real space. Sometimes, those cancelations seem unavoidable. Other times, they inhibit the kinds of growth we came to Middlebury to undergo in the first place.
Unfortunately, the nature and size of Middlebury’s social scene often encourages premature canceling. Rumors spread quickly, so that their subjects are sometimes canceled before they have a chance to defend themselves. Sometimes, entire groups of people (say, sports teams or Febs) are canceled by other groups on the basis of assumptions or predictions. Situations like those don’t demand cancels. Instead, they provide vital opportunities for others to learn, to ask questions and improve their own understandings of difficult and controversial topics. There are other times, however, when the burden of education cannot and should not fall on you. Then, canceling might be the best way to send a message. It might even be the only course of activism left.
It’s worth interrogating, too, the ways in which cancels are unevenly distributed among the student body. Just as white, male celebrities bounce back faster from social media cancels (see: Louis C.K.), so too are more privileged members of the Middlebury community often given the benefit of the doubt. We need to be careful that, in wielding our own cancelation tools, we don’t simply exacerbate the already profound power disparities which exist on campus.
At the end of the day, it comes down to determining the most effective way to send a message. Ideally, that message can be sent through conversation. This is what we think Obama was getting at: Rather than simply judging, we should strive for constructive, progress-producing conversations. Ideally, those conversations precede cancelation, hopefully rendering it unnecessary.
(11/14/19 10:59am)
Most students studying abroad in Chile chose to stay in the country despite civil unrest, after the college’s study abroad office gave them the option to leave.
After protests started three weeks ago, the study abroad office first considered an evacuation of all students enrolled in Middlebury programs in Chile. On Oct. 24, it elected instead to give them several options. They could remain in Chile, relocate to Buenos Aires, Argentina or return to the United States, where they could earn partial academic credit through remote work or full credit by adding a summer language course. Students were asked to decide on a course of action by Monday, Nov. 4.
Of the 23 students enrolled in Middlebury programs in six Chilean cities, three chose to return to the United States, one chose to relocate to Buenos Aires and the remaining 19 chose to stay in Chile, according to Assistant Director of International Programs Alessandra Capossela.
Students were first asked to decide on one of the four options by Nov. 1. However, many became frustrated by what they saw as limitations in the options. To earn full credit if they went home, students would have had to complete Chilean coursework remotely, in addition to the additional course of summer language school, the cost of which would have been covered by the college. Relocating to Buenos Aires would have allowed students to earn a maximum of 3.5 credits, rather than the full four.
For many students, the easiest way to earn full credit would be to remain in Chile, where credit wasn’t a guarantee either because many universities there remain closed. In response, students called and sent emails to the study abroad office requesting more flexible ways to earn credit. Capossela responded by sending students revised options in an email on Oct. 29, which included opportunities to earn more credits in Argentina and at home without taking a language school course.
“We are hearing from some of you that you are feeling like you are forced to remain in Chile because you need to get four credits for this semester,” Capossela wrote in that email. “As I had mentioned in a previous message, it certainly was not our intention to preference staying in Chile over any of the other options.”
Capossela followed up with another email to students later that day, detailing courses organized by the study abroad office, independent of Chilean universities, that students remaining in Chile would be able to take while host universities remained closed. The five-week long intensive course focuses on social movements in Latin America and is centered on Chile.
[pullquote speaker="Mason Arndt '21" photo="" align="left" background="on" border="all" shadow="on"]
A lot of the violence has continued. We’re limited in our movements and things feel really off.[/pullquote]
“This was big for us because it means we aren’t relying on the universities to resume classes in order to get credit, something we thought was unlikely to happen,” Mason Arndt ’21 said. Arndt is living in Viña Del Mar and chose to remain there for the semester.
Along with the intensive course, students will earn half a credit for each university class they were taking (most took three or four), one letter-grade credit for internships or independent studies and one credit for a writing and culture class that was already part of the Middlebury program. With these options, students have the opportunity to earn the four credits they expected to receive at the start of the semester.
Sidra Pierson ’21 was one of 11 students living in the sister cities of Viña Del Mar and Valparaíso who signed a petition asking to remain in Chile when the study abroad office considered an evacuation in October. The guarantees of credit for remaining in Chile only made her more sure of her decision, she said.
“There was a lot I could still get out of the semester even though we’re giving up a lot of your typical study abroad experiences,” Pierson said. “Getting another month and a half at the time with my Chilean host family and friends, and speaking Spanish, it all felt worth it.”
In Santiago, Mireille Becerra ’21 agreed, saying that staying in Chile is “easiest for me compared to all other options.” Because her semester in Chile is scheduled to end on Nov. 20, she said, leaving the country made little sense.
Though Chilean president Sebastian Piñera lifted the national state of emergency on Oct. 28, protests and violent government response have continued. Students studying in the sister cities and Santiago have watched protests and police crackdowns in their neighborhoods in the past days.
“Marches with thousands of people take place both on the streets and in plazas, parks, or other commercial sectors,” Becerra wrote in an email to The Campus. “Various stores continue to be broken into or set on fire as well. Both to disperse the massive crowds and to stop the robbers, the police use tear gas and water pressure.”
In Viña Del Mar, Arndt said, protests did not ease much even after the state of emergency was lifted. On Nov. 12, Pierson watched smoke rise above the city as fires set by arsonists raged, and took video of police clashing with protesters several blocks from her homestay.
“A lot of the violence has continued,” Arndt said. “We’re limited in our movements and things feel really off. There might be an image of everything going back to normal for students who have stayed, but that’s not really the case.”
On Nov. 13, administrators in Valparaíso had to cancel a meeting of the intensive course for the second time in two weeks amid concerns about students moving between the sister cities
“We’re all feeling like, ‘how the heck are we going to get this course done in the next four weeks?’,” Pierson said.
Students scheduled to study in Chile in the spring said they have received mixed messages about whether they will be able to proceed with their semesters abroad as planned.
“I feel that things are really up in the air, and the abroad offices are not offering very clear or specific information,” said Ella Houlihan ’21, who was planning on studying in Valparaíso in the spring. Some students have filled out applications to study in other locations such as Uruguay, Argentina or Cuba.
“I opened up a second app to Buenos Aires and I’m even considering applying to an external program to Cuba last minute,” said Olivia O’Brien ’21. “I really hope to go to Santiago, though. If Middlebury runs the program in the spring, it is still my top choice.”
According to Capossela, the study abroad office is in conversations with Chile program director Juan Pastene as to options going forward for students scheduled to spend the spring semester there.
“We are planning to let Spring 2020 students know what their options will be by the beginning of December,” she wrote in an email to The Campus.
(11/14/19 10:58am)
I woke up Thursday morning to loud voices outside my door. I am not someone who enjoys being jostled from sleep by someone else’s conversation, however interesting. As a result, my internal monologue went along the lines of, “Who do these loud people think they are?”
And then I began listening to their conversation.
“It will be nice to have weekends off, now,” said one voice.
“Where were you working before this?” asked the other.
“I did security. I worked at McDonald’s for a little bit, too.”
They shared a laugh, from which I guessed that neither of them thought very highly of the employment opportunities offered by Ronald McDonald.
Then, the second voice asked, “How old are you?”
“I’m 22,” the first voice replied.
22. The person behind that voice was 22 years-old and cleaning bathrooms used by people about their age — people like me. That voice was 22 and spent what might otherwise have been their college years working seven days a week, while I am spending mine typing out op-eds and essays.
I am undoubtedly a member of the middle class. At Middlebury, there are many people who are more affluent than my family and I. There are also people who are as well-off as I am. There are also people who grew up with far less than I did (at least socioeconomically speaking).
[pullquote speaker="" photo="" align="center" background="on" border="all" shadow="on"]The aspect of wealth I abhor is the distance it creates.[/pullquote]
On campus, discussion often turns to money. Money, here, is a topic of contention. There are people — and I have been this person at times — who roll their eyes at those who are from more affluent backgrounds. But the aspect of wealth I dislike is not the wealth. The aspect of wealth I abhor is the distance it creates. This distance can be observed in assumptions that we make about people whose socioeconomic statuses are different from our own. These assumptions range from assuming a person is able to buy a flashy new sweatshirt, to more severe notions such as the belief that peers attending community colleges are not motivated or ambitious. These kinds of money-related assumptions are not always symptoms of cruelty or malice, but are often simply the result of ignorance. This is an ignorance that I am not immune to.
In fact, this ignorance is why I was shocked to awaken to a 22-year-old talking about their previous work experience. I was shocked because, surrounded by my primarily wealthy or comfortable peers at Middlebury, I had forgotten my own privilege. Still, that conversation reminded me — first thing in the morning — that I am someone who is lucky. Lucky enough to forget about questions of distance and ignorance and privilege on a Thursday morning; lucky enough to attend a school where someone else (someone who is only a few years older than me) takes out the trash and wipes down the bathroom mirror.
I thought about that for a moment — thought about the way this other world was existing right beside my own. I shivered thinking that, if things had shaken out differently, that voice and I could have ended up in class together.
I began to reflect on the good fortune I had taken for granted — the way I had the means to spontaneously travel to Boston for Fall Break, the way my mother was determined to minimize my college debt. I thought about the way my aunt always wiped down the counter with a washcloth when we stayed at hotels, saying that she wanted to leave less work for whoever had to clean up after us. And then I thought about all the dried-yellow urine that was left on our Gifford toilet seat after every weekend, about this voice that was being trained to clean it up. I thought about the invisibility of their world, their world that did not have the opportunity that I had. Their world was right outside my door. I wasn’t going to forget that. I sighed and got up to use the bathroom.
Writer’s note: I would like to note that this op-ed makes the assumption that the “voice” is working as a custodian as a result of not attending school. I do not know the full story of this individual, as this is a conversation that I overheard. This piece is a reflection of myself, and I would like to acknowledge that I know only the context of my own privilege.
(11/07/19 11:04am)
Middlebury’s student body has more people of color and more students from Southern states this year than ever before. The 2019 Fall Student Body Profile points to small but distinct trends toward greater racial, ethnic and geographic diversity among students, making this the least-white student body in Middlebury history. At the same time, however, the college’s population is still primarily drawn from the same states it historically has been.
This year, Middlebury’s domestic student population is comprised of 26% students of color, the highest in the school’s history. The report also reports that the student body is currently 53.1% female and 46.9% male.
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Dean of Admissions Nicole Curvin is happy about how the admissions team has “made progress in bringing students from many backgrounds, geographies and lived experiences” to the college.
“The admissions team has worked intentionally to broaden our reach to more diverse student populations in the U.S. and I believe we have made good strides,” Curvin said.
Curvin cited over 50 community organizations in the country that the college works with — these groups provide support, such as application prep, internships and admissions counseling for college applicants from groups that are traditionally underrepresented in higher education, with the hopes of building bridges between students from these groups and the college.
Massachusetts is now the most represented state in the student body, taking the lead over New York, which held the top spot in 2018. California and Connecticut hold the next two spots, as they did last year.
However, the profile also points to increases in the populations of students in many traditionally underrepresented Southeastern states. North Carolina has seen a 37% increase among the student population, while Georgia has seen a 21% increase. Texas is now the 10th most represented state, while Virginia and Florida take the 11th and 12th spots respectively.
Natalie Figueroa, the admissions counselor for several Southeastern states including Alabama, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North and South Carolina and Tennessee, pointed to an evolution in the way that admissions counselors reach out to students in these states. This can include group travel with other liberal arts colleges such as Bates, Harvey Mudd, Wellesley and Wesleyan to high school visits, college fairs and counselor breakfasts.
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“What has been especially important for me is to listen to the needs of students and high school counselors in those areas and to understand what best helps them through this process,” Figueroa said. “This can include elaborating on what a ‘liberal arts education’ entails, what winter is like, or how the transition has been for students coming to the Northeast for school.”
Visits from an admissions counselor can make the difference in a decision for some students from the South.
In addition to learning about the college from upperclassmen and being attracted to the language programs, Sophie Mueller ’23, a student from a private school in Atlanta, Georgia, met with a Middlebury counselor at a college fair during all four years of high school.
“These interactions encouraged me to apply and helped me learn more about Midd,” she said.
Curvin estimates that the high schools the admissions office visits are 60% private schools and 40% public.
Other students from the South have found their way to Middlebury through personal research, postings on sites like College Point, and through friends and peers who had gone to the Northeast for college themselves.
Ryan Kirby ’22 is from Lorena, Texas and applied to Middlebury at the recommendation of a friend up north. “I had never heard about Middlebury. New England was never even a thought to anybody at my school, and I am fairly certain I’m the only person in my class that came up north. Most did not leave the state.”
Kirby’s experience is not rare: Curvin pointed to lack of name recognition, as well as weather and financial challenges, as major factors that discourage students in the South from considering or attending Middlebury.
In a Newsroom article from last March, Curvin discussed a several-year effort to expand recruitment in Florida and other Southern states. Florida had the fifth highest rate of admitted students for the class of 2023, with 63 admitted, but ultimately had a lower yield than Northeastern states. Florida remains outside of the top-ten-most represented states on campus.
“There are a lot of conversations about affordability — coming to an institution like Middlebury over a state institution with merit money or funding for students is challenging, and those are conversations that we’re having,” Curvin said. “Florida is a beautiful lovely place with beaches and warm weather, and so talking to students about coming to New England can be a challenge, but I think we’ve seen a growth in students wanting to have this kind of college experience.”
“It was difficult to look at the price of Middlebury versus the University of Florida and Florida State and reason it,” said Kate Talano ’21.5 of Naples, Florida. “New England is a different way of life and if you’re not familiar with it, that can prevent you from wanting to go up north.”
“When you’re looking schools, you know the places that you know,” Talano said. “And in Florida, Middlebury is not one of those places.”
(11/07/19 11:03am)
Throat singing, multilingual monologues, aerial dance, hyperfemininity, hypermasculinity, Max Ernst aesthetics, blood, violence, sexual references and many more contrasting and disparate elements came together last weekend at the Mahaney Arts Center. The 90 minutes of Director and Assistant Professor of Theatre Michole Biancosino’s interpretation of “The Bacchae 2.1” ran from Oct. 31 to Nov. 2 at Seeler Studio Theatre. The production starred Kevin Collins ’20 (as Pentheus) and Marci Urban ’22.5 , Cecelia Scheuer ’21 and Zachary Varricchione ’21 (all three as Dionysus), with music by visiting artist Neel Murgai and Ronnie Romano ’20. Murgai looked to Hindu Shiva for inspiration while adopting different ragas and improvising throughout the show.
“Bacchae” was written by Euripides in the fifth century B.C. as a perplexing and disturbing study of the clash and struggle between wilderness and civilization. This Greek tragedy, along with other pre-existing texts, were appropriated and adapted into a new creation by Charles Mee in 1993. Mee’s version incorporated much more violence and sexual reference while also adding layers to the discussion of the complexity of human nature. Gender relations, suppression, identity, dialectics and plurality all became subjects of interest to Mee.
Yet Biancosino made the play into, as she says, “a Bacchae 2.1a or 3.1.” When she began working with the company on this rather messy play with “jarring juxtapositions,” as she phrased it, Biancosino took it as a creative challenge to sort out how far they can go with some of the ideas dealt with in the play. She and the actors worked hard to fill the play with humanity while preserving its poetic nature. After all the creative and artistic additions to the play, the core of the show still lies in its discussion of otherness, which gives it relevance in any historical context.
The significance of putting on a show that discusses modernity, civilization and otherness is not trivial at the college. Biancosino believed that “The Bacchae 2.1” is inherently an acknowledgement to the people who don’t fit in and to the otherness that barely has space at a “white institution that’s known as a ‘pillar of civilization.’”
The tone of Biancosino’s “The Bacchae” was exactly that: She was careful, conscientious and creative with how to present otherness at the college in 2019. She started with tossing out the inflammatory parts in Mee’s version and bringing in other voices, including works of queer writers and writers of color. These elements created a poetic and more comprehensive understanding of the world. Further, Biancosino purposefully made the connotation of the color orange ambiguous: A tainted and deceptive orange downplays its symbolism as the “Eastern color” used in Mee’s interpretation.
The representation of otherness is detail-oriented, evident through how makeup was a means to showcase and discern various groups of characters. Stern blue suits with minimal makeup made Pentheus look “strict and conservative,” while the women in the mountains have “whimsical and outgoing” looks to help establish their characters, said makeup artist Devon Hunt ’23.
Further, Biancosino pondered how to bring otherness on stage in novel ways. Her most daring redesign was to use a multilingual approach including German, Spanish, Mandarin, Bengali, ASL and others. Indeed, what’s a more Middlebury thing to do than showcasing students’ linguistic talents? This was at times disorienting. As the Lavender Woman (Nuasheen Chowdhury ’22) began speaking Bengali, evident gasps among audiences reveal how some felt utterly lost. But the value of this approach lies in its ability to force audiences to move pass literal meanings, and propel the audience to look at otherness in a uniquely Middlebury way.
The actors were able to bring this complicated show together in a short seven weeks, and they each contributed their unique understanding of its message to the performance. Director Biancosino allowed a great deal of freedom for actors when exploring their characters.
“As an actor, I had to let go of my dependence on rationality and logic in order to fully engage with and find meaning in this play’s poetic and visceral language,” Gabby Valdivieso ’20 (tattoo artist) said. In order to develop her character, she “explored the history of how women with tattoos have been perceived — from tattooed women put on display as sideshow attractions to tattoos not aligning with conventional ideas of femininity to feminist beliefs in empowerment and body ownership.” In a similar way, Madeline Ciocci ’20 (Agave) said her character “has a complete shift at the end of the play, where she gets primal and animalistic, and afterwards, she seems like a totally different person. She is much more real and raw at the end." In order to best present such a drastic shift, she is conscious of her postures, language and how she interacts with other characters.
The actors’ diligent inputs led to commends among audiences. The intensity of the play left many in awe as they leave the studio. There was so much to grab the audience’s attention and people were invariably drawn to different things: as some focused on the image of blossoming rose on the backdrop, some looked at the chatty Bacchae aside and others stared at the musician.
Bair Lambert ’22, who played a supporting role in the play, said days before the play that he hoped audiences would walk out thinking “What the f**k!” I certainly felt that way, and many around me concurred. “The Bacchae 2.1” was not a narrative, nor a story, but an experience, an utterly intense one that impels deep reflections about otherness.
(11/07/19 11:02am)
Arizona PBS news anchor Vanessa Ruiz, who made national headlines in 2015 for her accented pronunciation of words in Spanish while serving as broadcast anchor, visited Middlebury this week to share her unique experience as a reporter. Ruiz gave a lecture, “Speak American: How A News Anchor Became the News,” on Monday, Nov. 4. She also visited with students interested in media and communications careers at the Center for Careers and Internships, and ate with a cohort of students and faculty members from the Luso-Hispanic Studies Department.
In her lecture, held in the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs, Ruiz recounted her ascent to a nightly co-anchor position in the major television market of Phoenix. It was there that Ruiz faced racially-charged attacks for her on-air pronunciation of Spanish words, including the names of nearby towns, like “Mesa” and “Casa Grande.” The packed audience on a Monday afternoon included Spanish majors, professors and students interested in journalism.
Ruiz was born in Miami and raised in Colombia until the age of five. She entered the field of journalism in college in 2001, taking an internship with Telemundo, a global Spanish-language television network based in Miami. From there, Ruiz worked as a foreign correspondent in Nicaragua and Venezuela, where she covered Hugo Chavez’s last presidential election. She returned to the United States as a reporter for the local NBC news station in Los Angeles.
Ruiz noted that in each site with a large Hispanic population, she was able to speak in her native accent without question.
“Growing up and living in cities like Los Angeles and Miami, you really are in a bubble – a multicultural bubble,” she said.
It was only once Ruiz arrived at KPNX or 12 News, the local NBC affiliate in Phoenix, that she faced criticism for her pronunciation of certain words. After just one month on the job, local viewers hurled insults at Ruiz on Twitter. One user wrote, “I turn in to watch a newscaster, not a mariachi.” Another viewer suggested in the tweet that Ruiz be deported, adding, “She isn’t American she has no right to be here no matter how much some corporation paid for her.”
Ruiz was offered the chance, by her bosses and co-anchor, to respond on-air to the acerbic commentary about her. On live television, Ruiz offered a rebuke of her critics.
“Some of you have noticed that I pronounce a couple of things maybe a little differently than you’re used to,” Ruiz said. “I do like to pronounce certain things the way they are meant to be pronounced.”
Following her response, Ruiz received support from local and national political figures, including Phoenix-area State Senator Martin Quezada. Quezada tweeted that “our news is now more mature, culturally accepting and accurate. How is that a bad thing?” The New York Times and BuzzFeed picked up the story and ran articles on Ruiz’s response to the contention she received.
The Phoenix community was also grateful that Ruiz decided not just to respond to backlash, but to stay at the news station too: they thanked her for not leaving.
“What does that say about a community, when they have to tell you ‘thanks’ for not leaving?” She answered her own rhetorical question at the talk: “They had been feeling repressed, antagonized, attacked for so long.”
During her lecture, Ruiz attributed her desire to respond and her upstanding demeanor to the pride she has for her identity. Acknowledging the privilege she experiences as a “fair-skinned” Latina, Ruiz told students that she felt the need to stand up for Hispanics in the Phoenix area, a city whose population is roughly three-quarters white, according to Census data.
Ruiz now reports for the PBS NewsHour West, based out of Phoenix, as well as Arizona’s PBS station, which is owned by ASU. She is also a professor at ASU’s Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication, where she directs their Borderlands program.
Ruiz says she tries to do news “the good way,” by aiming to diversify the newsroom and encourage more bilingual students in the classroom to follow their professional goals.
“I look at bilingualism as an asset, nothing less,” Ruiz said.
Attendee Lila Sternberg-Schur ’21.5 read about Ruiz in professor Brandon Baird’s Hispanic Linguistics class last year. “Having the opportunity to hear Vanessa talk about what she’d experienced in person really brought the story to life and made it more tangible,” she said.
In a hearty question-and-answer session at the end of Monday’s lecture, Ruiz answered questions about her identity and her experience in journalism.
At one point in the Q&A, Ruiz spoke about the role journalists play in 2019, and how to write with one’s identity in mind.
“I still believe that I’m not the news – I shouldn’t be the news. At the end of the day, facts are facts,” she said.
However, she said that having diverse journalists engaged in the newsroom is essential.
“It’s up to us to bridge those gaps, and bring people together who may come from different backgrounds, different perspectives, and different experiences,” she said. “It’s not an easy muscle to flex, because it takes courage to be that person always raising your hand. But if we don’t do it, who will?”
(11/07/19 11:00am)
“Even though it’s idealized, it felt pretty real.”— Donovan Compton ’23
In the best of ways, this film brings us back into a simultaneously dreamy, yet dreary world of reimagining sexuality in our society. Director Céline Sciamma orchestrates a gorgeous French historical drama in “Portrait of a Lady on Fire.” Brought to the college by the Hirschfield Film Series on Nov. 2, “Portrait” reinterprets the Greek myth of Orpheus and Eurydice, tugging at your heartstrings in a mixture of wry humor, beautiful cinematography and tender shifts in understanding love. In the best of ways, leads Marianne (Noémie Merland) and Héloïse (Adèle Haenel) dance around each other in a passionate performance.
“Portrait” takes place within the 18th century through the memories of Marianne, an artist both teaching and posing for her class, advising students as they sketch her. Emotions begin to run high as a student brings out a portrait of a woman by the sea, garbed in a burning blue gown, painted by Marianne herself. The eponymous painting “Portrait of a Lady on Fire” transports Marianne back to years prior, starting with her journey to the memory.
Here, the story begins to unfold on a tumultuous boat trip to a remote island, where she is commissioned to paint a wedding portrait for a notoriously uncooperative subject, Héloïse. Vehemently opposed to being married off, Héloïse thus refuses to sit for a portrait and is introduced to us in sombre rigidity, eyes cloudy and cold. Thus, as Marianne masquerades as her companion on the island, hoping to familiarize herself with her features so as to paint in secret, viewers are guided through the fascinating push and pull of forces that join and sever the duo. Albeit a definite exaggeration of the autonomy of femininity, the stark contrast of this narrative from portrayals of women in other period films is refreshing.
Merland and Haenel encompass the subtle beauty of their relationship in the little details that shift with their bond. Growing past the stiffness, we are introduced to Héloïse the blues of her eyes grow warm with mirth, dark with passion and unreadably pensive as the film progresses. Likewise, Merland captures the role of the brooding, impassioned artist as she renders Marianne with a full honesty that engulfs her in the performance. As the memory unfolds, so does the depth of the story — beyond the leading women, “Portrait” examines forms of female empowerment.
Through tongue-in-cheek humor at the desperation to be unburdened with fulfilling traditional familial roles, independence is a driving force as the film chronicles the trials of Sophie, a maid, trying for an abortion with the aid of Marianne and Héloïse by her side. It’s almost wacky — between watching the trio try remedies such as pushing Sophie to sprint to watching a group of women chant as Marianne and Héloïse battle feelings across a hearth, the multidimensionality of empowerment is highlighted in their agency. You are greeted with a new sense of love; companionship, art and community are highlighted as Sciamma strays from the conventions of recapturing individuality.
Visually, the film stuns as characters traverse a background of blues evolving through coldness and warmth in conjunction to the shifts between Héloïse and her mother. Set on the cliffside, the manor adopts a pensive aura with walls of blue, slivers of mahogany sconces cleverly designed to hint at warmth. Candlelight flickers at every corner, adding to the ambiance and solitude that amplifies every emotion in their rawness. “Portrait” hits its stride with its aesthetics as viewers are easily immersed in a vignette of their universe. By displaying women of the time with a certain freedom that would never have been realized elsewhere, a new perspective is ultimately fostered in the audience as Sciamma revitalizes possibilities to define oneself within an era that leaves no room elsewhere to breathe.
(10/31/19 10:05am)
After wrapping up the college's year-long workforce planning initiative this May, a process that saw 37 staff members take voluntary buyouts and caused a redistribution of workload among remaining staff, administrators announced via email to all college employees that the process had been a success — Middlebury could reduce its deficit without resorting to layoffs.
But an external email sent to facilities staff on Aug. 8 suggests the starkly different story, that some workers didn’t think workforce planning had been so “voluntary” after all.
“Middlebury Needs a UNION! -read on your break” the subject line of the email said.
It spelled out some of the pitfalls of the workforce planning process: Staff felt voiceless, overworked with insufficient pay, and as though the ground had been pulled from beneath them when they were offered buyouts and switched into new roles. Facilities staff specifically — those who work in maintenance and operations jobs, like custodial and groundskeeping services, as well as jobs in planning, design and construction — have reported to The Campus feeling exhausted and frustrated by failures in communication, too-long hours and last minute call-ins.
“I don’t know a bunch about unions — still don’t,” one facilities staff member said. “But I know the way that people get treated here. I’ve seen it. I just feel like we’ve got to do something.”
Throughout the summer, the email’s sender, David Van Deusen of the Rutland-based branch of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), met with facilities staff who sought to discuss how organizing a union would mitigate the heightened voicelessness brought on by the workforce planning process.
Not enough facilities staff have signed union authorization cards to trigger a vote to organize. Many said they see this as a sign that union efforts have failed. But Van Deusen remains adamant that efforts are ongoing. And facilities staff are insistent that something has to give.
Most of the 12 facilities workers The Campus spoke with for the story spoke on the condition of anonymity, for fear of retribution from peers and upper management.
Workforce planning raises “unanswered questions”
Most Middlebury students don’t know what workforce planning really means. But for staff, the process — which the college announced in June 2018 as a way to cut personnel costs and distribute work more efficiently — was ever-present for the better part of a year.
Department managers were tasked last fall with leading discussions within their divisions about how they could reorganize work more efficiently and cost-effectively, with the aim of shrinking staff compensation costs by 10% amidst an exigent budget deficit. That winter, senior leadership, in collaboration with human resources, finalized a list of positions that they would cut based on those findings.
The college identified 150 staff positions to be eliminated, though 100 of that number were “were already vacant through attrition and restrictions on re-hiring over the last few years,” The Campus reported in May. In February of 2019, the college handed out applications for buyouts — formally called Incentivized Separation Plans (ISP) — to 79 staff members, in hopes of cutting 45 of the remaining positions. Twenty-eight of those applications were offered to facilities and dining staff specifically.
The college sent more applications for the buyouts than were necessary, in the hopes that enough staff would elect to take them and the college would not have to resort to involuntary layoffs. If more staff than necessary applied, the most senior staff were offered buyouts first.
The college also created “close to 40” new staff positions based on needs identified during work reevaluations, according to Vice President of Human Resources Karen Miller. Applications for those positions were first made available to the staff who were offered buyouts, giving them the option to apply to stay at the college, rather than taking ISPs. To protect the privacy of the individuals who opted to take buyouts, the college has not made public the list of eliminated and added positions.
Ultimately, 37 staff took the buyouts, nine of whom were employees within facilities and dining. The college had hoped more staff would apply, but the number proved sufficient — the college did not have to resort to layoffs.
“This process has been both lengthy and challenging, and caused many in our community significant uncertainty and discomfort,” said President Laurie Patton in a May email to staff. “Thanks to your participation, the process was successful.”
Last year, The Campus reported growing anxieties among staff as they waited to hear from the administration about the futures of their jobs. For staff in some departments — like dining, in which a natural reduction of positions left few to be forcibly cut — these uncertainties have since mostly subsided. But in facilities, anxieties have subsisted. In some cases, they have worsened.
“There were a lot of unanswered questions. There still are a lot of unanswered questions,” said one Middlebury facilities staff member, a supporter of the union.
A 2017 survey, administered by the consulting firm ModernThink, shows that staff discontent surged even before workforce planning began. That survey showed frustration with communication from the Senior Leadership Group — Patton’s 17-member advisory council — a lack of transparency with decision-making and dissatisfaction with compensation, among other areas.
Still, workforce planning seems to have exacerbated many staff concerns. Some, for example, are frustrated with how work has been redistributed since some positions were cut, which has caused employees to feel overworked and underpaid.
“The work amped up with fewer people to do it,” said the aforementioned facilities staff member. “A lot of the extra stuff is taking away from the stuff that we need to do daily.”
The worker said he was frustrated with what he felt was a murky process. Decisions about the “voluntary” process were often made behind closed doors, he said, and the redistribution of work showed a lack of understanding about the work being done. “There was nothing voluntary about it,” he said.
Norm Cushman, vice president for operations, said communication can be a challenge in a department with so many workers. “It would have been very difficult to have solicited everyone’s input,” he said.
Cushman said the process of work redistribution will play out piecemeal, as employees who took buyouts gradually leave the college and their departments develop strategies for how to “do less with less.”
Low pay forces employees who work two jobs into a “balancing act”
The Campus has previously reported low wages as a source of dissatisfaction among employees. Separately, pro-union staff who spoke to The Campus said low wages were a major reason they sought to organize.
Many employees have to hold multiple jobs to survive. That balancing act, another facilities employee said, can become incredibly burdensome when workloads at the college are also increased in light of workforce planning. When many facilities staff did not show up to work after an unexpectedly severe snowstorm last year, for example, administrators questioned staff priorities.
“We had a meeting with a manager who was extremely unhappy because a lot of people weren’t here helping,” the employee said. “He told us that if we had second jobs, we needed to not go in and instead had to come in and shovel.”
The college has consistently framed workforce planning as a way to make staff feel more invested in the future of the institution. But according to staff, it doesn’t always feel like that.
“Yeah, you could say workforce planning is for us, because now [the college is] financially sustainable,” said Staff Council President Tim Parsons. “But if you’re only making $12.07 an hour and your shift in the custodial wing starts at 4 a.m., workforce planning doesn’t really feel like it’s for you.”
These low wages have led to shortages in some areas, like custodial and recycling services. To address these shortages, the college is currently spearheading a compensation review with an external consulting group. The aim of the study is to gather “market data” — information that will indicate what the college needs to pay going forward to make itself a competitive employer.
David Provost, executive vice president for finance and administration, said the college is undertaking the review now because it has been nearly a decade since the last one of its kind. He also said that the college has seen increased turnover in the last two years in positions within the lowest two pay bands, in which many facilities positions fall. Wages for OP1 positions — for example, some dining hall servery positions — begin at $11 an hour, while OP2 positions — including some groundsworking and custodial jobs — begin at $12.07 an hour.
Meanwhile, staff spoke about how comparable positions in town had wages that started three or four dollars higher, although without comparable benefits. Separately, custodians told The Campus that hiring shortages in custodial services might be due to the high costs of living in Addison County, costs which workers on an OP2-level budget are often not able to shoulder.
“We know over the last 18 to 24 months it has been more difficult to attract and retain OP1 and OP2 level positions,” Provost said. “If the review suggests we need to increase these salaries, then we will.” He added that the decision would have to be contingent on timing and availability of financial resources.
The college had to tackle workforce planning before the compensation review, Provost said, because addressing its financial management had to be a fiscal priority, given the severity of the deficit.
Provost said he is expecting the study’s data to show that the college should pay its OP1- and OP2-level employees higher wages. The study is set to be done by the spring. At that time, the administration will begin to work its findings into the budget for the 2021 fiscal year.
“A slap in the face”
The college did not officially lay off any employees. Some felt the offers they received backed them into corners anyway.
One employee, a servery worker who has been at the college for 31 years, said her situation felt like “a slap in the face.” She was previously employed in a facilities office job before her position was cut.
[pullquote speaker="" photo="" align="center" background="on" border="all" shadow="on"]At the college, seniority has never meant anything. I’ve been here 31 years — I’m a loyal worker, have always been on time, never been sick. Didn’t matter at all.[/pullquote]
Even though she shared a similar workload with the two other employees in her previous office, she had a different job title from her co-workers and hers was the only position that was cut. In other offices, where multiple workers held the same positions, the process was more “voluntary,” since one worker’s choice to take a buyout or job transfer meant others could refuse.
The servery worker was, as multiple staff members put it, “workforce planned.”
“At the college, seniority has never meant anything,” the employee said. “I’ve been here 31 years — I’m a loyal worker, have always been on time, never been sick. Didn’t matter at all.”
The staff member was informed by supervisors that her position would be cut toward the end of that phase in the process. But she couldn’t afford to take the buyout package the college was offering. The staff member instead applied for several of the then-newly-created positions posted on a private portal. Many of the available job postings required degrees, she said. “I don’t have a college degree,” she said. “Doesn’t mean I didn’t have the qualifications — I didn’t have the degree.”
All jobs for which she was eligible required higher levels of physical activity than she was used to. After working at a desk for so many years, the transition to a job that requires her to carry heavy loads and stand for hours at a time has taken a toll. Last week, she suffered a workplace injury.
Contacted by AFSCME while she was still in a facilities position, the staff member attended initial meetings and supported the effort to unionize. She said she would support unionization among facilities staff, even in her new role, “Because you’d have someone else looking out for you besides the people who are higher up here,” she said. “They expect the lowest paid people here to work the hardest.”
Despite low wages, staff like the servery worker identified the benefits the college offers to its faculty and staff as exceptional in comparison with other positions in the area. Among them are good healthcare, extensive retirement plans and paid time off, as well as discounts at some stores, free gym passes and roadside assistance.
“If it was not for the benefits, 90% of these facilities people would not be here,” the first facilities employee said.
“Benefits here are a lot better than what you would find anywhere else around here,” said the other. “But I can’t go down to Hannaford and buy groceries with my benefits.”
“Middlebury Needs a UNION!”
Van Deusen, the union rep and the president of the Vermont American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO), said he was contacted by facilities employees over the summer about starting a union.
While some staff concerns, like low pay and abrupt, last-minute shift scheduling, have been prevalent for a long time, Van Deusen believes this round of workforce planning catalyzed the staff’s outreach.
After their first meetings in Ilsley Public Library in July, Van Deusen said he was in contact with “dozens of facilities staff.” At subsequent off-campus gatherings, he spoke with interested parties about what the union could offer them. Many were intrigued.
One of the facilities workers told The Campus he “absolutely” supports the formation of a union, “Mainly for pay. And also, to have a voice.” He cited the workforce planning process as a period during which he felt particularly left in the dark by his superiors.
The servery worker said she would be in favor of a facilities union, “because of the seniority part of it. And to negotiate a better raise,” she said.
Some workers were also inspired by the successful union effort at St. Michael’s College. In 2012, custodians there unionized with AFSCME. They later negotiated $15-per-hour pay in their second contract.
Despite this recent win for Vermont labor advocates, Sociology Professor Jamie McCallum, who specializes in labor studies, said union decline in the U.S. has been happening since the 1950s and picked up speed in the late 1970s.
Once word of mouth began to spread about the Middlebury union effort, Van Deusen handed out authorization cards for interested employees to sign. What followed was a flood of information and rumors circulating between staff and the administration. On Aug. 19, one month after union authorization cards were first distributed, Miller, the vice president of human resources, replied to the initial drive in a letter that administrators hand-delivered to all facilities employees.
“Middlebury supports your right to choose whether to unionize,” the letter said.
“We know that many of you have raised legitimate and important concerns about your jobs,” it later added. “We also believe that joining an outside labor union to address those concerns is not the answer.”
The letter highlighted some commonly cited “disadvantages” of forming a union, such as the potentially high cost of monthly dues.
A few days later, Van Deusen sent an email to facilities employees responding to the administration’s outreach.
“AFSCME, the labor union many of you are seeking to affiliate with, is aware that Management has been spreading false and misleading information in an effort to get you to NOT form a Union,” it said, before addressing what it called “actual FACTS” about forming a union.
In the days following, some staff opposed to the union left flyers in certain shops and break rooms on campus, countering Van Deusen’s points. Shortly after, the administration sent a list of FAQs to staff, based on questions it had received from facilities when administrators traveled shop-to-shop with Miller’s first letter.
The union effort has not yet reached the strong majority within facilities that it needs to move forward. There is no specific benchmark for that number, Van Deusen said, but it would have to be a number with which the group would feel comfortable. Some staff said they see the slowing momentum as a sign the effort is doomed. But Van Deusen said authorization cards have not been circulating for long enough to determine whether the effort will succeed or not. He plans to continue to collect and tally cards.
If he could gather enough, staff would then need to file paperwork with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), an independent federal agency that protects the rights of private sector employees to better their working conditions and wages. The NLRB would then conduct a secret ballot election among facilities staff to decide whether a union would be formed.
If a majority opted for the formation of a union, the new effort would hold internal union elections for a bargaining team. From there, it would bargain a binding contract with the administration.
“This time next year, we would like to announce that a new union, with a contract, will be formed at Middlebury,” Van Deusen said. He hopes that contract would address staff concerns by forming a labor management committee, creating a binding grievance procedure and paying better for longevity and overtime, among other measures.
Not every staff member is in favor of a union coming to campus. One custodial worker said she would not support the formation of a union because she is worried about losing her benefits in the negotiations, although she is unhappy with her current wages. She was offered a buyout last winter, but did not have to take it because another worker on her team did.
“I enjoy my vacation time,” she said. “The health insurance isn’t what it used to be, but that’s changing in November, too. I enjoy my benefits.”
According to Miller, the college will put in place a new healthcare system this November, to go into effect in January, that will introduce more choice into the current plan.
Although some employees worry their benefits will be at risk if they unionize, McCallum said he finds it hard to believe that the college would target workers’ healthcare and benefits in negotiations.
“If Middlebury were to threaten the good benefits that workers now receive if they decided to go union, it would be joining a long list of union-busting corporations,” he said.
Besides, he said that employees would have to agree on any union contract with the college.
“Workers vote on any contract a union signs, and they would only vote ‘yes’ on a contract when their benefits improved or stayed the same,” he said.
McCallum said he sees collective bargaining as an “essential ingredient of a democratic workplace.”
“We need a living wage here, where everyone can live and work with dignity, and that will mean paying workers what they deserve, not just what the market dictates,” he added.
Middlebury’s “Black Tuesday”: A union effort three decades ago
The servery employee, who has worked at the college for 31 years and supports a union, was freshly employed at Middlebury when a series of job cuts in May 1991 destroyed a long-held perception of the institution as a reliable place to work. She remembers the day those positions were terminated, which has since come to be known by some as “Black Tuesday,” as a day filled with tears and disbelief.
The college administration has taken measures to avoid an event like Black Tuesday from recurring. Patton told two Campus reporters in an article published by VTDigger this fall that memories of 1991 have influenced how the college currently handles staff reductions, emphasizing its focus on giving people more of a choice and inviting them to think about the long-term trajectory of the institution.
Miller emphasized a similar sentiment in her conversation with The Campus.
“I can say that we were intentional to make this as humane as we could, to make sure that this was not a surprise to people and that they were engaged in conversations,” she said about this year’s workforce planning. “We really worked hard to do that. Were we 100% successful? I hope so, but maybe not.”
As in 1991, this recent round of workforce planning eliminated specific job “titles” rather than “people,” and both years saw efforts to organize. In September of 1991, The Campus reported that staff across campus were “exploring ways to increase their input in administrative decisions.” This included attempts by some to form a union, organizing for which would last four years before ultimately breaking down in 1995 after failing to garner enough support.
Those attempts were aimed at creating a wall-to-wall bargaining unit — a unit that would include all staff, unlike this year’s single-department effort in facilities. Bill Jaeger, director of the Harvard Union of Clerical and Technical Workers (HUCTW), an AFSCME affiliate, helped spearhead that effort. His team was contacted by Middlebury employees in 1991, two years after HUCTW negotiated their own first contract.
Jaeger said attempts to unionize arose because of anger about the layoffs, but that at its core were more permanent longings for democratic change at the college.
“People were feeling like their eyes had been opened to how consequential and important it can be to have some breadth and some inclusion in important policy matters and in decision making,” he said.
HUCTW members visited staff in Middlebury to talk about the union, at times once per week. Most interest came from those in administrative and technical jobs, although there was some level of support and involvement in all staff departments, Jaeger remembered. In response, the administration called all-staff meetings to address the efforts.
That union was not able to pique sufficient interest, but Jaeger said staff who were involved were united around a shared sense of excitement for what they were building. “Most people are driven in the most steadfast way if they’re really building toward something that’s going to make a positive difference in the long term,” he said.
By 1995, when the effort fell, the college seemed to be undertaking corrective policies that gave employees some reason for hope.
College looks forward, staff still waiting for change
The college has reiterated time and time again that workforce planning is not a one-time process. This means that administrators are still assessing its successes, as well as where it’s fallen short.
Administrators are hopeful that the workforce planning process will allow the institution to run more efficiently and proactively in the future. Some of the new jobs, for example — including some of the positions offered to staff whose positions were cut, requiring college degrees — are more specialized, and were intended to take into account potential demographic shifts in Vermont so that the college can be an “employer of choice for the next generation,” Miller said.
“The whole purpose of the workforce planning is we’ve got to be prepared for our future,” she said. “I know it was a difficult process for many, but for some, I think it really helped us to transform and leap into that future state,” she added, citing the How Will We Live Together review as a concurrent, future-oriented process.
Miller said that the administration is committed to revisiting any “pain points” among staff and addressing them accordingly. At an Oct. 24 staff meeting, Patton announced that Special Assistant to the President Sue Ritter will do a listening tour throughout staff departments to hear employees’ concerns. The administration laid out its plan for the compensation review at that meeting, as well as several other measures, like a restatement that Senior Leadership Group would attend the holiday party this December, that suggest an effort to reinforce commitment to community-building.
The custodial worker and nearly every staff member interviewed for this article spoke about an intangible change that has made the working environment feel more corporate, and less warm and community-centered.
“When I first came here, it was different,” the custodial worker said. “It was more family-oriented, and everybody looked out for each other. It’s not like that anymore. It’s more sterile.”
Parsons, the staff council president, said Middlebury used to be a small institution with a real family feel. “As we have grown and expanded both our physical footprint here and our global footprint, we have somewhat lost touch with that,” he said.
“It would be a real challenge to bring that back,” he added.
Staff also overwhelmingly expressed large amounts of pride in Middlebury as an institution, a collective sentiment that is backed up by data in the 2017 ModernThink survey.
“It’s a great place,” the first facilities worker said. “And the benefits are great. We’re just underpaid for what we’re doing.”
This pride seems to leave many staff members feeling hopeful. But they’re also worried that the college will continue to disappoint them. Some left initial workforce planning meetings a year ago with the impression that “everything was going to be open and that communication was going to flow.”
“But it never did,” one staff member said.
“With workforce planning, there were so many unanswered questions,” he added. “The administration wouldn’t have been able to do that without talking to the union first.”
As the dust settles on the consequences of workforce planning, staff are still waiting to see tangible changes.
(10/31/19 10:04am)
The commons system will no longer exist come next fall, the college administration announced in an email to the Middlebury community on Oct. 24.
The email detailed a host of changes to the current residential life system following a multi-year review of the system, including the creation of a new Office of Residential Life, a push to work towards building a new student center, and the consolidation of deans’ offices into two first-year “clusters.” All together, the administration is calling the changes “BLUEprint.”
The review process, which started to take shape in spring 2018, originated in Community Council in 2017, after a New York Times article about income inequality inspired the council to conduct a student survey . The survey ultimately pointed to discrepancies in residential life experiences among students. The following year, an external committee convened to build the report that would eventually become “How Will We Live Together.” The report’s recommendations informed the upcoming overhaul.
Currently, first-year students live in one of five first-year halls, depending on their assigned commons. Per the new system, first-years will instead either live in Allen and Battell halls on the north side of campus, or Stewart and Hepburn halls south of College Street, depending on which “cluster” they are in. These changes will turn Hepburn from a sophomore dorm to a first year dorm, while removing first years from Hadley, a first-year dormitory located in the Ross complex.
Administrators chose to move first-years nearer to each other in response to the external committee’s report, which said that relocating first year students to live in closer proximity to one another “should increase students’ sense of belonging at Middlebury, and reduce some of the tensions related to diversity and inclusion that we heard about during our visit to campus.”
These changes effectively put an end to the commons system, which was first established after the removal of Greek life from campus in 1989 and modeled off of the house system at universities like Harvard and Yale. The commons were put into place in 1991 and have faced major adjustments twice since then.
The upcoming changes to residential life attempt to combat the “inefficiency” produced by the commons model, while also working to better serve and support students, administrators told The Campus.
“I was shocked at how complicated the system was... and the faculty were not being used as effectively as they could be,” said Rob Moeller, a psychology professor who specializes in the mental health of college students.
Moeller has been an integral member of the How Will We Live Together Steering Committee. The committee formed in the spring of 2018 to develop and write the final recommendations.
“[We realized] that the experiment of randomizing students into communities didn’t work,” Moeller said. “You can tell someone that their new mascot is a squirrel or frog or a rhino, but it didn’t resonate with students. Students weren’t walking around saying, ‘Go squirrels.’”
The plan also suggests planning will soon be underway for the renovation or replacement of Battell Hall, the biggest first year dorm on campus, as well as for a new student center. Administrators said that the college cannot operate without the beds provided by Battell Hall, meaning that the building will likely continue to operate while a new facility is built.
A re-centralized residential life office
The shift away from the commons system will fundamentally change how the college approaches student residential life staff. It will also add two new positions to the residential life team, including an associate dean for residential life and an assistant director of student success. These positions will be filled by AJ Place,who served as theDean of Brainerd commons until spring 2019, and Michelle Audette, who now works as Middlebury’s ADA Coordinator, respectively.
The positions will both fall within a consolidated Office of Residential Life. This office, in addition to directing students towards resources, will work to remove some of the workload from deans, the number of which will be downsized from five to four.
The college will use new software to help deans manage student needs, and deans will be relieved of some of their residential life responsibilities. This shift is intended to help ease deans’ workloads as they become responsible for larger numbers of students.
The creation of these positions is already underway, according to AJ Place.
“I’ll be supervising the folks that we know now as the CRDs, which is what I’m already doing this year,” Place said.
Place will also be supervising Assistant Director for New Student Experience and Residential Education Kristy Carpenter and Assistant Director for Housing Operations Kady Shea.
These positions are one such way the college hopes to reach students “proactively” and move away from what Place termed a “purely reactive” approach. Place hopes this re-centralization will provide students with heightened access to resources, including programming that will help educate students on a range of topics.
“In Brainerd last year, we piloted a program in the fall [where] we did a number of series of events for first-year students, specifically,” Place said. “We had our first program with the CTLR on time management, which doesn’t sound like a fun topic, but we had well over 60 people at [the event] just here in Stewart. That tells me that students value having that [kind of resource] right here and that we’ve missed the mark on not doing that.”
With this shift, the administration hopes to have deans work in concert — rather than individually — to promote student wellness.
“When we think about what mental health is, when you think about health in general, it’s not just responding to problems, it’s about prevention,” Moeller said. “We’ve got all these great people on campus. We don’t need to just be in crisis response mode. Let’s start to use these skills in meaningful ways to really help all students.”
History of the commons
While the commons shape current students’ perceptions of how Middlebury organizes housing and residential life, this was not always the case. American Studies Professor Tim Spears was a member of the 1998 Residential Life Committee that fleshed out the College’s original idea for the commons system.
Spears said the original plan stipulated that each commons would have housing for all four classes, a dining hall, a dean’s office, and housing for the faculty head. If fully realized, these commons would have resembled Ross and Atwater facilities.
While this original plan was passed with hopes of creating five “microcosms” that would function together as the Middlebury experience, the plan was drastically altered in 2007, when it became clear that the college did not possess the financial means to build the infrastructure required by the 1998 plan. The last commons construction project was Atwater, which occurred at the same time the Davis Family Library was being built in 2004.
Due to the financial constraints, the college turned to a 4/2 plan, which features “a 4-year commons affiliation and a 2-year residency,” as described by a blog post written by Spears and dated September, 2007. This is the plan students at Middlebury have come to know — a plan under which students maintain their relationship with their commons Deans for the duration of their college experience, while only living within their commons for half of that time.
The 4/2 plan looked to keep the elements of the commons that had already been implemented, while letting go of the price tags required by the original framework. Though the move saved the college millions of dollars, it left the original commons vision largely unrealized.
Karl Lindholm, a retired American Studies professor who has worked in all five commons, including as faculty head of Atwater and the dean of Cook, explained that the idea behind the plan was to “decentralize” administrative offices.
“The word that was on everybody’s lips was decentralization,” he said. “In other words, we decentralized the Dean of Students office.”
Spears, who was the dean of the college when the 4/2 plan went into effect, said the goal of this decentralization was to create well-resourced communities to enhance the student experience. He wrote on his blog that he was saddened by the move away from the original vision of the commons, but that the shift was made with the belief that inter-commons relationships would be enough to sustain the reduced system.
“You build connections with students or faculty and commons staff during your first year or two, and then you move off and do other things, but those connections bring you back to the commons,” he said.
Those benefits were reflected in the 2018 survey — over 65% of students reported that the commons helped them to get to know other students, while 58% reported that the commons system helped them meet other people.
While the commons spurred inter-student connections, the data did not support the idea that the commons was central to community building, which was the intention behind its implementation.
“The impact [of the commons system] is only being seen mostly in the first two years and in a very small number of students, and it’s a very expensive program,” said Baishakhi Taylor, the Vice President of Student Affairs and Dean of Students.
John Gosselin, a senior who has served both on Community Council and on the How Will We Live Together Steering Committee, said that the faculty head model in particular does not make financial sense.
“The role of the commons heads originally worked a lot better than they do now,” he said. “The way it works now is we have very small dinners that cost $150,000 to cater for the five houses. That money could be spent better elsewhere.”
Gosselin said three people could be hired to work directly with students for the same amount of money.
Though the college has not confirmed whether the commons heads positions will be eliminated in the new model, there is no evidence suggesting that positions will carry over. The recommendations submitted by the Steering Committee describe the faculty head model as “real,” but says that “the preponderance of evidence suggests that [the reach of the faculty head position] is limited to a relatively small number of students, and relatively limited in scope, manifesting mainly as hosting dinner events.”
Both the Steering Committee and the administration used information gathered in the 2018 Student Residential Life Survey to support the idea that the common head positions are largely ineffective: data show that only 32% of students report having gotten to know their commons head.
Spears said that it is a “fair question” to assess how impactful the faculty head position is, especially because faculty are moving beyond the classroom, in some capacity, to serve in that role. He also noted figures such as those provided by the survey are hard to interpret.
“Just putting a number on it doesn’t really explain whether or how faculty are enhancing residential life and benefitting particular students,” he said.
Even if over 50% of students surveyed reported not having gotten to know their faculty head, it remains difficult to imagine eliminating the position, which is founded on support and care, Spears said.
“I’m sensitive to the fact that, in doing these interviews and meeting with people, there isn’t one single person connected to the current system who didn’t put their heart and soul into it,” Moeller said. “Each person really cares about students. Sometimes it’s difficult being told that you’re a part of something that’s not working as well as it should — it’s hard to hear that you’ve been pouring your soul into something and the outcomes clearly are not where they should be.”
Commons senators and student res life staff opine
Many students involved in the commons feel they were not properly consulted regarding the upcoming changes. Myles Maxie ’22, Middlebury’s Wonnacott Senator, is worried about how students will represent themselves given that the recommendations do not specify how the Student Government Association will change with the elimination of the commons. The current structure has five Senate positions affiliated with the commons — one seat to each commons — and the possible elimination of those positions would decrease senate seats by one third.
“I don’t appreciate the fact that this [new] system doesn’t have full thought behind it,” Maxie said. “They’re unsure on the status of commons councils, given the fact that they’ve removed the commons.”
Teddy Best ’22, who serves as Ross commons Senator, expressed a similar worry.
“I am concerned that the administration did not notify commons senators or commons councils of where they were headed with this process,” he said. “There’s no doubt there are problems with the commons system — that isn’t the question. The question is, what should we do about it? If it’s the case that the commons system is going to be abolished, that seems like a drastic response.”
Maxie also identified poor communication during the plan’s creation as a source of concern. Commons senators were officially notified of the final changes at the same time as the rest of the student body, leaving many to feel that they were not adequately involved in the review process.
“I don’t appreciate the lack of transparency that exists throughout this process,” he said. “This report is titled How Will We Live Together, and how can you live together with people when you can’t trust them to actually tell you the details on how they’re completing this process?”
Maxie and Best are not alone — residential life staff, including Ross Community Assistant Steph Miller ’20, expressed concern with the move away from the commons structure.
“I think a lot was overlooked in the ways these reviews were done,” Miller said. “I think some of the reviews were done hastily. The external reviewers were on campus for less than two or three days,” said Miller, who also expressed concern with the methods used to conduct the review.
“They didn’t talk to that many people and they didn’t talk to the [commons] teams as a collective,” she said. “I think if they had done that, they would’ve seen what is so magical about the commons.”
The Steering Committee, however, viewed the process differently.
“I don’t think there’s anything we could do that would have made this more transparent,” Moeller said. “Everything, the notes, the meetings, the reports on the go site. We would actually send out email invites to groups, blasting out [messages and] saying, ‘who’s willing to come for 40 minutes, an hour?’”
The past week has seen little public backlash to the elimination of the commons system, but it is a dimension of this announcement that is undeniably present. Though the greater student body has, for the most part, shown indifference towards the changes, many people affiliated with the commons and their offices were not available for comment or unwilling to speak on the record for this story, and several alluded to feelings of uncertainty and sadness at the prospect of moving away from the commons system.
Correction: A previous version of the article misstated that commons senators were informed of accepted changes prior to the rest of the student body. The article has since been updated.
(10/24/19 1:56am)
UPDATE: Thursday, Oct. 24, 6:45 p.m.
Rather than evacuating all students enrolled in its schools abroad in Chile, Middlebury’s study abroad office is allowing students to choose how to proceed.
In an email to students enrolled in the programs in Chile, Assistant Director of International Programs Alessandra Capossela outlined four options students may take going forward. Students can either choose to remain in their host cities and await universities resuming class; relocate to Buenos Aires, Argentina for the remainder of the semester; or can return home to the U.S.
If they return to the U.S., they have the option to complete coursework remotely for up to 2.5 credits, or can earn up to 4.5 credits by adding a course of summer study with the Middlebury School of Spanish.
“We spoke with Global Rescue this morning and our advisors there confirmed that the situation was stable for the time being, with some slight improvements in that curfew hours are being shortened in a number of cities,” Capossela wrote in the email. “[Schools in Chile Director] Juan [Pastene] is cautiously optimistic that many of the universities will reopen on Monday.”
In her email, Capossela asked that students make a decision by next Friday, November 1.
——
Oct. 23, 2019
Middlebury’s study abroad office is considering evacuating students enrolled in its programs in Chile in response to widespread civil unrest and government attacks on protesters that have recently swept the country.
Currently, 23 students from Middlebury and other colleges are enrolled in the C.V. Starr Schools Abroad there, located in Concepción, La Serena, Santiago, Temuco, Valdivia, and sister cities Valparaíso and Viña del Mar. Most students in Middlebury programs are located in the capital city of Santiago and the sister cities, where protests erupted at the end of last week after a hike in public transportation fares.
The hike was later revoked by President Sebastián Piñera, but protesters declared on social media that the increased fees were only the “tip of the iceberg,” and have demanded change in wealth inequality, government corruption and high cost-of living — conditions many see as remnants of Augusto Pinochet’s 1970s dictatorship.
The Chilean government declared a state of emergency in some cities, including Valparaíso and Santiago, on Saturday. Members of the police and military have since attacked and detained protestors, shooting at them with rubber and live bullets and throwing tear gas bombs.
Assistant Director of International Programs Alessandra Capossela, who advises for the college’s schools in Chile, alerted students enrolled in the programs on Tuesday via email that the college’s study abroad office is developing plans for a possible evacuation “should things not improve in the next few days.” But even if the protests did quiet down, she wrote, it would be doubtful students could eventually return to their classrooms, given potential for longer-term university closures and student strikes.
In an email to The Campus, Capossela wrote that the study abroad office is considering “all possibilities for the program in Chile going forward, including but not exclusively an evacuation of the students.” Any plan that is implemented will apply to all students enrolled in the Middlebury program regardless of their home institutions, Capossela wrote.
If students are evacuated, they will be flown to Buenos Aires, Argentina or a city in the United States, likely Miami. From there, they will take flights to their home cities. Global Rescue, the study abroad program’s security adviser, is working on an evacuation plan for students and will be in charge of all operations in the event of an evacuation, according to the email sent to students in the program.
In that email, Capossela wrote that her office is exploring “alternative solutions” to earn academic credit, so that students can earn credit even if an evacuation takes place.
Still, some students expressed frustration at the possibility of leaving the country.
“I can’t speak for everyone, but we feel relatively safe and want to continue learning from this experience, even if it’s not a traditional semester abroad,” said Sidra Pierson ’21, who is enrolled at the Catholic University of Valparaíso and living in a homestay in Viña del Mar.
According to Mason Arndt ’21, who is attending the same university and also living in a homestay in Viña del Mar, students in the sister cities have created a petition asking to remain in Chile. Eleven of the 12 students in those cities have signed the petition. Arndt was the only student who chose not to sign, saying that though he has had a positive experience in Chile, he doesn’t believe strongly enough to sign that staying is the right move.
“If they decide to send us home I would definitely be sad because I’d feel like I’d be losing a valuable experience, but for me it wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world,” he said.
In Chile, students in Middlebury programs have observed — either firsthand or through accounts by Chilean acquaintances — looting of stores by protesters, violent government response to protests and other signs of unrest over the past several days. Looting, arson and other violent tactics used by some protesters have created some conflict within the movement between those who do and do not condone the use of violent protest tactics.
Protests in Valparaíso and Santiago have significantly altered the course of students’ semesters. Some Middlebury students in Valparaíso had already missed substantial class time due to student strikes at universities that forced classes to start in September rather than mid-July. Classes at the Middlebury programs’ host universities were again cancelled this week when this round of protests began. Students have been told to remain indoors at all times in the face of various curfews put in place in major cities.
A 6 p.m. curfew was put into effect in Viña del Mar on Monday. Before then, beginning on Saturday, it was set to 8 p.m., Arndt said. With major cities under martial law, the Chilean military has repeatedly shot people for staying out past curfew.
Arndt saw protesters lighting trash cans on fire in the street outside his apartment window on Saturday night. One man threw a brick through the window of a pharmacy across the street, and protesters proceeded to steal items from the store. Later, Arndt watched police arrive and dispel the protesters, who were out past curfew, with batons and tear gas.
“It feels a bit apocalyptic,” Arndt said.
Over the weekend, Pierson said she tried to visit a friend’s homestay in the late afternoon, only to be turned around by a line of police officers advancing down a street and throwing tear gas at a throng of protesters.
“When I left my house, you could taste the smoke in the air,” Pierson said. “People were setting fires everywhere.”
Arndt understands the protestors’ cause, but he and other students have largely assumed roles as observers.
“It's easy to be empathetic in terms of the high inequality and the high cost of living,” Arndt said. “But it's really impossible for us to understand what it's like to live in a country like this that had a dictator.”
The program’s students have been told not to join protests in light of the violence, as well as for fear of possible deportation if they are caught. But the consequences of the protests and government response will not affect them nearly as severely as they affect Chileans, Pierson said.
"The way this is going to affect us is probably not going to reach far beyond our academics for one semester," she said. "It’s a pretty in-your-face reminder of our privilege and status as foreigners here. Chileans can’t just up and leave, this is their reality.”
Last year, students studying at the C.V. Starr school in Yaoundé, Cameroon were evacuated as a precaution following contentious presidential elections. That evacuation, to Morocco, was temporary.
This is a developing story and will be updated accordingly.
(10/17/19 10:05am)
The ongoing conversation about women in traditionally male-dominated professions was re-ignited at the college this past Wednesday, Oct. 9, with the opening of the “Women and Representation” lecture series.
Ruth Hardy, a Democratic state senator representing Addison County and a visiting professor at Middlebury this fall, kicked off the series with her talk, “Why Electing More Women Matters.”
Drawing on her experience as a state senator and her former role as the executive director of Emerge Vermont, Hardy focused her talk on worldwide statistics surrounding women in elected positions, the importance of electing women to office and potential barriers that deter women from running in elections.
“I started with a little story about when I first gave a talk like this just after the 2016 Democratic National Convention,” Hardy told The Campus. “I had gone [to the convention] and was really excited — I thought we were turning a corner in the whole ‘women in politics’ story and that we were about to elect our first woman president — and then, of course, what came after.”
The United States is ranked 76th in the world in terms of women in national legislatures; it falls far behind Rwanda, Cuba and Bolivia, which are the top three highest-ranked nations for female representation.
Within the U.S., Vermont does poorly in comparison with other states.
“It’s the only state that hasn’t sent a woman to Congress,” Hardy said. “You wouldn’t think so, but we haven’t.”
Hardy laid out the factors that prevent women from getting into politics, from structural barriers to personal ones. For example, women feel they need to be overly qualified to run for office, she said.
As Hardy explained in her presentation, many women face sexism and discrimination, bias in the media, voter bias and sexual harassment — obstacles that female candidates, especially women of color, must overcome but that men rarely encounter.
The lecture series, co-sponsored by Middlebury’s Political Science Department and the Feminist Resource Center at the Chellis House, aims to change the discourse surrounding the portrayal and representation of women, especially in elected positions.
Erik Bleich, chair of the Political Science Department, explained that his department decided to invite speakers around a particular theme decided upon last year. This year’s theme celebrates the 100th Anniversary of Women’s Suffrage.
“I asked [Hardy] to present because she is a dynamic local woman who has long been active in politics,” Bleich said. “Her talk was very well-received.”
The lecture series is of particular relevance because, as Bleich described, “Diversity is more than just an object of study. Institutions at every level function best when they’re at their most diverse, when everyone feels that they are represented and can represent themselves.”
According to Bleich, the “Women and Representation” series provides students with an “opportunity to think about things going on today — the rise of female candidates running for President of the United States, the surge of women running for office in the U.S., the issue of women’s rights around the world.”
“It’s becoming more and more important for political scientists to focus on gender,” he said.
In addition to Hardy, this year’s line-up of featured speakers will include Sabrina Karim, assistant professor of government at Cornell University, and Kimberly Morgan, professor of political science and international affairs at George Washington University.
For this first lecture, Hardy did more than highlight the gender inequalities within the U.S. political system: she spoke on the importance of electing women and how electing more women can become a reality.
“Women often make better leaders and better elected officials than men,” Hardy said. “They sponsor more legislation, bring more money to districts, improve the economy in their districts and have better health outcomes for counties and districts represented by women. Women are more collaborative and less partisan.”
Anna Durning ’19.5, who attended the talk, got to know Hardy when she volunteered for her state senate campaign last fall, and was excited to hear of her on-campus lecture.
“In her talk, Ruth did a really good job of bringing together scholarship on women and elections, and her own story of running for office, [for the] school board and then state senate,” Durning wrote in an email to The Campus. “She reminded us that here in Vermont, ‘We love to think we’re better than New Hampshire, but when it comes to women in office we’re not.’”
Durning also mentioned that during the lecture, a frustrating example of the treatment women sometimes face when they hold public roles came up. Durning explained that an older man answered a phone call and proceeded to talk loudly on the phone while Hardy was speaking about barriers that prevent women from running for office.
“In a somewhat small space such as the RAJ conference room, he was essentially speaking over Sen. Hardy, which I felt was incredibly rude and an absurdly well-timed example of how people do not value women’s expertise and experience,” Durning said. The man was eventually asked to leave.
Hardy’s talk had a lot of overlap with the class she is currently teaching this semester, focusing on issues such as the current status of women in politics and different identities of women in political positions — such as women of color, LGBTQIA+ women and Republican women.
Through both her lecture and her class, Hardy hopes to instill a sense of awareness in Middlebury students about Vermont politics and women in office.
Editor’s note: Ruth Hardy is the spouse of Prof. Jason Mittell, The Campus’ academic advisor. Any questions may be directed to campus@middlebury.edu.
(10/17/19 10:00am)
The word “inclusivity” gets thrown around a lot. At Middlebury, we commit time and time again to building an inclusive campus, to creating inclusive communities that stage inclusive conversations. Still, people rarely seem sure what inclusivity actually looks like — it’s much easier to say what it doesn’t look like, or to identify spaces in which doesn’t exist.
And so we as a board are impressed with the college’s new Inclusive Practitioners Program, which aims to implement tangible inclusivity measures in Middlebury classrooms and around campus more generally. The program, designed by Director of Education for Equity and Inclusion Renee Wells, is comprised of 14 different workshops related to inclusivity and anti-bias, from dealing with difficult student comments to properly using students’ preferred gender pronouns.
Although these classes are optional, we ask that faculty attend.
We’ve seen firsthand why this kind of training is so important. Members of the editorial board remember friends dropping courses after being excluded from class spaces. Others remember professors failing to make accommodations for religious observances, or offering inadequate support to students navigating disabilities. In some cases, these professors’ un-inclusive reputations preceded them — students were warned by their peers not to register for certain courses in the first place. Issues of inclusivity can impede not only a student’s ability to learn, but also a professor’s ability to teach.
While these are losses, we believe they’re avoidable ones. We’ve also had shining examples of what inclusive learning environments do look like — and these glimpses leave us excited about the IPP’s broader vision. We’ve been in lecture halls when professors have publicly apologized for comments that left class members feeling marginalized, and took the time and effort to adjust their discourse moving forward. We’ve received new syllabi after teachers, learning from students that assigned articles struck the wrong note, reconsidered their reading lists. And we’ve known faculty members who have skillfully turned tense, potentially divisive discussions into teaching moments.
Class period after class period, these classrooms held robust and challenging conversations. The saliency and impact of these conversations make these classrooms the kind that convinced so many of us to come to Middlebury in the first place.
As far as we’re concerned, every professor on campus stands to benefit from IPP workshops. We recognize the organizers’ deliberate decision not to make the program mandatory — Wells told The Campus she had better experiences with opt-in programs than with mandatory ones. “You can’t give someone a training that makes them not biased,” she told our reporter earlier this fall. “It’s a process of becoming critically more aware.”
Still, we encourage any and all professors to attend. What’s more, we want you to want to go, and we believe this to be a part of your responsibility as teachers. Just as doctors are expected to keep up with the latest medical terminology and procedures, so too should professors be made to brush up on any new vocabulary and strategies that allow them to perform their own pedagogical operations effectively. Students undertake their own anti-bias training in the form of JusTalks, which is far from all-encompassing but is certainly a good start.
We also urge you to take advantage of the wide variety of workshops available. Inclusivity can’t be created through any one measure; it takes many different strategies for a diverse group of students to feel supported in the same, shared learning space.
We realize some members of the faculty aren’t as excited about IPP as we are. As a result, most of the faculty have yet to sign up. We speculate that some professors see this training as unnecessary; others may even consider it part of a greater effort to encourage confining and cushy “PC culture” on campus. As your students, we’re telling you it is necessary. And claims about PC culture overlook the fundamental nature of inclusivity — by opening up the floor to all students, inclusive classrooms expand conversations rather than contract them. Students are much more likely to share difficult or unpopular opinions in classrooms in which they are made to feel comfortable and intellectually welcomed. Cognitively receptive professors provide students with supportive spaces in which they can collectively tackle the tough issues. It’s that simple.
Inclusivity also extends far beyond the classroom (even though that remains a great place to start). Semesters come and go, but many faculty and staff spend years working at the college. We believe the IPP can cultivate a more permanent culture of respect among all stakeholders in the Middlebury community, generating real progress that outlasts any one student’s individual college career (or any one bad MiddCourses review).
To be clear: We don’t expect you to attend every workshop offered this year. Instead, consider this a research project extended over the course of several semesters. When it comes to developing this kind of awareness, we students are learning too. But as the people standing at the front of the room, you occupy uniquely powerful positions from which you can set inclusive precedents and contribute to a culture of learning that reaches far beyond the confines of the classroom. We ask that you take advantage of it.
(10/17/19 9:59am)
Leaving behind your friends and family for a year is an immense decision, and when I touched down in Burlington after 30 hours of traveling, I couldn’t help but feel that I had chosen wrong. I was jet-lagged and overwhelmed, and to worsen matters, the only vending machine in the airport had run out of blue Gatorade. This seemed like foreshadowing. Had I made the wrong choice? Was yellow Gatorade better? More importantly, was postponing my life to spend a year abroad in a place where there are four cows to every one person the wrong decision? The answer was irrelevant, because there I was on a dark and empty bus, en route to a school I knew nothing about – my only friends the distant smell of manure seeping in through the open windows, and the same four Bryan Adams songs being blasted on repeat by the driver.
But I wasn’t alone for long. From the second I arrived at Middlebury, the International Student and Scholar Services made a fantastic effort to link all the international students together. Friendships are easier to build when people understand one another, be that in terms of common languages, shared values or mutual interests. It quickly became obvious that Middlebury is home to a sprawling global community. The student body is a melting pot of different cultures and creeds, and this made the transition for exchange students like me ineffably easier.
This was a little over a month and a half ago, however, and although efforts to ease the initial transition for exchange students were successful, we were scarcely prepared for the academic intensity that would follow. Adjusting to Middlebury’s working environment and its tight knit community is not easy. For many international students, the transition continues to be particularly tumultuous. As the work piles up and the homesickness builds, a dire institutional inadequacy becomes increasingly evident: Currently, exchange students lack any form of particularized representation or support within the SGA. This can and must be amended.
Middlebury, with all its quirks, is an overwhelming environment at the best of times. For everything from understanding the culture to just having someone to ask questions that seem far too simple to ask, exchange students are in need of someone to whom they can reach out. That someone should have both the knowledge to help, and the empathy to understand the difficulties of being an exchange student. The ultimate goal of all exchange students is to become bona fide members of this community of intelligent and eccentric individuals – and this immersion could be much easier if these students had consistent and accessible guidance.
Such representation wouldn’t just benefit exchange students. The inherent value of exchanges lies in our unique perspectives on global education. We come from Nottingham to East Anglia, SciencesPo to La Sorbonne, Potsdam to Freie Universität Berlin; our origins may be different, but our passion for learning – and our fidelity to the institutions that allow us to harness this passion – is certainly shared. Middlebury is our home for the year, and we want to be able to contribute to the chorus of student voices which seek nothing more than to ensure this college is serving its students to the best of its ability.
Attending this school is an honor, but many exchange students feel this lack of representation emphasizes the ephemerality of our time here. It’s true; this cohort of exchange students is temporary, as the next will be, and as the last was – but there will always be exchange students. If we work now to establish a means of providing them with the support and guidance they’ll need, we can be sure that future cohorts of exchanges will be better equipped to thrive at Middlebury.
This support doesn’t necessarily translate to the inauguration of an exchange student senator. On the contrary, exchange students are a collective – united by our disparate cultural identities and our concern for each other’s well-being and academic success. As such, we seek not to elect one individual, but to create an organization – one which harnesses all available resources to build a strong support structure that endures long beyond our time here. Inspired by a commitment to our future exchange brothers and sisters, a request to establish such an organization was submitted to the SAO on Oct. 14, 2019. While it is easy to admire Middlebury’s global community, one is also obligated to recognize the difficulties associated with the borderless pursuit of human excellence. It is therefore our unequivocal responsibility to ensure that future generations of exchange students remain unabated in this virtuous pursuit.
(10/10/19 10:04am)
“The important things in your life,” Katherine Arden ’11 said, “happen when you say, ‘screw it, let’s do it.’” Arden and I sat in the Adirondack chairs by McCullough on one of the last warm days in Middlebury, which comes about two months earlier than in many other places. Arden, a current Middlebury resident, is no stranger to this phenomenon. The national best-selling author, with five published novels and six more on the way, had no idea that post-Midd life would include being a full-time novelist.
Her plan was to take time off, get a masters degree in interpretation, and eventually work for the U.N. That path couldn’t be more different from the one she’s on now. Recounting her fascinating detour, Arden said that she worked on a farm in Hawaii with World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms (WWOOF) during her free time. “I got bored farming so I started writing a book,” she said. “I enjoyed it and decided to put the interpreting on hold to finish the book, and I sold it to a publisher as part of a trilogy.” Arden’s first book, “The Bear and The Nightingale,” was published in 2017, and the series’ second and third installments were published in the two years that followed. More recently, Arden has written two children’s books titled “Small Spaces” (2018) and “Dead Voices” (2019).
“It’s been super rewarding and I enjoy the freedom, the traveling and making stuff up for a living,” Arden said.
Of course, as a college student, I was curious about how Arden’s Middlebury education had impacted her career. Arden graduated with a degree in Russian and French. She recalled using what she learned in class to “seed” her first novel, which is set in Russia. “I guess trying to create an authentic sense of a place is challenging, and it helps to have been there and to have studied it,” she said.
[pullquote speaker="Katherine Arden '11" photo="" align="center" background="on" border="all" shadow="on"]You don’t have to know everything right away and make decisions right away. The achievements will still be there, the advanced degree will still be there if you take two or three years and just discover.[/pullquote]
On the topic of practicality and stability in career choice, Arden said that she is the only one of her friends to pursue the same career path since leaving college. “Everyone tries different stuff, everyone goes back for a second degree, everyone tries to make it work in this weird 21st-century economy,” she said. “It’s important to make decisions based off what is right for you. You can’t think, ‘This career won’t give me security,’ because, well, it has for me. Professionally, financially… spiritually. It’s been a good and stable career. You never know, and there’s so much self-motivation involved.”
Cognizant of the pressure that students feel to have their futures mapped out, Arden offered words of advice. “One thing that happens in college is that you have this sense that ‘I must hurry, I must decide, I must not get behind everyone else — the sense of a rush. In reality, when you’re 21 you have so much time; you have tons of time. Take a year off, go be a ski bum in Colorado. Do what I did and go work on a farm in Hawaii. You don’t have to know everything right away and make decisions right away,” she said. “The achievements will still be there, the advanced degree will still be there if you take two or three years and just discover.”
This leads us to another monumental influence in Katherine’s life: travel.
Already having spent a year in France and Russia before coming to the college, Arden returned to France and Russia in her junior year abroad. Before returning to Vermont, she farmed in Hawaii on two separate occasions, worked as a teaching assistant in the French Alps and backpacked across the world. “Traveling is important. It’s how you grow and learn about places that aren’t your place,” she said. “And it’s more than just being a tourist. It means going and trying to live somewhere else. Just going and looking at the Eiffel Tower isn’t going to make a difference,” she said. “Life surprises you, I didn’t expect to come back to Vermont. But I did, and it ended up being home.” According to Arden, it was travel that gave her confidence in herself and her purpose.
It’s easy to get caught up in the culture we establish on this campus. It’s even easier to get caught up in the opinions of others — on our goals, our majors, our summer plans. But coming from someone who has been in our Blundstones, who has hiked up the same Snake Mountain and found success in doing what she loves every day, I ask that you don’t take her advice too lightly.
“Take advantage of the freedom while you have it,” Arden said. “Because you will eventually have responsibilities, and then it gets harder to keep exploring. You might discover weird life curve balls, like being a novelist.”
(10/10/19 10:04am)
The fall high holidays can be difficult for Jewish students, as they try to complete their coursework while also making space to observe the two holiest days of the Jewish calendar. Rosh Hashanah, which this year began on the evening of Sept. 29, marks the Jewish New Year, and Yom Kippur, which began the evening of Tuesday, Oct. 8, is the Jewish Day of atonement.
Both holidays are meant to be days of prayer and celebration, and some Jewish students feel torn between attending services on the holidays and going to class. Though the college offers excused absences for religious observance, the balance is still difficult to strike.
“I felt like I had two days in one,” Jenny Moss ’20.5 said about her experience going from service to class during Rosh Hashanah. “It was a weird and sort of abrupt transition.”
Having to immediately leave the service and re-focus on school means less time for reflection and can take away from the holiday, Moss said. However, missing class can mean added stress on a day meant for prayer.
While professors are discouraged from having tests or assignments due on either holiday, per the College Handbook, various students have said that their professors have not always honored this policy. This may require a student to take an extension, which could mean devoting time during the holidays to studying or completing the extended work.
“I didn’t necessarily have to make up a ton of work,” Noah Hochfelder ’22 said. “But it still felt like I kind of needed a little more space to observe and to reflect.”
This balance can be even more difficult on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the year in Judaism. The day is meant to reflect on, and ultimately atone for, any wrongs one may have committed, and traditionally there is a daylong fast. This year, Yom Kippur falls on Wednesday, Oct. 9, the middle of the school week. The fast can make going to classes hard, and some students who feel they cannot miss class elect not to fast at all.
There is not an easy solution to making these days less difficult for the students observing them. Students agree that while it would be ideal to have school canceled, it is not pragmatic.
“I think it’s a challenge to fit a religious calendar that is different from the dominant Christian and secular calendar into the [school] year,” said Danielle Stillman, a rabbi and associate chaplain at the college.
However, there are steps that students say could make the balance easier for them. Professors, for example, could refrain from assigning large projects due in the days immediately following the holidays. Stillman thinks that educating the Middlebury community about these holidays could help professors and the student body be more aware and accommodating during these weeks.
For now, however, practicing students must make a choice: take the day off to observe the holiday, or go to class and observe still.
“I would love to be able to take that whole day to reflect on myself and my past year,” Moss said. “But I’ll either do that or I’ll go to class. You can’t do both.”
(10/10/19 10:03am)
Sweaty students, rejoice! ... For now.
Laundry machines on campus, which students previously had to pay to use, will remain free for the rest of the fall semester. Typically costing between $2.75 and $3.00 to wash and dry a load, the old laundry system required students to first purchase a $2.00 reusable laundry card.
According to Director of Business Services Matthew Curran, the third-party vendor that handles laundry transactions, CSC Laundry, has changed its control system, and the college is in the process of transitioning to the new program. Come J-Term, students will have to pay for laundry services with their student ID cards, he said.
Curran said that Business Services had intended to charge students for laundry this fall, but they encountered difficulties using the student IDs as a payment method.
“While going through this process, it was determined that the data needed to be on the ID cards to procure laundry services was more difficult to upload than originally thought,” Curran said.
Throughout the summer, CSC Laundry changed its charging system in laundry units across campus. The result was that select locations had washing machines and dryers running free of charge.
According to Torre Davy ’21, who was on campus over the summer, one washing machine and dryer duo in Meeker House was free, while other machines in the building required the usual pay-card method. Now, none of the machines in the building require any payment to function, as is the case across campus.
Many students rejoiced in learning that their first few loads of laundry this academic year would be free. Vanessa Young ’20 said she hopes to run more laundry loads before having to pay again.
“It’s amazing to have free laundry,” Young said. “I’ve split my load into two each time I’ve gone, but I would have previously shoved the same amount of laundry into one washer.”
For some, a free laundry system isn’t entirely new. Varsity athletes enjoy free laundry in the Athletic Center, but the services are limited to athletic clothing during their season. Young, who plays for the women’s basketball team, said the washer and dryer unit that runs athletic apparel often leaves her clothes damp and musty.
“We aren’t ungrateful for having laundry, but we end up having to spend money still by washing stuff in the dorms during the season,” she said.
Natalia Santiago ’23 hopes laundry will remain free beyond winter break. Santiago said she often has to run the dryer twice to completely dry her clothes, and her bedding requires an entirely separate cycle.
“Paying for laundry would be such a burden because these washers and dryers do not work to their maximum potential,” she said. “I don’t want to pay over three dollars on one round of laundry for it to be sub-par quality.”
Cost is not the only barrier to easy laundry access. Laundry rooms are scattered across campus, and not all residential buildings have machines. Notably, students living in Battell, the biggest first-year dorm, must trek to the expansive laundry complex in Forest Hall’s basement.
Students have also complained that the machines used to load money onto laundry cards are distant from many laundry rooms, and that the machines require cash to add more value onto the cards.
Curran ensured that any money on current laundry cards will be transferrable to students’ ID cards when the new system launches. Although the Business Services office has no official plan yet, Curran said they are anticipating students may be able to submit their current laundry cards and ID numbers for the College to add value on their behalf.
“Students should hold onto the old laundry cards for the time being,” he said.
