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(01/27/21 8:46pm)
In J-Term of 2017, Thor Sawin swiped his ID card to get into a Middlebury College building for the first time. Sawin, an associate professor at MIIS, was teaching a winter term course in linguistics, and had a moment of realization when he first set foot on the Vermont campus.
“I'm like, ‘Oh yeah, I'm home,’” Sawin said. “I didn't even need to do anything special. I can check out a book out of the library with the ID card that I already had. It works in both places.”
Sawin, who also serves as the current president of the Faculty Senate at MIIS, understands that faculty at the college might not know just how intertwined the two schools are. He had been previously asked by college faculty who his provost was (Jeff Cason, just like the college) and who his president was — to which he replied, of course, “Laurie Patton.”
Financial fears about MIIS and its purported drain on the college aren’t the only barriers to total cohesion between the two institutions. Some college faculty still believe that MIIS simply doesn’t offer anything to the undergraduate liberal arts experience that Middleury provides, while others suggest that a failure of communication has left college faculty in the dark about MIIS’ efforts and values. And for some, a belief that MIIS is a fundamentally independent institution colors these sentiments.
“It's just not Middlebury. It's not Middlebury College to me,” Frank Swenton told The Campus.
From an administrative perspective, that simply isn’t true.
“Monterey employees are Middlebury College employees. These folks are part of the family. They do fantastic work for the College and for Big M,” Provost said, using the term for the whole Middlebury institution, which includes the college, institute, schools abroad, Bread Loaf School of English and more. He also noted that Middlebury’s effort throughout the pandemic to provide wage continuity for employees and educational continuity for students applies unquestionably to all units, including the college and the institute.
However, for Monterey faculty and staff, a division between the institutions described by some college faculty isn’t just less visible — it’s impossible.
“Here in California, we can't help but be constantly thinking about Vermont. Everything that happens in Vermont totally affects our life.” Sawin said, noting that many decisions at MIIS can't be made "without thinking about Vermont first," but that college faculty aren't always obligated to think first of their California counterparts.
Word traveled in pieces to MIIS after Middlebury’s faculty voted 122 for and 133 against ending the college’s relationship with the institute. Even though the motion lost, a nearly-split vote was a blow to morale at the institute, according to Sawin.
“It was a depressing feeling around here,” Sawin said. The vote was especially disheartening in light of herculean efforts taken by institute faculty over the last several years to fit themselves into Middlebury by streamlining work, adjusting their jobs and cutting costs. MIIS reduced its full-time faculty from 84 to 71, 11 of them through a workforce planning process, last year, and the institute’s programs are currently well-enrolled despite an expected hit because of pandemic. However, Sawin said, the college’s faculty didn’t seem to be recognizing these painful belt-tightening measures and intense enrollment efforts.
In reflecting on the climate at Middlebury that led to the vote, Sawin noted, “Either [college faculty] don’t know what we do, and we haven’t done a good job of telling our story,” Sawin said. “Or what if they know our story and they still think that what we do is not valuable?”
Swenton’s proposition to move some current MIIS programs to the Vermont campus rather than eliminating them was met with mixed feelings. Sawin emphasized that while some faculty would be happy to do their job anywhere, many have a deep sense of pride about being Californians, and connect their academic work to the state and local environment. Sawin cited the institute’s close relationship to Silicon Valley, connections to Asia and the Pacific and research on oceans as some of the ways that the California location is integral to the work of its faculty.
“We’re glad that you like us, and we get that ending our campus doesn’t mean you want to fire us and throw us into the street,” Sawin said. “But California is a big part of what we do, and what we are.”
Swenton likens MIIS to an office of a company being moved, or employees being transferred to a different branch, and he says that expecting individuals to move for a job is “legitimate and not unexpected”.
“I don't think it's an unreasonable ask,” he added.
While moving operations to the Vermont campus may be plausible — if not academically practical — for the institute’s faculty, this strategy doesn’t present a contingency plan for staff in California, who would likely lose their jobs were the campus to be dissolved and its programs transplanted.
Swenton acknowledges that job loss would likely occur, but says that this fact does not excuse the expenditures of maintaining MIIS. In his view, Middlebury bailing out a bankrupt Monterey on accreditation probation 15 years ago has already been a service to the employees of MIIS, but the college is not obligated to maintain that employment in perpetuity. “Would I say that for sure every single person who is used is working there, every single staff member and faculty member, would be moved over? I don't know, maybe that's part of the reason for the resistance,” Swenton said.
From an administrative perspective, moving Monterey’s programs to Vermont isn’t on the table — in addition to the benefits of having a West Coast presence, David Provost says that the presence of 600 graduate students alone would be unsustainable for Addison County.
“There isn’t housing stock in Addison Country to support 600 new individuals living here,” Provost said, noting that their existence would require massive new development. “Where would we put them? Where would they learn?”
In addition to unrealistic infrastructure investments, Provost also noted that, without a doubt the closure of the Monterey campus would result in job losses for staff. He said that while he believes the college would hypothetically offer new jobs at the college to those staff first, asking those individuals to transplant from Northern California to the drastically different central Vermont would be logistically difficult for both those staff and the college and would lead to the widespread layoffs that the college has tried to avoid.
Correction: An earlier version of this piece identified the wrong number of faculty who left MIIS through the workforce planning process. It was 11, not 13.
(11/12/20 10:59am)
As the nation waited on edge to hear the results of the 2020 presidential election, many of Middlebury’s students of color feared that tensions could erupt into racialized violence on campus and in town.
Students worried that the college, which hosts a much higher concentration of people of color than the surrounding area, would provide an easy target for racial violence and hate speech. Many students of color decided to stay on campus, travel in groups, avoid the main roads and town and remain hyper-vigilant for the duration of election week and beyond.
Jasmin Animas-Tapia ’21 made one last trip into town to stock up on groceries on Nov. 1. She worries that tensions will continue to mount over the coming weeks instead of dying down. Unless absolutely necessary, she does not plan on returning to town before she leaves for the end of the semester.
As a Black woman, Kaila Thomas ’21 believes she is an easier target for racial violence than male students of color. For the duration of election week, Thomas scarcely left her college housing except to attend in-person classes and eat in the dining hall. Friends escorted her to classes and sometimes brought her meals so she wouldn’t have to leave her refuge.
Many students of color did not fear outright physical violence in Vermont but worried that they might be verbally assaulted by passing cars or community members. The threat of these interactions undermines a sense of “emotional safety” for students of color, according to David Vargas ’22.5.
Vargas defined emotional safety as the feeling that he is wanted or belongs here, something he has felt infrequently during his time at Middlebury. Similarly, Animas-Tapia thinks about it as “feeling comfortable enough in spaces to be open and honest” about who she is.
None of these feelings and fears were new or unique to this election week. The election, and the rising national tensions that surround it, only serves to exacerbate existing worries for students of color, many of whom feel unsafe and uncomfortable in town even under normal circumstances.
Vargas is hyper aware of how his skin color visually marks him as an “outsider” in town. He remains constantly on guard, aware of his surroundings and thoughtful of his actions to avoid conflict when he leaves campus.
“Being Brown in America, you always have to be careful,” Vargas said.
Animas-Tapia carefully polices herself and her conduct when she enters the town. She tries to keep her head down and avoid calling attention to herself. She wears makeup and purposefully dresses up and tries to “look presentable.”
When she walks with her Spanish-speaking friends, she is careful to only speak English. Though it goes against her nature as a native New Yorker used to brusque interactions, she tries to appear overly friendly to passersby and cashiers in town.
“I’ll go out of my way to make small talk even if I'm not invested in the conversation just because, if I come to your store, I want you to recognize me,” she said. “I don’t want you to see me as a threat or as an outsider.”
Many students of color shared stories of facing racial harassment in Middlebury in the past. Vargas recalled a man shouting “Make America Great Again” at him as he rode by on a bicycle during his first semester. A man recently yelled “All Lives Matter” at Hennah Vohra ’21 out of the window of a passing car, and Animas-Tapia recalls freezing in shock when a white woman referred to her using a racial slur in Hannaford.
“I can’t remember her face anymore, and I never saw her again, but it was just something that really really stuck with me,” she said. “It just takes one moment to mess up the relationship [with the town].”
An “institutional memory” of past incidents also informs students’ fears, according to Vargas. A recent incident in which a white student used a racial slur against Rodney Adams ’21 looms heavily in many of their minds. Other past incidents, such as the appearance of stickers for a white supremicist organization on campus and white nationalist propaganda in Davis Family Library, all lend weight to students’ worries that they too could be targeted.
The college responded to students raising concerns about their safety during the election by organizing volunteer groups of faculty, staff, and community members to patrol the campus perimeter during the week. Patrols ran on Monday and Tuesday from 8 a.m. to midnight and from 6 p.m. to midnight for the rest of the week, according to Center for Community Engagement Assistant Director Jason Duquette-Hoffman, who organized the patrols.
Volunteers walked through the biting winds and blistering snow Monday night for over nine miles during their three-hour shifts, on the lookout for any outside agitators harassing students. Professor of Anthropology Michael Sheridan volunteered Thursday night, completing eight laps of the campus during his shift. At the end of the night, Sheridan’s Fitbit informed him that he had taken 21,000 steps.
“I thought it was wrong that anybody in our community should have to worry about their physical safety on our campus,” Sheridan said. “I saw this patrol idea as one way to contribute something to overall feelings of security and belonging in the community.”
According to Duquette-Hoffman, the volunteers were primarily meant to support students. Should something happen, they were told to follow the students' lead, but to try to support them and guide them away from the interaction rather than directly intervene. The college does not know of any incidents in the past week, according to Interim Director of Public Safety Daniel V. Giatto.
Duquette-Hoffman hoped that volunteers wouldn’t face any harassment and would instead spend their shifts enjoying a nice walk around campus and friendly conversations with students. He aimed for their presence to comfort nervous students and signal that the college cares about them and their fears. Many students of color said that they appreciated the volunteers’ efforts.
“BIPOC students on this campus often feel very isolated in the challenges we face,” Vohra said. “Knowing that our campus as a whole is finally cognizant of those is comforting.”
In addition to Public Safety increasing staffing on Monday and Tuesday nights, Middlebury also hired Green Mountain Concert Services (GMCS) to provide extra security during election week. Like the volunteer patrols, the college hoped that they could support students and guide them away from tense interactions should outside agitators approach them, according to Giatto.
GMCS’s presence raised concerns for students of color weary of security services and police in a time when the Black Lives Matter movement’s national prominence has put police brutality and racism at the forefront of people’s minds. Rather than alleviate her fears, GMCS staff only made Animas-Tapia more tense.
With no strong connection to the college or sense of the campus community, she worried about how they might interact with students. Should a student of color respond to harassment, she feared that GMCS staff might side with the initial attacker and cause further harm to the student.
The college’s lack of transparency heightened these concerns for some students. Though the college announced the volunteer patrols in a campus-wide email, they sent no communication about GMCS. Animas-Tapia only noticed their presence because their bright yellow jackets caught her eye.
Elijah Willig ’21 was also frustrated by the college’s lack of communication and failure to proactively address students’ concerns, noting that the college only organized volunteers and hired security after students of color repeatedly raised concerns about their safety. In his view, the college’s latest actions are part of a larger pattern of the administration reacting belatedly and insufficiently to the concerns of students of color.
“The administration only supports students when students demand that the administration supports them,” Willig said.
Animas-Tapia also wishes the college had reached out to students of color and directly asked them what they wanted and needed. A solution informed by their actual experiences would make students feel safer than GMCS or volunteer patrols, whose efforts she thinks are largely ineffective.
Those patrols do not enter dorms, nor do they monitor the everyday, small interactions where harms pile up, according to Animas-Tapia. While the fear of those interactions may die down as the election fades into memory, the threat will not disappear.
“This is not the only time you should prioritize keeping your students safe from harm,” she said. “It's not coddling your students; it's just giving them the peace of mind to know that they are safe here and to live happily and healthy.”
No amount of temporary security will effectively protect students of color on campus if the college does not directly address its role in perpetuating systemic racism, according to Vargas.
“It's all connected,” Vargas said. “If you don’t work hard enough to eradicate white supremacy and racism here, that's not really supporting people much with regard to the election. The election and the atmosphere here is just a byproduct of what's going on in the country overall.”
Editor’s Note: Professor of Anthropology Michael Sheridan is senior writer Sophia McDermott-Hughes’ academic advisor.
(11/12/20 10:57am)
Tucked away in the folding alleyways and courtyards behind Middlebury’s Main Street is the unassuming Stone Leaf Teahouse, a building with a simple interior of stone and timbre and shelves of teaware. After a 17-hour flight and a three-hour drive that took me away from Asia to the foliage-covered mountains of Vermont, I did not expect to find a piece of home here.
“I never really thought the teahouse would be in Middlebury,” said John Wetzel, the owner of the teahouse. “I’ve always thought it would have to be in a bigger town to sustain it.”
However, the support from the community was so great that Wetzel decided to undertake the venture in 2009 after finding an ideal space in the Marble Works District. Between his trips to import tea from Asia and serve it to the Middlebury community, Wetzel found meaning in facilitating the cultural thread between the growers and the drinkers.
Travel
Studying and importing tea has brought Wetzel to tea farms across Asia, including those in India, Nepal, China, Taiwan and Japan. Driven by his goal to trade with local, family-owned tea farms, Wetzel visited many rural villages. His first trip was in 2006, when he traveled across Vietnam alone, save for one contact in Saigon.
Wetzel graduated from Washington College, a liberal arts college in Chestertown, Md., with a major in environmental studies. He had a multifaceted interest in culture, history, environment and agriculture.
Just like many other liberal arts students, Wetzel had no idea where his life was going to take him. However, he found a focal point for all his interests in tea. Yearning to learn more about tea and the culture that surrounds it, he headed eastward to its roots.
“It was before you can book everything online,” he said, chuckling as he recalled his first trip. “You take a train or bus into a town, and you just have to make your best guess to find a place to stay.”
Before he started to study Chinese this year, Wetzel had no knowledge of the local languages in the villages and cities he visited. Insisting on not following tourist norms and attracted by the adventurous aspect of self-exploration, Wetzel never hired a translator. Surprisingly, he was able to build connections as a result of his language barrier. Wetzel explained that since the younger generation in the rural areas had just started to learn English in school, they were happy to practice with him and serve as translators for their older relatives.
“Nevertheless, as a white person and a businessman, it can be a challenge to break down the stereotypes of American businessmen and tourists,” he said. Aware of his position, Wetzel emphasized the importance of respecting the local culture, as well as consciously avoiding cultural exploitation and appropriation.
Despite the language barriers and cultural differences, his encounters with locals have been largely positive. “People are very welcoming. Even if I [ended] up in a village where no one speaks English, they still took me in, shared meals and tea, and communicated whatever we could,” he said.
“Ten years ago, I would get the impression that I was the only white person people [had] ever seen,” Wetzel said. However, today, the situation has changed drastically, as even the rural areas of Asia have been impacted by the rapid wave of urbanization and globalization that metamorphosized its metropolitan areas such as Shanghai, Tokyo and Hong Kong.
The beauty of the people and the environment he encountered during his travels became one of the most meaningful facets of his work.
Humbly calling himself “a student of tea” despite more than a decade of specialization, Wetzel relished the diversity of tea in the different areas of Asia. “I don’t have a single teacher in chadao (the way of tea). Everywhere I go, all these people I meet, they are all my teachers,” he said.
Connecting
By conversing with locals and visiting tea farms across Asia, Wetzel was able to gradually build up substantial connections throughout the continent. He credits this to the social nature of tea-drinking culture. In Asia, many families greet guests and friends by serving tea. Casual social gatherings and friendly reunions are often done over afternoon teas.
“The nature of drinking tea is talking with people,” he said. “On my trips, I want to try and make those connections more than just business transactions. Going to buy tea, you have to sit down and talk to people about themselves: what they are going through, things in their lives, and so on.”
Maintaining the connections he built up over the last 14 years has become an important part of his life. Wetzel reached a point at which the purpose of his travels shifted from purely adventuring into new places to revisiting and rebuilding existing connections.
“I am actually not a natural traveler,” Wetzel admits. “There is a part of me that prefers to just stay local, especially with the ecological consequences of flying.” It is also difficult for him to be away from his family, with whom he cherishes spending time. However, adamant on the importance of maintaining these cross-continental connections through tea, and passionate about sharing the tea culture with more people in America, Wetzel’s love for tea and culture brings him time and time again back to Asia.
He believes that the teahouse finishes the circle of connection by providing a space for serving tea. The teahouse always pours the first cup of tea for its visitors — a purposeful act of offering in tea ceremonies.
Unfortunately, because of safety precautions related to the pandemic, Stone Leaf currently only offers pickup and deliveries. This has drastically changed the nature of the business — and Wetzel’s new goal is to educate more people about how to enjoy loose leaf tea at home, whether it’s simply adding hot water or making a good pot of Kung Fu Tea.
When asked about the reason behind his specific interest in tea, Wetzel highlighted the contemplative nature of tea-drinking that is generally not seen in the coffee house culture. While he definitely appreciates and enjoys coffee, the meditative aspect of tea ceremonies appeals to him on a deeper and more personal level.
“Often, people who are conversing stop and watch the flowing of the water as we pour the tea for them. There is this brief moment of silence,” Wetzel said. The act of drinking and making tea, according to Wetzel, is very much about being mindful and present, as well as being aware of the little details in our lives that have so much potential to bring joy yet are so often habitually neglected.
(10/29/20 9:59am)
In races as divisive as those in the 2020 general election, professors are faced with deciding whether to broach the topic in the classroom.
This year in particular, the question extends to nearly every academic department. “I think that it is often a pedagogical strategy to think of your course material in the context of what is going on in the world… So if it means talking about the election, then I talk about the election,” said Professor of Sociology Jamie McCallum, who is currently teaching a first year seminar called “U.S. American Left.”
McCallum explained that in the classroom, there is no non-political way to broach the topic. “On one hand, you don’t want to make the lecture into a pulpit. At the same time, I think it’s important to be clear about where you’re coming from,” he said. He explained that some professors may choose not to discuss politics in class, and while he believes that to be a valid approach, it is nonetheless a political stance.
In humanities classrooms across campus, political discussions are an expected part of the package. “I address the election insofar as the various policy positions on each ticket intersect with themes raised in the class,” Professor of History Amit Prakash said. He explained that the past can — and must — be used to understand our experiences in the present. “Otherwise it’s just antiquarianism,” he said.
Jennifer Wang, a professor of English and American literatures, found elections to be equally pertinent in her courses. “Given the nature of what I teach, literature and literary study, I don’t believe I could keep politics — topical, electoral, and otherwise — out of my classroom,” Wang told The Campus. “It’s really not about me, it’s about [my students].”
Meanwhile, in the Department of Film and Media Culture, Professor Jason Mittell takes a different tack. In his current course, he has spent time discussing the connection between television and democracy, as well as campaign ads and the mainstream media. “I acknowledge my positions and beliefs but make it very clear that students will never be evaluated on whether they agree with me or not,” Mittell said.
In his economic statistics class, Professor of Economics Akhil Rao finds that discussing the election allows him to touch on relevant topics like racial inequality, income inequality and public sentiment on climate change, although he does not believe that strictly addressing the election is necessary for his class. “I don't want to go too far afield from the important economic issues at stake,” he said.
For Mittell and many other professors, these conversations are not about disseminating ideology but rather acknowledging the effects of politics on their subjects. “I encourage them to argue for their own positions based on information and analysis,” Mittell said.
Professor Jason Mittell is The Campus’ faculty adviser. He is married to Vermont State Senator Ruth Hardy.
(10/22/20 9:58am)
Although traditional study abroad has come to a halt because of the pandemic, Middlebury offered remote courses and internships this semester as an alternative experience.
Throughout the summer, Middlebury suspended schools individually based on the Covid-19 levels in the area and local universities’ plans. By mid-summer, however, the school decided to close all Middlebury Schools Abroad and halt all study abroad options that might be available via external programs.
Middlebury students abroad often enroll directly in local universities, so Middlebury has a large contact network of faculty in each country. Dean of International Programs Carlos Vélez was able to reach out to the directors at each of the schools, who found local faculty who were willing to teach remotely to Middlebury students. He then communicated with department chairs at Middlebury — mainly those leading language departments — to finalize a list of courses.
“It was a very consultative process, both with my staff in the schools abroad but also with the chairs of the departments here,” Vélez said. “We wanted to make sure that whatever we offered wouldn’t conflict with other courses that are being taught in those departments.”
Originally over 50 students registered for these programs, but Vélez is unsure how many there are now. All courses but one are taught in a foreign language, and thus have the same prerequisites as they would normally.
Claudio Gonzalez-Chiaramonte, director of the schools in Argentina and Uruguay and associate professor at Middlebury, said that students were initially shy and nervous in his Spanish course on U.S.-Latin America relationships. But after three or four sessions, they warmed up to the class and became more comfortable speaking.
The Spanish-speaking schools also created a site with daily activities such as conferences, movies and chats that students can participate in.
Peter Stavros, an instructor with Middlebury Schools Abroad in Jordan is teaching refugee and forced migration studies this semester. The class is usually taught in Arabic, which meant that it was previously more focused on language learning than content, but this year it is being taught in English.
“Because we are doing it in English and most students obviously speak English very well, we’re able to kind of cover the substance more deeply,” Stavros said.
Students are also finding non-academic ways to stay connected to the abroad experience despite coming home. Diana Milne ’21 was studying abroad in Madrid last spring when the pandemic began to unfold, and was forced to return home early. Now, she is completing a 10-week remote internship for Liceo y Colegio San Juan Bautista, a school in Uruguay.
“I really felt like I didn’t get the full experience that I wanted studying abroad in Madrid because I’d lost so much time being there and it just wasn’t the same from the computer screen,” Milne said. “I thought it would be a great opportunity to kind of get a little bit more knowledge about their culture and work on my Spanish. And it just sounded like fun, working with kids.”
Milne spends her time in the Uruguayan classroom speaking in English so that the students can interact with a native speaker. This is particularly helpful for older students who are preparing for international exams. She joins their classes — all in person — via Zoom to give presentations about herself and hear the students’ presentations about themselves, Uruguay, their culture and their school. Milne’s communications with the director, supervisor and teachers are all in Spanish.
“I’ve been checking with half of the students that are taking these remote internships, and to my surprise, they are really very comfortable. I expected questions, discomfort, or some people who might feel lost,” Gonzalez-Chiaramonte said. “They felt that they were learning and they could do what they wanted to do.”
These courses have presented the same obstacles as many remote courses, since
professors and students have had to adapt to Zoom technology.
“It’s obvious that it is less interactive, less spontaneous than a real classroom. We miss
the classroom — I say ‘we’ as teachers and I suppose also as students,” said Nicolas Roussellier, a Paris-based professor who is teaching a French politics course.
KK Laird ’21, who is taking Gonzalez-Chiaramonte’s course, noted that the large asynchronous component of classes presents a barrier. Similar to other online classes, it is far less personal and interactive.
Still, students and professors are making the best out of the situation.
“You know, as we say in French, ‘It’s better than nothing, something like this.’ So still, I would say that if we keep a good spirit, a good morale, we can really make a good job,” Roussellier said.
He added that the small size of his class allows him to see all of the students on the same page, as opposed to his previous in-person lectures — with as many as 80 students — in which he was unable to have closer interactions with individual students.
“There are a lot of cultural assumptions in teaching — in my teaching, in your teaching, in teaching in France and China. It will be great that Middlebury students will be exposed to those differences,” Gonzalez-Chiaramonte said.
Gonzalez-Chiaramonte hopes that Middlebury will continue to offer international courses in the future. Middlebury is set to make more decisions about the spring semester on Oct. 30.
“I think one of the advantages is you could take multiple classes from multiple professors in different countries. And there is kind of an exciting element to that,” Stavros said.
(10/15/20 10:00am)
Luckily for the equestrian team, riding a horse is a socially distant activity. The ceramics club, too, can stay a panther apart at the pottery wheel. Yet during a pandemic fall semester at Middlebury, others — like Middlebury Model UN, the Quidditch team and many others — have had to think creatively to stay involved.
The International Students’ Organization (ISO) hit the ground running this fall, hosting an online trivia event alongside Middlebury College Activities Board (MCAB) the week students moved back onto campus. Since then, they have hosted virtual Monthly Monday Tea events to discuss global issues.
For ISO, online forums have provided an important tool for connecting with members.
“Being the International Students’ Organization, our membership — probably more so than any other group’s membership — is really scattered around the globe,” said Masud Lewis ’22, co-president and managing director.
ISO is working to develop the Remote Student Experience Program, which will help students keep in touch despite geographical distance. “[We are] trying to figure out how we can really engage with our international students who are studying outside of the US this semester,” Lewis said.
Like the ISO, Middlebury Model United Nations (MiddMUN) has been pleased with the online tools available for communication. “We’ve definitely been able to transition a lot of our activities to being online, including our meetings,” said Suria Vanrajah ’22, MiddMUN’s director of off-campus affairs.
Many Model UN conferences have been moved online, and 10 MiddMUN members will compete in an upcoming remote conference hosted by Seton Hall University. The club is looking forward to another online conference hosted by Georgetown in January.
Vanrajah is also the President of Middlebury College Democrats, which has been putting together election year programming via Zoom despite encountering several roadblocks. Principal challenges have included college restrictions on political endorsements and fundraising, as well as difficulty getting approval from the Student Activities Office for in-person meetings.
Other organizations, such as the Ceramics Club, rely more heavily on in-person connections. “Pottery […] is very hands on, so at this time it is very tricky,” Lexie Massa ’21, the ceramics club co-president, said.
The ceramics studio is now able to offer certain reduced hours every week, with some modifications to their typical format. Students are required to sign up ahead of time to ensure physical distancing and only one ceramics monitor is present at a time to help new artists get started.
Despite the restrictions, Massa is satisfied with the new system. “I’m just happy to get people back into the studio in whichever way possible,” she said.
Club sports have prioritized meeting in person in order to continue practices. The Middlebury College Equestrian Team had to cancel their show season but still meets as a team.
“In our practices, we remain socially distant and have our masks, although you pretty much keep more than six feet apart anyway because the horses stay spaced out in the ring,” equestrian team co-chair Tom Sacco ’20.5 said.
The Middlebury College Quidditch Team is also practicing in person. The team has amended its techniques to avoid physical contact and canceled the annual Middlebury College Classic Tournament, but members are happy to continue finding community in their team.
“Given everything that is happening right now, we are incredibly pleased with how the semester is going,” agreed Peter Lawrence ’21 and Mary Scott, ’21, the team’s co-captains.
“Multiple players have come up to us after practice expressing gratitude at an opportunity to connect with others and get a break from the often overwhelming world,” Lawrence said.
Some clubs experienced a surge of student interest this semester, especially from first-years. While Vanrajah expected that MUN would not receive much attention during a pandemic year, she was surprised to find that around 20 first-years were eager to join.
“[This] is more than I think we’ve ever had,” Vanrajah said.
Organizations have also spent this semester restructuring and reflecting.
“We took this as an opportunity to really reevaluate our tutoring program, and I think what we’ve come up with is going to be more accessible,” said Alex Dobin ’22, a program coordinator for the English Language Lessons branch of Juntos, Middlebury’s Student-Migrant Farmworker Solidarity Group.
In a typical semester, Juntos runs weekly in-person English lessons for a group of approximately five Spanish-speaking migrant farmworkers. This year, they are embracing online learning platforms as a way to build one-on-one relationships between tutors and students.
Dobin hopes that Juntos will continue using these online communication methods even after the pandemic is over as a way to maintain more consistent contact with farmworkers.
“Hopefully we’re building up a strong foundation, so that in the future we can get started with this more quickly,” Dobin said.
For many student organizations, this semester has gotten off to a slow start.
“We’re giving ourselves permission as student leaders to understand that this is a tough time. And we can have all these plans, we can be ambitious, but at some point we’ve got to be kind to ourselves,” Lewis said.
(09/17/20 9:59am)
As Phase One neared its highly anticipated end, the college concluded its campus quarantine programming last Friday with a remote lecture and Q&A by Scholar-in-Residence Bill McKibben. During the talk, titled “This Crisis and the Next One: What the Pandemic Suggests About the Century to Come,” McKibben spoke about the relationship between environmental injustice and Covid-19 and the reasons he believes Vermont has been so successful in its battle against the pandemic.
Jim Ralph, professor of American history and culture, introduced McKibben. Following his talk, three underclassman student panelists — Tim Hua ’23.5, Alicia Pane ’23.5 and Daisy Liljegren ’24 — opened the Q&A session with prepared questions.
Before diving into the future implications of the pandemic, McKibben began by speaking about its ramifications in the present moment. He emphasized the disproportionate severity of the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic on minority communities, even in predominantly white Vermont: one of the state’s few bad outbreaks occurred in Winooski, a city with a large immigrant population.
“If there was a single powerful quote from the last six months, it came, tragically, from George Floyd,” McKibben said. “And, as you all know, what he said was, ‘I can't breathe.’”
He described the many ways in which the compounding crises of the past six months have restricted the ability of people, particularly Black Americans, to breathe: police brutality; poor air quality from coal fired power plants, usually seen in POC communities; the wildfires filling the air with smoke; and the sheer heat of this past summer.
“We have this huge mix of crises on top of each other,” he said.
During his talk, McKibben highlighted three key aspects of the relationship between the pandemic and the climate crisis.
1: Reality is Real
“I've spent the last 30 years trying to remind people that chemistry and physics won't negotiate or compromise,” McKibben said. “And the pandemic was a good reminder that the same is true for biology. It’s fine for the president to get up and say it’s all a hoax and whatever, but the microbe could care less. If it says stand six feet apart, then stand six feet apart.”
2: Reaction Speed Matters
“We've learned a lot about flattening curves this year,” he said. “The U.S. and South Korea had their first cases of Covid-19 on the same day in January. South Korea went, admirably, to work. And it’s not over there, but it's definitely in the rearview mirror, and with a tiny fraction of the suffering and the loss of life that we've experienced here. That's because we wasted a couple of months, as Bob Woodward has demonstrated over the last couple of days, despite the fact that the White House knew very well what was going on. That slow reaction is the equivalent to the way that we've done nothing about climate change over 30 years that the scientists have given us a warning. And so now, of course, we need to move with extraordinary speed.”
3: Social Solidarity is Really Important
“I grew up in the political shadow of Ronald Reagan,” McKibben said. “He was the dominant figure in my early life, elected while I was in college. Unlike most presidents, he really did realign the country around a new ideological idea, and that idea basically was that markets were going to solve all problems — that government was, as he put it, the problem, not the solution. Indeed, the most famous laugh line in Reagan's speeches, always, was, ‘The nine scariest words in the English language are, I'm from the government, and I'm here to help.’ Well, it turns out that the scariest words in the English language are, ‘We've run out of ventilators,’ or ‘The hillside behind your house is on fire and you have to leave now, without any of your possessions.’ Those are not things that are solved by markets. Those are things solved by social solidarity of one kind or another, governments learning to work competently, but people joining together with some trust in those governments — and with each other.”
According to McKibben, about 78% of Vermonters mostly or completely trust their neighbors, compared with 38% of Americans. And 69% of Vermonters say they know most of their neighbors, as opposed to just 26% of Americans. He credits the state’s high level of social trust for the early, effective intervention that limited the spread of Covid-19.
Earlier this year, as armed protesters gathered in many states in opposition to wearing masks and other pandemic-related mandates, “in Vermont, there was a demonstration called for Montpelier outside the state capitol,” McKibben said. “And when the day came, there were seven protesters on the ramp for that demonstration.”
He doesn’t attribute Vermonters’ willingness to wear masks and maintain social distance to particularly liberal politics: though Vermont is home to democratic socialist Bernie Sanders, the state’s governor, Phil Scott, is a Republican. Rather, McKibben ascribes it to the state’s unusual geographical and political structure. Unlike other remote states, which tend to be centered around a small number of major cities, Vermont’s population is spread more evenly across the state, and individual towns manage their own affairs through annual town meetings.
“It is a state of villages, and what that means is that people tend to know each other better,” McKibben said. “More to the point, what it means is it’s enabled this long Vermont tradition of very close, democratic self-governance.”
He believes that local self-governance disincentivizes polarization, “simply because you have to get the business of the town done and everyone knows it.”
Many of the questions from panelists and audience members alike addressed the concept of social trust. Hua, one of the panelists, asked whether anti-mask protests could have decreased social trust elsewhere in the country; attendees raised questions about encouraging trust on a larger scale and the potential for people with more diverse backgrounds, in more densely populated communities, to develop similar levels of social trust.
McKibben emphasized that it is unclear how significantly Vermont’s demographics — being a particularly homogenous state with a predominantly white population — impact social trust throughout the state, and that it is difficult to gauge how well the concept of local self-governance might translate to other parts of the country. He denounced the increasing political polarization perpetuated by the current federal government and spoke highly of efforts like “citizens’ assemblies,” designed to help communities become informed about, and collaborate on ways to deal with, local issues.
Pane, another panelist, asked how McKibben sees Vermont’s motto, “Freedom and Unity,” playing out during the pandemic.
“We have chosen, I think, unity above other freedoms here in Vermont during the course of the pandemic,” McKibben said.
(09/17/20 9:57am)
In its first summer as part of Middlebury’s summer Language Schools, the School of Abenaki engaged 23 students in a two-week pilot program on Abenaki language and culture. Jesse Bowman Bruchac, a citizen of the Nulhegan Abenaki Tribe, led Middlebury’s first Native American language program. The school allowed all of its students to attend this year free of charge, something Bruchac noted as a demonstration of the college’s support of efforts to preserve indigenous culture and language in the area.
Like all of Middlebury’s Language Schools this summer, the program was conducted remotely.
“Being online helped to bring people together,” said Bruchac, who has spent his career traveling across New England and the country to teach. Bruchac has nearly 30 years of experience teaching the Abenaki language and working to preserve its culture.
Abenaki is considered an endangered language. It is still spoken throughout northern New England and in parts of Quebec, but few people are considered fluent.
School of Abenaki students ranged in age from 18 to 75, and Bruchac found it encouraging that some of the strongest speakers in the program were young people in their 20s. Twenty of the program’s 23 students are citizens of the Vermont-based Abenaki communities of Nulhegan, Elnu, Missisquoi and the Canadian reserve of Odanak in Quebec.
All students were members of the Abenaki language community, meaning that they had previous experience learning the language. The School of Abenaki enrolled both those with a relatively new interest in mastering the language and those who had been in its proximity for decades but wanted to ramp up their skills.
The program met for six hours a day, with two-hour sessions in the morning, afternoon and evening. Mornings featured formal lessons taught in a mix of English and Abenaki by Dr. Conor Quinn, a linguistics professor at the University of Southern Maine. Later in the day, Bruchac would lead participants in afternoon games, songs, crafts and other activities in Abenaki. Students spent their evening sessions doing homework together and giving small presentations in the language.
A special feature of this summer’s program was Kerry Wood’s two-day basket-weaving workshop.Students received materials in the mail and then used them to learn the craft live on Zoom with their peers. Aaron Wood, Kerry’s son, taught students about the black ash tree and how to make splints — the wooden ribbons that make up a basket — from harvested wood. Both mother and son are artists of the Vermont Abenaki Artist Association and gave their lessons in Abenaki. Other artists and performers made appearances throughout the program.
The program culminated in an hour-long presentation given entirely in Abenaki, with each student presenting for over two minutes.
Bruchac had never led a language program prior to serving as the director of the School of Abenaki at Middlebury. The Middlebury Language Pledge, a prominent element of the Language Schools, requires that students speak only in the language of their program. Bruchac said incorporating this feature into a pilot program for students who did not have much experience with prolonged immersion in the language was intimidating at first. Additionally, the remote modality meant that full immersion was not possible in the way it typically is for the on-campus language programs. But Bruchac said watching students’ online learning epiphanies was a powerful experience.
At the same time, Bruchac said he looks forward to the benefits that in-person classes will offer his students in the future. While he believes the sense of community was strengthened by online meetings, he thinks the experience would feel “more real” in person.
He is excited for future students of the program to be able to benefit from use of the language outside of the classroom, during meals and throughout other everyday activities.
Learning Zoom and Canvas technology was a beneficial skill to sharpen, according to Bruchac, as it can help bring together members of the Abenaki community to learn in new ways in the future. “We are going to keep that door open,” he said of online opportunities.
There is already interest for an in-person program next year, Bruchac said. While there are arrangements to reserve spots for Abenaki citizens first, Bruchac said there is room for anyone passionate to learn about the Abenaki language and culture, which he noted are inseparable.
“The Abenaki language needs speakers to help keep it alive,” Bruchac said, encouraging old and new learners to become part of the community.
(09/10/20 10:00am)
Professor of English Literature Jay Parini’s new memoir, “Borges and Me,” is a smart, soulful coming-of-age story that recounts a 1970 road trip through the Scottish Highlands that Parini took with aging Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges.
I recently chatted with Parini over Zoom about “Borges and Me.” During our conversation, we discussed how Parini went through reconstructing his 50-year-old memories, the long-term effects of mentors on their students, an upcoming film adaptation of “Borges and Me” — and even Donald Trump.
John Vaaler: “Borges and Me” is about a road trip you took with the Argentinian surrealist writer Jorge Luis Borges in 1970. Writing this memoir after that trip, in what ways did you go about revisiting these episodes, and was there a process that helped you weave memories with approximations?
Jay Parini: Well, I go to Scotland pretty much every other year, so I was in the Highlands only about two years ago. And I actually revisited — I redrove — much of that route. And I’ve done that many times over the last 50 years. Think about that: it’s been 50 years since I took that original trip, so a lot of it is faded from memory, which is why I, after 50 years, really think of it as a novelized memoir, as I say at the end. [“Borges and Me”] is a kind of autofiction. So, I’m inventing scenes, I’m making up the dialogue.
JV: You were talking about autofictions and how a fair amount of your memoir is recreation, but an even bigger amount is a novelization of past events.
JP: Memoir is a very tricky genre. I think I’m being pretty experimental with the genre here. So I’m foreshadowing things and really creating characters, although all the characters are real people.
JV: In what ways did Borges’s work influence your memoir about you and Borges?
JP: I feel like in many ways I’m reinventing Borges and rewriting him, although the style is not Borgesian, but I’m using so many of the Borges tropes and themes.
In many ways, I tried to make this tour of three or four days a tour through the major stories of Borges. So, when they stop at the [Carnegie] library, I’m kind of referencing the “Library of Babel,” one of Borges’ main stories. When Borges falls, hits his head and goes into the hospital, he himself alludes to an accident that had happened to him in 1938, which led to the writing of his famous story “Funes The Memorious.” I keep referencing the great essay “Pierre Manard, Author of the Quixote,” because I believe I got from Borges the idea that we’re all just rewriting literature. So I’m rewriting Borges’ story by writing my story.
JV: I was frequently moved when reading your memoir, but it’s also really quite funny. Are there any comic writers that you especially revere?
JP: I was modeling myself on Evelyn Waugh. I mean, Evelyn Waugh is a very funny writer - sharp. The dialogue is understated but sharp.
JV: Your memoir begins when you’re a graduate student fleeing possible deployment to the Vietnam War. “Borges and Me” has arrived in bookstores in 2020 during a Trump presidency, a watershed moment in how Americans address systemic racism and a global pandemic that’s ended thousands of lives. Does the anxiety of 2020 remind you of the anxiety you sometimes express in your memoir?
JP: I was stunned by the fact that the time we’re living in now is very like the late sixties. Very like the late sixties. There’s riots in the streets, there’s looting, there’s a president who’s out of control, people are feeling very uncertain and afraid. The economic fissures are really being horribly widened by the president. I don’t think I could have ever predicted we would be living under a truly mad president, but we are. “Truly certifiable,” as the British would say.
JV: At the end of “Borges and Me,” you talk about one inspiration for this book: an English film director told you that your experience with Borges would make a fantastic movie. What are some details you can tell The Campus about a film adaptation of your book? Are you currently involved with the project?
JP: I can say this whole book came about when I was sitting in a café in a little village — a seaside village in southern Italy — working on a film with Kevin Spacey about the life of Gore Vidal, which I wrote with the director Michael Hoffman.
During [the] filming project, there are a lot of visitors to the set. Ross Clarke, who’s done two or three films, was visiting the set because he’s the friend of the producer, Andy Patterson, and the director, Michael Hoffman. I was sitting at a table with Ross and Andy, and Ross happened to pull out a copy of the stories of Jorge Luis Borges. I said, “Do you like Borges?” And he said, “I love Borges, he’s my favorite author!” And I told him that I once chauffeured Borges around the Highlands of Scotland 50 years ago or so. I told him a few of the stories, and Ross said to Andy, “That’s our next movie!”
So I wrote this, and Ross and I started adapting this as a script, and we’re just finishing it up now. We expect to go to actors very, very soon. Andy Patterson, who did “Girl With Pearl Earring” (2003) and “The Railway Man” (2013) and many other films — “Beyond the Sea” (2004) and so forth, [is] producing.
JV: Are you writing any fiction or biography right now?
JP: You know, I’m the third of the way through a novel right now, but I’m putting it on hold. I’m never going to do [another] “biography” biography.
JV: Are those too exhausting?
JP: Yeah, they’re exhausting and I don’t want to spend thousands of hours in libraries interviewing people. They’re very hard to write. [“Borges and Me”] is a very light-hearted book, but with serious themes.
(07/14/20 4:47am)
In addition to the Covid-19-related difficulties all Vermonters face — such as finding childcare or struggling to pay rent — migrant farmworkers in the state are encountering additional challenges during the pandemic, according to Vermont Director of Racial Equity Xusana Davis.
“[Migrant workers] are more legally vulnerable than a lot of other Vermonters because of things like immigration, wage effects, lack of labor protection, et cetera,” Davis said. “So all of these things really compounded to make Covid-19 especially difficult for a population that was already vulnerable for a lot of reasons.”
The roughly 1,300 migrant farmworkers have also been excluded from the $1,200 stimulus payments that were a product of the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act. Congress passed the bill in late March to provide economic assistance to families, businesses and workers.
Federal regulations mandate that states use federal Covid-19 relief funds for U.S. citizens, permanent residents and other qualifying immigrant groups who meet certain specifications. Recipients must also have t a Social Security number, meaning that certain groups, such as undocumented immigrants or F-1 student visa holders, would not qualify for stimulus payments.
In cases of mixed-status families, in which one spouse with a Social Security number is married to an individual with an Individual Taxpayer Identification Number (ITIN) and the pair filed taxes jointly, neither individual would qualify for federal payments.
In mid-May, Migrant Justice, an organization based in Vermont whose mission is to organize for economic justice and human rights for the farmworker community, spearheaded a call-your-legislator campaign that advocated for Vermont legislators to create a Covid-19 relief fund for immigrant families.
“We have a population of people we consider to be essential,” Davis said. “But they are essential not just to Vermont’s bottom line. They are essential to our state as a whole, just as people.”
According to Vermont State Senator Ruth Hardy, Vermont received about $1.25 billion from federal Covid-19 Relief Funds (CRF), money distributed to each state to help with economic consequences of the virus. Hardy was involved in discussions with the Senate Agriculture Committee back in May to provide $500 payments to every farmworker in Vermont. These efforts have fizzled as the legislature later learned that providing payments to migrant workers would not be an eligible use of the CRF money “for a variety of reasons,” according to Hardy.
First, states cannot use federal funds for stimulus payments to people who do not have social security or other documentation, Hardy said. The state must also be careful to use the funds for eligible recipients — the state would never want to provide stimulus payment and then be in the position where they would have to ask for that payment back, according to Hardy.
“There isn’t a clear connection between just providing the funds to the workers and the allowable uses of the CRF funds, which have to be for economic harm or expenses due directly from the Covid-19 crisis,” said Hardy.
State funding is not really an option either, Hardy said. Vermont’s General Fund, which is normally used to fund state programs and operations, has been severely depleted due to the declining revenues from sales taxes and other taxes. According to Hardy, the state’s funds are about “$350 million in the red right now.”
Last week, Hardy was among a group of legislators who met with the Vermont Community Foundation, a charity that identifies communities in need and provides financial resources, to investigate the possibility of using private philanthropic funds to assist migrant workers and other workers who were not eligible to receive a federal stimulus payment.
The discussions are still in their early stages, and Hardy said that the Foundation has received inquiries from other groups of people requesting philanthropic assistance. However, Hardy said she believes the private route may be the best option at this point.
“There is a lot of demand for every type of money, whether it is federal money or state money or private money,” Hardy said.
Many of Vermont’s dairy farms, where many migrant workers are employed, have responded with precautionary measures to prevent the spread of the virus. The measures have seemingly been effective so far: the Open Door Clinic, a free health clinic for people who are uninsured or underinsured in Addison County, has documented only one patient with Covid-19, said Julia Doucet, the clinic’s outreach nurse and nurse case manager.
“What [farmers] have done is isolate the farm instead of isolating the individuals,” Doucet said in an interview with The Campus. According to Doucet, the challenges that migrant workers are facing are not unique to the Covid-19 pandemic, but are nonetheless heightened by it.
“They have always struggled with food insecurity,” Doucet said. “They have always struggled with social isolation. They have always struggled with lack of transportation. But Covid-19 has, in some ways, made it worse.”
Doucet said that the coronavirus has diminished the support system that migrant workers have. For example, The Addison Allies, a network of volunteers in Addison County that provides transportation, social interaction and in-person English lessons to migrant workers, has had to hold off on volunteering during the pandemic. Many of the volunteers are considered “higher risk” and therefore have to abide more strictly by social distancing guidelines.
Migrant workers may also face language barriers in acquiring health care or information about the virus. In addition, some workers may not have the necessary materials to identify the symptoms of the coronavirus, according to Doucet.
“There was not a single farmworker that we spoke to who said, ‘Oh, let me take my temperature on this thermometer I have in the bathroom,’” Doucet said.
The Open Door Clinic subsequently put together “Covid Kits” with soap, hand sanitizer, ibuprofen and masks. Many of the supplies were donated, and the masks were hand-sewn by community members. In total, the clinic was able to give 750 masks to 51 farms, according to Doucet.
Doucet also said the Open Door Clinic has been working hard to plan ahead and reach out to farmworkers ahead of the coronavirus spike that is expected to occur in fall and winter. They are also working with the Vermont Department of Health to make sure there is proper language access for contact tracing in Spanish.
“We’re all fairly concerned about what this fall will bring,” Doucet said. “I don’t know if we can get lucky enough and get through a second season with only one worker getting sick.”
Editor’s Note: Ruth Hardy is married to Middlebury College Professor of Film and Media Culture Jason Mittell, who is the Campus’s academic advisor. All questions may be directed to campus@middlebury.edu.
(07/01/20 6:12pm)
Marissel Hernández-Romero, departing visiting assistant professor of Spanish and Portuguese, sent an email to the Middlebury community on Sunday evening describing in detail a series of alleged incidents of racism she experienced in her department and at the institution during her three years as a faculty member.
Hernández-Romero, who is Black and Puerto-Rican, presented a weighty critique of systematic marginalization at the college punctuated with descriptions of allegations involving nine faculty members, all referenced by name.
“I came to Middlebury College in 2017 with a positive attitude, and within a month here, my opinion shifted to survival mode. A sense of powerlessness and marginalization took over my perspective of my place here,” read the email’s opening. “I am an outsider. I was hired, but never accepted, nor welcomed.”
The email was sent to all students, faculty, retired professors and alumni, as well as many administrators, student organizations and other individuals.
Hernández-Romero’s email went on to criticize the institution’s treatment of people of color. She states that the institution ignores and oppresses people of color — expecting them to assimilate into a hostile culture of whiteness and exclusivity without professional or personal support.
Her email frames the college as hypocritical — an institution that claims to advocate for faculty of color while protecting tenured faculty who defend “the continued and uninterrogated comfort of privilege under the guise of ‘free speech.’”
The email opened with a claim that Professor of Political Science Murray Dry made a threatening statement in 2017 directed at non-White faculty and administrators, which she interpreted as meaning that “challenging white privilege will bring worse consequences.” Dry denied this accusation in an email to the Campus, also noting that the meeting in question — centered on racial discrimination — was closed and confidential, therefore limiting his ability to discuss it.
“I would also observe that the statement attributed to me by Professor Hernández-Romero does not reflect my views on this important subject,” Dry wrote in the email . “I am more committed than ever to doing the work necessary to help make Middlebury [a supportive] environment for everyone.”
The remainder of the accused professors teach in Hernández-Romero’s own department. Those allegations vary in severity — from an interpreted racial microaggression from Professor Laura Lesta García to an alleged comment from Professor Patricia Saldrriaga suggesting that Hernández-Romero was an affirmative action hire. Both García and Saldarriaga directed the Campus to the Dean of Faculty when reached for comment.
Another assertion in the email alleges that Associate Professor of Luso-Hispanic Studies Marcos Rohena-Madrazo addressed Hernández-Romero with an offensive term.
“Professor Marcos Rohena called me ‘pendeja’ in front of a candidate, and two other male professors white passing, Enrique García and David Miranda, found it funny and inoffensive,” Hernández-Romero wrote. “When I confronted [Professor] Rohena, and asked if he would call other white female professors in the department such as he firmly said: ‘no, never.’” (“Pendeja” is a Spanish slang term that loosely translates to “dumbass” in English. The letter “a” at the end of the word denotes a female recipient, therefore making this a distinctly gendered term.)
Professors Rohena-Madrazo and García did not respond to a request for comment. Professor Miranda Hardy declined to comment.
Roughly two hours after Hernández-Romero sent the email, the college deleted it from Middlebury servers, removing the message from the inboxes of those who had received it. This retraction was met with outcry from students on social media, who criticized the removal as an action of censorship that violated free speech doctrines.
On Monday afternoon, seventeen hours after the contentious deletion, Chief Officer of Diversity Miguel Fernández sent a “Message of Accountability,” co-signed by Dean of Faculty Sujata Moorti and President Laurie Patton, to the campus community.
“[Hernández-Romero’s] email demonstrates the ways that individual incidents of racism and our inability to respond to such incidents in a way that addressed the underlying climate both reflect and reinforce racism at the systemic level,” Fernández wrote in his email to the community Monday. “We must be accountable for responding to incidents as they arise and for addressing the culture that enables such incidents to occur.”
Notably, Fernández is one of the named faculty members accused in Hernández-Romero’s email. She claims that he was dismissive when she inquired about race-related policy, an allegation he did not comment on in his message to the community. Fernández did not respond to The Campus’ inquiry.
In an email sent to the Campus, Hernández-Romero also alleged that Fernández ignored emails she sent about allegations of harassment regarding Department Chair Mario Higa. When reached for comment about this allegation, Fernández wrote in an email to the Campus that “I have never failed to take any claim of harassment seriously and to follow through appropriately and empathetically. I am fully aware of my obligations and responsibilities.” Higa did not respond to requests for comment.
According to Fernández’s statement to the community, Hernández-Romero’s email was deleted from the college server “in order to prevent an influx of reply-all messages from the thousands of recipients and the additional harm that might have been caused if anyone responded in ways that did attempt to dismiss or make light of her experiences.”
For many students, the acknowledgement came too late. By Monday morning, Dr. Hernández-Romero’s email had been widely circulated on Twitter and Facebook, and was posted on Instagram by accounts such as @dearmidd, @dearpwi, and @blackatmidd. Many individuals took it upon themselves to disseminate it, such as former sophomore SGA senator Paul Flores-Clavel ’22, who forwarded the email to all students. Student organizations such as SNEG, WRMC and JUNTOS followed suit in distributing the email to their registered domain lists.
Joel Machado ’22 composed an email template for students to send to administrators, which demanded both student oversight for the Anti-Racism fund and that the SLG investigate the faculty accused in Dr. Hernández-Romero’s email. “Rest assured knowing that the student body will continue to hold you accountable to the promises that have been made by President Patton,” Machado wrote in reference to Patton’s recent communications on racism within the Middlebury Community.
Monday night’s town hall on the college’s plans for re-opening in September led to conversation about the allegations that had been disclosed the night before. SGA Vice Presidents Roni Lezama ’22 and Sophia Lundberg ’21.5 along with SGA President John Schurer ’21 gave introductory remarks that called for all students to read the email. President Patton later alluded to Dr. Hernández-Romero’s allegations.
“We need to focus on accountability particularly as it relates to systemic racism and in the ways at Middlebury we must be accountable in addressing that racism,” Patton said. “Our policies of due process and confidentiality require that we cannot address this.” She then doubled down on her commitment to intensive fundraising in these areas.
In an email to The Campus sent on Wednesday — two days later — Patton stated that “[t]he deletion of the email in no way reduces our need to confront systemic racism, to diminish the deep pain that racism inflicts on individuals at Middlebury, and to hold public discussions as we work toward changing our institutional culture.”
Middlebury’s general counsel Hannah Ross affirmed that she cannot speak on the allegations, as proceedings under the code of Faculty Misconduct are completely confidential. The faculty misconduct code in question states in Section 3 that, "The principle of presumed innocence applies: until the process of review is complete, the faculty member is presumed innocent." It is unclear if any such review is taking place at this point, as Dean of Faculty Sujata Moorti did not respond when asked for comment.
The only faculty member named in Hernández-Romero’s email who was not the subject of an accusation was History Professor Darién Davis. Hernández-Romero alleged that the administration attempted to impose a harassment claim against Davis — who is Black — from her against her will. “I never had any problem with Darién,” she wrote in an email to the Campus.
She did, however, describe receiving a message from Davis she deemed as inappropriate, but that she did not feel uncomfortable or harassed. She did not further describe the contents of that message. In her communications with the Campus, she repeated that it was Higa, not Davis, against whom she had allegedly attempted to file a harassment claim.
Hernández-Romero is not departing Middlebury earlier than planned, as her visiting professor contract was three years long. She has accepted a tenure track position at an institution in New York that she declined to name. She also declined to provide evidence verifying her claims, although she stated that she has indicatory notes, emails, and witness accounts in her possession.
Hernández-Romero says that in the days since she sent the email, students and some professors from other departments have reached out to show their support. At the time of publication, the administration has yet to contact her.
“A lot of Black, Hispanic, and Latinx students have contacted me to show support and to share with me their experience[s] here at Midd, which are heartbreaking,” Hernández-Romero wrote in her email to The Campus. She noted the uproar that students are making on social media, which has become home to a myriad of calls to action on her behalf.
Hernández-Romero’s own statement to students was circulated on Instagram by Lily Colón ‘21.5, a student in her Socio-Culture of Salsa Music class this semester.
“I urge you all to continue denouncing racism until our institutions and people that run them change,” Hernández-Romero wrote. “I imagine for many of you, your experience may mirror mine, and for that I am sorry.” She then went on to reinforce the messaging in her email, calling upon students to listen and act fearlessly as they continue to move through a world seeped with systemic and institutional racism.
Colón, who has maintained a close relationship with her now-departed professor, fortified the feelings of isolation and hurt that afflicted Hernández-Romero at Middlebury.
“The constant teaching they have to do only to be continually undermined and pushed aside by administration and other students didn’t sit well with her,” Colón said in an email to the Campus, in reference to Black faculty and other professors of color. “Her email shows the ways the school failed her to the point where her hope turned into rage and frustration.”
Colón, who was working on a symposium project with Hernández-Romero and one other student, noted that the three of them met often. “I would like to say the email does not begin to cover the frequency or severity of the abuse she received here,” Colón said.
Hernández-Romero described this rage and frustration as beleaguering throughout her time at Middlebury. She stated that she had already been planning to denounce the racism she experienced when the Luso-Hispanic department released their Black Lives Matter statement last week, which she saw as hypocritical.
Dr. Hernández-Romero concluded her email by imploring all members of the Middlebury community to enact change and hold the institution accountable.
“Create a record of all these events, that are not rumors, but real traumatic experience[s],” Dr. Hernández-Romero wrote. “Make noise. Enough of hiding these events, enough of being off the record.”
(06/19/20 3:20pm)
The following statement was previously sent to President Laurie Patton and other members of the Senior Leadership Group on June 17, 2020. The piece has been lightly edited in accordance with The Campus’ style guidelines.
We the undersigned faculty and staff members wish to offer our perspectives on plans for the Fall 2020 semester and the possibility of bringing students back to campus. We know and appreciate that the administration has worked tirelessly to assess various situations and balance many factors, both known and unknown. However, we believe that bringing back a significant number of students to campus risks a devastating health crisis, and thus there is only one path forward that prioritizes the health of our community as well as the long-term financial status of the college.
We see four basic scenarios for how the fall might play out:
In-person fall: We reopen campus for the majority of students and, having exercised widespread diligence and made broad investments in health and safety precautions, we are lucky enough to get to Thanksgiving without a significant outbreak.
Mid-semester shutdown: We reopen campus for the majority of students, but despite our best efforts, there is an outbreak that causes us to shut down campus early, sending most students home, disrupting the semester and potentially infecting many students, employees and community members.
Last minute abort: On June 22, we announce plans to reopen campus for the majority of students, but by the time that students would be due to arrive, conditions have changed locally, and/or outbreaks have emerged on other campuses that repopulated earlier than we do, resulting in our cancelling plans to bring students back at the last minute.
Planned remote: We proactively plan to teach remotely, allowing only a small number of students on campus who would not otherwise be able to safely and effectively participate in remote learning if they were off campus.
We think scenario 4 of a remote semester is what we should plan for now. Obviously, everyone would love for scenario 1 of a non-disrupted in-person fall to work out. We cannot emphasize enough that this would be our preference in an ideal world. But in the world we are actually living in, we believe that a mid-semester shutdown or last minute abort scenario is likely if we plan to repopulate campus. The cost to the institution in money, pedagogy, reputation and (most importantly) health with either of these outcomes would be even more dire than those associated with a planned remote fall. We understand that substantial financial losses would occur as a result of a remote fall, but we believe these losses could be minimized. We have suggestions in that regard, based on the AAUP budget statements that have been overwhelmingly endorsed by the faculty at the June 12 faculty meeting.
By aiming for an in-person fall, we believe the college would risk far more costly and dangerous situations. A mid-semester shutdown due to an outbreak would obviously be the worst, and seems quite likely, given how outbreaks have flared up over the past month throughout the U.S. Based on our understanding of the psychology of young adults and their attitudes toward risk, having 2,000 students, or even half that number, cohabitating and interacting with a large number of employees and community members is likely to produce an outbreak that could overwhelm a small-town hospital, resulting in severe illnesses and fatalities. This would result in damage to the College’s reputation and a backlash from the community, and it would waste the significant funds we would have to spend on preventative measures on campus. Most importantly, it would put the health of thousands of people at risk. A last-minute move to shift to remote would avoid the worst of this, but would waste a great deal of time and money, damaging the College financially and reputationally, and undermining the quality of teaching due to a last minute scramble.
Even if we were fortunate enough for an in-person fall to occur without incident, the experience for students would be far from what they had signed up for, leading to a semester of widespread tension and anxiety, creating rifts between members of our community with different attitudes toward risk, and forcing students, faculty and staff to work in challenging teaching and living environments of questionable safety. What might it mean to try to teach and learn in an environment where everyone begins to regard their friends, students, teachers and colleagues with mutual suspicion? It would certainly be a subpar semester lacking in many of the educational and co-curricular activities that typically make Middlebury a vibrant place. We are convinced by the case made by the Biology Department at Macalester College, which assesses both the health risks and inequitable challenges to community and mental health that a trauma-suffused in-person experience would create.
On the other hand, given the higher-than-anticipated enrollments for the online Language Schools — roughly two-thirds of conventional enrollment — we think it likely that more students than anticipated would sign up for a remote semester that maximized safety and leveraged our pedagogical expertise in DLINQ to create a robust and vibrant, equitable remote experience. We believe that as it becomes clear that Covid-19 is not going away this summer, more and more campuses will follow the early lead of California State University and McGill (and most Canadian universities) for a non-residential experience, or Harvard and Stanford in committing to remote teaching, embracing online learning and avoiding unsafe campus conditions. By saving time and money on trying to make campus a Covid-19-safe teaching environment, we can focus on ensuring that a remote Fall 2020 is well-planned and designed to continue regardless of local health circumstances. We can also use the talents of our Communications Office to represent how valuable and effective this online semester will be. We believe that the College is fortunate to have a large enough endowment and can withstand the losses from room and board fees without triggering significant cuts to employee compensation.
None of us want to be teaching online, nor see our students far flung across the globe. But the virus doesn’t care what we want. Just as Middlebury has been a leader in adhering to the inconvenient truths of climate change, we must acknowledge the science behind the spread of Covid-19 if unchecked. We believe a planned remote semester is vital to the health of our students, employees and broader community. On December 1, we would rather look back at a successful remote semester in a healthy Middlebury and wonder if we could have brought students back, than regret a failed attempt to bring students back that caused avoidable damage to our community.
We recognize that based on the faculty vote on June 16, we are not in the majority among our colleagues. Assuming that the College does bring students back to campus, we will continue to collaborate in advocating for the strongest possible health and safety protocols, full transparency in communicating these plans to the community, and a clear emphasis on protecting the employees and community members who will suffer the most from a health crisis.
Sincerely,
AAUP Working Conditions Subcommittee:
Jeanne Albert, Center for Teaching, Learning & Research
James Berg, English & American Literature
Lorraine Besser, Philosophy
Diane Burnham, American Studies
Laurie Essig, Gender, Sexuality & Feminist Studies
Jamie McCallum, Sociology
David Miranda Hardy, Film & Media Culture
Jason Mittell, Film & Media Culture
William Poulin-Deltour, French & Francophone Studies
The signatories are members of the Working Conditions Subcommittee of the Middlebury branch of the AAUP.
Editor’s Note: Jason Mittell is The Campus’ faculty adviser.
(05/23/20 12:50am)
Simone Kraus
Alumna, Bread Loaf School of English (2005), Bread Loaf Translators’ Conference (2016 and 2017), Bread Loaf Writers' Conference (2017)
Location: Germany and the Czech Republic
Submitted May 20, 2020
In March, some E.U. countries decided to close their external borders — a decision that affected my life directly. I had anticipated and feared it, but being confronted with it is a totally different thing. I was born, raised and educated in Germany; my parents originally came from former Czechoslovakia, now the Czech Republic. They left their home country after the Prague Spring was crushed in August 1968. I used to have a complicated relationship with my parents' home country because of what happened in the past. I usually ran away from it, rather than to it. But the reality of closed borders changed many things. I was in Germany when I learned that the Czech border would be closed at midnight. I realized that I didn’t have any blood relatives in Germany whatsoever; my friends are scattered all over the world, and my parents, who spend most of their free time in the Czech Republic, were on the other side of the border. Without needing to think about it, I packed up my things, squeezed as much as I could into my car, locked up my apartment and set off. I asked my neighbor to take care of my mail. I knew I had to be fast if I wanted to put five hundred kilometers between my home and the place we have in the Czech Republic.
I reached the border just in time. The highway was surrounded by dark forests. The only people that I could see when I was approaching the last checkpoint were two men dressed in full protective gear. From a distance, they looked like two white specks. They hovered in the background, just in case. The Czech border police officer who checked every car — in a calm manner — was wearing a face mask — a FFP3 mask, I could tell. Those protective masks were the world's most wanted commodity at the time, as were ordinary surgical masks. Everybody had learned some new vocabulary by watching the updates on the coronavirus response. Seeing this mask on the man's face made me think, "It's happening." I asked the officer if I could return to Germany the following week. He said "I don’t know, to be honest, but I will check later on the Internet” — as if there was a possibility that I would speak to him again. He let me cross the border, and that was all that mattered.
What has been your greatest worry or day-to-day concern as coronavirus has spread?
I want to keep my family safe and healthy. I'm worried about the protests against lockdown measures in Germany which broke out last week — as restrictions were being eased. What will happen to the Schengen Area in the E.U.? I'm worried about the book that I'm writing. Will I be able to finish my book project?
What has made you happy over the past few weeks?
Gardening. My form of gardening begins every morning by watching the lilac tree that has been in our garden for twenty years. When I get up in the morning, I make coffee. I do it the old-fashioned way by pouring hot water onto ground coffee beans. While the coffee is brewing, I open the window and look at the tree. I waited for it to bloom for several weeks. This month, it’s blooming.
I've joined the Middlebury College Alumni Book Club that was launched online this month. I enjoy being part of the community. For weeks, I wasn’t able to write, email, or read. The book club is a good opportunity to find my way back to writing and reading.
(05/14/20 10:37am)
The following statement was sent to members of the college administration, as well as the Board of Trustees, on May 8. Signatories are listed at the bottom of this piece.
The piece has been lightly edited in accordance with The Campus’ style guidelines.
The coronavirus pandemic has disrupted the lives of hundreds of millions of people across the globe, causing death, sickness, stress and isolation. The parallel economic impact has likewise been enormous. As businesses have shut down, some have chosen to furlough or fire their workers, which has, in turn, led to massive increases in unemployment and economic hardships.
Middlebury has not been immune to the consequences of the virus. Some faculty, staff and students have fallen ill, we’ve lost loved ones, and our work lives have been quickly disrupted and transformed. At the college, there will be greater expenses than revenues this fiscal year and a projected deficit in the tens of millions of dollars next year. What is the best way to deal with this crisis? The Middlebury chapter of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) believes that the solutions we should adopt should reflect the values the college has long espoused in its public statements and deeds.
One place to view the college’s values is through the people it chooses as recipients of honorary degrees. Each year Middlebury College chooses an Honorary Degree Recipient whose aspirations and achievements are meant to serve as role models for our graduating seniors. In 1996, Middlebury conferred an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters on Aaron Feuerstein. Feuerstein was the owner of Malden Mills, the producer of Polartec fleece. The company’s factory was destroyed by the largest industrial fire in Massachusetts. He could have collected the insurance money and retired to a comfortable life, leaving his former employees scrambling to find other jobs. Instead, Feuerstein vowed not only to rebuild the plant, but to continue to pay all his employees their wages and benefits during the construction process.
Could Middlebury follow Feuerstein’s example, one it so visibly honored, as it works through a temporary period of disruption caused by the virus? We believe that it can and that it should. Here’s how.
The AAUP plan: Stop endowment hoarding and create real transparency and faculty governance now
There are adequate funds in Middlebury’s endowment to get us through a 12- to 18-month period without firing staff and reducing the compensation — salaries, healthcare, sabbatical leaves, parental leaves, etc. — of those who work here. The small additional draw down from the endowment would have little long-term negative impact on the institution while providing much needed support for its loyal employees.
There is no principle of financial management, no wisdom of corporate governance or tenet of economics that would argue against an increased draw from the endowment in the face of a once-in-a-lifetime pandemic.
Yet, all the models Senior Administration is sharing with faculty groups only allow for a 5% draw from the endowment. In reality, we have the ability to use at least 20% of the endowment to confront this crisis. This includes unrestricted funds, the Trustee-designated funds, and funds designated for capital building projects.
Increasing the amount we draw from the endowment to at least 7% would allow us to maintain current compensation levels while weathering the crisis. We propose the college pursue this path instead of widespread austerity.
The so-called “five percent rule,” which has its origins in the laudable desire to preserve intergenerational equity, should itself be reconsidered. There is no ethical reason the current generation of Middlebury students, staff and faculty should bear all of the burdens. In fact, Middlebury has used up to 7.1% of the endowment as recently as 2001/02. Further, the particular choice of five percent, which delineates “surplus” from “deficit,” is itself a matter of some debate: intended to preserve the real value of endowments, there is evidence that it has allowed institutions to “endowment hoard,” and at least one New York Times op-ed has called for an eight percent rule which, if adopted, would transform the conversation on our campus. In this moment of extraordinary upheaval, we must utilize our resources to support the extraordinary education we offer here at Middlebury.
The budget challenges we now confront are not a choice between prudent finance and community values. Rather, we believe that the college must choose a financial path forward that honors the commitments it has made to faculty, staff and students — and to the values it so often endorses in public.
To help ensure that happens, we propose the creation of a collective bargaining process that will allow faculty and staff to negotiate with the administration over compensation and the financial future of the college. A democratic workplace means we must elect a body that is trained and committed to this specific bargaining task during this unique time. We need faculty advocates with a seat at the table who are treated as equals, not merely an advisory board. Such a bargaining committee would have full access to the college’s financial planning resources, and would be able to consult with the larger faculty and staff before big decisions are set in stone. We suggest that the AAUP seed such an organization, as it does at over 500 colleges across the country.
We are concerned about more than compensation, but the well-being of the institution and its future reputation. If faculty compensation is cut — as proposed in all of Senior Leadership’s projections, including the best-case scenario where students return in the fall — faculty will be forced to recalibrate their time and energies. Already, there is precarity among our community members who are supporting their families on one salary or who are living dual lives in order to maintain careers alongside their academic partners. Less money will translate to lower productivity because, necessarily, faculty will find alternative ways to generate income, such as freelance work, to pay their rent and mortgages and to support their families.
All of this means that our students will get less: fewer faculty with engaged research agendas, less faculty time and energy, and fewer faculty who feel they are being treated fairly by an institution that claims to put education first. The administration talks of “the Middlebury Way,” and relies on the rhetoric of “family” as they ask us to sacrifice for our jobs. This line of reasoning uses our own best intentions against us even as it obscures the reality that Middlebury is a nonprofit entity that has generated nearly a billion dollars in a sheltered endowment. We must ask: what is this money for if not to secure the well-being of the workers and students who make up the Middlebury community?
Middlebury’s future gets decided now
What we do now will define the future reality of working at the college. Research in the American Economic Review shows that when endowments experience negative shocks, hiring and benefits are taken away. When endowments experience positive shocks, these are not returned. We need full transparency and collaboration between our stated financial planners and the faculty and staff. To make decisions while only informing a small portion of the faculty and staff — some of whom were appointed by the administration or elected for unrelated committees — undermines faculty governance. Decisions about capital improvements, real estate acquisitions or even “brokering” a dorm building in Monterey, Calif. should not be made without the entire faculty being able to see the actual long-term costs of such projects.
As a community, we must ask ourselves what we value most — and act accordingly. Our AAUP chapter believes that high-quality education and maintaining our fair compensation for labor should be our primary concerns. We need a financial plan that reflects our mission and will rise to the occasion, not set us back a decade. We look forward to implementing such a plan alongside our faculty, staff and administrative colleagues — one that utilizes our endowment responsibly and ethically, to ensure a vibrant future for the college and those who work and learn here.
Signed,
Rachael Miyung Joo, American Studies
Marybeth E. Nevins, Anthropology
Ellen Oxfeld, Anthropology
Peter Matthews, Economics
Andrea Robbett, Economics
Tanya Byker, Economics
Julia Berazneva, Economics
Jeffrey Carpenter, Economics
Carolyn Craven, Economics
Akhil Rao, Economics
Tara L. Affolter, Education Studies
Antonia Losano, English & American Literature
Yumna Siddiqi, English & American Literature
Marion Wells, English & American Literature
Rebecca Kneale Gould, Environmental Studies
Erin J. Davis, Film & Media Studies
David Miranda-Hardy, Film & Media Culture
William Poulin-Deltour, French & Francophone Studies
Laurie Essig, Gender, Sexuality & Feminist Studies
Hemangini Gupta, Gender, Sexuality & Feminist Studies
Catharine Wright, Gender, Sexuality & Feminist Studies and Writing Program
Carly Thomsen, Gender, Sexuality & Feminist Studies
Natalie Eppelsheimer, German
Florence A. Feiereisen, German
Guntram H. Herb, Geograpy
Tamar Mayer, Geography
Carrie Anderson, History of Art & Architecture
Edward A. Vazquez, History of Art & Architecture
Febe Armanios, History
Maggie Clinton, History
Darién J. Davis, History
Joyce Mao, History
Jacob Tropp, History
Max Ward, History
Linda White, Japanese Studies
Enrique Garcia, Luso-Hispanic Studies
Gloria Estela González Zenteno, Luso-Hispanic Studies
Patricia Saldarriaga, Luso-Hispanic Studies
Luis Hernán Castañeda, Luso-Hispanic Studies
Irina Feldman, Luso-Hispanic Studies
Fernando S. Rocha, Luso-Hispanic Studies
Priscilla S. Bremser, Mathematics
Michael Olinick, Mathematics
Frank Swenton, Mathematics
Kemi Fuentes-George, Political Science
Justin Doran, Religion
Matthew Lawrence, Sociology
Jamie McCallum, Sociology
Linus Owens, Sociology
Rebecca Tiger, Sociology
James Chase Sanchez, Writing & Rhetoric
Hector Vila, Writing & Rhetoric
The signatories are members of the Middlebury branch of the AAUP.
(05/08/20 8:41pm)
Arthur Martins (2022.5)
Brasilia, Brazil
How have you been impacted by the coronavirus outbreak?
Solitude has many faces — this is the main lesson I have learned from this quarantine. At first, solitude was staring at my phone in front of McCullough in disbelief that the life I had built this year would vanish. I only had enough strength to cancel a meeting and sink into a sea of unknown: would I be kicked out from campus, would I have time to say goodbyes, when would I even be back? Solitude from not knowing. On the eve of returning to Brazil, solitude was the fear of being stranded as major airlines — including mine — cancelled all flights home, and then it was flying empty planes away from where I felt the happiest. Solitude from leaving. Now, at home for nearly two months, I still find a different solitude each day. It is overhearing my mom complain I spend more time speaking English in my room than interacting with the family — a mixture of shame and “but that’s where my life is.” It is never having talked so much with my friends and still be made victim to the solitude of missing them dearly. Sometimes solitude is fright, anxiety, remembering I am not insured outside Midd; sometimes solitude is peace, self-love, remembering the moments and people that make this solitude worth it. The outbreak has shown me many faces of solitude — and the more I see, the less lonely I feel.
What has been your greatest worry or day-to-day concern as coronavirus has spread?
I’ve worried a lot about my peers whose current conditions are challenging and burdensome. Lately, I worry about Brazil and what I’ll do if the US shuts down its borders for us due to our worsening outbreak.
What has made you happy over the past few weeks?
I had the pleasure of seeing the Midd community stand up for each other and fight for fairer grading — it amazes me how we continue to create and strengthen bonds despite our distance. It’s been humbling and brought me a warm sense of belonging to see it all unfold. Also, making homemade Brazilian brigadeiro fudge and my cats.
Where do you feel local?
Brasília, Brazil; Freiburg, Germany; Middlebury, VT
(05/07/20 9:50am)
The Campus asked Middlebury students to participate in the second annual Zeitgeist survey in November, looking to gain insight into campus culture by asking the questions that are often not discussed. This year’s survey included an exploration of love, relationships and the ever ill-defined “hook-up culture.” A total of 1,245 students responded — nearly 48.25% of the student body.
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The vast majority of Middlebury students — 90.82% — prefer a romantic relationship to a hook-up, according to the second annual Zeitgeist survey.
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Despite this indicated preference, 50.44% of respondents said that they have had a one-night stand in the past and 43.53% reported having had an, “unspecified, slightly-monogamous ‘thing.’”
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About 55.37% of respondents, or 686 students, reported having been in a committed romantic relationship before starting at Middlebury. However, only 39.43% of students, or 491 respondents, reported being in a committed/monogamous relationship at Middlebury.
Athletes are 7.09% more likely to have partaken in a one-night stand and, on average, have a higher number of sexual partners than non-athletes.
Students identifying as part of the LGBTQ+ community are equally as likely to participate in all forms of relationships and sexual activity as non-LGBTQ+ students.
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When asked about their satisfaction with the romantic scene at Middlebury, 46.01% of respondents answered that they were somewhat dissatisfied or extremely dissatisfied, 30.41% were neither satisfied nor dissatisfied, 23.58% said that they were somewhat satisfied or extremely satisfied.
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The length of relationships for students have varied. 34.90% of respondents said that their longest relationship lasted over a year, while 22.35% have never been in a relationship.
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More than one in ten students — 10.17% of respondents — said they have cheated in a romantic relationship.
Respondents were asked how many partners they have engaged in consensual sexual activity within the last 12 months. The most common response was 2-4 partners, with 386 students. 263 students reported they had not engaged in sex within the last year. Respondents who identified as cisgender female were more likely to have not engaged in sex compared to their cisgender male counterparts: 24.25% compared to 16.26%.
Despite the fact that many students have participated in hook-up culture to some degree, it is not clear what this term actually means. Students attempted — and struggled — to define “hook-up” in the survey. 1,130 students heeded the call to demystify the ambiguous (and popular) term.
“Hook-up is a deliberately ambiguous word in English that can connote anything from just making out to full-on sex,” reads one response, adding that “hook-up” is not a term they use when speaking of their own encounters. “I believe that encounters of any sexual nature would constitute a hook-up, but I’d be wary of defining mine as such because of the social implications this term carries.”
Many responses stated that hooking up is the range that begins with making out and ends with sex. Some designated hook-ups as an act that must occur privately, while others included infamous Dance Floor Make Outs (DFMOs) in their definition. Many others explicitly defined hook-ups as, “anything more than kissing”, requiring some sort of sexual encounter.
One respondent wrote that hook-ups are, “Something sexual in nature that can turn into something more, but [that] doesn’t necessarily have too much meaning or … emotion.”
The word “party” appears in responses 40 times. One response says that hook-ups are “having sex with someone after a party and then not getting into a relationship for more than a couple weeks or so afterward.” The words “casual” and “casually” appear 66 times in responses. “Spontaneous” and “spontaneously” appear seven times.
A common theme in the responses is a lack of emotional connection or significance. As one respondent puts it, hook-ups are, “Having a sexual relationship with someone without necessarily the need for an emotional/romantic connection or committment to that person.”
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For those involved in the romantic scene at Middlebury, survey respondents were given a range of options to select how they have met romantic partners. The most popular option was through mutual friends, with 527 people, followed by on nights out (495), extracurriculars (275) and through residence halls (225). Respondents also pointed to orientation and on-campus jobs as places they met romantic partners.
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The data also shows that Middlebury students tend to download dating apps during their later years at Middlebury. The percentage of students who use dating apps increased as students aged, with only 17.25% of the class of 2023 respondents having used a dating app at the time of the survey compared to 44.19% of the class of 2022, 48.36% of the class of 2021 and 57.32% of the class of 2020.
Editor’s Note: This article was originally published in The Campus' April 23 Love Issue.
Riley Board and Caroline Kapp contributed reporting.
(04/30/20 10:00am)
Aaron Petty ’02 missed his own graduation. A few weeks before the ceremony, he contracted tuberculosis; by the day of graduation, he was bedridden. As the valedictorian of his class, he was scheduled to give a speech entitled “On the Existence of God” to close out the ceremony. That speech, sadly, was never delivered, leaving a significant gap in the program. His absence was especially awkward, though, because Petty was the only person set to graduate that day.
Middlebury’s first graduating class, the class of 1802, consisted of one person. That person was Aaron Petty. A shoemaker by trade, Petty wanted an education so that he could become a minister. He entered the college as a junior in 1800, the year Middlebury was founded, and split his time between shoemaking and school to pay for his classes.
Graduation in Petty’s time was a rather solemn affair. Considering the ceremony included 24 speeches over the course of 24 hours (two orations in Latin, two orations in Greek, three declamations, two colloquies, three dialogues, three disputes and nine orations in English, plus four sets of sacred music and two sets of instrumental music), you could argue that Petty was lucky to have fallen ill when he did. If modern graduation ceremonies are a bit of a snooze, this must have been an excruciating puritanical night terror.
Despite the ceremony’s inexcusable dreariness, though, Petty must have been pretty disappointed to miss it. He was known “for his ambition to advance himself in life,” according to historian David Stameshkin, and he hoped that an education would provide the bootstraps with which to pull himself out of … well, boot-making. After two years of hard work and many pairs of shoes, Petty was expecting to have a ceremony to honor all that hard work — graduation was, quite literally, his day. But, for reasons out of his control, he had to celebrate commencement from his bedroom.
Petty’s story seems especially relevant this year, when, once again, the entire senior class will miss graduation due to illness. We will observe commencement, at least for now, from our respective bedrooms.
Two hundred and twenty years later, an old Middlebury tradition has found new life.
Like the Panther Parade, this is not a tradition anyone had really hoped would continue. Nobody wants to fear for their health. And nobody wants to miss graduation, except maybe for younger siblings.
Just as Petty did in 1802, we want recognition of our efforts. And rightfully so! The multiplicity of experiences and challenges that the members of our class have lived through over the last four years (and the last four weeks) should be honored, publicly. Every person has their own reasons for feeling a sense of accomplishment this May, and to suddenly lose the recognition of that accomplishment is like finishing a marathon only to find there was no one watching the race.
There’s no sugar-coating it: losing graduation sucks. (Losing Senior Week sucks, too, but for slightly more Dionysian reasons.) It sucks for us, it sucks for our families, it sucks for local businesses, and it sucks especially for the hungry campus squirrels.
Yet amid all that suckiness, there are also reasons to rejoice. Recently, I’ve found myself turning to a favorite poet of our generation, who says, “Ain't about how fast I get there, ain't about what's waitin’ on the other side … it's the climb.” Miley Cyrus’s corporate-spawned clichés hit home for a reason: it is about the climb, and that’s especially true for college.
Whether there is a ceremony or not, nothing about the four (well, three and three-quarters) years we spent at Middlebury will change. We still filled our brains with useful information and economics; we still formed beautiful, lasting friendships; we still figured out that Atwater is not the place to find love; and we still leave Middlebury with memories of immense happiness, with the scars of immense stress, and, most importantly, with a whole lot of love. We will also hopefully still leave with one of those weird old-timey canes.
In loss, we have been granted clearer vision of what we have been given. And we’ve been given so much.
Six months after graduating from his bed, Aaron Petty died. He had never recovered from the tuberculosis that had forced him to miss commencement. Thus the class of 1802, half a year after leaving Middlebury, ceased to exist.
Unless I’m horribly mistaken, the class of 2020 has a much brighter future ahead of it. Whatever may happen in the coming months, and whenever we hold our eventual physical graduation, that future — our future — is something to have faith in.
Will O’Neal is a member of the class of 2020.
(04/30/20 9:56am)
Middlebury Language Schools, MiddCORE and the Bread Loaf School of English, among other summer programming, will be taught through remote instruction this summer, while the School of the Environment in China, the Museum Studies Program in Oxford, and several other Middlebury summer programs have been canceled, according to an April 17 announcement from Provost Jeff Cason.
“We were most concerned to provide academic continuity and the possibility of degree completion for our largest summer programs: the Language Schools and the Bread Loaf School of English,” Cason wrote in an email to The Campus.
Rachel Lu ’23, was excited to attend the French Language School this summer to meet the language requirement to study-abroad in France, until she heard of the change to remote and withdrew from the program.
“My biggest concern for online school is that the immersive experience would be compromised,” she said. “I think Language Schools are tested and proven because of the environment it creates, but there is no way that can be replicated in front of a computer screen, unfortunately.”
According to the Language School website, programs will only run if there is enough interest for each online course. Tuition will remain the same, but room and board costs will be eliminated.
Cason said he has received significant positive feedback when the switch to remote learning was announced for both Bread Loaf and Language Schools. He predicts that the online model will draw in new students, including alumni, who can now participate in the programs from wherever they are located.
After Mariana Zieve-Cohen ’23 learned of the switch to online, she decided to apply to the Spanish Language School. “As I spend all year in Vermont on Middlebury’s campus, I did not want to spend my summer there,” she said. “But with it online, I can stay home while also participating in the program.” She said she works well at home, so is not very concerned about being about to focus on the material, but is wondering how practicing speaking will be affected.
“Remote learning is more accessible for many students so in that sense I think there are benefits,” said Zieve-Cohen.
Still, Cason anticipates lower enrollment at the Language Schools this summer. This could pose a financial burden to the college, depending on the final enrollment numbers. “Normally, the summer programs provide a significant boost for the college in financial terms,” Cason said. This will add to the already large financial impact of Covid-19 on the college.
Associate Dean of the Language School Per Urlaub and Director of Enrollment Molly Baker commented on how the shift to remote learning is changing preparation for the summer classes.
“Preparing for the Language Schools is always a demanding process since we have so many moving parts to create a top-level curriculum, engaging co-curricular activities, and an environment for students with all the tools they need to succeed,” they wrote in an email to The Campus.
Moving the program online not only creates many of the same challenges, but also presents hurdles with technology and engaging students from a distance. But Urlaub and Baker do feel optimistic about the continued success of the program and the faculty’s ability to take on the new challenge of going remote.
“At Middlebury, we are very fortunate to have the absolute best language faculty in the world,” they wrote. “Teaching online will be a new model for some of them and provides an invitation to experiment, but virtually all of them routinely use technology in sophisticated ways at their home institutions to engage with their students.”
While mindful of the limitations technology and remote learning present, including less ability to expose the students during co-curricular activities to their target language and provide them with constant feedback throughout the day, Urlaub and Baker say the faculty and staff are up for the task and that the programs will have the same “rigorous spirit” and “intensive standards” as they always do.
In addition to the Language Schools, the Bread Loaf School of English will also be offering online classes. Cason noted that it was important to continue these classes, since some of the masters students were planning on completing degrees this summer. But two of the three Bread Loaf Writers' Conferences have been cancelled. This includes the Translators' conference and the Environmental Writers' conference, both of which take place in June. A decision about the August Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference will be made in June.
"I have generally asked our staff to hold on making preparations for the August conference until we hear further instructions from Middlebury’s senior management and their Crisis Management Team." said Jennifer Gotz, director of the writers' conference.
"However, since we have officially canceled our June conferences, our staff is hard at work on that and on setting up some virtual programming that we are hoping to offer," Gotz said. These programs will be free and open to the entire community.
(04/26/20 9:17pm)
I have been in and around educational spaces as a TA, teacher, volunteer, educator and professor for 20 years. Long before I knew that the job of “professor” existed, I was an educator, or, at least, an aspiring one. However, as I was a first-generation college student, writing centers, much like my understanding of academia in general, were on the periphery of my experience.
When I was in college, my school’s writing center was largely unknown to the student body — none of my professors talked about it in class. The center, which had a couple of student workers and offered only a few hours of service a week, sat in the corner of a little-used academic “house.” Instead of attending the writing center, I struggled through my writing on my own or with the support of some very gracious and thoughtful English faculty. While I muddled through, I did not learn much about how to write in academic settings until much later in my academic career. Most of what I picked up about writing was implicit, unconscious.
It wasn’t until I entered graduate school that I worked in my first writing center. As a graduate tutor, I worked primarily with undergraduate students in the first-year writing program. Our main set of attendees were international students whose first language wasn’t English. Since most of the students who attended did so because their faculty demanded they go, it would take another four years for me to realize that writing centers weren’t just punitive spaces where teachers sent their “bad” writers. Later, I was the assistant director of the writing center at Northeastern. During this time, I realized that writing centers were professional spaces where its workers trained to do the very hard, but frequently misperceived, work of teaching writing.
Writing centers, however, are also spaces of social justice that theorize and enact equitable practices around language instruction, especially for first-generation and multilanguage students. They provide more than localized feedback to help a student get a better grade on a paper; they provide a safe and inclusive space for students who might otherwise be reluctant to share their writing and ideas. For many, as I later learned as the director of the writing center at Ohio State, the writing center is the only place where a student will receive feedback on their writing, their ideas, their processes, their struggles, their joys.
A common misconception about writing centers is that only “struggling” students seek them out. But writing centers actually attract high-performing, thoughtful and intentional writers who are motivated to develop their writing skills and knowledge further. I have worked with tenured faculty, postdoctoral fellows and advanced graduate students; often, the higher the stakes of the writing project — grants, manuscripts, journal articles — the more motivated the “client.”
In the eight months that I have been at Middlebury, I have met many faculty who are thoughtful and engaged in the process of teaching writing. I also have met many students who are excited by writing but terrified of “not getting it right.” Lately, given the current world-wide pandemic we are all facing, the phrase “perfect is the enemy of the good” has been circulating in many online spaces. Even before this moment, in my experience, this sentiment has prevented students from fully engaging in the educational process of writing. It has also caused students days, if not weeks, of procrastination, blank pages and scratched-out writing. Students, I promise you, writing doesn’t have to be that stressful.
This is where Middlebury’s own writing center comes into the picture. The Middlebury Writing Center is a space that accepts students on their merit, but also one that tries to tell every student that walks through its doors that they are OK: that their writing and ideas matter. In place of grades, tutors offer qualitative feedback. In place of critique, tutors offer praise. In place of strict edicts, tutors discuss possibilities. The writing center doesn’t follow you throughout your academic career like a millstone around your neck (like GPA blips might). The writing center will (hopefully) never cross out writing and simply write “no” on your essay (yes, I have been there). Instead, writing centers demystify feedback, assignment prompts, specific genres and the writing process in general. They help writers to slow down and think about their writing with little pressure to “get it right.” They are the best-kept secret of most colleges and universities, and I wish, as an undergraduate, that I had known about them and worked with and for them.
Genie Giaimo is a professor of Writing and Rhetoric and the director of the Middlebury Writing Center.
Recently, the Middlebury College Writing Center has launched online tutoring services. For more details, visit the Middlebury Writing Center website.
(04/23/20 12:58am)
The Campus asked Middlebury students to participate in the second annual Zeitgeist survey in November, looking to gain insight into campus culture by asking the questions that are often not discussed. This year’s survey included an exploration of love, relationships and the ever ill-defined “hook-up culture.” A total of 1,245 students responded — nearly 48.25% of the student body.
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The vast majority of Middlebury students — 90.82% — prefer a romantic relationship to a hook-up, according to the second annual Zeitgeist survey.
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Despite this indicated preference, 50.44% of respondents said that they have had a one-night stand in the past and 43.53% reported having had an, “unspecified, slightly-monogamous ‘thing.’”
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About 55.37% of respondents, or 686 students, reported having been in a committed romantic relationship before starting at Middlebury. However, only 39.43% of students, or 491 respondents, reported being in a committed/monogamous relationship at Middlebury.
Athletes are 7.09% more likely to have partaken in a one-night stand and, on average, have a higher number of sexual partners than non-athletes.
Students identifying as part of the LGBTQ+ community are equally as likely to participate in all forms of relationships and sexual activity as non-LGBTQ+ students.
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When asked about their satisfaction with the romantic scene at Middlebury, 46.01% of respondents answered that they were somewhat dissatisfied or extremely dissatisfied, 30.41% were neither satisfied nor dissatisfied, 23.58% said that they were somewhat satisfied or extremely satisfied.
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The length of relationships for students have varied. 34.90% of respondents said that their longest relationship lasted over a year, while 22.35% have never been in a relationship.
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More than one in ten students — 10.17% of respondents — said they have cheated in a romantic relationship.
Respondents were asked how many partners they have engaged in consensual sexual activity within the last 12 months. The most common response was 2-4 partners, with 386 students. 263 students reported they had not engaged in sex within the last year. Respondents who identified as cisgender female were more likely to have not engaged in sex compared to their cisgender male counterparts: 24.25% compared to 16.26%.
Despite the fact that many students have participated in hook-up culture to some degree, it is not clear what this term actually means. Students attempted — and struggled — to define “hook-up” in the survey. 1,130 students heeded the call to demystify the ambiguous (and popular) term.
“Hook-up is a deliberately ambiguous word in English that can connote anything from just making out to full-on sex,” reads one response, adding that “hook-up” is not a term they use when speaking of their own encounters. “I believe that encounters of any sexual nature would constitute a hook-up, but I’d be wary of defining mine as such because of the social implications this term carries.”
Many responses stated that hooking up is the range that begins with making out and ends with sex. Some designated hook-ups as an act that must occur privately, while others included infamous Dance Floor Make Outs (DFMOs) in their definition. Many others explicitly defined hook-ups as, “anything more than kissing”, requiring some sort of sexual encounter.
One respondent wrote that hook-ups are, “Something sexual in nature that can turn into something more, but [that] doesn’t necessarily have too much meaning or … emotion.”
The word “party” appears in responses 40 times. One response says that hook-ups are “having sex with someone after a party and then not getting into a relationship for more than a couple weeks or so afterward.” The words “casual” and “casually” appear 66 times in responses. “Spontaneous” and “spontaneously” appear seven times.
A common theme in the responses is a lack of emotional connection or significance. As one respondent puts it, hook-ups are, “Having a sexual relationship with someone without necessarily the need for an emotional/romantic connection or committment to that person.”
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For those involved in the romantic scene at Middlebury, survey respondents were given a range of options to select how they have met romantic partners. The most popular option was through mutual friends, with 527 people, followed by on nights out (495), extracurriculars (275) and through residence halls (225). Respondents also pointed to orientation and on-campus jobs as places they met romantic partners.
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The data also shows that Middlebury students tend to download dating apps during their later years at Middlebury. The percentage of students who use dating apps increased as students aged, with only 17.25% of the class of 2023 respondents having used a dating app at the time of the survey compared to 44.19% of the class of 2022, 48.36% of the class of 2021 and 57.32% of the class of 2020.
Editor’s Note: All the results from the second annual Zeitgeist survey will be published on May 7, in the special Zeitgeist issue.
Riley Board, and Caroline Kapp contributed reporting.
