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vol. cxlv, no. 10 | Tuesday, February 9, 2010 | Serving the community daily since 1891

Simmons won’t be ‘buffeted about’ on boardsBy alex Bell

Senior Staf f Writer

President Ruth Simmons said in an interview last week that she does not expect negative publicity about the practices of Goldman Sachs, whose Board of Directors she serves on, to carry over to the University’s image.

Simmons joined the board in 2000 while president of Smith Col-lege. The New York–based financial services company Goldman Sachs has suffered harsh criticism since early in the current financial crisis for doling out high bonuses to its executives after receiving money from the federal bailout program. All 10 of the company’s directors serve on its compensation com-mittee, which is responsible for determining and approving the compensation for the company’s CEO and executives, according to the committee’s charter.

The debate over Goldman’s practices is to be expected, Sim-mons said, but she declined to make a public statement on the company’s past actions.

“There are lots of things in a complex institution that go on,” she said. “You’re not in charge of everything that your friends do and every policy that organizations that you’re affiliated with issue.”

In a statement on its compensa-tion policies released in December, Goldman stated that its compen-sation policy, which emphasizes performance-based bonuses, is “designed to attract and retain the most talented human capital, which has been a key contributor to generating excess returns rela-tive to peers.”

But to the surprise of many analysts, Goldman announced on Friday that the bonus received by CEO Lloyd Blankfein will be only $9 million this year and will be delivered entirely in stock. Blank-fein’s largest bonus, of $67.9 mil-lion, came in 2007. Newspapers such as the Times of London had reported suspicions of a bonus as high as even $100 million this year.

In January, Chairman of the Fi-nancial Crisis Inquiry Commission Rep. Phil Angelides, D-Calif., criti-cized Goldman’s practices during the months leading up to the finan-cial crisis of selling debt products tied to mortgages it knew were declining in value. He compared the practice to “selling a car with faulty brakes and then buying an insurance policy on the buyer.”

Simmons said she can “fully ac-cept” the public’s scrutiny, as well

Low point for the diving teamBy nicole BoucHer

Staff Writer

Nothing brings a group together quite like a road trip, and practice has taken the diving teams out of state twice a week for over two years.

After structural problems led to the demolition the Smith Swim Center in 2007, a temporary aquat-ics facility was built on campus to accommodate the swimming, diving and water polo teams.

However, the pool is not deep enough to allow for three-meter diving.

This setup places the diving team in a unique situation — they must travel off-campus twice a week to practice with the three-meter springboard.

“We deal with what we have and we get by by thinking posi-tively,” said Rebecca Tassell ’12, a member of the diving team.

Fish out of water — and out of state

The team travels about 40 minutes to the University of Mas-sachusetts at Dartmouth twice a week to use the three-meter board. They leave around 2:30 p.m. and get back around 6, Tassell said.

“It’s hard on the team in terms of traveling and commitment,” said team member Kara Lindquist ’11.

Traveling takes time away from school work and other social ac-tivities, she added.

Diver Charles Kambe ’10 put a positive spin on having to use off-campus facilities. “On the up-side, it makes us much better at traveling,” he said. “We are bet-ter at adapting. A lot of teams

Former dean dies at 88By ana alvarez

Senior Staff Writer

Elizabeth LeDuc, former dean of biological sciences and landmark member of Brown’s Division of Bi-ology and Medicine, died Jan. 31 at 88 years of age. At a time when few women were included in academic life, LeDuc left a legacy of effective leadership and groundbreaking re-search in biology.

According to the University Ar-chives, “Dukie,” as her colleagues called her, earned full professorship in the BioMed division at Brown in 1964 — the third woman to reach that rank in Brown’s history and the first to do so in biology, the Providence Journal reported.

LeDuc served as the division’s dean from 1973 to 1977, another im-pressive achievement for a woman

Nick Sinnott-Armstrong / HeraldThe temporary aquatics facility cannot accommodate three-meter diving, forcing the team to travel to Massachusetts for practice.

C R E AT I V E C O N S T RU C T I O N

Hilary Rosenthal / HeraldConstruction on the Creative Arts Center progresses on Angell Street.

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trustee may face lawsuit from ex-wifeBy goda THangada

Senior Staff Writer

A high-stakes lawsuit against a Cor-poration member may be brought back to life after being dropped in January.

Steven Cohen P’08, a trustee of the University’s highest governing body who amassed a vast fortune in hedge funds, was accused by his ex-wife Patricia Cohen in December of concealing assets at the time of their divorce in 1990. Her lawyer, Paul Batista, dropped the suit in mid-January, though Patricia Cohen announced that she would continue to pursue the suit with another law-yer, Gaytri Kachroo, who told The Herald that the case will be refiled soon.

“What is open to us now is to file a new complaint or an amended complaint,” Kachroo said.

SAC Capital, the hedge fund founded by Steven Cohen after the divorce, was also named in the suit.

“As we have said from the outset, these decade-old allegations by Mr. Cohen’s spouse are patently false and entirely without merit,” said Jonathan Gasthalter, an SAC Capital spokesperson.

Patricia Cohen’s claims come at time when the public is increas-ingly scrutinizing the practices of prominent hedge funds. In the suit filed by Batista, she sought $300 million.

The earlier suit went into depth describing Steven Cohen’s financial

Faculty wage freeze may be lifted for next yearBy Max godnick

Senior Staff Writer

The University Resources Com-mittee made a recommendation to the Corporation earlier this month that the freeze placed on faculty and staff salaries be lifted in the next year’s budget. Last year’s budget initiated a freeze on all University employee wages

due to the harsh economic cli-mate.

Should the recommendation be acted upon by the Corporation when the budget is passed later this month, it would allow Presi-dent Ruth Simmons’ Plan for Aca-demic Enrichment to continue in its efforts toward creating com-

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The Brown Daily Herald (USPS 067.740) is an independent newspaper serv-ing the Brown University community daily since 1891. It is published Monday through Friday during the academic year, excluding vacations, once during Commencement, once during Orientation and once in July by The Brown Daily Herald, Inc. Single copy free for each members of the community. POSTMASTER please send corrections to P.O. Box 2538, Providence, RI 02906. Periodicals postage paid at Providence, R.I. Offices are located at 195 Angell St., Providence, R.I. E-mail herald@browndailyherald.com. World Wide Web: http://www.browndailyherald.com. Subscription prices: $319 one year daily, $139 one semester daily. Copyright 2010 by The Brown Daily Herald, Inc. All rights reserved.

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TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 2010THE BROWN DAILY HERALDPAgE 2

CampuS newS “It boils down to making sure that we remain competitive.” — Rajiv Vohra P’07, Dean of the Faculty, on lifting the salary freeze

University endowments nationwide saw an average endowment loss of 18.7 percent for the last fiscal year, according to a report with data from 842 institutions compiled by the National Association of College and University Business Officers and Commonfund.

Colleges with small endowments, on average, saw better returns than their wealthier counterparts — an outcome that most experts have never encountered, Inside Higher Ed reported Jan. 28. Brown’s endowment, which is among the biggest in the nation, saw more than a 26 percent decline, President Ruth Simmons wrote in an e-mail to the Brown community Feb. 2.

Some of Brown’s wealthier peer institutions suffered bigger losses — Harvard’s and Yale’s endowments took the biggest hits, with a 29.8 percent and a 28.6 percent reduction, respectively, according to the report. However, several institutions with larger endowments than Brown’s — including Princeton, Columbia, Northwestern and the University of Chicago — reported comparatively smaller decreases.

yale cuts grad admission by up to 15 percent

Yale will downsize doctoral admissions to its graduate School of Arts and Sciences by 10 to 15 percent beginning the next academic year, according to Inside Higher Ed.

The scale back in graduate admissions is one of several efforts — along with staff layoffs and reduced salaries of top administrators — to recover from Yale’s budget deficit of more than $100 million, the Yale Daily News reported Feb. 5.

Though master’s degree students pay tuition, Yale supports each doctoral student with $65,000 to $70,000 per year in stipends and fellowships, Yale President Richard Levin told the Yale Daily News.

Brown, faced with an endowment reduced by about $740 million, is considering $30 million in budget cuts for the next fiscal year, according to Simmons’ e-mail to students, faculty and staff Feb. 2, but doctoral programs may see increased funding.

“The University’s resources committee’s budget recommendations call for modest funding increases for the graduate School,” Dean of the graduate School Sheila Bonde said, “with improved stipends for doctoral students, funds for 10 additional graduate students and enhanced faculty compensation to ensure that Brown attracts and retains top scholars, who work closely with both graduate and undergraduate students.”

“Over the past decade, Brown has invested in strengthening the graduate School, which is central to the University’s mission,” Bonde added. “The University maintains that commitment.”

Survey reports falling endowments nationwide

higher ed news roundupheeyoung min

senior staff writer

petitive faculty and staff wages, said Provost David Kertzer ’69 P’95 P’98, who also chairs the URC.

“One of the goals of the Plan for Academic Enrichment was to ensure that Brown did have competitive salaries to ensure that we can build the best faculty possible,” he said.

The plan was successful in bring-ing Brown closer to its competitors in terms of median staff and faculty salary by 2006, said Dean of the Fac-ulty Rajiv Vohra P’07.

“In the first few years of the plan we made rapid progress,” he said. “By 2006, in terms of where we stood as far as median salaries are concerned, we had made up for that gap.”

But by 2008, these improvements had deteriorated due to changing economic conditions and cautionary measures that were implemented in the budget, Vohra said.

“We undertook some cautionary measures when the budget was to be decided. Salaries of senior admin-istrators — those receiving more than $175,000 — were frozen and faculty salaries went up only by four percent,” he said.

At the same time, Vohra noted that peer universities were still in-creasing their salaries at the normal rate — about five to six percent.

In 2009, University salaries took an even greater toll when the budget included no salary increases for any faculty or staff.

“Last year we were faced with having to very quickly cut $35 mil-lion from our prospective budget with very little time,” Kertzer said.

“One of the levers you can most easily pull to save millions of dol-

lars is freeze salary increases,” he added.

Both Vohra and Kertzer noted that Brown was not alone in its 2009 salary freezes.

“Last year it was hardly uncom-mon for universities to have zero salary increases,” Vohra said. “We were part of the much larger sce-nario.”

Despite similar trends at other peer institutions, zero salary increas-es are an unprecedented figure for Brown, Vohra said.

Kertzer said this year, the eco-nomic environment will allow for salary increases.

“We are still faced with having to cut tens of millions from the budget,” he said. “But we have had the op-portunity to do the organizational review to look at ways we could ef-fect savings without affecting the core of the student experience.”

Vohra said the decision to lift the salary freeze was made for two main reasons: to increase Brown’s com-petitiveness with peer universities and to maintain employee morale.

“I think perhaps we have a win-dow of opportunity in which we can make up for the grounds that we already lost,” he said. “It boils down to making sure that we remain competitive.”

Vohra and Kertzer both recog-nized the importance of keeping faculty and staff morale high.

“To have no salary increases means you are unable to reward even the most productive employ-ees,” Vohra said.

“A zero increase means that ev-eryone is treated the same, regard-less of their accomplishments, and that’s a problem in itself, I think,” he added.

Kertzer said that he is impressed with the dedication of University staff.

“Their good work is key to the good functioning of Brown. Nothing would function if they weren’t there and working well,” he said.

The general sentiment among faculty and staff regarding this year’s salary freezes has been an under-standing one, said Chung-I Tan, professor of physics and chair of the Faculty Executive Committee.

“The University has to make pri-orities,” he said. “The priority right now is to maintain what we have set for the University, which include preserving academic programs as well as making sure that students’ interests are being taken care of while they are on campus.”

“In this difficult time I think ev-erybody agrees that the budget is pretty tight,” he said.

Kertzer made similar observa-tions regarding faculty and staff reaction.

“It was widely understood that last year was an extraordinary one,” he said. “I heard no criticism from faculty or staff.”

Vohra noted that some faculty had gone as far as to advocate for another year of salary freezes due to the economic climate.

“I think that even today, there are some faculty who are here saying that we have such a difficult task ahead in cutting $30 million from next year’s budget, that perhaps there shouldn’t be an increase,” he said. “However, I do worry that if (the freezes) were to continue, there could be more long-term impact on faculty and staff morale. We don’t want to see our faculty beginning to think about the possibility of greener pastures.”

Vohra hopes that the decision to lift the salary freezes will put Brown back on the track that it was on be-fore 2006.

“I think we are well-positioned but I wouldn’t say that we can be complacent,” he said. “It’s going to remain a challenge, but if we are able to ensure that we do not lose ground in the next few years, then we should ensure we will be in a reasonable place for the years to come.”

hopeful outlook for u. salary increasescontinued from page 1

CampuS newSTUESDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 2010 THE BROWN DAILY HERALD PAgE 3

“We’re almost struggling with our success right now.”— Professor Jan Hesthaven on Brown’s supercomputer

Alex Bell / Heraldgov. Donald Carcieri ’65, center, was present in the fall for the ribbon-cutting at the supercomputer site.

Supercomputer already swampedBy Sydney eMBer

neWS editor

After almost three months in operation, Brown’s multimillion-dollar supercomputer is running at full capacity, according to Profes-sor of Applied Mathematics Jan Hesthaven, the director of the computational center. Spurred by research projects initiated by many of the University’s science departments, use of the comput-ing cluster has increased by about 50 percent since Nov. 20, when the cluster was officially unveiled, Hesthaven said.

The enthusiasm for the high-performance computing cluster — which was initially created in partnership with IBM to boost the University’s national research pres-tige — will allow Brown to more effectively apply for state and na-tional research grants, especially because of the system’s immediate-ly quantifiable success, he said.

The increasing University and statewide interest in the supercom-puter could also generate further investment in the cluster’s develop-ment and drive it into the TOP500 — a prestigious list that ranks the world’s 500 most powerful com-puting systems — in the next six months, Hesthaven said. Already, the computer is the most powerful supercomputer in Rhode Island, with an ability to perform 14 trillion operations per second.

“It really is a resource that cre-ates visibility,” he said. “We’re al-most struggling with our success right now.”

Though the cluster was initially available to everyone, including undergraduates in research-driven courses, Hesthaven said the center has had to limit who could use the system by giving first priority to University researchers.

The computing cluster — which is located in the Center for Com-putation and Visualization at 180 George St. — is available to outside institutions such as the University of Rhode Island and the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, Mass., Hesthaven said, add-ing that other large companies in the state have already begun using the computer for a fee.

Part of the initial plans for the supercomputer was to allow Rhode Island middle- and high-school students to use the facility, giving students from across the state access to a system usually reserved for advanced research. But so far, Hesthaven said the fa-cility has not been opened up to these students because the cluster is already swamped with University projects.

“It’s something that we continue to pursue,” he said. “But it’s some-thing we have to find resources to do.”

He said administrators have dis-cussed using the supercomputer

to spearhead a proposal for a Race To The Top award — a grant to advance education reform given to states by the U.S. Department of Education.

Brown is also hoping to receive a significant grant to fund a math institute at the University using the availability of an on-site supercom-puter as one of the cornerstones of the award proposal, said Clyde Briant, vice president for research and another leader of the initial computing initiative. The institute would serve as a statewide think tank for computational and experi-mental mathematics, he said.

“Having a statewide collabora-tion is really a good and healthy and strong thing to do,” Briant said, adding that many institutions in the area already have access to the system through secure ac-counts.

Though Brown is using the cluster to promote collaborative research across the state, the University is also seeking grants for its own researchers. Since the supercomputer’s unveiling, many professors have already used the facility in a wide range of grant proposals to appeal to various agen-cies, Briant said.

“Overall, there’s going to be a lot of proposal opportunities cen-tered around supercomputing,” he said. “Having a supercomputer makes the University an attractive place.”

professors limit enrollment in some uncapped coursesBy MaTTHew kleBanoFF

Staf f Writer

Shopping period — already stress-ful for many — becomes all the more complicated when professors require overrides for courses that appear uncapped on Banner.

This semester, as in previous years, some professors placed registration restrictions on their classes after the preregistration period in November, preventing students from joining without re-ceiving instructor approval.

Most of these registration restrictions were enacted when more students preregistered for a course than the professor ex-pected, said University Registrar Michael Pesta.

“If the professor at the begin-ning of the semester finds out that the resources they have at their disposal aren’t adequate — if they can only get so many TAs and can’t handle any more students, the (College Curriculum Council) has said they can request to put a restriction on the course,” he said.

Assistant Professor of Geologi-cal Sciences Meredith Hastings, who teaches GEOL1350: “Weather and Climate,” said her class was supposed to have a limited enroll-ment during preregistration, but

because of an administrative slip-up, Banner listed it as uncapped.

After preregistration period, Hastings noticed that more than 30 students had enrolled in her course, and she contacted the CCC and decided to enforce registration restrictions through Banner.

“The classroom I’m in didn’t fit more than 30 students, and for some of the labs I wanted to do, there was only enough equipment for a certain number of students,” Hastings said. “Just from my ex-perience in the department, that’s the reason I hear most often that there is a cap.”

Professor of Political Science Mark Blyth said he decided to place registration restrictions on his course, POLS1420: “Money and Power in the International Political Economy,” when he realized his classroom could not accommodate the 118 students who had enrolled in his class on Banner.

Blyth received a larger class-room that could fit 110 students, and everyone who wanted to get into his course received a spot, he said.

But it was not just the space restrictions that forced Blyth to limit enrollment in his class. He also chose to place a cap on his

continued on page 4

Blog promotes social entrepreneurshipBy caSey BleHo

Contributing Writer

The Swearer Center for Public Ser-vice launched an 11-part series on Change.org’s social entrepreneur-ship blog last month. Organized by Brown’s Social Innovation Initiative, the series will showcase stories and ideas from the University’s students, faculty and alums on the topic of undergraduate social en-trepreneurship.

The blog’s main goal is to raise awareness for the center’s work, said Alan Harlam, director of social entrepreneurship for the Swearer Center. The center also hopes their success with the blog will lead Change.org to sign on for a second series.

“The blog is an ever-evolving and emerging tool,” Harlam said. So far, posts have included advice on how to create sustainable so-cial entrepreneurship initiatives and discussions about ethics and generosity among social entrepre-neurs.

The Social Innovation Initiative was “formed to build a capacity of student-led and -run projects,” Harlam said. Students work to cre-ate better constructed and sustain-able projects to foster community development.

“Our sense historically is that there are a lot of students at Brown that get (these projects) started both locally and globally,” said Roger Nozaki MAT’89, director of the Swearer Center and associate dean of the College. “It is the fabric of Brown. I believe that the Brown curriculum and natural interests (of students) in social change leads to social entrepreneurship or a so-cial culture.”

“Our challenge at Brown wasn’t to create a culture of social inno-vation among students,” Nozaki wrote in his Change.org blog post. “We needed to figure out precisely what we could do to increase the potential for student learning and significant, sustainable impact re-sulting from what students were already doing.”

“If the organization itself is going to succeed, it must be well thought out,” said Barrett Hazeltine, profes-sor emeritus of engineering and author of the second post on the Change.org blog. To make their projects sustainable, entrepreneurs must have a “cold mind” focused on profits, while making a difference in the community, he said.

“Little things can really make a big difference, and if you can make life better for one family, it’s worth it,” he added.

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 2010THE BROWN DAILY HERALDPAgE 4

CampuS newS “It could funnel to me, but not to the University.”— President Ruth Simmons on bad publicity from her board service

as potential regulations and legis-lative actions regarding compensa-tion policies that might ensue. But she said she does not believe her affiliation with Goldman Sachs will garner negative publicity for the University.

“I don’t see how it could funnel into the University,” Simmons said. “It could funnel to me, but not to the University.”

She added that if she ever thought her actions “put Brown in a dif ficult position,” she would be “very concerned.”

Stephen Nelson, an assistant professor of educational leader-ship at Bridgewater State College who studies university presidents, agreed that the likelihood of the is-sue becoming a publicity problem for Brown is relatively low.

“Generally, it runs under the radar screen,” Nelson said of uni-versity presidents’ positions on corporate boards. “I don’t mean that anybody is hiding it. It’s just not that big of a deal for the aver-age person.”

Regardless of the potential ef-fects on Brown’s image, Simmons said her work on corporate and nonprofit boards is important to her personally.

“What I’d like my students to understand is that we all make de-cisions about what we are going to commit to doing,” Simmons said. “In making that decision, and a commitment, our obligation is to do the best we can and to do it ethically, but not to be buffeted about.”

Simmons said she originally joined Goldman’s board at the rec-ommendation of Smith’s Board

of Trustees around the time that she started a center for financial literacy on campus.

“We had a big push to think about how we could improve the knowledge and ability of women to manage their financial af fairs,” she said. “At the same time, there was a good deal of interest in the fact that women have not done so well in the financial sector and on Wall Street.”

Simmons said she and Smith’s Board of Trustees sought to make certain fields more accessible to women and minorities through her service on the boards of Goldman, Texas Instruments and Pfizer.

“I think we had a good discus-sion about whether or not the time allocation and the involvement with corporate boards would do anything for my position as presi-dent of Smith,” she said. “They were persuaded that it would, and so with some reluctance I acceded to that.”

She called her work with wom-en and minorities on boards mean-ingful to her in “a way that a lot of people won’t understand.”

Simmons said her service on Goldman’s board gave her the eco-nomic savvy to take certain risks that she might not have taken oth-erwise, such as the introduction of need-blind admissions. But Sim-mons said she was unsure of what, if any, skills still remain for her to take from Goldman’s board.

“I appreciate the question about whether or not it’s the right com-pany for me to be involved with at this point,” she said. “That’s a legitimate question. It is one that I think about, as I think about ev-erything that I do.”

If Simmons were to leave Gold-

man’s board, she said, she does not think she would join another board.

“At this juncture, I sort of think I would like to devote most of my time to Brown,” she said. “So my guess is that if I leave boards, I’m not going to replace them.”

One reason Simmons cited not to seek out new positions was that the seniority she now enjoys on Goldman’s board allows her to advocate for programs to help women and minorities.

Simmons said that, as with her retirement from Pfizer’s board three years ago, the decision to call it quits with Goldman will not be one she makes by herself, but rather in cooperation with the Cor-poration, the University’s highest governing body, with which she meets regularly to evaluate her actions.

“I feel very strongly that I don’t know enough as an individual — a sole individual — to make that decision alone,” she said.

Matthew Mallow ’64 P’02, a Corporation fellow, also acts on her behalf whenever a conflict of interest could arise between her function as president and a direc-tor for Goldman, she said.

“The president is not involved in any way” with the process of selecting a bank through which to issue debt, Executive Vice Presi-dent for Finance and Administra-tion Beppie Huidekoper wrote in an e-mail to The Herald.

The University has employed Goldman Sachs in the past for debt services, and Goldman cur-rently serves as the remarketing agent for some of the University’s outstanding debt, Huidekoper wrote.

Simmons says board service is importantcontinued from page 1

course because the political sci-ence department could not pro-vide enough teaching assistants to accommodate the number of students signed up for the course, he said.

Senior Lecturer in Educa-tion Luther Spoehr, who teaches EDUC1200: “History of Ameri-can School Reform,” faced simi-lar problems this semester when his uncapped class attracted the interest of more students than expected.

“It regularly, every year, has an enrollment of 24 or 30 students, which meant that I was able to in-

clude a lot of discussion,” Spoehr said. “So there are teaching tech-niques, pedagogical reasons, why numbers matter in a course like this.”

When nearly 70 students at-tended Spoehr’s first class this semester, he decided to enforce enrollment restrictions on Ban-ner.

“My course is in a particularly dif ficult position,” Spoehr said. “It’s not a lecture course. (Having so many students) was fundamen-tally affecting the kind of course I was teaching.”

Spoehr said about half a dozen students told him they decided not to take his course because they

had expected a small, discussion-based class.

In order to provide his students with opportunities for discussion and more personal attention, he decided to split every Friday class into two sections that meet at dif-ferent times.

Spoehr said he plans to put a cap on his course before prereg-istration next year, but said he thinks the issues af fecting reg-istration are highly complex and require attention from administra-tors, including the Registrar.

“I think there will be a lot more faculty asking for caps because the demand is both unpredictable, but generally growing,”he said.

Surprise course caps trip up studentscontinued from page 3

Dean LeDuc remembered as warm, professional

at the time. “She was a woman in an age

when there were not many woman professors,” said Professor of Biolo-gy Peter Heywood, who worked with LeDuc at the time, “and certainly not many woman full professors who then became deans.”

Marjorie Thompson ’74 PhD’79 P’02 P’07 P’09 P’12, associate dean of biological sciences, studied under LeDuc as an undergrad at Brown and later took over teaching LeDuc’s course on histology.

“The thing that was wonderful about Dukie is that it wasn’t about gender,” Thompson said.

“We are making that observation now in retrospect,” she added, “be-cause she was in a sense free of all the decrements of worrying about whether this was a woman achieve-ment or a man achievement.”

According to a short biography Heywood penned about LeDuc, she grew up in Vermont, earning her bachelor’s of science from the Uni-versity of Vermont in 1943. She then went on to earn a master’s degree from Wellesley College.

After obtaining her PhD at Brown, LeDuc stayed on in Provi-dence for a postdoctoral fellowship and — after teaching anatomy at Harvard Medical School — returned to Brown for the remainder of her academic career. As a graduate student, she co-authored several articles with her mentor, J. Walter Wilson, Heywood said.

According to Heywood, LeDuc taught histology, focused her re-search on cellular biology, special-izing in liver cells and pioneering the field of cytochemistry.

“She helped push biology for-

ward at a time when other depart-ments weren’t growing,” Heywood said.

Outside of Brown, LeDuc was recognized for her work as a re-searcher and prominent leader in the field of biology. She was the only woman appointed to then-President Gerald Ford’s nine-member Commit-tee on Science and Technology, ac-cording to Heywood’s biography.

During the summer months, she collaborated with researchers from the Institut de Reserches Sci-entifiques sur le Cancer in France, according to the biography.

“She was a member of 12 profes-sional societies, served on several editorial boards and was a member of the National Advisory General Medical Sciences Council of the National Institutes of Health,” the Journal reported.

But beyond her impressive ca-reer, her colleagues remember her most for her approachable and af-fectionate personality.

“She was a very good person to work with. She was a very profes-sional sort of person, but she was also a warm person, just ideal to work with,” Heywood said.

Thompson said “she was sim-ply someone who was a leader, who was excellent and who engendered the admiration, love and respect of everyone.”

LeDuc was a “lover of travel, of food, of the arts,” Thompson said.

Heywood shared LeDuc’s love for French food.

“She loved to eat,” Heywood said, “and for someone who in the labora-tory worked with liver, she liked to eat liver, too.”

He added, “I think she enjoyed the good life and good food and good company.”

continued from page 1

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 2010THE BROWN DAILY HERALDPAgE 5

CampuS newS “Would you rather pay your cell phone bill or your health insurance premium?” — Vincent Mor, professor

Grads face a future without health coverageBy caiTlin Trujillo

Senior Staf f Writer

Jessica Kissel ’10 turns 23 in March — which is when her status as a dependent under her mother’s health insurance policy is slated to end.

Fortunately for Kissel, she and her mother are confident that she can remain a dependent while she is enrolled in school. But Kissel plans to go directly into the work-force after graduation, confronting her with the prospect of living and working in a world where she can-not afford health insurance.

According to Edward Miller, an adjunct associate professor of community health, people under 30 make up nearly a third of un-insured Americans and are the fastest-growing group of people without health insurance.

Miller said many states allow for parents’ insurance to cover their children as dependents regardless of whether they are enrolled in school. New Jersey, for example, has one of the countr y’s best plans for allowing dependents to remain on their parents’ insurance, Miller said. Children stay covered until age 31, provided they have no spouse or dependents of their own, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures Web site.

About 30 states have laws that allow for parents’ insurance to ex-

tend to their children regardless of enrollment status, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures, according to the Web site.

Parents might be willing to help graduating seniors purchase health insurance, Miller said, or young alums may be able to enroll in graduate school and purchase health insurance there through the university for a better price.

But those planning to leave school behind will struggle to find low-entry jobs with adequate ben-efits, Miller said, especially since many positions require employees to work for a certain length of time before offering them benefits.

Miller said he expects many col-lege graduates to forego health in-surance altogether until their jobs offer it as a benefit or they can af-ford private insurance — especially since college graduates tend to be young and relatively healthy.

Unfortunately, Miller said, the trend of younger people waiting to buy health insurance can drive health premiums up.

“In a sense, you need those healthy people in as well to keep costs down,” Miller said.

Professor of Medical Science Vincent Mor said people under 30 who go without health insurance leave themselves open to accidents and other “dastardly things.”

Kissel herself is aware of the risk, she said. About five years ago,

her cousin — who had no health insurance — was in a bad car ac-cident. She said the prospect of lacking health insurance was some-thing she worried about, despite her age.

Still, Mor said the motivation to go without health insurance was strong, especially since many col-lege graduates might see paying for insurance as a waste of money.

“Would you rather pay your cell

phone bill or your health insurance premium?” Mor said.

The problem, he said, was that people who cannot afford the in-surance need subsidies. A fight to improve the situation has been raging in Congress, but Mor said he does not expect the problem to be resolved soon.

For her part, Kissel said she is not sure what she will do about ob-taining health insurance. She plans

to work for a year or so — not long enough to gain benefits in most places, she acknowledged — and then enroll in graduate school.

She said she and her friends do not talk much about their predica-ment, though she has a friend who has secured a position that will come with benefits.

“Mostly we just talk about, ‘Lord, I hope I have a job,’ ” she said.

Herald file photograduates may need to find new health insurance when they move away from University Health Services, above.

www.blogdailyherald.com

By Mark rayMond

Contributing Writer

Thomas Cobb could never have imagined that the story he wrote when he was a student at Univer-sity of Houston would one day be made into an Academy Award-nominated movie.

Cobb, an English professor at Rhode Island College, wrote “Crazy Heart” as a doctoral dis-sertation, and got the inspiration for the story’s protagonist from a line that repeated over and over in his head. “Bad’s got the sweats again,” Cobb claims, served as the inspiration for the character known as Bad Blake, played by Jeff Bridges in the recent movie adaptation of the book.

Cobb, who worked as a music critic while working towards his doctorate, said he heard a song about a washed-up country singer on an album he was supposed to review, and Bad Blake’s character developed from there.

The book that resulted from his dissertation was published in 1987, and while it received criti-

cal acclaim, it did not sell many copies.

“It got great reviews but it just didn’t sell,” Cobb said. “It only sold around 11,000 copies.”

The 2009 movie, directed by Scott Cooper, has now made its way to theaters nationwide and is the recipient of numerous awards, including Best Actor in a Motion Picture (Drama) at the Golden Globes for Bridges’ portrayal of Bad Blake.

“I’m really happy with Jeff and Maggie’s performances,” Cobb said, referring to Bridges’ por-trayal of Bad Blake and Maggie Gyllenhaal’s portrayal of journalist Jean Craddock. “Jeff really cap-tures Bad Blake’s character and Maggie’s performance was very effective.”

When pressed about the mov-ie’s chances at the Oscars, Cobb placed great faith in Bridges’ like-lihood of winning Best Actor, as well as T-Bone Burnett and Ryan Bingham’s prospects of winning Best Original Song for “The Wea-

metroThe Brown Daily Herald

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 2010 | PAgE 6

“Your life shouldn’t be ruined.”— State Rep. John g. Edwards on the penalty for marijuana possession

under alum, tFa expands to r.I.By anne arTley

Contributing Writer

Teach for America, a program which trains recent college graduates in teaching and places them in under-performing school districts, will start sending teachers to Rhode Island for the 2010-2011 school year. Heather Tow-Yick ’98, a former teacher, is heading up the organization’s expan-sion — which will send 30 teachers in its first year — as the state executive director.

Tow-Yick said TFA had “a lot of support” from the Rhode Island community, including philanthropic groups, the Board of Regents and Education Commissioner Deborah Gist.

The program “works with com-munities when the time is right,” she said.

Tow-Yick added that Gist was in-strumental in bringing the educational program to the state.

“Teach For America has a reputa-tion as an organization that trains intel-ligent, qualified people,” Kim Rose, the chief communications officer for the Providence Public School District, said. “We all know having an effective teacher in front of kids is the most important factor in education.”

Tow-Yick herself is a TFA alum. After graduating from Brown, she

taught at a public junior high school in the South Bronx.

Her passion for education start-ed with an internship she received while still an undergraduate at Brown. During one winter break, Tow-Yick worked with a fifth-grade teacher at Community Preparatory School in Providence, which was founded to educate students of color from low-income families. She described her work with the students as “compel-ling” and “wonderful,” adding that she remembered this experience when TFA came to recruit at Brown.

The program recruits its students through their universities. After grad-uating from college, TFA participants must complete a five-week teacher training program before applying for teaching positions.

Tow-Yick, who double concentrat-ed in English and American Civiliza-tion, decided to continue working in education after teaching in the Bronx. She said she would encourage any college graduate to apply to TFA.

“It’s a great opportunity to do something that will have a measur-able impact on society. Good teachers can make a tangible contribution,” she said. “Less than half of my kids entered 8th grade reading at below grade level, but after setting clear goals, all but one kid exceeded ex-pectations when they took the New

York state English and language arts exam.”

According to Tow-Yick, the mis-sion of TFA is to bridge the gap in academic performance between afflu-ent schools and schools in low-income communities.

TFA works with district partners across America to identify disadvan-taged schools with openings. While critics have accused TFA of taking jobs from traditional teachers, Rose said the new teachers do not replace anyone, since they have to go through the same application process.

“Some people think the five-week program is not enough, but we have data that shows our teachers are just as effective,” Tow-Yick said.

Rose said she hopes TFA teachers will be employed in “harder-to-fill” positions such as math, science and bilingual education.

Even if TFA teachers decide not to follow a career in education, Tow-Yick said, she believes that their experience will give them an optimistic attitude and a solid work ethic that will allow them to succeed in other fields.

“What’s most important is that people come away with a deep con-viction that the kids in these schools can achieve as much as kids in afflu-ent neighborhoods,” Tow-Yick said. “They can take (this conviction) and apply it to other professions.”

rIC professor revels in novel’s success

r.I. considers decriminalizing potBy jaMie Brew

Contributing Writer

State Rep. John G. Edwards, D-Dist. 70, introduced a bill last week in the General Assembly that would decriminalize possession of up to one ounce of marijuana.

Under current law, possession of such small amounts is a criminal offense that carries a $500 fine and up to one year in prison. The sec-ond offense counts as a felony.

Decriminalization would mean that offenders could no longer be convicted and sent to prison. Under the proposed legislation, the only punishment for small-scale posses-sion would be a fine, much like a traffic ticket. Additionally, the bill would reduce the fine from $500 to $150.

The legislation “will keep people from having their lives ruined for something that is pretty simple and insignificant. If you get caught with a small amount of marijuana, your life shouldn’t be ruined,” Edwards said.

Edwards said 35 representa-tives, including two Republicans, have already signed on as cospon-sors.

Rhode Island would be the thir-teenth state to decriminalize mari-juana possession to some extent, after California, Colorado, Maine, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Mis-sissippi, Nebraska, Nevada, New York, North Carolina, Ohio and Oregon. In Nov. 2008, Massachu-setts passed by ballot measure a

law similar to that proposed by Edwards.

The bill’s introduction came just before the fifth meeting of a Special Senate Commission that is investigating possible marijuana law reform in Rhode Island.

Sen. Joshua Miller, D-Dist. 28, chairs the nine-member panel of experts in economics, law and med-icine, which includes David Lewis, professor emeritus of medicine and community health, and Glenn Loury, professor of economics.

“There’s a significant amount of support” for the bill, Miller said. “More than most people ex-pected.”

In its meeting last Wednesday, the panel heard from Jack Cole, a former narcotics officer who said that police resources ought to be directed away from drug cases and toward more serious crimes, ac-cording to a Providence Journal article from last week.

“Let police get back to protect-ing all of us from violent criminals and child molesters. We will all be much better off,” Cole told the pan-el, according to the article.

Miller echoed Cole’s sentiment; he said less strict marijuana laws would provide “the potential for lo-cal law enforcement to save worth-while money.”

He was referring in part to the cost to the state of incarcerating marijuana offenders. It costs an av-erage of $44,000 per year to house inmates at Rhode Island’s Adult Correctional Institute.

Edwards predicted his bill could save the state anywhere between $250,000 and $2 million annually.

But this savings might turn out to be quite insignificant, said com-mission member Jeffrey Miron, who is a senior lecturer in econom-ics at Harvard.

The bill “would save the state some money, but not a lot,” he said.

Still, there are compelling argu-ments for relaxing marijuana laws beyond pure economic benefits for the state, Miron said.

“Everything should be legal unless there’s some compelling reason for it not to be legal,” he said. “The burden of proof to make it illegal should be on those who want to make it illegal.”

Meanwhile, Miron said that al-though in his view the bill would be “a step in the right direction,” it was noteworthy that it did not address the laws punishing the production and distribution of marijuana.

The commission will continue to meet throughout this spring and has pushed back its deadline for issuing recommendations from January to March 31.

Asked about the role of the commission, Edwards stressed the need for quick action. “They’re go-ing to talk about it until it’s dead. My opinion is, get the bill in,” he said.

Edwards’ bill is currently under evaluation by a committee chaired by Rep. Don Lally, D-Dist. 33, one of its cosponsors.

Hillary Rosenthal / HeraldRhode Island College professor Thomas Cobb did not expect his novel to be adapted into a movie when he wrote it in 1989.

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Man, do we have a site for you.

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continued on page 7

ry Kind,” which is featured in the movie.

“Jeff has a really good chance and I also think the song has a really good chance,” Cobb said. “Maggie is up against Mo’Nique who has won Best Supporting Ac-tress twice already, so she has a tough road ahead of her.”

Despite all the recent success, it wasn’t always clear to Cobb wheth-er or not his book would become a movie.

“There was always the hope that someone would get it made, but I wasn’t holding my breath,” said Cobb. “It was a real surprise when Scott was actually able to do it, because nobody had come that close before.”

Cobb said a movie adaptation had been considered on and off ever since the book was released in 1987, but Cooper was the first person to get the film green-lighted by a studio.

The professor’s life has certainly changed now that the movie has been released and is doing well all across the country.

“I’m doing lots of press and fly-ing back and forth between Provi-dence and L.A.,” Cobb said. “I’ve walked the red carpet a couple of times.”

Cobb said the royalties from the movie have also allowed him to remodel his home, and that the original book is now back in print for readers to purchase.

“I’m happy that it’s back in print after all these years,” said Cobb,

who is also the author of the 2008 novel “Shavetail.”

Even with his publicity and teaching duties, Cobb continues to write. He said he is working on a new book that he hopes to complete this spring if all goes as planned.

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 2010THE BROWN DAILY HERALDPAgE 7

CampuS newS “It would be nice to have a place to call home.”— Diving Coach Alisha Hanoian on lacking an on-campus diving pool

struggle with that and we are more flexible.”

Three days a week, the team uses the one-meter boards in the tempo-rary aquatics bubble for two hours each day. The diving boards face each other, said Katie Olko ’10, so the diving coach cannot watch both sides at the same time.

“We are in a very unique situa-tion,” Olko said, and you “have to give credit to all of us who have stuck through it. I’m not sure other teams could have stuck it out so much.”

no home field advantage

Team members agreed that the setup impacts their performance at meets.

“Our team has done very well in remaining competitive, but we are at the same time at a disadvan-tage because most teams practice the three-meter five or six times a week,” Lindquist said.

Olko compared practicing the three-meter only twice a week to using only half of a basketball court. As a result, the team has less confi-dence than other teams going into competition, she said.

“They have done a good job overcoming the adversity,” said diving coach Alisha Hanoian, who joined the coaching team in 2008 after the Smith Swim Center had already been closed. She said she looks forward to eventually getting a permanent, on-campus pool in order to “give the team a better advantage” in competition.

The team also regrets not hav-ing meets at Brown. “It would be nice to have a place to call home,” Hanoian said.

Lindquist said that even with sup-portive friends on campus, the extra time needed to travel to the meets at the University of Massachusetts leads to limited crowd support.

Olko said parents have helped to

fill the absence of student support at the games. “Swimming is not a huge spectator sport anyway,” she added.

different perspectivesThe seniors on the diving team

recall a time during their freshman year when the Smith Swim Center was still fully operational. When the center was deemed unsafe to use, the entire swimming and diving team was forced to travel every day for practice before the temporary pool was built.

“At first, we pretty much pan-icked,” said Kambe. “We weren’t sure what would happen to the team.”

Initially, Kambe said, the tempo-rary pool seemed like a “God-send” because it meant traveling only twice a week for the diving team. Still, he said it has been difficult to avoid becoming worn out by traveling every week.

Olko said the team dynamics shifted after the Smith Swim Center closed. With a permanent facility, she said the swimming and diving team “was more cohesive” because they could practice together, which is not always an option in the tem-porary aquatics bubble. “The social aspect is different,” she said.

She also said the diving team felt more competitively confident during her freshman year because they had more practice time with the three-meter boards.

Tassell and Lindquist knew about the state of the facilities when they signed on. Tassell said the unique situation made her freshman year difficult, but she tries not to focus on the negatives.

Lindquist transferred to Brown after her freshman year, knowing that the swimming facilities were temporary and that she would have to travel. “I valued the swim team, but the ultimate reason I came to Brown was for the school.”

Diving on the road: the team that has no home

continued from page 1

Hilary Rosenthal / HeraldThomas Cobb’s novel is now an Academy Award-nominated film.

rIC prof ’s story hits the big screencontinued from page 6

gains during his career as a Wall Street trader from 1978 to 1992. The suit alleges that he had a con-fidential source alert him to Gen-eral Electric’s purchase of RCA in 1985. “Although she did not have a college degree and had no train-ing in finance or law, Ms. Cohen questioned defendant Cohen about the legality of trading inside infor-mation,” the suit stated. In New York, there is a five-year statute of limitations against insider trading charges.

Steven Cohen’s representatives responded to the suit by request-ing that Batista be sanctioned for bringing a frivolous suit. “There may have been a problem with the prior complaint,” Kachroo said.

Batista told the New York Times last month that he dropped the suit because Patricia Cohen was not returning his phone calls. “I cannot fulfill my responsibilities with a client who doesn’t speak to me,” he said. He also told the Times he believed the case was strong, but that he could not move forward without the cooperation of his client.

Patricia Cohen claimed the suit was dropped without her knowl-edge, Kachroo said. “The former attorney withdrew his counsel and attempted to voluntarily dismiss the case,” Kachroo said.

“We are not surprised that they withdrew the complaint,” Gasthal-ter said of the earlier suit.

When asked whether Batista’s move damaged her client’s case, Kachroo said, “I don’t think so. We’re going to file an amendment anyway.” She said that a new suit would have the potential to be “stronger and more accurate.”

The case caused a stir in the fi-nancial community, but no further information on SAC Capital’s busi-ness activities has emerged.

“I took the case because I thought she had some strong claims against Mr. Cohen and SAC Capital,” Kachroo said.

Kachroo is no stranger to hedge fund scandals. She has represented Harry Markopolos, who blew the whistle on Bernard Madoff’s Ponzi scheme in 2005. Securities and Ex-change Commission officials infa-mously did not act on Markopolos’ claims at the time.

“I see Mrs. Cohen as an under-dog, the same way I see Harry,” Kachroo said. “Mr. Cohen is a very powerful, financially capable, re-sourceful man. Harry Markopolos and Patricia Cohen don’t have the same kind of resources.”

Vice President of Public Affairs and University Relations Marisa Quinn declined to comment on the matter.

Steven Cohen is a very wealthy man who has shied away from the public eye during his career. Forbes Magazine ranked him the 87th richest man in the world in 2009, with an estimated wealth of $5.5 billion. After his career as a trader, Cohen went into the emerg-

ing hedge fund market in 1992, founding the stalwart firm SAC Capital. SAC is incorporated in the British West Indies, but maintains trading floors in Stamford, Conn. and New York City.

Suspicions of insider training are not new to SAC. Though Mr. Cohen seldom speaks to the public, the Wall Street Journal published a feature in 2006 on his career. The paper referred to rumors about SAC’s improper trading practices, noting that the firm had never been formally accused.

“If unethical behavior is not pe-nalized, it will continue to grow,” Kachroo said. Kachroo expressed the need for more oversight and regulatory ef forts over the fi-nancial industry. “There has to be enough law on the books and enough examples to send a very clear message so that they’re care-ful as to how they conduct their business,” she said.

In December, former SAC analyst Richard Choo-Beng Lee pled guilty to insider trading at the scandal-plagued hedge fund Galleon Group. Lee said he will provide information on any insider trading that occurred during his five-year tenure at SAC from 1999 to 2004. B.J. Kang, an FBI agent investigating the Galleon Group, is said to be looking into SAC with the cooperation of Lee, the Times reported in December. Kang previ-ously looked into SAC in 2006, but did not obtain evidence sufficient for prosecution.

trustee faces lawsuit from ex-wifecontinued from page 1

world & nationThe Brown Daily Herald

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 2010 | PAgE 8

obama’s new budget sits better with leaders at historically black collegesBy williaM douglaS

MCClatChy neWSpaperS

WASHINGTON — The leaders of the nation’s historically black colleg-es and universities breathed a sigh of relief last week when they learned that President Barack Obama’s fiscal 2011 budget includes a $30 million funding increase for their financially struggling schools.

Last year, many black educa-tors were shocked by what they considered to be substantial cuts to black colleges and other edu-cational institutions dedicated to select minorities, such as Native Americans, in Obama’s first budget proposal.

“The United Negro College Fund and the entire community of minority-serving institutions were disappointed at last year’s budget proposal, which recommended a decrease from previous funding levels,” fund President Michael Lomax said in a written statement analyzing Obama’s latest budget. “The increase — $30 million higher than last year’s levels — proposed in the budget that has just been released shows that the administra-tion was listening.”

For the fiscal year that will begin on Oct. 1, Obama proposes $279.9 million for historically black col-leges and universities — $30 million more than he proposed for fiscal 2010 and $13 million more than Congress appropriated, according to the United Negro College Fund. Including other minority-oriented educational institutions, Obama’s total budget request is for $520 mil-lion, up from $496.3 million this year.

The proposed funds are dis-cretionary, meaning that colleges that receive the money would have leeway to spend it on items rang-ing from academic programs to construction and maintenance of instructional facilities to student services.

Administration officials said the funding request reflects the premi-um it places on minority education institutions, which they say will play an important role in helping to meet Obama’s goal of the U.S. having the world’s highest college graduation rate by 2020. The U.S. ranks 15th among 29 developed countries in college completion, according to the most recent National Report Card on Higher Education.

“I said from day one we desper-ately need historically black col-leges and universities not just to survive, but to thrive,” Education Secretary Arne Duncan said in a recent television interview with syn-dicated columnist and talk show host Roland Martin. “So, we want to support the institutions. We’re going to make sure many more students can go through.”

HBCUs — 105 federally recog-nized schools that were accredited and established before 1964 for the

purpose of educating black Ameri-cans — are just 3 percent of the na-tion’s higher education institutions, but they produce almost 20 percent of blacks who earn undergraduate degrees.

More than 50 percent of black public school teachers and 70 per-cent of black dentists are HBCU graduates, according to the United Negro College Fund.

The impact of the nation’s weak economy is being felt at all of Amer-ica’s colleges and universities, but officials at black colleges say their schools have been hit harder than most.

Heavily dependent on tuition, with modest endowments and deal-ing with declining student enroll-ment, even some of the most pres-tigious black colleges are shedding faculty, reducing course offerings and weighing other measures to stay afloat.

Atlanta’s all-female Spelman Col-lege, one of the wealthiest black campuses, eliminated 35 teaching positions last year. Its neighboring brother school, all-male Morehouse College, saw its endowment take a $40 million hit last year. North Carolina’s Barber Scotia College made news last year when its enroll-ment dwindled to double-digits.

In Mississippi, Republican Gov. Haley Barbour is advocating merg-ing three state-supported HBCUs — Jackson State, Mississippi Valley State and Alcorn State — to save money.

Several black higher-education officials quietly questioned the first black U.S. president’s commitment to black colleges last year.

They pointed to the administra-tion not renewing a two-year, $170

million program that provided di-rect funding to HBCUs.

White House officials said they increased other direct aid support for the schools, but officials at black colleges argued that the expiration of the two-year program yielded a $73 million cut.

Administration officials disputed the claim, asserting in a May e-mail to BET.com that they’d raised discretionary funding for HBCU undergraduate and graduate pro-grams by 5 percent — “more than twice the rate of inflation.”

“There were a lot of high expec-tations among (black) educators because of who (Obama) was that they would do much better; he’s a black president, they’re black colleges — you expect to do bet-ter,” said Ronald Walters, a political science professor emeritus at the University of Maryland. “There was a lot of grumbling.”

“Obama is under pressure to be everyone’s president, and that’s a difficult line to walk,” said Marybeth Gasman, an expert on black colleges at the University of Pennsylvania. “I do think he’s cognizant of the contributions of black colleges and the challenges they have.”

Seeking to avoid last year’s controversy, black higher educa-tion officials have stepped up their lobbying on Capitol Hill and at the White House.

“We’d like to see President Obama engage HBCUs and (minor-ity-serving institutions) in a more robust way,” said Edith Bartley, the United Negro College Fund’s direc-tor of government affairs, “to really taking a strong look and understand the role that our schools play.”

Foreign internships help job hunters in tough environmentBy julie wernau

ChiCago tribune

CHICAGO — After JPMorgan Chase laid off Adi Clerman as a recruiter in August 2008, the 26-year-old Chicagoan couldn’t find a job — any job.

“I was looking and looking for work and interviewing and inter-viewing, and nothing was coming,” she said.

So Clerman decided to go abroad. She grabbed a five-month internship in Tel Aviv, Israel, at an American marketing firm through MASA Israel’s Career Israel pro-gram, a partnership with the Is-raeli government that sends young people to the country for work ex-periences. It filled a huge gap on her resume.

“When people asked me, ‘You got laid off in August 2008; what have you done since then?’ I had a really great answer,” she said.

One month after returning to the United States, she landed a job as an admissions representative at Harrington College of Design in Chicago.

With available jobs at record lows in the United States, and a business world that is increasingly global, more Americans are seek-ing overseas internships and other resume builders than ever before, experts say.

The number of people travel-ing abroad for internships from 2000 through 2008 doubled, from 6,950 to 13,658, based on a survey of about 1,500 educational institu-tions, according to the Institute of International Education.

Officials at schools and other organizations that help arrange such work experiences say they continued to see increases through 2009, partly fueled by those who cannot find a job. Despite a lifting recession, nearly 10 percent of Americans remain unemployed, and the rate is more than double that for young adults.

“Everybody knows, of course, that the U.S economy is not doing well,” said Robert Trumble, direc-tor of the Virginia Labor Studies Center at Virginia Commonwealth University. “Most people will look for full-time jobs here, and when that doesn’t work out, they’ll look for internships anywhere.”

Lauren Krause, 21, a senior majoring in journalism at Loyola University Chicago, is counting on her summer internship at a com-munications company in London to help set her apart in an increasing-ly competitive field. She snagged an internship last semester at Fox Chicago and scored an interview with ABC7, where she’ll intern this semester.

“There’s thousands of journal-ism students in Chicago alone look-ing for jobs right now,” she said.

Victor C. Johnson, senior public policy adviser for NAFSA: Asso-ciation of International Educators, believes an overseas experience soon will no longer be an option in lining up a good job.

“This is the next digital di-vide,” Johnson said. “The kids who graduate from school who have international experience are going to have a leg up in gaining successful lives.”

Employers are looking to hire people who understand the econo-mies and cultures of the world, he added.

“We just hear CEO after CEO saying that the work force of the future, really, the work force of the present, has to be a cross-culturally competent work force. Work forces are cross-cultural; businesses are global,” he said.

The Association for Interna-tional Practical Training, a Mary-land nonprofit that places about 2,500 people in internships abroad each year in 24 time zones, saw a 20 percent increase in 2009 com-pared with a 3 percent increase the previous year. About a third of their participants are young professionals.

“It used to be that speaking English meant you could work anywhere in the world, but it’s not the case anymore. Companies are selecting candidates who are multilingual,” said Craig Brown, executive vice president at the as-sociation.

Cadee Oakleaf, 22, a senior at Colorado State University, has studied abroad, volunteered in more countries than she can count, including South Africa and Costa Rica, speaks Spanish and has taken classes in French and Italian. She hopes her experiences will show global civil engineering firms in the U.S. that she would be a good candidate for one of their foreign offices.

“I would love to go anywhere,” said Oakleaf, who graduates in December.

Still, some people with over-seas experience say having that background doesn’t guarantee a job offer.

When Jay Johnson, 30, of New York, was laid off from his first job as a fashion stylist at Macy’s flag-ship store after just three months, he filed for unemployment and fo-cused on getting additional unpaid experience, including working on an ad campaign for Napket, a high-end coffee shop in London.

Now unemployed for more than a year, Johnson said his ex-perience abroad hasn’t paid off, although some recent callbacks have made him hopeful about his job prospects.

“I was expecting way more,” he

Todd Sumlin / Charlotte ObserverBiddle Hall at Johnson C. Smith University in Charlotte, N.C., in 1997. To-day, leaders of the nation’s black colleges and universities praise President Obama for recommending a $30 million increase in aid for their campuses.

continued on page 9

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 2010THE BROWN DAILY HERALDPAgE 9

worLD & natIonSpace shuttle endeavour lights up the night sky in successful launchBy roBerT Block and Mark

k. MaTTHewS

the orlando Sentinel

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — Space shuttle Endeavour brought an early dawn to Kennedy Space Center on Monday, punching its way through cloudy skies to close the curtain on night-time shuttle launches and kick off the final year of liftoffs for the aging orbiter fleet.

Low cloud cover almost scrubbed the attempt for the sec-ond straight morning. But in the end Endeavour’s picture-perfect launch, on time at 4:14 a.m. EST was greeted with cheers from the crowds that lined the roads from Titusville to Cocoa Beach to wit-ness the last time a shuttle climbed into dark skies.

Only four shuttle flights now remain — all scheduled daytime launches — before NASA retires the orbiters.

It was a bittersweet moment for the agency and its contractor workforce.

The 13-day mission is the first of the final five, a long-anticipated fate realized last week when Presi-dent Barack Obama released his 2011 budget ruling out any further orbiter flights and canceling Con-stellation, the planned successor to the shuttle.

The dramatic shakeup of NASA’s human spaceflight program cast a pall over the preparations for Endeavour’s launch, but NASA managers and astronauts did their best to ignore the distractions and focus on the task at hand: sending Endeavour to the space station on a major construction mission.

“OK Zambo, looks like the weather came together tonight, vehicle is in great shape, so it’s time to go fly,” shuttle launch director Mike Leinbach told shuttle com-mander George D. Zamka.

Zamka was joined by his crew: rookie pilot Terry Virts Jr. of the Air Force; mission specialists Nicholas Patrick, a British-born engineer, Robert Behnken, a for-mer weapons designer, Stephen Robinson, a veteran of three shuttle missions, and Kathryn Hire, the first U.S. woman assigned to a mili-tary combat aircrew.

In a post-launch press briefing, NASA officials said they saw foam break away from the external fuel tank soon after takeoff, but that their initial assessment determined that no “gross damage” was done. Falling foam that damaged space shuttle Columbia in 2003 led to its

destruction.The main goal of Endeavour’s

mission is to add a final compart-ment to the station. Named Tran-quility, the module will provide astronauts additional room to work and a windowed dome, or cupola, that will afford them an unparalleled view outside. Cur-rently there are but small portal windows on some compartments at the station.

“The cupola is going to change the quality of life for astronauts who live on station because it’s going to give them a window on the world,” NASA Administrator Charlie Bold-en, a former astronaut, told space center workers on Friday.

“Just having the opportunity to float into something like the cupola and reinvigorate yourself is going to make an incredible difference to their quality of life.”

Tranquility and its seven-pane bay window were constructed in Italy by Thales Alenia Space for NASA and are the last major com-ponents for the station. It will take three spacewalks to install the new additions. Once attached to the left side of the station’s central Unity module, the station will be 90 per-cent complete.

The module will house life sup-port equipment, exercise gear and a toilet. NASA originally planned to put Tranquility on the right side of the station, but engineers decided to move it to provide better visibil-ity and more clearance for Soyuz spacecraft docking nearby.

While spacewalkers are busy attaching the new room, the rest of the crew will be working on re-placing part of the station’s water recycling system. The urine pro-cessor shut down recently when a blockage disabled the unit that converts waste into clean water for the station’s six full-time resi-dents.

Obama’s $19 billion 2011 budget supports extending the space sta-tion’s life through 2020. The $100 billion station would have been splashed into the Pacific Ocean in 2016 under existing plans.

Bernardo Patti, the station pro-gram manager for the European Space Agency — one of NASA’s international partners — said he was very happy about the station’s potential life extension. The extra time, he said, would “give us a great opportunity to use to the full extent the (station).”

But while the budget was good news for the station, it represents a fatal blow to the Constellation

program and its Ares rockets and capsules that were supposed to replace the shuttle and return as-tronauts to the moon by 2020.

A White House blue ribbon panel last year found that the pro-gram was too expensive and behind schedule. It recommended cancel-ing Constellation and using com-mercial rockets to take astronauts to the station. Until then astronauts must hitch rides aboard Russian Soyuz rockets at more than $50 million a seat.

The White House decision stunned space supporters, espe-cially at Kennedy Space Center, which faces 7,000 job losses when the shuttle retires. Many workers had been hoping Constellation would save them.

“Distractions are there, shock is there, uncertainty,” said shuttle Launch director Mike Leinbach. “But I do not worry about the folks on console when they’re doing their job. I do not worry about the people ... working on the orbiters. ... When teams are faced with challenges they come together and they act like a professional team.”

The final space shuttle mission is scheduled for Sept. 16.

said. “I thought it would make my portfolio look like gold. What else can I do? I’ve done everything under the sun in order to become gainfully employed again.”

Annie Lesser, 21, a native Chi-cagoan, has run into similar issues. Despite a resume that includes stints all over the world, from teaching English in China to editorial intern-ships in Prague, she can’t get anyone to call her back.

“I’ve sent out my resume to probably like 20 different places. I haven’t heard back from a single one of them,” Lesser said.

Now in school at New York Uni-versity Tisch School of the Arts, Lesser said she finds herself los-ing out to highly experienced in-dividuals who lost their jobs in the downturn.

Despite these stories, interest in overseas internships continues to grow.

At Northeastern University in Boston, more students are planning to go abroad for their co-op experi-ence: 112 students in the first half of this year, compared with 96 in all of 2007.

“It’s now the fastest-growing part

of the industry,” said Stephen Reilly, director and program development coordinator for Global Experiences Inc.

The Internet has broken down global barriers, said Reilly, who started the company nine years ago as a placement program for teaching English as a foreign language. It has evolved to a full-service international internship program to meet the de-mands of clients.

“You’re coming into the worst employment market in our history. What sets you apart? I really believe a university degree isn’t enough any-more,” he said.

Amelia Marksz, a business major at Northeastern, noted that working abroad isn’t like studying abroad.

She spent six months working full time at a startup in Singapore and five months working for the U.S. embassy in China, aiding renewable-energy projects through Northeast-ern’s co-op program.

“With study abroad, you’re kind of sheltered,” Marksz said. “You’re with a lot of other American stu-dents. You’re with a university.”

Working abroad, she said, meant “I had to find a place to live. I had to get a phone. I had to get a bank account.”

workers turn to foreign jobs to pad resumes

continued from page 8

Thanks for reading!

editorial & LettersPAgE 10 | TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 2010

The Brown Daily Herald

E R I K S T A Y T O N A N D E VA N D O N A H U E

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editorial

Last Tuesday, President Ruth Simmons e-mailed the Brown community to share a report issued by the Organizational Review Committee, the group charged with finding $14 million in cuts from the University’s fiscal year 2011 budget. As President Simmons noted, the budget process is ongoing, and we hope to con-tribute continually to the conversation and help the administration find solutions that are economical, fair and sensible. Today, we would like to discuss one of the proposed cuts.

In the report, the ORC suggested canceling sub-scriptions to the New York Times and the Providence Journal that are currently available in dining halls. These subscriptions cost the University $33,000 each year. While we understand what an enormously difficult task the Organizational Review Committee has undertaken, we strongly disagree with this particular cut.

Life at Brown can be insular, and newspapers pro-vide an essential link to the outside world. We rely on newspapers to promote political awareness on campus, connect our academic studies with current events, prepare us for professional futures, learn more about the Providence community and enable educated politi-cal decisions. For many students, casually skimming a newspaper during a meal is an extremely important part of the day. While students also have access to news online and in libraries, the dining hall subscriptions provide a convenient avenue for thousands of us to get our daily news fix.

When it comes to the budget, the $33,000 in savings would only represent about one-fourth of one percent of the total amount URC has proposed to cut. To eliminate such a valuable resource for a minimal return would simply be a poor business decision. Instead, we want to propose a few steps might help reduce the cost burden.

First, we implore students to stop removing newspa-pers from dining halls. These newspapers are intended to be a communal resource. If students leave news-

papers in the dining halls — and leave them there in good condition — fewer copies of the newspapers will be necessary and the University will save money. Din-ing Services should place a sign near the newspapers informing students of the expectation that newspapers will remain in the dining halls.

Second, the ORC report noted that entire $33,000 currently comes out of Dining Services’ budget. We hope administrators will take a look at this and see how the subscription costs might be more equally shared among multiple divisions.

Third, the University should immediately conduct a poll to determine students’ news reading habits. The New York Times has announced that it will start charg-ing for online content this year, and the Providence Journal said it is considering the same move. Polling information will help the University determine whether to curtail print subscriptions and channel savings into securing electronic access for the entire institution.

The University could also solicit voluntary dona-tions from parents and alumni who feel strongly about access to print journalism. We would hope that the cost of tuition covers newspaper subscriptions, but in the worst case scenario, students can also be asked to make an additional contribution. For a nominal fee, students could subscribe to dining hall newspaper service. Under one possible system, individual student subscribers identified by a sticker on their Brown ID would be allowed to take a newspaper upon entering the dining hall.

We understand that none of these solutions are ideal, and that none add up to $33,000. We also know how difficult and painful the process of implementing budget cuts will be. However, the University should not underestimate the importance of our access to newspapers.

Editorials are written by The Herald’s editorial page board. Send comments to editorials@browndailyherald.com.

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correction

A photo caption in Monday’s Herald (“Crooners for Haiti,” Feb. 8) misidentified Austin Boxler ’12 as Lee Saper ’12. The Herald regrets the error.

After you have read, Reflect upon your feelings — We will always care.

letters@browndailyherald.com

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 2010 | PAgE 11

opinionsThe Brown Daily Herald

Barack Obama recently took the opportu-nity during his State of the Union address to chide you nay-sayers for your negativity. “Just saying no to everything,” he condescended, “may be good short-term politics, but it’s not leadership.”

Please pay him no mind. Keep saying no.When the semi-governmental organiza-

tions, the bloated banks and failed car compa-nies that no longer deserve the title of “busi-ness” come begging for taxpayers’ dollars, tell them no. It’s not your money to give. Tell them that if they have a product worth selling, someone will buy it.

When Obama wants to spend billions on a high-speed rail that won’t reduce emis-sions, traffic or travel time, tell him no. Let the European cities keep their ambiance of sophistication; we will take the coarseness of efficiency.

When President Obama earns standing ovations by announcing that he has and will continue to cut taxes, then, not two minutes later, announces further spending projects, tell him that no, that’s not how money works, not even for the president. You can’t have less of it, spend more of it, and claim you are tightening your belt all in the same speech.

When he appeals to Republicans by claim-ing he has cut taxes for 95 percent of working

families, tell him that’s not enough. Tell him that tax cuts shouldn’t be used as a device to swell your constituency; they are given as a matter of principle.

When he appeals to the welfare of your constituents, when he claims that it is his role to stand between two consenting adults, American or abroad, who want to exchange goods and services, well, say no to that too. Don’t baby us, or soon we’ll be reliant on your paternalism and cease to provide for ourselves.

Don’t let a president who has never really participated in the private sector decide how to regulate it.

When you see a problem worth solving, like the opaque and misaligned healthcare market, please resist the urge to solve it on the Senate floor. There are many causes worth fighting for; there are few causes that will be helped, not hindered, by more legislation.

Remember what has always been true in the United States: The creation of wealth, the employment of workers and the dissemination of goods are within the realm of the American entrepreneur, not the central planner.

Remember that when you were elected to Congress you abandoned the mantle of leader-ship and assumed the mantle of protectorship. Your salary, skimmed from the salaries of Americans doing actual work, will be money well spent only so long as you spend your time in Congress protecting us from the savior complexes of your companions.

When you are tempted to help the down-trodden, the poor or the unemployed, remem-ber that charity is charity only so long as you give of yourself. Even when you find yourself

moved by a sincere desire to better the lives’ of your constituents, say no to the emotions that stir your heart. Do not be so cynical as to assume that the empathy that moves you does not exist within those whose money you would spend.

Do not be so prideful as to assume that by virtue of your election, the bounds of your largesse extend past those of our property rights.

When your constituents approach you for pork barrel projects, tell them no. Turn them away. Be mindful of the fact that the old D.C. game of concentrated benefits/diffuse costs

hurts those of us who have chosen to hire workers instead of lobbyists.

When he realizes that his grandiose notions of Father Government have died on the Senate floor and pares his legislative reforms down to a face-saving fraction of their previous scope, still say no. Tell him that he was not elected to shake hands on television. Obstinance may not play well on MSNBC, but you can hope that your voters understand progress is more than a new law.

Tell him that you were not elected to go along to get along.

Remember that you were elected for your principles and not for one man’s idea of prog-ress.

Always remember this quote: “The Ameri-can Republic will endure until the day Con-gress discovers that it can bribe the public with the public’s money.” When people like me lose conviction, when we smile wryly and sigh that we are far past Tocqueville’s point of no return, prove us wrong.

Tell us that the essence of self-sufficiency that set the New World apart from the Old, however battered it may be by bailouts and New Deals, subsidies and pet projects, still exists. Tell us it will prevail over political demagoguery.

Tell us that despite scandal and corruption, egotism and demagoguery, there exists in the U.S. Congress some ideal that outshines desire for re-election.

Will Wray ’10 occasionally surrenders to the joys of dogmatism.

to the nay-sayers in Congress, keep naying

Born to a small Chinese village two thousand miles away from Beijing, my father traveled to the nation’s capital in the spring of 1978 and toured the city for the very first time. Eighteen years old, he had been deprived of the opportunity for normal schooling thanks to the turmoil of the Cultural Revolution that had engulfed the nation in the preceding de-cade, and he had no idea what was to come into his life.

By chance, he came upon the campus of Tsinghua University, one of China’s top uni-versities, and was enraptured by what he wit-nessed: people conversing with each other in foreign tongues and students quietly enjoying their readings on the lawn. At each corner of the campus he was able to find an authentic ambience of learning.

He then snuck into a lecture hall, and despite not understanding most of what the professor was saying, he was impressed by the old scholar’s calm confidence, mild hu-mor and above all, the air of dedication to the pursuit of knowledge and truth that the professor was able to conjure up on the po-dium. Returning to his hometown, he quickly dropped the family’s plan for him to apprentice for a local watchmaker and spent the next two years studying for the college entrance exam, a career choice that was considered sheer madness by his family and friends. To

this day, my father credits the day he visited Tsinghua as the turning point of his life, and attributes his life’s successes to the inspiration he drew from that visit.

This is the story that my father has re-counted to me many times, and it was the story I bore in mind when I decided to sign up for the volunteer program sponsored by the Commerce, Organizations and Entrepre-neurship program. The volunteering program brings students from Hope High School in

Providence to experience college life at Brown for one day.

Hope High is a public school that seems to have suffered all the problems that plague American public schools. It is in an East Side neighborhood and has been historically aban-doned by the middle class, who prefer to send their children elsewhere. The student body is made up predominantly of ethnic minorities. The school is handicapped by structure and lack of funding to improve its performance. Despite state authorities’ efforts to reform the administrative structures and to aggregate

financial investment for the school, test scores at Hope are extremely low, and not so long ago, the dropout rate was 56 percent.

There are already many initiatives taken by our fellow Brown students to help kids at Hope High School, but I was particularly intrigued by the promise of the COE volun-teering program and signed up for it believing that, just like my father’s trip to Beijing, one day of an authentic Brown experience might prove truly transformative and inspiring for

high school kids who may otherwise choose to forgo college education altogether.

Existing programs on campus are indeed abundant and valuable, and usually enlist Brown students’ help in improving the aca-demic performance of the students at Hope High School. These range from SAT prepara-tion to debate team coaching. Still, the role we have in tutoring high school students seems limited.

One thing that those eager to help need to realize is that most Hope students have grown up in underprivileged families and minority

neighborhoods, which is to say they grow up in a world distinctly different from the “Brown bubble,” an elitist circle. Some of the Brown volunteers actually commit several afternoons each week to walking a few blocks over to Hope High School to tutor those children in SAT verbal tactics, yet most of tutees remain blind to what college life is all about. Even with higher test scores, Hope students still live in an environment of abject poverty, frequent violence and depressing morale. Bringing those students over to Brown, even for one day, to truly savor college life in its entirety and authenticity — in Brown’s libraries and seminar rooms — may have a more profound and lasting influence on the psyches of those kids.

At Brown we always readily extend a helping hand to the struggling kids in our neighboring communities. Compared with the academic tutoring services we bring to Hope students, the COE volunteering program suggests another possible way to help them: What is more important than Brown University reaching out to the community is perhaps bringing in the local children and stirring aspirations to great education and great expec-tations. It is for this reason that I would urge you to volunteer to couple with a Hope High student for one day. Bring them to classes and other campus venues you visit. Share your day at Brown with one of those students, for the sake of inspiration and hope.

Yue Wang ’12 is a political science and German studies concentrator from

Shanghai. She can be reached at yue_wang@brown.edu.

For the sake of hope

Bringing those students over to Brown, even for one day, to truly savor college life in its entirety

and authenticity — in Brown’s libraries and seminar rooms — may have a more profound and

lasting influence on the psyches of those kids.

Be mindful of the fact that the old D.C. game of concentrated benefits/diffuse costs hurts those

of us who have chosen to hire workers instead of lobbyists.

WILL WRAYopinions columnist

YUE WANgopinions columnist

TueSday, FeBruary 9, 2010 PAgE 12

Today 56

Homework versus health care

Decriminalization bill introduced

The Brown Daily Herald

34 / 22

Today, FeBruary 9

9:00 a.M. — Breakfast in Bed and

Bake-sale for Haiti, J. Walter Wilson

12:00 P.M. — Queering the Family:

Some Reflections on Making a “gayby,”

LgBTQ Resource Center

ToMorrow, FeBruary 10

12:00 P.M. — Center for gerontology

& Healthcare Research Brown Bag,

121 South Main Street

7:00 P.M. — Ice Skating with Class

Board, Bank of America Skating

Center

excelsior| Kevin grubb

Fruitopia | Andy Kim

STw | Jingtao Huang

SHarPe reFecTory

luncH — Linguica Sandwich, Cheese

Quesadillas, Cheese Pizza, Hermits

dinner — Orange Turkey, Acorn

Squash with Curried Rice and Chick-

peas, Chocolate Pudding

verney-woolley dining Hall

luncH — BBQ Chicken Sandwich,

Noodles Alfredo, White Chocolate

Chip Cookies

dinner — Beef Lo Mein, Curry

Chicken Saute, Chocolate Marsh-

mallow Cake Roll

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crossword

the news in images

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35 / 24

today tomorrow

cabernet voltaire | Abe Pressman

dot comic | Eshan Mitra and Brendan Hainline

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