The Brown Daily Herald F riday, F ebr uar y 8, 2008
Volume CXLIII, No. 13
No more parking for students on campus
Creative Arts Center will have outdoor amphitheater By Caroline Sedano Senior Staff Writer
Starting next semester, the University will no longer provide on-campus parking for students, a University official announced Thursday at a public presentation on facilities design. “Next fall students will be parking off campus,” Michael McCormick, assistant vice president for planning, design and construction, said during the meeting. Students will have to find their own parking, as the existing spots will be “redistributed” for other University parking needs, he said. The University has been trying to cut down on the number of student cars in the last few years with free use of Rhode Island Public Transportation Authority and the introduction of rental company Zipcars to Providence, McCormick said. The number of student cars allowed to be parked on campus has dropped from 500 to 250 in the last couple of years due to these changes, he said. Responding to a question on whether Brown plans to build underground parking below its planned facilities, McCormick said the University is aware that there is “neverending demand for parking” and has looked at the cost of underground parking, which he said costs $70,000 per space versus $3,500 per space for
above-ground spots. The University “is trying to make it not necessary to have cars,” McCormick said. Reaction around campus from students informed of McCormick’s announcement was mixed. “My immediate reaction is there is still going to be a really big demand. Students feel like they need their cars,” Mallory Taub ’08 said. “People have jobs or have other legitimate reasons for having cars, so I guess demand for parking will go up and get more expensive.” Other students said that student parking wasn’t a necessity “There are other forms of transportation — I use RIPTA every weekend,” Asia Del Bonis ’11 said. “It’s not up to Brown to provide students with parking spaces.” “I didn’t know Brown had student parking. I was planning on having a car, but I know it’s already pretty bad. I’m really pleased with RIPTA and safeRIDE so I guess I can live without one,” Andrew Migneault ’11 said. But for upperclassmen who live off campus or who have already gotten used to having a car, this change will be a bigger blow. It “makes people with cars more miserable – it’s already a pretty crappy parking situation,” said Jon Spector ’10. Taub said she thinks it would be important for students to at least have some kind of parking farther
SPOTLIGHT
How concussions affect academics
Athlete freezes in class; Ohio State ‘man beast’ By Chaz Firestone Features Editor
When it was finally his turn, Mark MacDonald ’08 strode to the front of the class knowing exactly what to do. He wrote his name on the blackboard and explained that his friends call him “Big Mac” because of his 6-foot-9 frame. But then MacDonald paused, and the Lyman Hall basement started to feel a lot like the Pizzitola Center a few days earlier. There were the eyes of his peers, fixed squarely on him and anticipating his next move, but there was also confusion, dizziness and a sudden loss of memory. MacDonald stood silently for a few seconds as the other members of TSDA 0220: “Persuasive Communication” looked on. The usually articulate center for the basketball team says he didn’t just forget what he was going to say next, he forgot how to say it altogether. So instead of continuing his introductory speech and talking about himself, he talked about Saturday, the game against Yale and the head-on collision with teammate Chris Skrelja ’09 that sent MacDonald to the floor with a bloody nose and a grade-three concussion.
continued on page 4
Social activist Angela Davis packs Salomon By Allison Wentz Staf f Writer
Racism has taken on “unfamiliar forms” in society today but still persists, social activist Angela Davis told an overflowing crowd in Salomon 101 Thursday. “I want us to think about that which was not eliminated, those aspects of racism that have been allowed to continue, to develop and have grown even more intense than they were a half-centur y ago,” said Davis, who was delivering the University’s 12th annual Mar tin Luther King Jr. Lecture. Davis’ lecture was well-received by the audience, which punctuated the speech with applause and murmurs of agreement throughout. Because the lecture hall filled quickly, additional spectators viewed the lecture on a simulcast in Salomon 001, which was also nearly full. Davis originally became famous during an international campaign to free her from an 18-month incarceration following her implication in an attempted prison break by the Black Panther Party. Her flight following the incident led the FBI to place her on its Most Wanted list, making her only the third woman ever to be placed on the list.
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ARTS & CULTURE
An academic injury Adjunct Lecturer in Theatre, Speech and Dance Pamela Howell remembers that moment in Lyman 007 well. As a section leader for “Persuasive Communication,” she assigned students to give two-min-
Courtesy of Patrick Lynch Steve DeLucia / Herald graphic
ute speeches introducing themselves. She says that after MacDonald explained his nickname, he appeared to lose his train of thought. “He didn’t seem to make the continued on page 6
Iraqi translator teaches at U. By Sophia Lambertsen Staf f Writer
Courtesy of Brown.edu
Renowned social activist Angela Davis spoke on the need for social justice. Davis now works as a professor of histor y of consciousness and feminist studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz. She has written eight books and lectured nationwide. A predominant theme in her work has been the social injustice of criminalization and the American prison system. To draw a contrast with today’s more subtle injustices, Davis spoke about her experience growing up in pre-civil rights era Birmingham, Ala., which was, according to her, “the most segregated city of the South.” “The protocol of racism I learned as a child I no longer have
Set in wonder PW’s latest play gives the audience ‘a sense of discovery’
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CAMPUS NEWS
to obser ve today,” Davis said, referring to segregation. “But I would be grossly exaggerating the contemporar y circumstances of the city if I generalized by saying we have successfully eliminated racism.” Speaking about the literal signs that pronounced the separation of blacks and whites during that era, Davis said, “Now that the signs are gone you might argue discriminatory practice continues under the sign of equality.” Davis said that racism is still as overt as it was during segregation, but that “perhaps we do continued on page 4
Pressure’s on With the RPL application deadline on Feb. 22, some are hoping to stay in the units for another year
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OPINIONS
“It’s definitely different,” said special non-degree graduate student and Arabic teaching assistant Qussay AlAttabi GS, who arrived in Providence from his native Iraq last summer to take classes and teach at Brown. “It’s a new culture, new people, new educational system, but I’m trying to cope with that.” Al-Attabi, who grew up and went to college in Baghdad, served as a part-time interpreter for the U.S. Army in Iraq. His academic experience in the U.S. has been much more demanding than his studies in Iraq, he said, but also much more rewarding. In addition to taking graduate courses in the Department of English, Al-Attabi instructs students in Arabic. He said he makes an effort in class to talk about his life back home and especially his experience as an interpreter for the military, “time allowing, of course.” “The point of our class is just for us to get experience with conversation,” said Kate Ganim ’08. “But he definitely has talked about his home … about the general state of Iraq, though not a lot about his personal experience.” One major difference Al-Attabi sees in his home countr y is that students do not enjoy the same de-
absolutely Matt Prewitt ‘08 on how corruption can affect market economies
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Min Wu/ Herald
Qussay Al-Attabi GS served as a translator for the U.S. Army in his native Iraq.
gree of academic freedom. Al-Attabi said that all his life, there have been significant restrictions on freedom of speech in Iraq. Academics in particular faced these limits, he added. “It used to be that you could talk about anything except Saddam,” he said. “Now with the rise of religious fanaticism in Iraq, you can talk about everything except for certain religions.” “Students in Iraq do not have the same opportunities as in America,” he added. “They can only dream of having the same facilities.” continued on page 4
tomorrow’s weather It’s going to rain pints — of water. Unlike this week’s blood drive, though, probably no bats
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