INDEPENDENT SINCE 1880
The Corne¬ Daily Sun 8 Pages – Free
Vol. 139 No. 42
TUESDAY, March 7, 2023 n ITHACA, NEW YORK
News
Arts
Sports
Weather
Co-Op Housing
The Last of Us
Men's Wrestling
Windy
Students join co-op houses for more affordable, community-centered living options.
Lena Thakor '25 discusses a "The Last of Us" episode "Left Behind.'" | Page 5
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Men's wrestling won its 27th EIWA title, with six Cornellians taking home individual titles.
HIGH: 31º LOW: 24º
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Faculty Senate Condemns Hubs Newly-passed Resolution 184 promotes academic freedom By SOFIA RUBINSON Sun Managing Editor
A resolution condemning the political, social and cultural repression in the People’s Republic of China amid the University’s expanding Global Hubs programs in the country was passed by the Faculty Senate on March 2. Resolution 184: Academic Freedom in Cornell Programs in China and Other Parts of the Global Hubs System passed with 58.56 percent of the vote on Thursday, with 22.52 percent voting against the resolution and 18.92 percent abstaining from voting. The Resolution points specifically to the Global Hubs system. China’s Global Hub consists of two partners: Hong Kong University of Science and Technology and Cornell China Center. However, Cornell has 26 active partnerships in China according to Director of Media Relations Rebecca Valli, including the Cornell-Peking MMH/MBA program, a partnership between the Nolan School of Hotel Administration and the Guanghua School of Management at Peking University in Beijing.
In April 2021, the Faculty Senate voted against the partnership with Peking University, though the University continued with the partnership nonetheless. The Faculty Senate has also passed other resolutions that require the University to consult with the Faculty Senate on international partnerships, but these have also been ignored by the central administration according to Prof. Richard Bensel, government. “The Faculty Senate has consistently expressed doubts concerning Cornell’s involvement with China, and in some cases, outright rejected that involvement,” Bensel said. “The central administration’s response has been a deafening silence.” The State Department determined in January 2021 that the Chinese government is committing genocide and crimes against humanity through its wide-scale repression of Uighurs and other predominately Muslim ethnic minorities in its northwest region of Xinjiang. The United States accused China of using internment camps and forced sterilization. See CHINA page 4
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Across the globe | Cornell has partnerships around the world, including 26 in China.
JASON WU / SUN SENIOR PHOTOGRAPHER
Sky's the limit | Ithaca Tompkins International Airport, which is struggling with low passenger numbers and a pilot shortage after COVID-19.
Airport Holds First Town Hall By SOFIA RUBINSON Sun Managing Editor
In the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic, airline travel demand is back — but airports are still recovering. Like many airports across the country, the Ithaca Tompkins International Airport is facing widespread issues, like the national pilot shortage, in addition to regional problems. On Wednesday, airport leadership hosted the first-ever Ithaca airport town hall to discuss these problems and implementation of potential solutions. “In the United States, passengers fell 97 percent from 2.5 million to under 100,000. So we’re trying to build that back,” said ITH Airport Director Roxan Noble. “This is hard. This isn’t going to be easy. It’s
not something that can happen overnight. We’re working to not only increase our relationships with our current airline partners, but talk to new airlines, getting the information out of why [to fly] Ithaca.” Despite the loss of American Airlines in September, airport leaders said at Wednesday’s town hall that their plan for 2023 is to keep pushing forward and encourage the local community to fly Ithaca. Matthew Colbert ’09, ITH’s air service development consultant and the founder and principal consultant of Empire Aviation Services, said the Ithaca airport was able to recover from the surge in passenger demand in 2020 due to the structure of Ithaca’s market. See AIRPORT page 4
Claire Saffitz Shares Journey to Celebrity Chef Career By BREANNA MASCI Sun Staff Writer
Claire Saffitz, a recipe developer and cookbook author visited, Cornell this past Friday, March 3 for a signing at The Cornell Store of her latest recipe book, “What’s for Dessert: Simple Recipes for Dessert People,” followed by a question and answer session in Statler Auditorium. Hosted by Matthew Merril ’26, a chef influencer and Kids Baking Championship competitor, the sold-out Q&A offered Cornellians a chance to hear how Saffitz started her journey as a food lover and built her passion into a career as a food writer.
Having majored in history as an undergraduate at Harvard, Saffitz did not immediately pursue her interests in food culture. Only years after graduating did she realize cooking was where her true passion lied. “All I wanted to do was cook all the time,” Saffitz said. “I would read about cookbooks, I would go buy the cookbooks and I would cook from the cookbooks. And I realized, at a certain point, that [food culture] was the only thing I had a really sustained interest in.” Raised in a tight-knit family where cooking was a means of bonding, Saffitz’s passion for making meals and creating recipes stemmed from her childhood.
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Sweet speech | Claire Saffitz talks with Matthew Merril '26, who hosted the event.
“Food was always a big part of my family and the time we spent together and how we
socialized and related to one another,” Saffitz said. After one year at École Supérieure de Cuisine Française and graduate school at McGill University, Saffitz began focusing on her passion and has since been featured on Bon Apppétit’s “Gourmet Makes” series on YouTube, along with being a contributing editor of Bon Apppétit magazine and publishing two of her own cookbooks. Saffitz said inspiration for creating a recipe starts as an idea and then, from there, testing reveals whether the dish is actually feasible and worthwhile to prepare. See COOKING page 3