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The Daily Northwestern Monday, October 2, 2023
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Band showcases discography on tour
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TND sees changes in new school year Format returns to theatrical production By ELLA JEFFRIES
daily senor staffer @ellajeffriess
This year’s incoming freshmen class took part in a redesigned Student Body True Northwestern Dialogue during Wildcat Welcome. The modifications to the program come after about three years of criticism from both students and peer advisers who shared a common sentiment that the TND was disrespectful to the topic of sexual violence prevention. The Student Body TND is designed to introduce students to the Center for Awareness, Response and Education and its resources, and provide a comprehensive sexual health and prevention dialogue. The TND touches on healthy relationships, consent, violence prevention and bystander intervention. Saed Hill, assistant director of prevention and masculine engagement at CARE, said he received “overwhelmingly positive” feedback from students on the TND. “Overall, I’m really proud of the work that we did this year,”
Hill said. “A lot of the feedback I received was how emotional the production really was for students and how it felt really beautiful to many students how survivorship was portrayed.” The Student Body TND is typically conducted in person as a theater production. It changed to a video presentation in 2020 and 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, which Hill said students did not resonate with. The class of 2027 was the first group of students since the pandemic to experience a full theater-production style TND once again. Saed said because violence is often intellectualized and approached from an analytical perspective, using theater allows students to be part of the experience of understanding relationships and have an emotional response to these topics. Writer and director of the TND Nik Zaleski said previous students took issue with the use of humor in the online production. “The ways in which actors are able to feel audiences and respond to them live just wasn’t possible on a pre-recorded piece, so humor landed honestly pretty offensive to students,” Zaleski said. “They felt like the piece wasn’t taking sexual violence
» See STUDENT BODY, page 6
Micah Sandy/Daily Senior Staffer
Fiesta Hispana attendees watch Mariachis Sirenas perform at Fountain Square. The all-women mariachi group was one of many attractions at the third annual event.
Fiesta Hispana lights up Evanston Residents celebrate the third annual event in Fountain Square By MICAH SANDY
daily senior staffer @themicahsandy
From the vendors behind their tables to the residents
rocking the dance floor, everyone moved to the groove of music playing at Fiesta Hispana, Evanston Pride’s annual fall event for the city’s Latine community Thursday evening. Music could be heard all
around Fountain Square, whether from Evanston/Skokie School District 65 Board President Sergio Hernandez, who served as the event’s DJ, or from the Mariachis Sirenas, an allwomen mariachi group.
The event also featured a dance performance of baile folklórico, a complex dance style portraying Mexican culture — though dancers led by example,
» See FIESTA, page 6
Skate park construction commences NU hosts former Twiggs Park skate park will likely be open at the end of this year By LILY OGBURN
daily senior staffer @lilyogburn
Quentin Herzig started skating when he was 8-years-old, but later stopped because there was no skate park in Evanston, and he didn’t know many other skaters. During the pandemic, Herzig returned to skating. He noticed skate obstacles popping up at Ridgeville Park District and soon decided to build his own ramps and promote the park’s impromptu setup on Instagram. “Tons of people started coming, and that’s how I started to meet everyone and get involved,” Herzig said. Evanston Skates, a wheeledsport community group cofounded by Ald. Juan Geracaris (9th), asked Herzig to help the organization push city officials to fund a permanent skate park, Herzig said. After years of advocacy and planning, Herzig’s vision is close to becoming a reality. Construction of a skate park is finally underway at Twiggs Park at 1901 Simpson Street.
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City Council approved a $1.76 million contract to construct the skate park in March, and construction began in July. The park will be a 10,000-square-foot custom concrete facility, featuring numerous obstacles, pathways, a shade structure and new landscaping. “We’re in the process right now of forming all the areas for the new concrete skate park, so there’s quite a bit of intricate formwork that’s being constructed,” Stefanie Levine, senior project manager for the city, said. According to Levine, the park will likely be open to the public at the end of this year or early 2024, depending on weather conditions during construction. Throughout the design process, the city and its contractors consulted the Evanston skating community. Levine said the skaters were willing to provide feedback on all the details of the park, from the heights of ledges to the appearance of the grind rails. “We had a pretty big group of community skateboarding advocates that were involved in
French President Talks political extremism and global affairs By DELILAH BRUMER
the daily northwestern @brumerdelilah
Lily Carey/Daily Senior Staffer
The skating facility at Twiggs Park is currently in construction and will be open to the public in late 2023 or early 2024.
the design process,” Herzig said. “(The contractors) really let us in, in the process and the design, and allowed us to really make pretty big changes. (They) were really good at incorporating the needs of every single person and the wider community.”
As the park nears completion, Northwestern students also look forward to visiting the park. Communication sophomore Lara Llamas has skated
» See SKATERS, page 6
Former French President François Hollande warned about the dangers of political extremism and shared his view of global affairs at a Buffett Institute for Global Affairs lecture Thursday afternoon. Hollande, who held office from 2012 to 2017, addressed an audience of more than 850 NU community members both in-person at the Arthur Rubloff Building at the University’s Chicago campus and over Zoom. “There have been so many crises and fears,” Hollande said in French. “But we need to know what is the most resilient: democracy.” Throughout his hour-long lecture, Hollande touched on global challenges like economic relations between the U.S. and
China, along with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. “When the world is increasingly polarized, there are risks of authoritarianism,” Hollande said. “That would mean that strength would be more important than what’s right.” Throughout the lecture, Hollande alluded to themes of political extremism tackled in his recent book “Bouleversements” — a French term that translates to “upheaval.” The former head of state discussed economic difficulties facing several European countries and condemned the global community’s slow action to combat climate change. “Europeans have been forced to review their trade policies, especially considering fossil fuels,” Hollande said. “The climate crisis is here.” During his time in office, Hollande pushed for the legalization of same-sex marriage and signed onto the Paris Climate Agreement on behalf of France. However, following the 2015 terrorist attacks on Paris, Hollande’s
» See HOLLANDE, page 6
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