Vol. 108, Iss. 3 | Tuesday, March 13, 2018
The Flat Hat The Weekly Student Newspaper
of The College of William and Mary
‘THIS WON’T GO AWAY’ In wake of Parkland, Fla. shooting, students at College, local middle and high school organize walkouts to honor victims, advocate for changes in gun policies. NIA KITCHIN // FLAT HAT MANAGING EDITOR SARAH SMITH // FLAT HAT EDITOR-IN-CHIEF As students prepare for a walkout this week, The Flat Hat spoke with students planning protests across campus and took a closer look at existing weapons policies and what the state’s lawmakers are doing in response to student voices. For 17 minutes on Wednesday, March 15, at 10 a.m., students all across the country will be leaving their classrooms and walking out for gun control. Each minute honors each of the 17 victims killed at Stoneman Douglas High School Feb. 14 by a student armed with a gun. In Williamsburg, walkouts will occur at the College of William and Mary, Jamestown High School, Lafayette High School, Warhill High School, Berkeley Middle School, Lois S. Hornsby Middle School and Toano Middle School. These walkouts were organized by the students at their respective institutions. Neither faculty nor staff have endorsed or sanctioned the walkout either at the College or at any of the Williamsburg-James City County Public Schools. Students have pushed for these walkouts, which aim to raise awareness for gun violence and to prevent what happened at Stoneman Douglas High School from happening again. Middle and high school students participating in the WJCC school district shared their plans with administrators, who worked with student leaders to plan the walk out. Students who walk out for the specified 17 minutes at 10 a.m. will not face repercussions; however, students who leave campus or who disrupt the school day will be subject to disciplinary action. Because of the walk out, community access to JWCC school campuses will be limited during that time. WJCC has said that they respect the right of students to assemble peacefully and practice free speech, and that this can prepare students for the real world. “Virginia’s new Profile of a Graduate identifies Community Engagement and Civic Responsibility as areas for us to develop the life-ready individual, and this event provides us with an opportunity for a ‘teachable moment’ for all of our students,” a WJCC press release about the
As student activists engage, Virginia legislators push for stricter gun policies Students around the United States have been participating in classroom walk-outs to protest gun violence, meeting with state and federal legislators and planning letter-writing and phone-banking campaigns. Students at the College of William and Mary are no different — activists have organized an event scheduled for March 14 and are encouraging their peers to wear orange and take 17 minutes to walk out of their classes and meet on the Sunken Garden. What exactly are these students advocating for? What are Virginia legislators already doing to respond to school shootings like the one that happened Feb. 14 at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida? The Board of Visitors first adopted a policy prohibiting weapons in
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In the wake of Parkland and countless other tragedies, it’s all too clear that we need to take action to protect our communities from gun violence. U.S. Senator Tim Kaine
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campus buildings and at College events in 2011. In November 2017, the Board discussed expanding this prohibition, and met in February 2018 to approve these resolutions. According to BOV member Will Payne ’01, the Board asked the College to review these policies earlier in the fall to better promote safety on campus. Now, this policy prohibits weapons at athletic, academic, social, recreational and
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walkouts said. WJCC Director of Public Relations and Engagement Betsy Overkamp-Smith said that, while students are free to participate in the walk out, teachers and staff are not. She also said that the Student Code of Conduct applies throughout the day, and while students are allowed to chant and hold signs, violating the code will not be allowed. High school students walking out across the country need not worry about their admission prospects with the College. The Office of Undergraduate Admission released a statement assuring prospective students that engaging in peaceful protest would not jeopardize their chances of admission. “For 325 years, William & Mary has encouraged its students to think critically and ask difficult questions,” The William and Mary Admissions Office said in a press release. “ Today, we live in a time that needs thoughtful dialogue and determined action. Our faith in this generation of students to lead us forward could not be stronger.” Organizers Samyuktha Mahadevan ’19 and Matthew McCauley ’20, said that the walkout at the College will officially last for 17 minutes and take place on the Sunken Garden. However, Mahadevan said that they expect it will last longer than that because students will need time to walk out of classes in academic buildings farther away from the Sunken Garden. In addition to the walkout, Mahadevan said that the two organizers plan to hand out flyers promoting a club they plan to start in the fall, offer participants a stamp for their hands and distribute postcards for See WALKOUT page 3
educational events as well as in vehicles and other outdoor activities on university property. Beyond expanding the coverage of this prohibition, the amended GRAPHIC BY MADELINE MONROE / THE FLAT HAT policy also expands the repercussions for being caught in violation of campus weapon policies. The 2011 policy stated that someone caught with a weapon would face disciplinary action and be asked to remove the weapon from campus immediately. Now, someone in violation of this policy may also be found subject to arrest for trespassing. Beyond stricter weapons policies on individual school campuses, many high school and college students are asking administrators to support their protests. Some school districts, like Loudoun County in Northern Virginia, have officially said that all students participating in walk-outs will be seen as “disrupting” classroom environments and as a result, will be liable to face disciplinary consequences. As students canvassed neighborhoods and called representatives, some Virginia lawmakers were already drafting legislation. U.S. Senator Tim Kaine announced Feb. 27 that he was co-sponsoring the Assault Weapons Ban of 2017, which has three main provisions. It would ban the sale, manufacture, transfer and importation of 205 military-style assault weapons by name, ban any assault weapon that accepts a detachable ammunition magazine and has one or more military characteristics and would ban magazines and other ammunition feeding devices that hold more than 10 rounds of ammunition. “In the wake of Parkland and countless other tragedies, it’s all too clear that we need to take action to protect our communities from gun violence,” Kaine said in a press statement. “Students and parents across the country are courageously speaking up to shake Congress See GUN CONTROL page 4
Sunny, High 54, Low 31
Campaigns kick off Boylan, Tawalare announce SA bids, down ballot features crowded candidate field SARAH SMITH FLAT HAT EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
For the first time in many years, one student, Sen. Brendan Boylan ’19, is running unopposed to be Student Assembly president. Next Thursday, March 22, the College of William and Mary will elect new representatives to SA. Campaigns for senate, class president and student body president and vice president officially began March 12. “I wanted to run for SA president after serving in the senate and realizing that there is so much untapped potential with Student Assembly that with the right leadership and a good team, we can unleash that potential,” Boylan said in a written statement. “It also ties into my belief that there are a lot of issues facing our campus, chief among them being the stress culture and the mental wellness aspect that SA should be involved in alleviating by working more closely with administrators and the like.” Boylan chose Samir Tawalare ’19 to be his running mate, and the two have identified engaging with incoming College President Katherine Rowe as one of their primary goals, since they will be the first SA administration to establish a relationship with her office. “And in spite of a myriad of problems and criticisms of our community, we should also appreciate the incredible work of our peers and how unique this place is, and then when we build a community of respect and compassion as Samir and I are setting out to do, we can accomplish a great deal of reform both internally in SA, and culturally throughout the entirety of campus,” Boylan said. Boylan has served as a senator for the Class of 2019 for the last three sessions and has also served as the chair of the senate’s policy committee and as the senate historian. Unlike last spring’s elections, when each class president ran unopposed, the race for each class president position this year is contested. Current Class of 2019 President Jonah Yesowitz ’19 will not be running for re-election. Sen. Sikander Zakriya ’19 and Sen. Zauhirah Tipu ’19 are now campaigning for the position Yesowitz has held for three years. Class of 2020 President Kelsey Vita ’20, who ran for re-election unopposed last year, is now campaigning against Abe Winterscheidt ’20, who has not previously served in SA. In his first bid for re-election, Class of 2021 President David DeMarco ’21 faces competition from an SA insider, Sen. Aria Austin ’21. While some incumbent senators are not running for re-election, there are enough newcomers in the race to ensure that all positions are contested this year. For the class of 2019, incumbent Sen. Shannon Dutchie ’19 and Sen. Alexis Payne ’19 are joined in the race by newcomers Alec Friedman ’19, Annika Papke ’19, Ryan Semsel ’19, Will Siegmund ‘19 and Jessica Seidenberg ’19. Sen. Jack Bowden ’18, a transfer student from Thomas Nelson Community College who will not be graduating with the class of 2018 due to his status as a transfer student, will be running for re-election to represent the class of 2019. “I’m running for a senate seat on 2019’s delegation simply because I’m not graduating this year,” Bowden said in a written statement. “When I transferred to the College almost two years ago, I was assigned 2018 because of my accepted transfer credits. … Despite my non-traditional student experience, I’m confident I would represent the senior class of 2019 on their senate delegation just as well as I have with the senior class I’ve been representing this year.” For the class of 2020, Sen. Abhi Chadha ’20, Sen. Clare DaBaldo ’20, Sen. Sarah MacPhee ’20 and Sen. Ellie Thomas ’20 are campaigning for re-election once again. Ryan Walter ’20, who challenged Chadha in a special election in the fall 2017 semester, is also running again. The race for the class of 2021 senate is the most contested, with 10 candidates running for four spots. Sen. Helen Tariku ’21, Sen. Kyle Vasquez ’21 and Sen. Jack Simmons ’21 are all running for re-election in their senate spots. They are joined by newcomers Keyyatta Bonds ’21, Abby Fergus ’21, Benjamin Hotchner ’21, Anthony Joseph ’21, Margaret Lister ’21, Patrick Salsburg ’21 and Ben Wagner ’21. Candidates will continue to campaign until next Thursday, and many have already published platforms on social media pages and campaign websites. Elections will occur via an electronic ballot that will be emailed to students the day of the election.
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Spring break is best spent with family
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Katherine Yenzer ’21 says that students should spend quality time with family over break rather than taking trips with friends. page 5
Julie Shackford comes home
In December, Julie Shackford ’88 was hired as head coach of Tribe women’s soccer. Now she talks life, her career and her return to the College of William and Mary. page 10
The Flat Hat
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News Editor Leonor Grave News Editor Madeline Monroe fhnews@gmail.com | Tuesday, March 13, 2018 | Page 2
THE BUZZ
If everyone in this community is facing a housing problem, certainly there are populations that are facing it worse. And certainly those are non-white populations, probably predominantly female, and no one wants to talk about that and that’s really problematic.
— Office of Community Engagement Community Housing Fellow Kat Shaub ’17 on the intersectional nature of the lack of affordable housing for different populations within the City of Williamsburg
POLICE BEAT
March. 8 - 11
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Thursday, March 8 — Trickster thwarted: A charge of fraud trick under false pretenses was reported at Sterling Manor Drive.
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Friday, March 9 — The Wrong Man: Tyreek E. Brown, Jr. was arrested on a charge of falsely identifying to a police officer at Richmond Road.
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Saturday, March 10 — Wreaking havoc on Henry: A charge of destruction of property and vandalism was reported at Henry Street.
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Sunday, March 11 — Pardon my French: Leonel Ramirez was arrested on charges of public intoxication and swearing at Merrimac Trail.
COLTRANE, GINSBERG AND ALL THAT JAZZ
Student Assembly President Elijah Levine ’18 reflects on academic journey, year in office SARAH SMITH // FLAT HAT EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
A THOUSAND WORDS
COURTESY PHOTO / ELIJAH LEVINE
Left to right: BOV Member Brian Woolfolk J.D. ’96, SA President Elijah Levine ’18, SA Vice President Annelise Yackow ’18, SA Chief of Staff Noah Ferris ’20.
For most of his teenage years in McLean, Virginia, SA President Elijah Levine ’18 was set on attending the University of Virginia, studying business and securing a job after graduation at Barclays, a financial services company and multinational bank. However, after he attended events at the Raymond A. Mason School of Business with his father, he found himself considering the College of William and Mary. In just a few months, Levine will graduate and set out on a path much different than the one he once planned.
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‘Holy the groaning saxophone!’ This new path was first shaped in Levine’s first year at the College, when he took a freshman seminar with English professor Christopher MacGowan called “The American Short Story Since 1900.” Levine said this class prompted him to start writing more, and eventually led him to become an English major. His new academic focus, coupled with his personal redefinition of success, is what he said has helped him grow over these last four years. “I am such a different person than who I was coming in,” Levine said. “[McLean] always impressed upon me, sometimes in a toxic manner, how important it was to do well in school and take education as the most serious thing possible. What came with that is as socially, as ethnically diverse as Northern Virginia is, it is very [homogenous] in terms of values, and there is not a broad definition of ‘success’ and it is certainly something that I tried to assimilate into, I don’t think it was even conscious, when I got here, that was still who I was.” Now, Levine said he dresses and presents himself differently and prioritizes new things like reading literature and supporting social causes. “I think maybe in the past semester or two there have been times I stopped and thought about what defines me and to a large extent I am happy about it, and I realized how far it was from the person that entered William and Mary in fall 2014,” Levine said. Levine’s pursuit of an English major led him to pursue an honors thesis that blends his love of music —his unofficial minor — and literature. A defining academic moment for him was a class he took his sophomore year with English professor Richard Lowry, which led him to begin research comparing spiritual expressions in John Coltrane’s album “A Love Supreme” and in Allen Ginsberg’s “Howl.” “That class was awesome because along with reading novels and short stories, we watched ‘I Love Lucy’ and listened to some jazz,” Levine said. “I couldn’t have constructed a class that matched up with what I wanted to study more. He became my thesis advisor, he is the professor with whom I have the closest relationship and we share a lot of interests, music-wise and literature-wise. I am glad to have gotten the chance to have him. Like many of the faculty here, he is brilliant.” Now, Levine argues in his thesis that to understand the spiritual context of “Howl” it is necessary to understand the works of Walt Whitman and William Blake. With funding from the Roy R. Charles Center, Levine visited Columbia University and the University of California, Berkeley to read some of Blake’s letters. ‘Highs! Epiphanies! Despairs!’ Before Levine was elected to serve as SA president, he served as president of the Sigma Chi fraternity and vice president of programming for the Interfraternity Council. He also works as a staff writer for the features section of Rocket Magazine. What these positions taught him, he said, is the importance of communication, especially with the College administration. He cited his involvement with the creation of the Supporting Survivors program when he served in his IFC position as particularly formative. “[I learned] how crucial it is to have a plan but also be adaptable,” Levine said. That goes for his work with Rocket as well, Levine said. As a member of the features team, he learned to work collaboratively, both within his team and with his editors, to shape an idea into a fleshedout magazine feature. “[Rocket’s] also just been an incredible way to meet so many people on campus, and it’s been super valuable in forming how I communicate,” Levine said.
By the time Levine stepped into the role of president for his fraternity, with a study abroad trip to Cape Town, South Africa, fresh on his mind, he began to think differently about the relationships he had with the administration and student groups. One day, he asked former SA President Eboni Brown ’17, who had served as his orientation aide, if she knew anyone interested in running for her position. Six days later, he and SA Vice President Annelise Yackow ’18 had a plan. “I messaged Annelise and we met at Swemromas and we talked for an hour,” Levine said. “I was super excited because I knew that she had the institutional knowledge [of SA] and I knew that she was on board with the vision that I had to go through with it.” After what Levine described as the longest six days of his life, he received a Facebook messenger notification late into the night. It was from Yackow: she was in. Over his time as president, Levine said he has learned that it is helpful, and sometimes necessary, to ask for help. He said that he’s learned this through grappling with one of his biggest challenges: figuring out a diplomatic strategy for the position. “Even though there have been people in this position since 1994, there is barely a road map for figuring out what you want your [agenda] to look like,” Levine said. “… There are certainly things that you have drawn out for you step by step to keep some yearly programming going on, but it’s a simultaneous extreme freedom, where you are just constrained by knowing too many options to not know which one to take.” Grappling with that balance along with his team, Levine said, has been the most productive part of his tenure as the president of SA. As his term comes to an end in just a few weeks, Levine said he is still looking forward to events he has in the works. Still, he is proud of the work he has already accomplished in connecting students, administrators and members of the Board of Visitors. Notably, Levine said he is pleased with how the SA budget supported programming over the past year, which included events like the second annual Sankofa Gala, a culminating celebration of Black History Month at the College. ‘To converse about America and Eternity’ For Levine, the dream of working at Barclays after graduation is long gone. He recently accepted a job through Teach for America in New York City, where he will be teaching at a middle school in the Bronx. The importance of teaching and mentorship, he said, was first imparted to him through his mother, who used to work in the district attorney’s office in Mount Vernon, New York. “I think it is super important because I never had, growing up, someone at the front of the class who looked like me,” Levine said. “I know there is going to be a classroom of 28 to 32 kids who are going to have someone who loves English, who wants to be there talking to them.” While Levine said that he thinks teaching will be challenging, he hopes Teach for America will better equip him to communicate his passion for English in a way that enables his students to engage meaningfully with the coursework. “A curriculum has so much to do with who is expressing it, and the narrative that goes along with it,” Levine said. His last semester as a student at the College has also been a reflective time for Levine. He reminisced about his quieter moments on campus over the last four years, and about his love for long walks around campus listening and taking in the beauty around him. Now, he is looking forward to graduation and to the opportunities his class will have to be united once more. Last year, when he addressed the freshman class during Day for Admitted Students, Levine said that, looking out at the crowd, he marveled at the individual paths that would emerge from that one group of students and how that reminded him of his own class’s journey. “It’s exciting that the 1,700 of us are at least symbolically regrouping to take wider and longer paths, which sounds super cliché, but that might be the slight sentimentalism in me,” Levine said. “… I have never loved going to school more, and I have met incredibly bright and passionate and caring people, which has made the experience for me.”
The Flat Hat
Tuesday, March 13, 2018
Page 3
WILLIAMSBURG
Williamsburg lacks affordable housing
Housing Partnerships Inc. rehabilitate homes, promotes town-gown engagement LEONOR GRAVE FLAT HAT NEWS EDITOR
More than 39 percent of Virginia households are facing financial hardships. In the City of Williamsburg, that figure rises to 57 percent. This economic reality makes the lack of affordable housing in the area a significant burden for the community. United Way’s ALICE — an acronym for Asset Limited, Income Constrained, Employed — Study of Financial Hardship Report released in Spring of 2017 found that in James City County, 37 percent of the population faces financial hardship. The ALICE population represents individuals and families who live above the official federal poverty level, but earn less than the basic cost of living. In the City of Williamsburg, that figure is even steeper: 57 percent of the population qualifies as either below the poverty level or as ALICE. A James City County Housing Needs Assessment published in June 2015, prepared by the College of William and Mary’s Center for Public Policy Research, found that approximately one-third of households in the county report being cost-burdened in terms of housing. The assessment also found that the supply of affordable homes for first-time buyers is much lower than the potential demand for such homes, and most homes for sale are not affordable for the typical rental household. The impact of inadequate housing strongly correlates with health. A Housing Virginia Assessment conducted by the Williamsburg Health Foundation in 2017 found that when households are cost-burdened, individuals’ health suffers. A household is considered cost-burdened when housing expenses constitute at least 30 percent of gross income. According to the report, the more cost-burdened a household is, the lower the life expectancy of its residents. Additionally, the report found that most affordable units in greater Williamsburg are in areas with life expectancy rates below the regional median. Rehabilitation, redevelopment, reaching out to community A James City County Housing Conditions Study available on its website issued a set of recommendations to address Williamsburg’s housing crisis. The objectives outlined by the county are to reduce the median combined housing and transportation costs for the average household, to reduce the percentage of severely cost-burdened households in the County and to reduce the number of households living in marginal to substandard conditions by enabling households to upgrade these structures, seek alternatives of better quality or both. The report recommends three main solutions to these issues: the rehabilitation of existing homes in deteriorated conditions, the redevelopment of existing low-quality mobile homes and sites and planning for long-term new affordable housing development. While there is no simple fix to the multi-tiered problems of housing in Williamsburg, the Williamsburg-based nonprofit Housing Partnerships, Inc. works to repair and replace substandard housing in Williamsburg, James City County and York County. Kat Shaub ’17 is the College’s
COURTESY PHOTO / HOUSING PARTNERSHIPS INC.
Recent report finds that 57 percent of Williamsburg faces financial hardship.
COURTESY PHOTO / HOUSING PARTNERSHIPS INC.
A James City County Housing Conditions Study recommends rehabilitation of deteriorated homes; Housing Partnerships Inc. volunteers repair homes in Williamsburg.
community housing fellow for the 2017-18 academic year and volunteer coordinator for Housing Partnerships, Inc. Shaub serves as the liaison between Housing Partnerships and the College’s Office of Community Engagement, which contracts her to volunteer full time with a local nonprofit. This is the first year that her specific fellow position has existed. Shaub was tasked with increasing volunteer engagement by utilizing the College’s student network. She has been interested in the intersection of housing and other social justice issues since her childhood in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, where her mother served as executive director of the local branch of Habitat for Humanity. “Housing has an ability to affect almost every other social issue — it’s very foundational in that way,” Shaub said. “… Your zip code defines what communities you’re a part of and what communities you’re not considered a part of.” During her four years as a student, Shaub said she found it interesting, for example, that students have a conception of a “townie” as someone who isn’t considered part of the College community despite their status as a permanent residents of Williamsburg. “These kinds of paradoxical ideas of who belongs here and who doesn’t are really interesting to me,” Shaub said. “Everyone skirts around them and everyone knows that they’re there but doesn’t want to talk about it.” Shaub said the Williamsburg community essentially breaks down into three separate populations: the student population, the more affluent, typically older population and the working poor. These three populations are not financially stable, Shaub explained; students often rely on family support, the older population relies on pensions, the working poor on minimum-wage jobs. “Students who live off campus tend to get support from their parents to pay rent, meaning that they can typically afford to pay more than a resident on minimum wage can,” Shaub said. “That incentivizes landlords to deny housing to families and instead raise their cost and sell to students.” The average rental rate here for a single family, two-bedroom, would be around $900-$1100, and if a house is lived in by six students there paying at least $500 per room, that amounts to $3000 a month, roughly three times the amount a landlord would get from having a single family move in. Reports show that it takes 3.2 minimum-wage workers to make full rent in Williamsburg. “Students don’t have really any bargaining power with their landlords because of the three-person rule,” Shaub said. This law encourages landlords to raise rent and inflate prices over time, with student tenants having very little input. Shaub also said that even among people in the Williamsburg community who are aware of the problem, the fact that a lot of the heads of nonprofits are white and middle class means that they’ve had little experience with the issues they hope to solve. “If everyone in this community is facing a housing problem, certainly there are populations that are facing it worse,” Shaub said. “And certainly those are non-white populations, probably predominantly female, and no one wants to talk about that and that’s really problematic.”
For first time, Housing Partnerships hires student interns Shaub’s efforts to increase campus engagement have manifested in several ways, with one being the hiring of three student interns who work on data management and communications projects. One of the recently hired interns is Peter Kress ’18. Kress, who studies physics and economics at the College, already had experience in data management. He saw the Housing Partnerships internship as an opportunity to use his skills to give back to the Williamsburg community before he graduated. Kress explained that the work he does as part of his position is aimed toward modernizing the way Housing Partnerships stores information about its donors and individual projects. “I’m taking paper records, or somewhat incomplete or haphazardly managed spreadsheets of information and standardizing that and uploading it to a single database,” Kress said. “It’s contributing to allowing [Housing Partnerships] to derive a lot more insight about where their money is going and what projects are effective.” Kress said he hopes that the community engagement outreach efforts Housing Partnerships is undertaking will raise awareness of the issue among the College community. “Hopefully further engagement from William and Mary will be in the future,” Kress said. Before she graduated at the end of the last fall semester, communications intern Emily Lynch ’18 was the service vice president for Alpha Phi Omega. It was in that role that Shaub reached out to her, and together Shaub and Lynch set up a service project where APO members volunteered by doing a home repair. “It helped us get a look at the community in Williamsburg outside of campus, which is something that I don’t think William and Mary students tend to do a lot,” Lynch said. “We tend to get stuck in our bubble of the William and Mary campus.” Lynch saw this internship as an ideal opportunity to combine her professional interests with an issue she cared about. As a communications intern, Lynch work on social media promotion, writing donor newsletters and advertising specific events, such as the March 1 film screening and community discussion panel at the Stryker Center in Williamsburg. The nonprofit screened the PBS Frontline documentary, “Poverty, Politics, and Profit: Housing Crisis,” to a room of about 40 community members. Following the movie, a panel discussed and fielded questions about lowincome and affordable housing in Williamsburg. The panel was made up of local leaders engaged in housing reform: House of Mercy Director Shannon Woloszynowski, Economic Development Director for the City of Williamsburg Michele Mixner DeWitt, Manager of the United Way Community Resource Center and Home for Good Charvalla West and Director of Strategic Initiatives for the Williamsburg Health Foundation Kyra Cook. Shaub said that she hopes her position with Housing Partnerships as a housing fellow will allow her to bring the topic of the housing crisis to the forefront of discussion and to make students at the College think about their role in how people live in the greater Williamsburg community. “There needs to be a concerted effort to show the community, ‘this is what we’re dealing with, and you are a part of it,’” Shaub said.
As gun policy debate stirs nation, local students work for change Student organizers call legislators, organize walkouts, plan gun policy-focused club WALKOUT from page 1
participants to write to their representatives with legislative concerns. The organizers will also ask participants to wear orange — the color of solidarity in the fight against gun violence. Mahadevan and McCauley said they organized and promoted the walkout mainly through social media and saw a greater response than they had expected. Currently the Facebook event shows that 263 people have said they will attend the walkout and 461 have said they are interested. Mahadevan and McCauley said they would be pleased if those numbers reflect the actual event turnout. According to Mahadevan, the purpose of the walkout is to raise awareness for gun violence and create an inclusive discussion on campus about this topic. She said it is important to come out and show solidarity for this one event, but even more important to remain engaged and persist in this mission. “The goal is to get people to persist in this mission, and I think that when we have such a high expected turnout, if even a small percentage of those people move forward
with this issue, then we can become a more engaged student body,” Mahadevan said. The club that Mahadevan and McCauley plan to start would be called Students Demand Action and would address issues of gun violence and gun control. They said that having this structure in place will be helpful to organize and effect change. In addition, they said this club would be bipartisan, intersectional and open to everyone. “One of the main goals is to give students the voice,” McCauley said. “The voice to speak out for change. I think that too often students don’t think they can do anything in our government or in the real world … students think that they have to graduate college and be in the workforce to do anything, but no. We can do it right now.” Students have been advocating for legislative change since the Parkland shooting Feb. 14. The NextGen and Virginia21 chapters on campus organized a phonebank Saturday, Feb. 24 in support of survivors of the shooting; students called constituents for two hours to show their support for gun safety legislation. But for McCauley, advocating for gun violence awareness is not just for one side of the political spectrum. McCauley said he considers it important for the walkout at the College to be a non-partisan event because the issue of
gun violence transcends party lines. For him, the walkout is a path to progress, not a way to push a party agenda. “There are no strings attached to any party, this is just a very humane movement,” Mahadevan said. This issue is personal for many students. For example, McCauley said that the fear and feeling of unsafety he experienced during a violence threat at his high school encouraged him to become more involved in preventing gun violence. “I remember showing up that day and no one was there, there were cops everywhere, dogs, and I was like, ‘This is not where I want to be. I don’t feel safe,’ McCauley said. “So as these shootings continue to happen, I feel more of this responsibility to do something. And I think people here on campus feel that too. ... This won’t go away.” Mahadevan and McCauley said that the reverberations of the Parkland shooting have been more effective because students themselves have been fighting for legislative change. These students, McCauley said, have given the issue a face and the effects of hearing kids plead with legislators for their lives have been powerful. To Mahadevan, political saliency correlates with the simplicity of the issue, and students across the country have made this issue simple.
“These are kids pleading for their lives, saying ‘We don’t want to get shot at school anymore,’ and that message has a much louder tone when it’s coming from kids, the people who are most affected,” McCauley said. University spokesperson Suzanne Seurattan said that the College respects students’ right to freedom of expression and expects that the walk out this Wednesday will be peaceful. “Faculty, of course, will determine their own response to student walkouts of individual classes and I can’t speak for them,” Seurattan said in an email. “Those decisions, however, will be made on the foundation that William & Mary is a place where discussion, debate and thoughtful dialogue are part of the educational experience… we value and support all individuals’ rights to free speech, including free expression in the form of peaceful protest.” McCauley said that this issue of community safety should be very important to everyone, regardless of where they fall on the political spectrum, especially in a community as tight-knit as the College. “Since the shooting in Parkland was a school shooting, there’s a particular importance for people in schools to step forward and claim accountability from the representatives for their own safety,” Mahadevan said.
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The Flat Hat
Tuesday, March 13, 2018
FACULTY
Faculty salaries differ across disciplines Business, law faculty paid more than arts and sciences; higher median salaries at UVA An analysis of the salaries of over 2,000 professors, lecturers and staff at the College of William and Mary revealed a pattern that continues pay tendencies of years past. Professional experience is a factor, but it is not the only one. Among arts and sciences employees, professors of certain academic disciplines earn more than others, and, as a whole, the College has lower average pay than other public research universities. In October 2017, the Richmond Times-Dispatch released its report on public employee salaries for the 2016-17 fiscal year, which includes data for 2,240 employees of the College. In addition to academic faculty, the report also contains employment data for part-time assistant positions as well as custodial and secretarial staff. The report divides salaries at the College into seven distinct brackets. Only four professors earn salaries in the lowest two brackets, which correspond to yearly earnings of less than $50,000. Meanwhile, almost a third of the College’s total employment falls into this category, with 899 out of 2,240 staff members receiving compensation below $50,000. Departmental differences College President Taylor Reveley receives the College’s highest salary. He earned $550,000 in gross pay for the 2016-17 fiscal year. Other administrative officials, including Provost Michael Halleran and Marshall-Wythe School of Law Dean Davison Douglas, earn salaries of $428,000 and $332,000, respectively. A significant portion of professors, especially ones designated as
Philosophy Dean Elizabeth Radcliffe
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Differential pay is justified by demand, but it does not necessarily reflect the value of a discipline to the William & Mary students.
eminent scholars, earn yearly salaries upwards of $100,000. Since eminent scholars tend to have contributed greatly to their field of study, the report suggests that seniority plays an important role in salary determination. The College’s average pay is approximately $72,000. According to the report, faculty members earning salaries within $100 of this average pay level are professional lecturers, assistant professors and information technology specialists. The median pay for all of the College’s employees is several thousand dollars lower at $58,000, which corresponds to the wage earned by an employee in the university’s technology services department; the difference between average and median pay is above $10,000, indicating that
the salaries earned by employees in the College’s highest income bracket may have inflated the average pay and caused it to drift from the median. The report shows that differences in compensation persist across departments. Professors in the College’s graduate programs, receive higher salaries than their counterparts in other subjects. Over two-thirds of the 32 non-administrative professors with salaries at or exceeding $200,000 for the 2016-17 fiscal year worked in either the Marshall-Wythe School of Law or for the Raymond A. Mason School of Business; only a handful of professors from undergraduate disciplines met this threshold. Undergraduate professors earning salaries above $200,000 include Charles Johnson in mathematics, Tracy Cross in the School of Education, Melvin Ely in history and Don Campbell in economics. Elizabeth Radcliffe, who chairs the College’s undergraduate philosophy department, said she views the existence of differentiated pay levels as essential for the College’s success. While she said she recognized the importance of all disciplines to an immersive liberal arts education, she did not dispute the need for higher salary-based incentivization for professors in more competitive fields. “The reality is that, in some disciplines — for instance, the natural sciences, computer science, and business — there are alternative careers outside of academia that can pay more,” Radcliffe said in an email. “So, the competition keeps salaries higher in these areas than in arts and humanities. It’s like this at all universities. So, differential pay is justified by demand, but it does not necessarily reflect the value of a discipline to the William & Mary students.” This is a common sentiment, and professors from multiple departments acknowledge the College’s justification for offering various pay levels to its faculty. But while members of the College’s faculty see the administration’s economic prioritization of certain disciplines as logical, some departments have struggled to hire new faculty because of relatively low salary offerings. Economics professors, for example, are among the College’s best-paid faculty members in the arts and sciences. All 11 individuals listed as professors of economics on the department’s faculty directory earned salaries in the 90th percentile compared to staff members of the College as a whole. Despite the fact that the lowest salary for an accredited economics professor at the College is approximately $132,000, Berhanu Abegaz, chair of the economics department, stated that even his department has trouble attracting prospective professors due to the College’s relatively low compensation standards. “Economics is probably the highest paid in Arts & Sciences but we still have a hard time hiring in some fields — we just had four of our offers declined in part due to salaries (but also for personal reasons or the small size of the ‘burg),” Abegaz said in an email.
Across the Commonwealth Outside of Williamsburg, the report also contains employment data for other public universities in Virginia, including nearby Christopher Newport University in Newport News and the University of Virginia in Charlottesville. In spite of the College’s close academic and athletic relationship with UVA, the report shows that on average, faculty members at UVA earned higher salaries than those at the College for the 2016-17 fiscal year. The median salary at UVA is approximately $63,000 and the university’s average salary is slightly above $81,000 per year. However, the disparity in salaries between faculty at UVA and at the College is not a cause for concern, Halleran said. Higher
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UVA’s salaries are on average higher than W&M’s ... the difference obviously reflecting the amount of research conducted at the institutions. Provost Michael Halleran
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ETHAN BROWN FLAT HAT OPINIONS EDITOR
salaries at UVA are the result of higher research activity and do not necessarily indicate a higher quality of undergraduate education. “UVA’s salaries are on average higher than W&M’s,” Halleran said in an email. “[This is because] it is categorized as a ‘doctoral university — highest research activity,’ while W&M is a ‘doctoral university — higher research activity,’ the difference obviously reflecting the amount of research conducted at the institutions,” Halleran said in an email. Furthermore, College officials maintain their commitment toward increasing salaries for faculty and staff over time. College spokesperson Suzanne Seurattan said that the university has made great strides in meeting statewide benchmarks for salary raises, and that the gap between the College and other collegiate salaries across the nation is dwindling. “[The College is] working toward its and SCHEV’s (State Council of Higher Education) stated goal of having faculty salaries at the 60th percentile (to national peers),” Seurattan said in an email. In an effort to promote transparency, the Richmond Times-Dispatch publishes the salaries of employees at public universities throughout the Commonwealth of Virginia on a yearly basis. The newspaper’s report, which also publishes information about various other state-run institutions, contains the names, salaries, and official occupational titles of thousands of Virginia employees. Counted among these public employees are those at the College, whose salaries are publicly accessible. The Richmond Times-Dispatch report can be accessed at data. richmond.com/salaries/2016/state/college-of-william-mary.
STUDENT ASSEMBLY
SA votes to allocate funding to TEDx conference, Spring Food Festival Act Senators propose bill to create week dedicated to transition following SA inauguration SARAH SMITH FLAT HAT EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
Senators vote to pass six new bills as reelection campaigns approach At the Tuesday, Feb. 27, Student Assembly Senate meeting, Senate leadership once again emphasized appropriate behavior and respectful practices as senators voted to pass six new bills. This push for decorum is being emphasized as the election of new representatives to the College of William and Mary’s Student Assembly nears. To address previous concerns about senators speaking out of turn, disrespecting or ignoring one another or repeating comments during discussion, Chair of the Senate Alaina Shreves ’18 and SA Vice President Annelise Yackow ’18 introduced a speakers’ list and limited the time for discussion on each bill. Additionally, they encouraged senators to vote by roll call during the weekend’s committee meetings on each bill, as opposed to voting unanimously to recommend a piece of legislation. Sen. Sikander Zakriya ’19 sponsored The TEDx 2018 Conference Act, which passed by a unanimous vote during the meeting. In previous years, SA has funded the TEDx event, and in 2016, it allocated $17,000 for the event’s speakers’ travel and lodging. This year, Zakriya’s goal was to lower the amount allocated to the group. The final version of the bill will allocate $8,816. Additionally, this year, TEDx will not be charging admission for the event, and conference organizers hope to introduce a pre-booking system since each event is
capped at 100 audience members. In the future, TEDx representatives said that they would also consider becoming a recognized student organization, which would allow them to request a budget through the Executive Appropriations Committee process. Zakriya said he denied funding requests from the group to cover exclusive breakfasts and lunches that would only be open to members of TEDx’s executive board. However, he decided to include funding for a videographer. “We had a lengthy discussion in finance [committee],” Zakriya said. “I included the hiring of the videographer because if they want to step up their game and improve their brand, the videographer gives them great material. It is good for publicity to make [the event] a staple of William and Mary. They are trying to compete with other TEDx events at other Virginia schools; there is no reason ours shouldn’t be up there.” Three new events also received funding at the meeting, including one aimed at increasing SA’s engagement with graduate students. The “Let Grads Ring” Act, sponsored by Sen. Alec Jentink MBA ’18, Sen. Melissa Horne MBA ’18, Sen. Kody Carmody MPP ’18 and Shreves, will allocate $2,507 to create a new event for graduate students to ring the bell in the Sir Christopher Wren Building before their respective graduations. According to Horne, the event is scheduled for April 20, and she is working on securing a location for the reception. Jentink explained that the funds would be used for catering. “I want to commend the grad school senators for doing this,” Shreves said. “… It is a great way
for all of us to work together.” This bill was also passed by a unanimous vote. Another new event was created and funded through The Spring Food Festival Act, sponsored by Sen. Clare DaBaldo ’20. During the Feb. 27 meeting, DaBaldo amended the bill and increased the total amount of funding allocated to $922 to accommodate equipment rental fees that were higher than previously expected. This money will fund a food festival for student organizations that traditionally sell food as a method of fundraising. At the time the bill passed, a few student organizations had already expressed interest in participating in the event, but there were no confirmed groups. The third new event, spearheaded by the Class of 2021’s representatives, followed a series of listening sessions and class activities led by Class of 2021 President David DeMarco ’21. At this meeting, DeMarco amended the funding requested, raising it to $3,007 because he said he is unsure if AMP would help pay for screening rights to the film “Coco.” He also said he plans to allocate $1,250 to purchase food, which would include options for vegetarian and vegan students. Although there was limited discussion on this bill, some senators expressed their support. Others, like Sen. E.J. Jackson ’18, questioned the name of the bill, the Cocoa a la Matoaka Act, because hot chocolate will not be served at the event. Ultimately, the senate voted unanimously to pass the legislation. “This bill is great,” Class of 2019 President Jonah Yesowitz said.
Also at this week’s meeting: • Undersecretary of Queer and Trans Affairs Andrew Uhrig ’20 introduced the Janet Mock Act, which would allocate $20,007 to bring famous transgender activist and writer Janet Mock to campus. • Sen. Brendan Boylan ’19 introduced the Transition Act, which would dedicate the week of Student Assembly inauguration to information about transitioning the senate and class president positions between terms. • Boylan introduced the Tending Our Roots Act, which would allocate $3,586.75 for materials needed for the Tending Our Roots Symposium, a multiday event starting March 29. • Senators passed the Financial Accountability Act, sponsored by Yesowitz by a vote of unanimous consent. This act amends SA code so that all excess funds will remain in SA reserves, as opposed to rolling into the Fund for William and Mary. • Senators passed the Representative Accountability Act by a vote of unanimous consent. This bill, sponsored by Boylan, prohibits students from serving on Honor Council and in elected SA positions at the same time.
Virginia legislators Kaine, Northam advocate for smarter gun policies Proposed bill to ban bump-fire stocks, require safety devices, prohibit transfer of magazines GUN CONTROL from page 1
out of its complacency. We owe it to them to act. This bill is a critical step we can take to help keep weapons of war off our streets and out of our schools.” This bill includes a grandfather clause exempting all weapons lawfully possessed at the date of its enactment. Additionally, it would require these grandfathered weapons to be stored using safety devices such as a trigger lock, would prohibit the transfer of high-capacity ammunition magazines and would ban bump-fire stocks that allow semi-automatic weapons to fire at fully automatic rates.
Virginia Governor Ralph Northam, whose stance on gun control is similar to Kaine’s, said early in January 2018 that for the year’s upcoming legislative session, one of his top priorities would be expanding background checks for all firearm sales. According to the National Rifle Association’s Institute for Legislative Action, it is likely that he would propose a type of background check law that would make it a crime for any person to participate in a sale, rental, trade or transfer of a firearm without first having the transaction brokered through a licensed dealer. In the past, Northam had introduced legislation including a bill that would ban bump stocks, but none made it through the Virginia General Assembly. Now, in the wake of the Parkland shooting, he has reaffirmed
his commitment to prioritizing gun control policies. Although U.S. President Donald Trump has voiced support for arming teachers as a measure of prevention of future school shootings, Northam said that he disagrees with this suggestion. He said that he hopes to see federal and state lawmakers work “across the aisle” to come up with solutions. “I do commend the youth and the energy we are seeing coming out of Florida right now,” Northam said at a press event at the National Governors Association in late February. “That’s not going away, and it shouldn’t go away. Our children go to school every day. We expect them to be safe, to be educated, and we expect them to come home in the evening.”
opinions
Opinions Editor Ethan Brown Opinions Editor Katherine Yenzer fhopinions@gmail.com // @theflathat
The Flat Hat | Tuesday March 13, 2018 | Page 5
STAFF COLUMN
Spring break is best spent with family
Katherine Yenzer FLAT HAT OPINIONS EDITOR
GRAPHIC BY KAYLA SHIRLEY / THE FLAT HAT
STAFF COLUMN
Spring break should be for relaxing, not work
Anthony Madalone
FLAT HAT OPINIONS ASSOC. EDITOR
Saturday saw me visiting a friend at the University of Connecticut, so I had an excuse to ignore work then. Sunday, I returned home and ate dinner with my mom for the first time in nearly a month. The food and rest were welcome and gave me what I thought was all the motivation I needed to get to work the next day. Monday, I figured out how to write a cover letter. Proud of myself, I spent the rest of the day playing Rocket League and watching college basketball. Tuesday, I helped my dad clean out his office’s basement and went to bed early. Wednesday, after successfully finding a monologue for my acting course and slowly making progress on an English paper, the power in my mom’s apartment snapped off. Losing the wi-fi and light I needed to continue working on my paper, I thought about potential ways to still do something worthwhile. As I weighed my potential options, I thought back to my late Friday nap. At that moment, I slammed my laptop shut, plopped on the couch and proceeded to partake in doing absolutely nothing. After that, my break plans shifted monumentally. While I did some writing, I never did work unless I was truly moved to do so. Instead, I found myself going wherever my lazy desires took me, whether it be reading a random play, playing a marathon of Wii Sports or vibing to the entire soundtrack to “Les Miserables.” Having the freedom to play more, listen more and sleep more was something I had sorely missed during this semester so far. Hard work would return regardless of how much I got done; lengthy relaxation was something I could only really get then. I know that this week will bring a plethora of writing, reading and research. However, since having the opportunity to breathe last week, I have been reminded of the things I work for in the first place, and I am more prepared than ever before to get back to the grind.
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I went into spring break ready to work my fingers to their theoretical bone. It was time to apply for every single internship possible, read all of the books I needed to for the next two weeks and have papers done three assignments ahead of schedule. With my friends all having break a week ahead of me, I would have plenty of time to work diligently in solitude, saving myself as much future stress as possible. As I am writing this article on my ride back to the College of William and Mary, my stomach is returning a little rounder. My mind and soul are returning fully rejuvenated and recovered. Perhaps most pointedly, my work is returning barely more finished than it was beforehand.And you know what? I wouldn’t have it any other way. After visiting my high school on Friday, I returned home to treat myself to a nice nap. After waking up to my typical 20-minute alarm, I turned to face my phone, thought about what I actually had to do the rest of the day and calmly shut the alarm off to return to my rest. About two hours later, I woke up feeling bizarrely okay with my lack of progress. I shrugged this off, still ready to get to work as soon as possible.
Having the freedom to play more, listen more and sleep more was something I had sorely missed during this semester so far.
Email Anthony Madalone at asmadalone@email.wm.edu.
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COMMENTS @THEFLATHAT
Thank you for posting this! It’s so cool to see what is being done with Landrum. I lived there in spring and fall of 2011 and enjoyed it for its central location, big windows, elevator (for moving in and out), and Jack and Jill bathrooms. However it was old, creaky, and incredibly dirty. It deserved the TLC it’s getting now. I love that they are renovating it rather than bulldozing and building something else in its place.
— Caroline Wren Martin ‘12 on “Landrum Hall: A Sneak Peek”
This week, my social media has been full of spring break posts. Pictures of the beach, the mountains and the desert completely flooded both my Instagram and Facebook feeds. With the end of spring break will come the inevitable onslaught of “I wish I was here instead” posts that emphasize college students’ desires to perpetually be on spring break instead of being in school. While many of the people I know took to exotic locales with college friends for a week of fun, I returned to my home of Saint Louis, Missouri for my spring break. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the weather of the Midwest this time of year, I spent my spring break bundled up in jackets and scarves to protect myself from the 30-degree or colder climate. It even snowed twice while I was home, despite the fact that spring is supposedly right around the corner. I won’t lie, as I watched my friends enjoy their 80-degree Cancun vacation, a part of me wished that I too had planned a tropical getaway with pals. The cold weather and lack of beaches makes Saint Louis a less than ideal location for spring break. While I am sure I would have been perfectly happy spending my break on the beach with friends, I was definitely happier spending my week at home with family.
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Even though the typical college spring break is obviously lots of fun, is it really any different than a regular weekend at the College? As an out-of-state student, weekends at home are literally impossible. Thanks to the Richmond airport’s lack of direct flights, it takes me about 10 hours to get from Williamsburg to Saint Louis. If I were to attempt to return home for a weekend, I would end up spending half of my weekend traveling. Most out-of-state students have it even worse than I do, and many international students could not even make it home for spring break. Because of my distance from my home, I truly treasure any time that I get to spend with my parents and little sister during the school year. My family is the reason why I will never regret saying no to going to a more ideal climate for my spring break. Honestly, I may never get to have the typical college spring break experience, and that’s okay. When I chose to go to the College of William and Mary, a school that is 13 to 15 hours away from my house, I knew I was going to have to make some sacrifices. One of those sacrifices being that I cannot go home on the weekends when I miss home. Instead, I take full advantage of my longer breaks and spend as much time at home with my family as possible. Frankly, I think all students, regardless of how far away from campus they are, should consider going home for their spring breaks or taking a vacation with their families instead of their friends. Even though the typical college spring break is obviously lots of fun, is it really any different than a regular weekend at the College? Unless you’re headed to explore another country, spring break is just a week-long party that happens to be near the ocean. The appeal of college spring break is the freedom, lack of responsibility and absence of parental supervision or judgement, but doesn’t that describe every weekend at college? Personally, I think it is worth sacrificing a week of partying and beach time in order to spend time with family. Before you know it, you’ll have a full-time job in another city, state or maybe even country. You won’t have the opportunity you have now to take a week off and hang out with your parents. So, while you may be tempted to use your breaks to let loose on Hilton Head Island, South Carolina, consider going home instead. Your family will appreciate it more than you think. We should all make an effort to spend as much time with our families while we have the time, even if it means missing out on a week at the beach. Email Katherine Yenzer at keyenzer@email.wm.edu.
The Flat Hat
Tuesday, March 13, 2018
Page 6
STAFF COLUMN
Daily language courses beneficial for students, strengthen basic skills
Anna Boustany
FLAT HAT OPINIONS ASSOC. EDITOR
When I arrived on campus for Orientation, I had only a general idea of the classes I wanted to take. As I desperately searched through the course list, trying to put together a schedule the night before registration, one terrifying thing stuck out to me. Language classes were only offered every single day, and no introductory language sequence followed a typical Monday/Wednesday/Friday or Tuesday/Thursday schedule. As a potential international relations major, I both needed and wanted to take a language, yet the idea of being stuck with classes every day wasn’t appealing. People around me were scheduling their classes in order to have entire days off, but I didn’t really have the option to not take a language. So, reluctantly, I signed up for Arabic 101 at 8 a.m. every day. All of my friends who I told about my enrollment in Arabic said I was crazy, and I would deeply regret my choice. However, I am incredibly glad both for the 8 a.m. timeslot and the fact that the class takes place every day. I have found that languages are best learned by spending as much time as possible with that language and being forced to spend at least 50 minutes a day on the language is a good place to start. While my experience with languages at the College of William and Mary has been limited to Arabic, I have also realized that having a class five times a week allows teachers to devote time to more difficult topics. In languages, it is important to have a good foundation to build on, and spending five days a week in class is perhaps the best way to achieve that outside of actual immersion in the native country. So, while I am not exactly thrilled that I won’t get a day without classes for a while, I appreciate the necessity of having language classes every single weekday.
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While my experience with languages at the College of William and Mary has been limited to Arabic, I have also realized that having a class five times a week allows teachers to devote time to more difficult topics. Now, I will be the first to admit that what I also loved to complain about was the earliness of my Arabic class. I signed up to do it again in this spring semester, though, so there must be something I liked about it. I’ve been lucky enough to grow close with people in my class, so I’ve made wonderful friends. There’s nothing like waking up early to learn a hard language to bring people together. I also personally find that when I don’t have a reason to get up in the morning, I do nothing and am incredibly unproductive; so, for me, having an 8 a.m. forces me to start my day and get things done, which I can lack the motivation to do on my own. After all, my bed is very, very comfortable. Another added bonus of the language department being housed in Washington Hall is its closeness to Marketplace, which, in my humble opinion, has the best breakfast on campus. Honestly, having an 8 a.m. and going to Marketplace afterwards with my friends is the only reason I eat breakfast, and that’s a healthy habit to celebrate. While I understand that taking both an 8 a.m. and a class that meets five days a week doesn’t work for everyone, I am very grateful for my 8 a.m. Arabic class every day. Email Anna Boustany at aeboustany@email.wm.edu.
GRAPHIC BY JAE CHO/ THE FLAT HAT
STAFF COLUMN
Discovering Tribe spirit through lost and found
Ethan Brown
FLAT HAT OPINIONS EDITOR
The weekend before my spring break was chaotic. I spent my Friday and Saturday volunteering at the International Relations Club’s annual Model United Nations conference for middle school students and served as a rapporteur for a regional committee. I had a great time working with the conference’s delegates and was thoroughly impressed with their decorum and demeanor. However, while staffing the three-day event was enjoyable and informative, I was disastrously stressed by Saturday night. The weekend was certainly a success on a professional front — as I had obtained enriching experience staffing a collegiate conference — but at the same time, the weekend’s frustrating lack of productivity with regard to homework and midterm studying significantly boosted my stress levels. Like a typical student at the College of William and Mary, I had bitten off more than I could chew. As I looked over the various problem sets, readings and assignments to complete by Monday morning, the price of my lapse in judgment seemed increasingly evident. Also like a typical William and Mary student, I became angsty and resilient, refusing to acknowledge my defeat; Saturday afternoon, I decided to lock myself in my bedroom and be ferociously productive. I feverishly cranked through
my economics homework, completed my multivariable calculus problems and annotated my readings for Comparative Politics (while downing a few cups of coffee in the process). When I was done, I figured that a weekend of volunteering, as well as my afternoon of intense and exhaustive productive effort, made me eligible to enjoy my Saturday night. So I went out with my friends and decided to blow off some steam, which I thought was the perfect way to conclude my busy and boisterous weekend. I had a great time, especially since it was the last weekend I’d enjoy with my pals before we all returned home for spring break. It unquestionably made the stress of the preceding two days worthwhile, and when I returned to my dorm room in the wee hours of the morning on Sunday, I felt confident that I could conquer the week’s upcoming deadlines with aplomb.
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my desk, only to discover a measly 34 cents and a spare cardigan button (quite disappointing finds!). I soon dreaded the loss of my favorite frames since I felt my glasses had become such a vital part of my personal motif; without them to push angrily up my nose, how could I indicate my frustration to slow walkers and frustrating passersby? An Ethan without his glasses was an Ethan deprived of his habits and of his very identity. Hyperboles aside, I was fairly upset when I turned to William and Mary’s Lost and Found page on Facebook as a lastditch effort Sunday night. As I scrolled through the countless images of misplaced keys and Tribe cards, it increasingly seemed that my search would prove futile. But then, in a flash of unparalleled relief, I saw them — someone had posted a picture of my prescription Warby Parkers on the Sunken Garden with the comment that they’d drop them off to their owner at his or her convenience. I quickly messaged the post’s author and agreed to pick up my glasses the following morning. Within 12 hours, I had the wondrousness of sight returned to me, but even more importantly, I felt a deepened appreciation for the warmth and compassion of my campus community. It is extraordinarily meaningful that students at the College are willing to sacrifice their time to preserve the property of their fellow members of the Tribe. Because there is a less cohesive sense of community at larger schools, I sincerely doubt students at bigger universities feel compelled to improve the lives of their peers as students at William and Mary do. These simple acts of kindness make me cherish my college, and I’d bet that anyone else who has been saved by a benevolent stranger on the Lost and Found page feels the same. Email Ethan Brown at ewbrown@emailwm.edu.
Within 12 hours, I had the wondrousness of sight returned to me, but even more importantly, I felt a deepened appreciation for the warmth and compassion of my campus community. When I woke up the next morning, something felt off. Indeed, something was off — namely, my glasses. The tortoise shell frames that usually adorn my face were nowhere to be found, leaving me slightly blind and intensely confused. I checked my phone’s camera roll to see if I was wearing them in the dorky pictures I’d taken the night before. Sure enough, my admittedly dirty (but undeniably present) glasses were on my face in every single photo. I tore through my drawers and emptied
LETTER TO THE EDITOR Bruce Buchanan, Sharon Tucker, and Michael Thompson of the Saint Andrew’s Society of Williamsburg are planning details for the Society’s first pub night. The event is set for March 22 at 5-7PM, and will be held at the Amber Ox on 521 Prince George St. The event is open to all who have an interest in “all things Scottish”. Opportunities to learn about the Society, its activities throughout the year, including joining the pipe band and its scholarship program, and membership will be available. The meet and greet, conversation, and a “draft and eat” will add to the evening’s festivities. In order to let the Amber Ox know, please email us by March 20 at saint.andrews. society.w.@gmail.com. -Michael Thompson Vice President, St. Andrews Society of Williamsburg
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COMMENTS @THEFLATHAT
If there were a market for student tickets, they wouldn’t be giving them away. –Ian Brickey ‘11 on “Encouraging student engagement with campus athletics”
variety
Variety Editor Heather Baier Variety Editor Carmen Honker flathat.variety@gmail.com // @theflathat
The Flat Hat| Tuesday, March 13, 2018 | Page 7
Libraries for change Samantha Boateng ’20 brings love of reading to Ghana CARMEN HONKER // FLAT HAT VARIETY EDITOR
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ollowing the return of her mother from a teaching trip in Ghana, Samantha Boateng ’20 was inspired to improve the students’ access to books. Boateng was driven by her mother’s depiction of the lack of functioning public libraries there. During her junior year of high school, Boateng started gathering books for the children in Ghana. What began in 2015 as a small book drive ultimately resulted in the collection of over 14,000 books and 22 computers. Additionally, Boateng and her school community raised approximately $15,000 to support the cause. With the success of the fundraising work, Boateng’s vision quickly grew to include the establishment of Read 2 Lead. Read 2 Lead is the nonprofit organization founded by Boateng and her mother that has now built and established two permanent libraries in Ghana. The mission of the organization is to build sustainable community libraries by providing the information and facilities needed for learning and discourse and, according to Boateng, to foster a love of reading. “Basically, our main goal is to encourage education and a love of reading,” Boateng said. “By doing so we build libraries and we hold academic competitions, like Quiz Bowl-type competitions, reading programs and different activities and opportunities for students to further their education.” The construction of the first library in Accra, Ghana, began in 2016 and was a lengthy process. Boateng recalled that on her first trip to Ghana she was discouraged by all the work that needed to be done. “It was a long process; it was a lot of work,” Boateng said. “This was our first one; we didn’t really know how to go about everything, so the whole process was really difficult. It took so long for us to open the library because it was large, and when we first went to Ghana we didn’t have enough money fundraised to finish. So, I felt pretty discouraged my first trip.” Boateng recounts her most memorable moment associated with Read 2 Lead and the joy brought by interacting with the excited children. “A lot of kids were really excited about the library, so they were all waiting outside the library one day, looking in, trying to see was going on in there and we opened the doors just to let them in because most of the library was done,” Boateng said “... Just seeing how excited they were for something that was still not done, and they were just so happy that someone thought of them to do something like this for them really encouraged me, like a lot. They were running around, jumping. They were all really excited. That was probably one of my best experiences.” The second library opened in 2017
“… Our main goal is to encourage education and a love of reading. By doing so we build libraries and we hold academic competitions, like Quiz Bowltype competitions, reading programs and different activities and opportunities for students to further their education.”
COURTESY PHOTO / WM.EDU
“… Eventually, hopefully we could spread across Africa. Just knowing that students or someone has been positively impacted by the project will make me know that this project has been successful.”
COURTESY PHOTO / READ 2 LEAD
“… Just seeing how excited they were for something that was still not done, and they were just so happy that someone thought of them to do something like this for them really encouraged me, like a lot. They were running around, jumping. They were all really excited.”
COURTESY PHOTO / WM.EDU
and is located in the Ashanti region of Ghana. The library was dedicated in honor of Boateng’s grandfather, who built a school in the community over 10 years prior. Boateng usually travels to Ghana twice a year for about a month at a time during summer and winter breaks to assist in the running of the library operation. The libraries remain functioning with the ongoing support from several local individuals who Boateng said are extremely passionate about keeping the libraries up and running. The locals head the libraries, seek assistance from volunteers and are in constant communication with Boateng and her mom. Boateng said that Read 2 Lead’s projects are very much a community effort, as the building materials for the libraries come from Ghana and the locals themselves assist in the building process. “Everyone who works there, is from there,” Boateng said. “So it’s really like a community-building initiative where individuals there built the libraries for themselves, for their community.” On campus, Boateng is involved with the African Cultural Society, dances with the Aphrodite Dance Team, volunteers with Griffin School Partnerships and is a resident assistant. In particular, her involvement with GSP, an organization that supports local schools through classroom assistance, tutoring, mentoring and enrichment programs, is directly related to her work with Read 2 Lead. “Griffin School Partnerships and African Cultural Society kind of merge together,” Boateng said. “They are both towards my interest because I really am interested and passionate about education, especially for individuals in developing countries like Ghana.” As for the future of Read 2 Lead, Boateng is optimistic. The organization is currently starting a new project involving shoe and clothing collection as well as establishing the plans for a third library. Read 2 Lead is also partnering with the African Cultural Society, the Delta Sigma Theta sorority and the School House Block organizations on campus to raise more funds. “My number one goal with the organization for the future is … [to] start the process of a third library,” Boateng said. “… Eventually, hopefully we could spread across Africa. Just knowing that students or someone has been positively impacted by the project will make me know that this project has been successful.”
T HONKER / THE FLAT HA GRAPHIC BY CARMEN COURTESY PHOTO / READ 2 LEAD
The Flat Hat
Tuesday, March 13, 2018
Page 8
BSO hosts BLACK Days campaign LEXI GODREFY // FLAT HAT STAFF WRITER ers around campus, among other marketing ploys. “People would see us taking pictures, and would be like, ‘What are you guys doing?’” Covington said. “So then we’d explain to them what BLACK Days are, and then it got the word out.” The Center for Student Diversity helped in bolstering the event by having some of its faculty members participate in BLACK Days, and it increased social media presence by posting captions on Instagram for
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“I know there’s not a lot of us of color on campus, so having a format or platform that actually highlights us and says, ‘We’re here. We matter.’ It’s something that we wanted to publicize.” –Niya Gray ‘19
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February is Black History Month, which honors and celebrates African-American achievements while simultaneously recognizing the haunting past that black populations have endured throughout America’s history. The College of William and Mary’s Black Student Organization sought to commemorate Black History Month in its own way: with BLACK Days. BSO aims to create unity and representation on campus, harbor a safe space for students of color to socialize and interact, as well as promote black thought and support students’ needs. It is very active on campus in pursuit of its goals, setting up fundraisers, distributing scholarships, holding discussion panels and hosting back-to-school cookouts, among many other things. BLACK Days was founded in February 2017 to both highlight black students and raise awareness of the prevalent issues surrounding the community. Each Tuesday of Black History Month, BSO encouraged not just black students, but the entire campus to participate in showing support for the black community by dressing in all black. Its main BLACK Days event took place Feb. 20, when the organization pushed for campus-wide participation in the campaign. “It was kind of a day to highlight us as students and just embrace our culture, come together as a university — it’s not exclusively for African Americans,” BSO president Niya Gray ’19 said. BSO’s goal in the campaign was to encourage the College to recognize and embrace African-American history, as well as to present issues that black citizens and students face every day. Since its inception last year, BSO has experienced a lot of support and involvement in BLACK Days from both students and faculty. “When it first started, people were like, ‘Oh my god, what’s this? Why are you wearing all black?’ So … many students participated in it … and faculty,” the group’s social chair Lauren Covington ’19 said. The group relies heavily on its social media pages, such as Facebook and Instagram, to publicize the events, as well as tabling in Sadler and putting up fli-
the events. “Some [other] faculty members would repost [the event], or like it on social media, but it was mostly the Center [for] Student Diversity [that helped with the event’s publicity],” Gray said. With BLACK Days, the BSO hopes to bring issues of diverse representation within the College community to light. “It’s that representation factor,” Gray said. “I know there’s not a lot of us of color on campus, so having a format or platform that actually highlights us and says, ‘We’re here. We matter.’ It’s something that we wanted to publicize.” The current political climate also influences BLACK Days, with the founding of the event occurring after U.S. President Trump’s election to office.
“I feel like BLACK Days came about more after the Trump presidency, because a lot of things were happening on campus, and there were racist remarks going on,” Covington said. “I feel like [BLACK Days] was more to go with that issue as well … to say, ‘We are standing together as one’ … and more about bringing the community together.” This year, BSO enjoyed the same amount of success with the campaign as it did last year and has not experienced any sort of pushback from the community. Despite previous instances on campus, BSO had no trouble inspiring the community to participate in the campaign. “We are active,” Gray said. “We are doing events that better the community that aren’t just in the sphere of African Americans, but [for] the broader campus, as well.” Gray said that BSO encourages all students to participate in its events and insists that membership is not exclusive to black students. “[We’re not interested in] just black thought, but other people of color, as well, really everybody,” secretary of BSO Jasmine Adams ’19 said. Adams said the organization tries to cultivate this inclusivity through many of the activities it hosts. Every year, it throws a back-to-school cookout and a lastday-of-classes cookout that is open to the public. It also invites other schools to participate in its annual public step show, in which students perform step routines for an audience. This year, the group presented at the 2011 National Poetry Slam, and brought in 2012 and 2014 Women of the World Slam Champion, Dominique Christina, for an open lecture. Among the panels, movie nights, festivals, bake sales, contests and more, BSO encourages students of all races and ethnicities to participate in its events. “My hope is that [BLACK Days] would spread out to other campuses,” Gray said. “Just having this [be a] platform to show how other campuses can do this, [to] promote black thought and diversity needs in other communities.”
FORKIN’ AROUND SEAN WILLNER FLAT HAT DIGITAL MEDIA EDITOR
When Mattie and I first walked into Amber Ox Public House, I was struck by the cheerful yet noisy ambiance of the restaurant. The place was stuffed to capacity, as one would expect on a Saturday night. A giant mural of an ox stared down at us as we sat at our table. The beer menu has over 18 colorfully named options on it, most of them brewed in-house. Options range from a #Publyfe pale ale, deemed “liquid nostalgia in a glass” by the menu, to a Butcher’s Mouth imperial stout that includes smoked malts, bacon powder and molasses. I chose a Munich Dunkle called Tracing Lines, a beer with heavy malt flavoring and pleasant tastes of bread and citrus. With just a touch of bitterness, this beer had a light feel to it and was easy to drink. For my entree, I chose the sweet tea-brined pork chop. For $16, I received a large pork chop over grits and collard greens. It had bourbon-apple and pot liquor sauces drizzled on top of it. The pork chop was juicy and flavorful, and it went really well with the consistency of the grits and greens. The sauces added an extra burst of flavor. The serving was large enough that I, a person who usually has no trouble finishing off meals, was not able to totally clean my plate. This was a heavy meal, as were most of the other options on the menu. The service was generally good, and the music added a fun vibe to our dining experience. The two largest drawbacks were the volume of the dining room and the prices. I often had a hard time hearing my fellow Flat Hatter as we were discussing our meals, and I ended up paying approximately $26 for a small beer and an entree. Granted, I received a lot of good food, and the restaurant is located close to Merchants Square, where high prices are the norm. But for a college student such as myself, a trip to Amber Ox must be a rare treat, or else my bank account will quickly go dry. Despite these drawbacks, I’d still recommend Amber Ox to anyone looking Forkin’ Around is a new Varity column that will provide readers for a large, creative reviews of popular restauraunts in the Williamsburg area. beer selection with hardy food.
Amber Ox:
MADELINE MONROE FLAT HAT NEWS EDITOR
Amber Ox Public House’s inviting atmosphere capitalizes on its name — warm-colored decor dominates the dining area with some southern undertones which complement its small dining menu that thrives on classics, like b¬uttermilk drop biscuits and shrimp and grits, and its drink menu that invites one to relax, and rest easy. The brewpub’s seating capacity is massive. These seating arrangements, however, prioritize quantity over comfort and were situated in rather close-quarters. Such arwith rangements also contributed to the noise level, which I found overbearing during conversation. Aside from the abysmal seating arrangement, we experienced excellent service, and the staff often checked on us, as well as other guests, with a frequency that was not intrusive. I first started my food journey with a White Russian — a cocktail that incorporates vodka, Kahlua and cream or milk. My White Russian was elevated with some vanilla flavoring, either in the form of a vanilla vodka or a drop of extract, and went down rather smoothly — perhaps, too smoothly because the subtleness of the Kahlua. I chose the potato and cauliflower soup and was served a considerable portion. The soup was a light consistency accented by sharp and sweet taste of cauliflower, while the taste of potato made up the undertone of the dish. A garnish topped the soup alongside a few drops of annatto seed oil. Other than its saltiness, the soup was perfect. For $18, I had the classic shrimp and cheese grits, with pieces of tasso ham in a pool of beer vinegar sauce. Though intriguing, the tasso ham was disappointing; it was underseasoned and texturally off. The five shrimp on my plate appeared underwhelming, but tasted fine. They, like, the ham, could have benefited from more seasoning, but less so. The creamy grits were the star of the dish; they were dense and complex in texture, and soaked up the beer vinegar sauce well, the latter of which had a kick. Unfortunately, the large amount of garnish detracted from my grits experience. I ended the night having spent roughly $44 on my full meal after taxes — $24 on food, $9 for the drink and $7 for the tip. The food was great, but for the price, it was underwhelming when compared to restaurants that operate on similar price points.
Forkin’ Around
Worth the Cost?
MADELINE MONROE / THE FLAT HAT
SEAN WILLNER / THE FLAT HAT
“I kn c form h her t
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The Flat Hat | Tuesday, March 13, 2018 | Page 9
MEN’S BASKETBALL
Tribe trips up EMILY CHAUMONT / THE FLAT HAT
The Tribe bench hangs its head during the waning moments of the College’s 83-73 loss to Towson in the CAA tournament semifinal. Although the Tribe has advanced to the semifinals for five-straight years, it has never won the CAA tournament.
After quarterfinal victory over Towson, College falls to eventual CAA champion Charleston KEVIN RICHESON FLAT HAT SPORTS ASSOC. EDITOR Over spring break, William and Mary headed to Charleston, South Carolina, to compete in the Colonial Athletic Association tournament. The Tribe was looking for its first CAA championship win. Sunday, March 4, the No. 4-seeded Tribe (19-12, 11-7 CAA) took on the No. 5 Towson Tigers (18-14, 8-10 CAA) in the CAA quarterfinals. The College got off to a hot start, with senior guard Connor Burchfield banking home a layup for the first points of the game. The Tribe stayed hot at the offensive end. Sophomore forward Nathan Knight got into the action, hitting two free throws and then making a layup through contact and finishing the three-point play to give the College its largest lead thus far, 27-15. The Tigers cut the deficit to single digits, but another two free throws from Knight gave the College a 38-28 lead with two minutes to go in the half. The College finally ended a six-minute stretch without a field goal with sophomore guard Matt Milon’s third triple of the game, giving the Tribe a 41-32 advantage at the half. After making a run to start the second half and cutting the Tribe lead to three, the Tigers went cold. Junior forward Paul Rowley hit the Tribe’s first three of the second half to give it a double-digit lead once again, 51-39.
The Tigers continued to hang around, but the College hit its free throws down the stretch to hold off the Tigers and claim an 80-66 victory. Monday, the Tribe took the court to face No. 1 Charleston (26-7, 14-4 CAA) in the tournament semifinals. The game started at a blistering pace with Knight dominating on the offensive end for the Tribe, scoring eight points in the first six minutes. The Tribe missed its first three attempts from three-point range, allowing the Cougars to gain a lead midway through the opening 20 minutes, 17-12. Charleston guard Grant Riller hit three treys in a row, giving the Cougars a double-digit lead. Knight responded at the other end with a basket of his own to cut the deficit to nine. The Cougars closed the half well, taking a 3934 lead to the locker room despite a three-pointer from senior guard David Cohn to beat the buzzer. Cohn started the scoring for the College in the second half, cutting the lead to 39-36. The Tribe then struggled to get stops, allowing Charleston to continue to play with the lead. The Tribe made a run, punctuated by a Rowley three, but the Cougars refused to give up the lead as guard Cameron Johnson drained yet another triple to bump their advantage up to 50-46. Riller and Knight — the two leading scorers in the game — traded buckets, and the Tribe got a rare stop on the defensive end. Then, Rowley drove to the basket and laid it in to bring the College within three with nine minutes to play.
COMMENTARY
After another stop, the Tribe had a chance to tie the game, but a Knight turnover led to another Cougar three. Pierce responded with a layup, with Cohn assisting, bringing the score to 60-56. Once again, the College could not draw even, as Charleston guard Joe Chealey hit a trio of free throws to stretch the Charleston lead to 63-57. With the game slipping away from the Tribe, Cohn buried a clutch three to keep the Tribe within striking range, 69-62 at the four-minute mark. However, the Tribe could not come up with the necessary stops on defense, and the Cougars quickly went back on top by 11 points. A minute later, with the College down 13, Rowley hit his third and fourth threes of the contest to cut the Cougars’ lead to seven. The Tribe started to foul the Cougars to extend the contest with a minute to play, but the Cougars hit their free throws and punctuated the 83-73 win with a Brantley dunk with 30 seconds to play. With the loss to the Cougars, the College was eliminated from the CAA tournament and did not receive the conference’s automatic bid to the National Collegiate Athletic Association tournament. The Tribe is one of only four original Division I teams to never qualify for the NCAA tournament. Charleston continued on in the CAA tournament, beating No. 2 Northeastern to claim an NCAA tournament bid. Next season, the Tribe will return its three sophomore starters, Knight, Milon and Pierce. Burchfield and Cohn will graduate in the spring.
WOMEN’S BASKETBALL
There’s always next year for the Tribe College falters in CAA tournament College’s consistency points to future success
Brendan Doyle FLAT HAT SPORTS EDITOR
At the Colonial Athletic Association tournament, the No. 4-seeded William and Mary squad advanced to the semifinal with the help of a couple key senior stars. The next day, the Tribe ran with the No. 1 seed, playing tough basketball and getting chances to change the momentum of the game. However, the team was unable to get a key stop or a bucket to take the lead late, and a very close game turned into a double-digit loss for the College and a bitter end to the seniors’ careers. Wait, you thought I was talking about this year? Little of this year’s Tribe resembles last year’s team. The 2016-17 team was a veteran group with a deep bench that sometimes struggled to score in key situations. The 2017-18 team was young apart from a couple crucial seniors and couldn’t get the stops it needed to put conference teams away, a trait exacerbated by the necessary short bench deployed by head coach Tony Shaver. Even so, the stories of these two teams and their respective demises in postseason play are remarkably similar. Both teams were bounced in the semifinal against a favored No. 1 seed in a game in which they played well, but not well enough to win. I don’t know if I can draw some great conclusion about how two teams built so differently could suffer the same exact fate in the conference tournament. Maybe the conclusion is that the men’s basketball program is cursed. Zero bids to a tournament that has been around since 1939 and now invites a whopping 68 teams might very well be the result of a supernatural force. More likely is the influence of random luck, but they’re basically the same thing, right? The best way to go after a National Collegiate Athletic Association tournament appearance, if you’re a coach of a program like the College, is to build a consistent winner year in and year out. At-large bids to the NCAA tournament are not a viable goal in today’s CAA. A team that wins in the conference regular season will always have a chance in its conference tournament, and therefore will always have that flickering flame of hope that this will be the year. Some may look at Shaver’s 15 years at the helm of the Tribe, see the lack of NCAA tourney bids and
automatically declare his time in Williamsburg a failure. But he has turned the College into a perennial contender for the CAA crown and, by extension, an NCAA tournament appearance, something that has rarely been the case over the 109 years of Tribe basketball. Even this year, with its finish that still stings to the heart of the Green and Gold faithful, should be considered a huge success. Picked by the CAA’s coaches to finish eighth in the conference before the season, the Tribe started 5-0 in CAA play and proved itself a force to be reckoned with. The team would then put an exclamation point on the regular season with its Senior Day win against Charleston. How fitting that the same team who would eventually hand the Tribe its most painful loss also provided the College with its most fulfilling win. The Tribe is set up well for next season to be just as good, if not better. Three starters and, arguably, two of the College’s best three players will be back. Freshmen guards Luke Loewe and Jihar Williams will have to play much bigger roles, but program history suggests they will be up to the task, as the Tribe’s player development is one of the strong suits of the program. And, with the addition of a new class of freshmen, the College should be able to roll with a larger rotation. Who knows; maybe next season will end just like this season and the one before that. It’s possible, even probable, that next year’s Tribe will not win the CAA or advance to March Madness. But it’ll have as good a shot as anybody else. For tonight, and probably a good while longer, this loss is going to hurt. It’s going to be tough for Tribe fans to see the team take the floor without senior guard David Cohn, who has been a mainstay for the College over the last three seasons. But the strength of the Tribe program as a whole should be a point of light. The College will be in the conversation as a contender for the foreseeable future. The Tribe has been in the thick of things for the past number of years. That, in and of itself, is a testament to the strength of the Tribe. There’s somewhat of a joke between Tribe fans: “There’s always next year.” It’s never a good thing to hear that, because it means that the Tribe has fallen short yet again. But this time, that phrase is more than just a joke. It carries more weight than a way to make a loss hurt less. The prospects of next season are truly worth honest hope. And so, Tribe fans, earnestly and hopefully: there’s always next year.
Elon rolls Tribe in season-ending quarterfinal loss CATHERINE SCHEFER FLAT HAT SPORTS ASSOC. EDITOR Thursday, the No. 6 seed William and Mary entered the Colonial Athletic Association tournament coming off a five-game losing streak to end the regular season. The trend continued for the Tribe (16-14, 7-12 CAA), as it suffered a tough 67-50 loss at the hand of No. 3 seed Elon in the quarterfinal, bringing its season to an end. The Phoenix (22-7, 15-4 CAA) took charge from the start of the game, opening with two free throws. Freshman guard Nyla Pollard added the Tribe to the scoreboard with a free throw early in the first quarter. The Tribe rallied neck and neck with the Phoenix and entered the second quarter trailing by just one point. The College caught a break in the early minutes of the second quarter and took the lead on a layup by senior center Abby Rendle. This marked the only time the Tribe held the lead, spanning for 19 seconds. Throughout the remainder of the first half, the Phoenix soared. They outscored the College 22-12 in the second period to take control of the game and gain a lead that they did not relinquish. The Tribe fought strongly in the third quarter, matching Elon with 12 points in the period, but was unable to cut into the deficit. Elon plowed ahead in the fourth quarter and obtained its biggest lead yet, 58-43. The Tribe then took advantage of an Elon lull and put together a
quick 6-0 run, but it could not get any closer than nine. The Phoenix would regain the momentum and cruise to a 17-point victory. Throughout the match, the Tribe’s Achilles’ heel was its shooting, as it only made 26.5 percent of its shots from the field as opposed to 45 percent for Elon. To conclude her career, Rendle headed the scoreboard, registering 19 points. Pollard followed Rendle in points for the College, as she put up eight points for the Tribe. For the Phoenix, center Malaya Johnson led the way with 13 points and forward Meme Garner and center Ra’Shika White each tallied 12 points apiece. Rendle proved to be a powerhouse during her four years playing for the College, as she skillfully netted 1103 points whilst starting in 85 games and playing in 108. Senior guard Jenna Green also concluded her reign as a starter for the College with seven points in her final game. Throughout her career, she started in 115 games and played in 122, registering 798 total points for the Tribe. Although injured for part of the season, senior guard Jeanne Gaumont added 183 points for the Tribe throughout her four years. Green, Rendle and Gaumont will all graduate in the spring, leaving the Tribe without key playmakers. After the College was eliminated from the tournament, the Phoenix beat James Madison and Drexel to win the CAA.
COURTESY PHOTO / TRIBE ATHLETICS
Senior guard Jenna Green scored seven points in the Tribe’s season-ending loss in the CAA quarterfinal to the Elon Phoenix.
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Sports Editor Brendan Doyle Sports Editor Julia Stumbaugh flathatsports@gmail.com @FlatHatSports
The Flat Hat
Varsity head women’s soccer coach Julie Shackford ’88 is running drills on the field. In between a square of four cones, she jolts forward, plants her left foot at the far end, springs back and receives a give-and-go pass from an assistant coach standing on the other side. “Just like that,” Shackford said. “Just like that.” Shackford finishes her drill and grabs some cones with her left hand and a Coke Zero with her right. In between mouthfuls of blonde hair, blown into her upper lip by the wind, she keeps talking, walking forward the whole time. Practice begins in 15 minutes. The varsity women’s soccer program at the College of William and Mary began four years before the U.S. women’s national team even played its first match. Women’s soccer was a new sport, arriving at colleges across the country. The College’s team played its first match Sept. 19, 1981, a 5-1 victory over Richmond. Since then, no team has ever ended the season with a losing record. The College has made the National Collegiate Athletic Association tournament 24 times, its second head coach, John Daly, won more than 300 games over 26 years and one of the team’s former players, Jill Ellis ’88, is coaching the U.S. national team. But when Shackford arrived on campus in 1984, none of that had happened yet. She didn’t know it would. She was just happy that the College had a varsity team. “When I was in high school, there were very few college programs, and I was freaking out,” Shackford said. Still, she didn’t feel like the men’s team got special treatment or that her needs weren’t being met, even in the new program. “When I got here, I always felt like I was treated like a true student athlete,” Shackford said. The program, though, was in no way a high-class affair. “We traveled in beat-down vans, we stayed four to a hotel room, and we did our afternoon meals at Wendy’s — we got to go to Golden Corral on a good day,” Shackford said. She remembers playing her matches at Barksdale Field, next to Jamestown Road and the library. Team members wore tight shorts, plain white jerseys and stiff leather cleats. When Shackford first came, shin guards weren’t even mandatory. There are some old black-and-white photographs of Shackford in uniform. She smiles underneath large blonde bangs and curly hair falling on either side of her head. Her number 16 is embossed opposite to the old William and Mary feather logo, with small type underneath reading, “Women’s Soccer.” In other photos, Shackford is on the field chasing after a loose ball, jostling with an opponent. Her arms swing wide, and her left leg opens up for a shot. “I can remember a lot of goals,” Shackford said.
| Tuesday, March 13, 2018 | Page 10
That might be because in her four years, there were a lot of goals to remember — 20 to be exact. She had nine assists too, three selections to the All-American team, and four straight trips to the NCAA tournament. In 2000, Shackford became the third women’s soccer player inducted into the William and Mary Athletics Hall of Fame. Most of all, though, she remembers the people. “I remain best friends with all of my teammates even after all these years, which is really a unique thing about William and Mary,” Shackford said. “It creates these connections that last forever.”
A Different Direction
Shackford thought she would go to law school after graduating. She either wanted to be a sports agent or a university athletic director. Then, John Randolph, a former athletic director at the College, called her and told her about a women’s soccer program starting at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. She wasn’t sure if she wanted to coach long term, but she thought she’d get her master’s degree and stay a year. She stayed five. “I just fell in love with it, and I never looked back,” Shackford said. Then, in 1995, she got a call from Princeton University, which was searching for a new head women’s soccer coach of its own. “I thought it would be cool to coach smart kids who were a higher caliber athletically, so when the [Princeton] job opened, it seemed like a great fit,” Shackford said. “It was a phenomenal experience, and we were able to go to a NCAA final four without scholarships and have a consistent, winning program with kids who were doing phenomenal things.” During her time at Princeton, she won the NCAA Division I Coach of the Year and led the Tigers to the NCAA tournament semifinals in 2004, the only time an Ivy League team has ever made it that far. Shackford spent 20 years at Princeton. Her team eventually lost to UCLA, coached by Ellis, Shackford’s old teammate and best friend.
JULIE SHACKFORD Julie Shackford ’ 88 COMES was hired in December as head coach of Tribe HOME Women’s Soccer. Now she talks her career and her homecoming. NOAH PETERSEN // FLAT HAT STAFF WRITER
Coming Home
In 2017, after a two-year break from coaching and a stint with the United States Development Academy, Shackford’s phone rang again. This time, the College was on the line. She had no second thoughts. “Any time your alma mater comes calling it’s a no-brainer,” Shackford said. “But to actually come back is really like a dream come true, to be able to be at the place that gave me so many opportunities and to be able to pass that on.” Shackford is inheriting the job from Daly, one of the longest-serving coaches in NCAA history. Her focus, though, is not on the past. She can remember Daly yelling at the referees in the middle of games back when she was a player. She admired his competitiveness. “He was a hard-ass,” Shackford said. Now, she’s trying to take the team in a different direction, and she wants to crack the top 25 programs in the country in a few years. “My head is spinning, trying to put my stamp on a program and get to know the kids, but it’s been phenomenal,” Shackford said. She’s talking to an assistant coach now, finishing her last sips of Coke Zero, now stretching out her legs. Her team rounds the corner on its last warm-up lap and gathers near the sideline. Shackford walks over, her hair still blowing in the wind. Practice is about to begin.
COMMENTARY
Catch up with the Tribe
Where did you head for your spring break? Maybe you caught a flight to Mexico and attempted to tan away that Williamsburg winter glow. Maybe you headed home and spent some quality time with Netflix and your pet. Or maybe you stayed right here to savor a campus without classes. But where were Tribe sports while you were traveling the globe? Here’s a look at just a few of the highlights from a busy week of spring break for College athletes.
JULIA STUMBAUGH // FLAT HAT SPORTS EDITOR
COURTESY PHOTO / TRIBE ATHLETICS
Tribe women’s gymnastics broke records over break as they tallied the third-best overall team score in school history.
1. Baseball comes back to win extrainning thriller
William and Mary baseball went 4-4 over break in a week of overtime thrillers and dominant performances that started right here at Plumeri Park. Its four wins included two extra-inning nailbiters, one blowout and the team’s first away victory of the season. The Wednesday before spring break, the College pushed a wacky no-hitter from Virginia to 11 innings before ultimately falling. The Tribe’s very next match at Plumeri Park on the first day of spring break went in the same direction, as the Tribe’s Saturday matchup against High Point went to 11 innings — and more. It wasn’t until the 12th inning that a team finally broke the 2-2 tie; unfortunately for the Tribe, it wasn’t someone in green and white. High Point scored a run in the top of the 12th to put the College down 3-2 going into the bottom of the inning. It was do or die for the Tribe; if it didn’t score, the game would go to the Panthers in the second extra-inning heartbreaker in a row. When junior catcher Hunter Smith stepped up to bat, the game was on his shoulders. The bases were loaded; there were two outs on the board. If he struck out, the game would be over. If he hit a single, the College would tie the score and could get another chance in the 13th. But under pressure, Smith did the Tribe one better: He cracked a double past the Panthers that caused an error, sent two College runners home and ended the game in a walk-off win. “[The win] was a combination of a couple of well-placed, welltimed hits and their miscue there on the last play,” head coach Brian Murphy told Tribe Athletics. That extra-inning double from Smith sparked the Tribe into going 4-4 over the next week. Its record over spring break was a vast improvement over its record leading into that week (1-8) and gives the College momentum as it continues through the season.
2. Men’s basketball victorious in CAA Quarterfinals
Spring break was the biggest week of the season for the Tribe as it headed to Charleston, South Carolina to play in the Colonial Athletic Association tournament in the hopes of finally getting the bid to the National Collegiate Athletic Association tournament that has long eluded the College. Senior guard Connor Burchfield was the first player to put up points in this year’s playoff run. His layup 54 seconds into the first period of the CAA quarterfinals matchup between the Tribe and Towson opened scoring in the College’s crucial first match, grabbing a Tribe lead that the Panthers were never quite able to catch up to. Maybe it’s fitting that Burchfield was the first to score in what would end up being one of his last games with the College. He was one member of the Tribe’s senior core, for whom this CAA tournament was the last shot at getting a chance to finally play for the NCAA title. Towson fought throughout the game to chip away at the Tribe’s lead — in the second half, it got it as close as three points — but was never able to overtake a team confident in its ability to make the CAA semifinals for the fifth straight season. The College closed out the match in a decisive 80-66 victory that confirmed a semifinal appearance. Cohn dominated the Tribe’s last regular season performance, scoring 30 of its 114 points in an overtime comeback win against Charleston in the College’s Senior Day and final regular season game of 2018. He was a standout once again in its first match of the playoffs, putting up 24 of the College’s 80 points in one of his final games with the Tribe. Burchfield was not far behind with his 15 points on the afternoon. The team headed into its game the next day against Charleston bolstered by the strong performance. Unfortunately, despite fighting hard, the College fell in the semifinals to the Cougars.
3. Women’s gymnastics puts up one for the books
The 2002-03 Tribe women’s gymnastics team was a powerhouse all the way from regular season meets until it claimed its thirdstraight overall title in the Eastern College Athletic Conference. A week before it won an astonishing three-peat, it set a school record with an overall score of 195.450. The meet that won it the 2003 ECAC title was another record-breaker just short of that at 195.200. Those two meets, one week apart in 2003, rank as first and second in Tribe history. 15 years later, the 2017-18 women’s gymnastics team would spend its spring break following in that team’s footsteps. It was only .350 points behind the 2003 team’s historic score with a 195.100 victory against West Chester that would rank as the third best overall team score in College history and the second best overall score at home. The overall score wasn’t the only record the West Chester meet would shatter; the College also smashed its previous team record on bars (set at Towson in 2004). Cheers of “go Katie” rang through Kaplan Arena Sunday as freshman Katie Waldman swung gracefully between the bars in a strong performance that earned her the Tribe’s best individual score of the day and helped the College beat its 2004 high score. Career-best scores from Waldman, sophomore Evan Pakshong, sophomore Erika Marr and sophomore Taylor White as well as a season-best showing from senior Monica Ouellet led the College to a score on bars of 49.125, its best performance in school history. The team has had a strong season, not yet having dipped below 190.000 points. It only has three meets left after the historic West Chester meet before it heads to the 2018 ECAC Championship, where it will hope to emulate the victorious 2002-03 team in even more ways than setting scoring records.