Mostly Sunny 40/34
THE TUFTS DAILY
VOLUME LXI, NUMBER 19
Where You Read It First Est. 1980 TUFTSDAILY.COM
Thursday, February 24, 2011
Nuclear proliferation experts kick off EPIIC symposium by
Ellen Kan
Daily Editorial Board
Speakers at last night’s “Religion, Ethics, and the Bomb” panel initiated the 25th Anniversary Norris and Margery Bendetson EPIIC International Symposium with a discussion of the intersection of nuclear weaponry and the spheres of religion and ethics. The panel marked the start of the five-day-long annual symposium that brings together prominent speakers and experts as the culmination of the Education for Public Inquiry and International Citizenship (EPIIC) colloquium, sponsored by the Institute for Global Leadership (IGL). “We’re looking for what we have called all these years passionate scholarship,” IGL Director Sherman Teichman said. “Sometimes people scorn the whole concept of academic as being moot.
Daphne Kolios
Daily Editorial Board
Bill Cosby, longtime entertainer and visionary in children’s television, will tomorrow morning receive the Eliot-Pearson Award for Excellence in Children’s Media.
Cosby, to accept Tufts award tomorrow, sees room for improvement in children’s media by
Amsie Hecht
Daily Editorial Board
While legendary entertainer Bill Cosby is best known for his work as a comedian and star of The Cosby Show (1984-1992), he has also devoted much of his adult life to serving as an advocate for children’s education. Cosby will be honored for his work at tomorrow’s Eliot-Pearson Awards for Excellence in Children’s Media. The event, to be held at 10 a.m. in Distler Performance Hall, will also recognize Harvard Medical School Professor of Psychiatry Alvin Poussaint, who worked as a production consultant for “The Cosby Show.”
Cosby spoke with the Daily before the award ceremony to discuss his career in children’s entertainment. Amsie Hecht: What sparked your interest in children’s entertainment? Bill Cosby: Education and the chance through the entertainment industry to give my point of view about education and what the television set can do to aid teachers and parents and children … [and] the offer from the [former] Dean of the School of Education at the UMass Amherst, Dwight Allen, who offered me an opportunity to earn a master’s degree and an Ed.D [doctorate in education], at
see EPIIC, page 2
Engineering Week brings competition, camaraderie by
MCT
To me, an academic environment is the ideal place for the candid, open exchange of ideas.” Teichman stressed the importance and relevancy of this year’s symposium’s theme, “Our Nuclear Age: Peril and Promise.” “We’re trying to subject this complex issue to an interdisciplinary prism . ... What would be distinctive about it is the salience and the importance of this theme, which has been marginalized,” he said. “Our speakers have articulated very forcefully why it is imperative to deal with such a critical issue.” Last night’s panelists discussed the relevance of religion on a personal and community level in dealing with the issue of nuclear weapons. David Cortright, director of policy studies at the University of Notre Dame’s Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies, discussed the idea of “Nuclear Zero,” or a
Tufts’ third annual Engineering Week kicked off Tuesday with a series of activities designed to encourage awareness of engineering in society and to foster camaraderie among the university’s various departments in the School of Engineering. Groups and disciplines within the School of Engineering will sponsor activities, contests and lectures through tomorrow, according to sophomore Ashley Martin, who serves on the Engineering Student Council. As part of the week’s festivities, the engineering honor society, Tau Beta Pi, today will hold a Jeopardy-style quiz competition among teams from the school’s disciplines, and the Department of Biomedical Engineering tomorrow will sponsor a relay race. The Society of Women Engineers (SWE) tomorrow will also present “Date an Engineer,” which Martin, who is also an event coordinator for SWE, said will imitate 1950s dating-game shows.
“[There are] four different rounds, and a girl from each grade … sits in the front with three guys behind her, and she can’t see them,” Martin said. “She asks them engineering-related questions … and she then picks.” The activities this week coincide with the 60th annual national Engineers Week, whose sponsors aim to raise appreciation of engineers’ contributions to society and educate young people about the field. While in the past a Graduate School of Engineering student has been charged with organizing the weeklong event, this year an undergraduate Engineering Week chair, sophomore Kristen Ford, and the newly formed Engineering Student Council also helped to manage the week’s activities. This new approach made for a more widely publicized and student-oriented event, according to Engineering Student Council President Maren Frisell, a junior. “I think that the students have been able to reach out to the student community in see ENGINEERING, page 2
see COSBY, page 2
Dong, Riche fill empty TCU Judiciary seats Junior Gregory Dong on Tuesday night ran unopposed to fill the seventh seat on the Tufts Community Union (TCU) Judiciary. Judiciary Vice Chair Adam Sax, a sophomore, said he supported the addition to the body. “I believe Greg is a great fit for the Judiciary, he has a strong voice in our discussions ... and I think he will suit the Judiciary well,” Sax said. The Judiciary is the arm of the TCU government that oversees on-campus student organizations and the judicial advocates program.
Dong said he was eager to begin working as the body’s newest member. “I’m excited to continue the work of the Judiciary, and I’m looking forward to bringing a new perspective to the table,” Dong said. Freshman David Riche earlier this month also ran unopposed to join the body. Dong and Riche filled spots that were left vacant when former Judiciary members Danielle Cotter and Colin Smith, both juniors, resigned this semester before leaving to study abroad. —by Martha Shanahan
Inside this issue
Ashley Seenauth/Tufts Daily
Senior Michael Motola-Barnes competes in a Lego competition sponsored by the Center for Engineering Education and Outreach as part of Engineering Week, which concludes tomorrow.
Today’s Sections
Art hotbeds around the world, like Versailles, are now available virtually through Google, but is it a good thing?
Will Tao (LA ’96) uses the thriller genre in “Formosa Betrayed” (2009) to raise awareness about Taiwan
see FEATURES, page 3
see WEEKENDER, page 9
News Features Comics Editorial | Letters
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Op-Ed Weekender Classifieds Sports
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