For ExCollege professor, storytelling a tool for climate justice see FEATURES / PAGE 3
TUFTS BASKETBALL
Volleyball continues to steamroll NESCAC competition
Step aside Beyoncé: Solange captures the black female experience on brilliant new album see ARTS&LIVING / PAGE 5
SEE SPORTS / BACK PAGE
THE
INDEPENDENT
STUDENT
N E W S PA P E R
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UNIVERSITY
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T HE T UFTS DAILY
VOLUME LXXII, NUMBER 24
tuftsdaily.com
Thursday, October 13, 2016
MEDFORD/SOMERVILLE, MASS.
Mickey Toogood to leave role as judicial affairs administrator by Maddie Gupta Contributing Writer
Mickey Toogood left his position as judicial affairs administrator in September after two years in that capacity, according to an email announcement to faculty from Dean of Student Affairs Mary Pat McMahon on July 12. Toogood has continued to work remotely from his new home of Seattle, while Senior Associate Dean of Student Affairs Raymond Ou oversees the search for a director of community standards to replace him, according to McMahon. The Office of Student Affairs will be involving staff, faculty and students in the search for his replacement, McMahon said. “We’ll never be able to replace Mickey, but we hope to hire someone similarly appreciated by students,” McMahon told the Daily in an email. In his time as judicial affairs administrator, Toogood led more than 500 conduct cases, revised the university’s judicial sanctions and worked closely with a number of campus groups including University President Anthony Monaco’s Sexual Misconduct Prevention Task Force and the Greek life advisory group, according to the announcement from McMahon. “Mickey’s two years in the role have had a tremendously positive impact on Tufts students and on our dayto-day functioning as an office and a division in Student Affairs,” McMahon wrote in the announcement. Upon taking up his new role, Toogood said in an interview with the Daily that when working with students, he hoped to be seen as more of an equal than as an administrator by opening up communication. “I’m trying to move away from students viewing me as a principal, from feeling like I’m their high school principal who’s calling them in to yell at them, and instead trying to shift the conversation to be more about community standards,” Toogood said in the 2014 interview. Toogood also worked as a faculty advisor for Theta Chi Fraternity, according to Theta Chi Vice President of Health and Safety Qais Iqbal. According to Jake Lissoos, a brother of Theta Chi, Toogood’s role included attending occasional chapter
SOFIE HECHT / THE TUFTS DAILY ARCHIVES
Judicial Affairs Administrator Mickey Toogood, pictured here on Sept. 29, 2015, is working remotely until a replacement is found. meetings, overseeing general fraternity administration and helping with judicial concerns. “He gave feedback to the executive board on how we could run things more smoothly, so he was pretty involved in helping us out in ways that we wanted,” Lissoos, a junior, said.
Iqbal appreciated Toogood’s work in his role as faculty advisor of the fraternity. According to Iqbal, Toogood worked well as a sounding board for ideas because he could help effectively bring them to life. see TOOGOOD, page 2
Somerville initiatives advance carbon-neutral goals by Charles Bunnell Contributing Writer
The City of Somerville has been making progress on several of its initiatives to achieve its goal of becoming carbon-neutral by the year 2050 and has assessed which sectors and technologies could be used in the future to create policies that would reduce further environmental damage. Somerville Director of Sustainability and Environment Oliver Sellers-Garcia described a number of key initiatives that have already been implemented to improve sustainability. For example, the city has converted public streetlights from incandescent bulbs to LEDs, changed
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indoor lighting to fluorescent alternatives in public buildings and has begun to evaluate buildings to see how they could be consolidated or redesigned to be more fuel-efficient, according to Sellers-Garcia. Furthermore, Somerville’s environmental team has begun analyzing methods of de-carbonizing the main sources of emissions for the city, mostly through a greater focus on alternative and sustainable energy, according to Sellers-Garcia. However, not all energy sources can be easily converted, which is why Somerville has put forward policies that would reduce the use of transportation and construction within the city, Sellers-Garcia said. In order to greatly cut back on expended energy, Somerville has begun a solar campaign in which
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local homeowners are encouraged to place solar panels on their houses to reduce the amount of energy consumed by individual homes, Sellers-Garcia said At this time Tufts has no formal agreements with Somerville regarding these plans, according to Shoshana Blank, education and outreach program administration for the Tufts Office of Sustainability. However, Blank was pleased with the university’s efforts towards becoming carbon-neutral, noting that this spring, Tufts signed onto the Second Nature Climate Commitment. Blank said this agreement commits the university to creating a climate action plan to work towards carbon neutrality.
NEWS............................................1 FEATURES.................................3 ARTS & LIVING.......................5
see SUSTAINABILITY, page 2
COMICS....................................... 7 OPINION.....................................8 SPORTS............................ BACK
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THE TUFTS DAILY | News | Thursday, October 13, 2016
T HE T UFTS D AILY Arin Kerstein Editor-in-Chief
EDITORIAL
Sophie Lehrenbaum Jake Taber Managing Editors Evan Sayles Associate Editor Kathleen Schmidt Executive News Editor Gil Jacobson News Editors Melissa Kain Robert Katz Liam Knox Catherine Perloff Jei-Jei Tan Hannah Uebele Joe Walsh Juliana Furgala Assistant News Editors Jesse Najarro Danny Nelson
Miranda Willson Executive Features Editor Constantinos Angelakis Features Editors Nina Joung Becca Leibowitz Justin Krakoff Executive Arts Editor John Gallagher Arts Editors Eran Sabaner Isaac Brown Assistant Arts Editors Jocelyn Contreras Alison Epstein Elliot Storey Emma Henderson Executive Op-Ed Editor Shannon Geary Cartoonists Stephen Dennison Allie Merola Miranda Chavez Editorialists Frances DeFreitas Eriko Koide Anita Ramaswamy Noah Weinflash Phillip Goldberg Executive Sports Editor Yuan Jun Chee Sports Editors Maddie Payne Eddie Samuels Maclyn Senear Josh Slavin Noah Smith Assistant Sports Editor Max Lalanne Mia Lambert Caroline Ambros Ray Bernoff Scott Fitchen Jean Gonzalez Kevin Ho Thaw Htet Lilia Kang Sitara Rao Evan Sayles Zachary Sebek Alexis Serino Seohyun Shim Angelie Xiong Ezgi Yazici
Executive Photo Editor Photo Administrator Picture Tufts Editor Staff Photographers
PRODUCTION
tuftsdaily.com
Toogood works remotely as search for replacement begins TOOGOOD
continued from front “He was always good at deliverables or action items so I would throw ideas around at him,” Iqbal said. Toogood was also helpful with budget allocation and in linking brothers of Theta Chi to contacts in other parts of the university, according to Iqbal. According to Lissoos, Toogood was successful in his goal of being approachable and communicative during his time at Tufts, which helped strengthen the fraternity’s relationship with the Office of Student Affairs.
Iqbal and Lissoos both expressed concerns about the way in which Toogood’s departure from Tufts might impact the communication between the fraternity and the administration. Iqbal also described his worries about Theta Chi having a faculty advisor. “With the departure of Mickey Toogood, it’s kind of like stepping back in the relationship that [Theta Chi] had with the administration … I think the biggest fear is not being understood,” Iqbal said. Lissoos had similar concerns about the change.
“I’m afraid that they won’t understand and see the positives of Greek life,” Lissoos said. “I think it will be really hard shoes to fill. I don’t think whoever comes and replaces him will be able to do as good of a job as he did. I think we will always miss him.” McMahon stressed that Toogood was appreciated as a resource for both students and his colleagues across campus. “He has connected wonderfully with students in some of their most difficult moments,” she said.
Tufts works toward carbon neutrality, reducing energy emissions SUSTAINABILITY
continued from front “Over 600 colleges and universities in the U.S. have signed onto this commitment, so Tufts is in good company,” Blank told the Daily in an email. Sellers-Garcia expressed interest in connecting Tufts to these new initiatives. Giving an example, SellersGarcia said both Harvard and MIT are required to abide by Cambridge environmental ordinances, especially those regarding building-by-building energy use on campuses. At this time, both of these Cambridge-based institutions work jointly with their local government to advance climate change adaption planning, Sellers-Garcia said. Somerville is interested in doing the same with Tufts, Sellers-Garcia said, adding that the university does not seem to be doing its own form of climate adaptation. However, the university does have its own climate initiatives, some of
which have been in place for years, according to Blank. For example, in 2013 Tufts made a goal to reduce energy consumption by five to seven percent every year for three years, with additional consumption reduction targets set for 2016, according to the Office of Sustainability’s Commitments and Environmental Policies. This goal has been achieved each year, meaning new targets will be set in the future, according to the Commitments and Environmental Policies. Furthermore, when University President Anthony Monaco took up his position in 2011, he made a point of having sustainability be a key focus in his administration, beginning by creating the Campus Sustainability Council in 2012, according to the Office of Sustainability’s website. “This academic year, we are working to create that climate action plan, using our existing Campus Sustainability
Council Report from May 2013 as a starting point,” Blank said. The Campus Sustainability Council’s policies and initiatives mirror those of Somerville at times by setting goals for reductions in energy use. However, according to Sustainability Tracking, Assessment & Rating System (STARS)’s evaluation of Tufts for 2015, Tufts scored 1.68 points out of a possible six on energy consumption, meaning total building energy consumption had increased. In the renewable energy category of Tufts’ STARS evaluation, zero of a possible four points were attained. However, this does not mean that renewable energy sources are not being used, as multiple sites on campus make use of solar panels in order to generate electricity, according to the report. Tufts achieved a silver rating the year of evaluation and overall, Tufts ranks similarly to schools such as Boston University and Williams College, according to the report.
At a Glance: Somerville Carbon Emissions
David Westby Production Director Allie Merola Executive Layout Editors Sebastian Torrente Lilia Aronoff-Aspatur Layout Editors Jewel Castle Brianna Mignano Emily Sharp Astrid Weng Ezgi Yazici Alice Yoon Petrina Chan Creative Director Allie Merola Executive Graphics Editor Petrina Chan Graphics Editors Peter Lam Juliana Furgala Ashton Stephens Rena Tang Belinda Xian Sebastian Torrente Zach Hertz Executive Copy Editors Jei-Jei Tan Norrie Beach Copy Editors Arthur Beckel Caroline Bollinger Alison Epstein Gil Jacobson Melissa Kain Reena Kerasin Bibi Lichauco Kathleen Martensen Netai Schwartz Nihaal Shah Arielle Sigel Liora Silkes Dan Strauss
Maxwell Bernstein Executive Tech Manager Nitesh Gupta Online Editor Mia Lambert Social Media Editor
Somerville’s greenhouse gas emisisons in 2014
Building emissions by energy type 200,000
Transportation
609,565
64% Building energy
34%
Emissions (metric tons of CO2/year)
metric tons of CO2
2%
150,000
100,000
50,000
Waste Electricity
Heating fuel oil
Natural gas
Sources of transportation emissions
Approximately 139,000 residential solar systems would be required to compensate for Somerville’s total community emissions. That’s 4x the number of homes in the city.
2%
trains & buses
98%
personal vehicles
SOURCE: SOMERVILLE GREENHOUSE GAS INVENTORY REPORT, RELEASED JAN. 2016.
BUSINESS Josh Morris Executive Business Director ALLIE MEROLA / THE TUFTS DAILY
Thursday, October 13, 2016
Features
Prof. Norah Dooley marries storytelling, social justice by Ana Sofia Amieva-Wang
3 tuftsdaily.com
Amanda Lillie Maintaining Your Tuftsanity
Contributing Writer
Despite the intensity with which Norah Dooley discusses her outrage toward climate change, she manages to slip in hand gestures and punctuate her speech with facial expressions in an extraordinarily subtle manner. She is a storyteller and an activist. Dooley teaches storytelling at Tufts’ Experimental College and at Lesley University, as well as in K-12th grade classrooms and in Alzheimer’s disease homes, she said. She sees her role as a teacher to empower people by “giving [students] the awareness of their own ability to be creative.” When Dooley was first introduced to storytelling while completing her Master of Education degree at Lesley University, she was struck by how the medium seemed to recognize the art inherent in daily communication. “Everyone uses storytelling because it’s how we organize our experience,” she said. “[Storytelling] was just a wonderful melding of my political activist quest for ways to interact with people around issues of justice and equality.” Recently, the act of engaging others through stories to promote change led Dooley to practice civil disobedience in opposition to the West Roxbury Lateral (WRL) pipeline under construction in West Roxbury, Mass. According to her blog, Dooley was arrested on Aug. 31 while physically blocking construction in the trench of the pipeline. “It was a way to raise the issue with my peers, friends and family,” she said. “You can send an email and say: ‘Hi everybody, it’s really important to pay attention to climate change.’ It has a lot more weight if you say: ‘Hi everybody, yesterday I jumped into a trench where there was a big-a** shovel of a huge earth digger and I stopped construction. I was arrested and I’m going to trial, and I would really like your support.’” Spectra Energy, the Texas-based company heading the pipeline project, states on its website that the Algonquin Incremental Market Project (AIM), of which the WRL pipeline is a component, “will provide the Northeast with a unique opportunity to secure a cost-effective, domestically-produced source of energy to support its current demand, as well as its future growth, for clean burning natural gas.” A number of elected officials, including Boston’s mayor Marty Walsh, and many residents of West Roxbury, oppose the project. The grassroots campaign Resist the Pipeline has raised concerns over the project’s safety, including its proximity to an actively blasting quarry. The campaign also opposes the project based on the environmental impacts of natural gas, according to Dooley. In addition, another grassroots group opposing the pipeline, Stop the West Roxbury Lateral Pipeline, is concerned about the high-pressure gas the pipeline will be carrying, a quantity almost double that carried by the Pacific Gas and Electric Company pipeline that exploded in San Bruno, Calif. in 2010, killing eight people and destroying 38 homes. According to a Wicked Local Dedham article, over 140 individuals have been arrested in West Roxbury for carrying
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BRENDAN MATULIS COURTESY NORAH DOOLEY
As part of a non-violent protest, ExCollege adjunct professor Norah Dooley sits in Spectra Energy’s West Roxbury Lateral Pipeline trench, on Centre Street in West Roxbury, shortly before her arrest on Aug. 31. out acts of civil disobedience in an attempt to halt the pipeline project. The bulk occurred during summer 2016 as part of “escalation summer,” a strategic, active effort to increase resistance, Dooley said. She said the tactic of civil disobedience is being used to send a clear message to public officials. “Your citizens are throwing themselves in the path of these big machines,” she said. “What are you going to do about this?” Dooley heard about escalation summer at the end of the spring 2016 semester, and recalls telling her Tufts students about her plans to participate. Her decision to participate and get arrested was largely based on her frustration with the global community’s failure to address the growing threat of climate change. In particular, she felt that the agreements reached during the United Nations Climate Change Conference in December 2015, which included the first major global commitments to slow climate change, were being disregarded. Fighting against the WRL pipeline, and specifically using her own body to stop it, was a way for Dooley to channel her frustration into action. She was outraged by the pipeline’s continuous development despite the community’s and elected officials’ attempts to oppose it. “City officials were unable to stop this. That’s a real problem for human beings and for our democracy,” Dooley said. She added that as a Tufts alum (A’76) and adjunct faculty member, she is
also angry about Tufts’ indirect support of the pipeline through its membership in the New England Council, an alliance of New England-based organizations that endorsed the pipeline’s construction in 2014, according to Dooley. She is even more upset by Tufts’ failure to divest its endowment from fossil fuels despite pressure from staff and student groups. Dooley said she now plans to teach a course on the history of civil disobedience at Tufts’ ExCollege. She wants to empower students to confront larger issues such as climate change through activism and storytelling. It was, in fact, a story that Dooley heard as a teenager that drew her to a life of fighting for social justice. After moving to Boston at the age of 13, she attended Brookline High School, where she and her friends got involved with Cesar Chavez’s farm workers movement. She convinced her mother to host a farmworker in their home as part of a campaign to “raise consciousness” by hearing the stories of real farmworkers. “This young man came, he was maybe 16, I was 15 at the time, so he was just a little older than me, and he told us what it was like to be a farm worker from his eyes, from his experience,” Dooley said. “The intense cold at night, the unbearable heat, the working conditions during the day, the lack of water, the way they would spray the fields with pesticides while they were still in the fields.” see STORYTELLER, page 4
Changeup time
lectronics have never been up my alley. Not even relatively close to my alley if I’m being honest; they’re more in a completely different city. My butter-fingers have made sure of that. I’ve dropped a camera lensdown into sand and lost many an iPhone to all of the accidents not covered by the protection plan. It’s been a good time, let me tell you. In a recent series of events, my laptop came to its unfortunate demise. It’s been a solid couple of months since I’ve broken anything; it was bound to happen. So when I opened it to find the screen looking like the child of a black hole and a rainbow, with colorful barcodes cutting across every inch of it, the sinking pit in my stomach was a little less drastic than in the past. Heck, if I wasn’t a broke college student in the midst of what feels like ten thousand midterms, I might have thought it looked like artwork. Before I lose myself to a rant about how Apple may very well be designing their products to break upon the slightest impact (I’m telling you, brittle phone disease exists), let’s get to the part where I tell you how this may relate to you at Tufts. Gifted with a common room right outside my room in Wren this year, my relationship with Tisch has all but disappeared. Why walk across campus when there’s a perfectly good couch and table duo two feet away? I soon found my answer. After spending an entire afternoon calling every tech support number I’ve got, I was forced to accept defeat, which meant trudging over to Tisch for some quality time with a desktop computer. After weeks of the same ol’ thing, from classes to the common room and back again, everything started to blur together. When forced to change my ways, I got more work done than I have in a while. I never thought I’d say this, but for once, my bad luck with electronics paid off. We are creatures of habit; people say it all the time. When it comes to school, habits help the days go by a little faster. But don’t forget to throw yourself a refreshing changeup once in awhile. Now, it would probably be in your best interest not to go smashing laptops so you absolutely have to go to Tisch to get any work done, but if you’re feeling the drag of the weekday grind, check out some different study spots on campus. I practically lived in the Hodgdon common room last year, but there’s also the Lilly Music Library, Brown and Brew Coffee House, Fletcher, Olin or one of the many nooks and crannies of the campus center. Or Tisch, of course, if you’d like to see yours truly yelling at a Dell desktop because the only web browser it offers is Internet Explorer and it takes about five million years to load the homepage.
Amanda Lillie is a sophomore who has not yet declared a major. Amanda can be reached at amanda.lillie@tufts.edu.
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THE TUFTS DAILY | Features | Thursday, October 13, 2016
tuftsdaily.com
ExCollege Professor on climate change, pipelines and the power of storytelling STORYTELLER
continued from page 3 She said she was particularly moved by the story of his older sister, who died of leukemia. “They were pretty sure it was from the multiple poisoning that they received [from working],” she said. “And as a 15-year old, I was just bowled over. How could this be true? This was the United States of America. How could people be treated in this way in
the same country that I lived in? … I literally couldn’t sleep.” A few years later, Dooley was arrested for the first time, during a sit-in for the farm workers’ cause protesting nonunion produce. Still a young student, she was planning to leave the sit-in when police arrived making threats of arrest. Her decision changed, however, when she saw the police gathered outside and decided to stay in support of the other protesters. She was
soon arrested by an officer, resulting in Dooley’s first and only other act of civil disobedience since her recent arrest in West Roxbury. From the back of the police wagon, Dooley recalled overhearing a “stream of verbally abusive racist crap … about the women who [were] about to be arrested,” from the police officers. “I was just like, ‘OK, guys, that’s just about it. I know whose side I’m on. You aren’t on it, are you?’” she said.
Despite not intending to get arrested at the protest, Dooley knew then that she had made the right choice. Since then, Dooley has not stopped incorporating activism and social justice into her career as a professional storyteller. “I’m an activist because I love people,” she said. “I love seeing people succeed and do good things, and until we make the world a better place, I’d like to be with people who are making it a better place.”
Thursday, October 13, 2016
ARTS&LIVING ALBUM REVIEW
Solange creates musical medicine for the soul on long-awaited ‘A Seat at the Table’ Solange is tired of being silent. Like so many other black artists this year, the 30-year-old singer-songwriter sees the ongoing struggle to define what it means to be black in America, both in regards to the current discussion on police brutality and the larger historical narrative going back decades to the Civil Rights Movement. What makes Solange’s “A Seat at the Table,” released on Sept. 30, stand out is its willingness to ground this discussion within the specific context of what it means to be a black woman in this country. Amidst all of Solange’s personal frustrations and anger, she does something truly inspiring by offering the listeners one simple truth: hope. Following the album’s surprise announcement three days before its release, Solange took to Twitter to recall that her third studio album was “meant to provoke healing & journey of self-empowerment.” Over the course of 21 post-R&B-inspired tracks, “A Seat at the Table” does just that by providing listeners with insights on how Solange views the struggle of being a black woman in America but also finds great strength despite these challenges. Solange was always not such a political artist. As the younger sister to the pop icon Beyoncé Knowles, she spent the beginning of her career attempting to define herself and her artistry. This initial period was uneven, at best, but did produce the still-exhilarating EP “True” (2012), which saw Solange Solange Knowles at the From Earth to Heart Event at The W challenging pop music conventions and preempting the 1980s-inspired pop trend by nearly two tener, “Be leery ’bout your place in the years. Prior to the release of “A Seat at the world / You’re feeling like you’re chasing Table,” almost a decade a had passed since the world.” The latter denies this sorrow by her last full album release, making her presenting a flat-out denial in the form of decision to create an inherently political this uptempo gem sprinkled with eerie lyrbody of work largely with R&B producer ics such as “I slept it away, I sexed it away” Raphael Saadiq all that more impactful. and Solange’s delicate falsetto towards the “Rise” opens “A Seat at the Table” and track’s end. was previously premiered at a show in Los It is Solange’s portrayal of anger, howAngeles last year, during which she declared ever, that truly shows the mastery in her the track was “for Ferguson, for Baltimore.” art. “Mad,” just like the title says, is an The slow, jazz-inspired track greets the outraged anthem that unpacks the “angry listener with a proper introduction to the black girl” stereotype to great effect. record as she warmly coos, “Fall in your Working with hip-hop veteran Lil Wayne ways, so you can crumble.” Solange’s use of once more, Solange’s voice never goes “fall” here is striking because she is telling above a whisper, yet when she sings “I got the listener to take up a stance of activity a lot to be mad about (Be mad, be mad, be rather than passivity, instead of being set mad),” one can understand her deep-seatin their ways, segueing into one’s further ed frustrations with regard to the isolation engagement with the album. and objectification that afflicts her. Following the opener, “Weary” and Similarly, “Don’t Touch my Hair,” fea“Cranes in the Sky” offer two very different turing a groovy baseline courtesy of British perspectives on how to confront melan- electronic musician Sampha, continues to choly. The former is a downtempo, woozy see Solange pushing angrily back against track that sees Solange counseling the lis- microaggressions with her defiant decla-
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CLAIRE SULMERS VIA WIKIMEDIA COMMONS
Hotel in December 2015. ration that “You know this hair is my sh*t / Rode the ride, I gave it time / But this here is mine.” By seeking to reclaim the physical aspects of her body that others would seek to infringe upon, Solange is marking her hair as a site of contestation, and she will not be limited in her unfettered expression of it. In other words, “Don’t touch my pride / They say the glory’s all mine.” While the technical quality of “A Seat at the Table” is beyond superb, it is worth highlighting the numerous 90s-esque interludes scattered throughout the record as they offer an emotional authenticity to the stories Solange sings about. Whether it’s when her father Mathew recounts his experience with desegregation busing and the KKK on “Interlude: Dad Was Mad” or when her mother Tina marvels at the beauty of being black on “Tina Taught Me,” these brief anecdotes coax out the most soulful elements of the record, demonstrating that the best kind of music comes from the heart and that the heart is just where Solange is singing from.
tuftsdaily.com
Parker Selman All in Good Taste
by Justin Krakoff
Executive Arts Editor
5
Thelonious Monkfish
am excited for another opportunity to visit the jazz-themed Asian fusion restaurant, despite its slightly hectic atmosphere. The restaurant is perpetually dark, and we are always greeted by the sound of a piano and trumpet playing live from one room over. Though on multiple occasions I have experienced almost infuriating wait times, even after making a reservation, the food and ambience keep me coming back. All of the extended delays have occurred when I’ve come with large groups; when I’ve accompanied parties of two to four people, we’re always seated immediately. The restaurant has two dining areas: the first room contains the sushi bar — a number of wooden tables and an area where people are seated on the ground — while the second room contains a bar, jazz stage and more seating. Even if you are not seated in the room with live music, it drifts throughout the whole restaurant and can be heard from virtually any table. The menu is extensive, to say the least. There is an almost overwhelming number of options including sushi, soups, fried rice options and noodle specialties. The menu is filled with cleverly-named rolls and entrees, many of which reference jazz music. I was initially drawn to the restaurant due to its number of inventive vegetarian sushi offerings. I’ve tried a number of the vegetarian rolls, and all of them have been impeccable. Beyond sushi, there are a number of vegetarian entrees as well. My roommate, Ana, opts for the spicy tuna on crispy rice as an appetizer and picks the Crazy Roll as an entrée, which includes shrimp tempura, avocado, cucumber, tobiko and eel sauce. I start with an order of the edamame and choose one of the fairy tale sushi rolls called “The Snow Queen Roll.” The large and elaborate roll is filled with shiitake, green apple, cucumber and asparagus and draped in coconut, drizzled with pineapple mayo and garnished with coconut flakes. Ana describes her spicy tuna and crispy rice appetizer as not too spicy and very flavorful. She loves the contrast between the crispy rice and the tender tuna and only has positive reviews. I love my roll, which combines a mixture of sweet fruits and vegetables flawlessly into eight filling pieces. The thing I appreciate most about Thelonious Monkfish is their ability to be creative with their vegetarian options. I love that they incorporate fruit and vegetables into a number of the rolls, as I am so tired of only having cucumber and avocado rolls available to vegetarians at Asian restaurants. Thelonious Monkfish is only slightly pricier than its Medford counterparts (Yoshi’s, Taipei Tokyo), but in terms of the quality of food and overall experience, you are getting a far better deal. The restaurant is located in nearby Central Square and is perfect for a date night or for evenings where you want to feel fancy without paying fancy prices. On top of this, the restaurant delivers to the Tufts campus through GrubHub! Visit their website to make online reservations and check out their schedule for live jazz music. Parker Selman is a sophomore who has not yet declared a major. Parker can be reached at parker.selman@tufts.edu
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THE TUFTS DAILY | ADVERTISEMENT | Thursday, October 13, 2016
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Sophomores:
Study with Tufts Programs Abroad in 2017-18! Learn More @ Our Upcoming Pizza Parties:
Tufts in Madrid:
Thursday, October 13th at 6:00pm Dowling Hall, Milmore Room
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Thursday, October 13, 2016 | Comics | THE TUFTS DAILY
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Comics
LATE NIGHT AT THE DAILY Sophie: “You should be focusing on your sins right now.”
Comics
SUDOKU DOONESBURY BY GARY TRUDEAU
Difficulty Level: Choosing a good Halloween costume.
NON SEQUITUR BY WILEY MILLER
Wednesday’s Solution
CROSSWORD
Monday’s Solution
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Anna Sossenheimer Jumping Hurdles
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On feeling homesick
s I’m typing this, I’m all sorts of emotional. This past weekend was filled with amazing people in beautiful spaces, and I have spent all day reflecting on how lucky I am to be alive and to be loved. I spent part of my weekend on the beach in Rhode Island with a couple of friends, unplugging for a night and just enjoying each other’s company. Something about being in a house with a bunch of people I care about filled me with a sense of longing to go home and spend time with my family. Maybe it’s the weather, maybe it’s the season, maybe I’m just a sap, but I’m feeling homesick. Homesickness has always been a familiar feeling to me. I’m a homebody; I resent change. I’ve always loved spending time with my family and have felt lucky that I have had such a good relationship with them. I’m also irrationally attached to the place I’m from — I grew up frolicking in the mountains of Utah and have developed a very special bond with the nature that’s just outside my house. It’s never easy for me to leave, even though as I’ve grown I’ve gotten pretty good at it. Coming to college was one of the hardest things I ever did in terms of my homesickness — I don’t think I’ve ever cried harder than the day I said goodbye to my parents, about to embark on my freshman year. With time, the stabs of pain I would feel when thinking about home turned into dull aches. I was able to quell my homesickness by finding little pieces of comfort here at Tufts. And now, two years into college, I feel comfortable and content with my new home in Massachusetts. But these feelings today reminded me that just because I’m two years older doesn’t mean I’m immune to homesickness. Although I’ve grown comfortable at Tufts, I’m not sure it will ever feel completely like home — and honestly, that’s okay with me. I think there is a lot of pressure to make it seem like you love every part of your college, and feel like you really belong. After all, we all came to Tufts for a reason — we were drawn to this school, whether by a relative that went here, a convincing tour guide or random chance. So when I came here, and realized it wasn’t all gold and glitter all the time, I felt ashamed that I wasn’t completely happy at this school. I felt, and still sometimes feel, that everyone had a place except me — that I’m just a floater. But I’ve realized that there are so many people who all feel the same way. I’ve come to accept the fact that while there are many things I love about Tufts, and I feel very happy and fortunate to be here, I’ll probably never feel 100 percent like I belong. But these four years are just one small part of my journey through life, and the best thing I’ve learned to do is find little slices of “home” here and there in ways such as going on a weekend trip to Rhode Island with good friends. These little things help me through the homesickness and remind me that maybe, just maybe, “home” is more than just a physical location.
Anna is a junior majoring in sociology. Anna can be reached at anna.sossenheimer@tufts.edu.
Opinion
Thursday, October 13, 2016
OP-ED
Is “sex positivity” really positive? by Paris Sanders
The third wave of feminism, particularly its ongoing transition into the “fourth wave,” has been an interesting time. It has brought an awareness of the intersectionality between gender, sex, race, sexual orientation and class. It has attempted to dismantle the exclusionary elements of trans-exclusionary radical feminism (TERF) movements that occurred in the second wave; it has propelled the idea of body positivity and sexual expression into mainstream discourse. Perhaps most poignantly, it has made feminism marketable, which may — or may not — have its benefits. The third wave has also introduced the idea of “sex positivity” — absent in previous iterations of feminism — both critiquing and reclaiming the notion of a “slut,” drawing attention to the fact that women can, and do, enjoy sex. These are by and large good things. Yet, not withstanding all of that, I do not want to identify as a “sex-positive” feminist. Digital Age “sex educators” like Laci Green, Eileen Kelly (blogger of “killerandasweetthang”) and “Oh Megan,” as well as movements like “SlutWalk,” have captivated millions and have rapidly transformed the way feminism talks about sex. In short, these individuals and movements attempt to combat sexism by asserting the broadbased notion that women can — and do — like sex, that women should not be harassed based on their sexual choices and that sex is a good thing. When I was in high school and early into college I devoured these buzzwords, thinking, “Wow, this is great! Women should be allowed to enjoy sex like men do! Consent is sexy!” Beyond that, these movements also resonated with me on a more ideological level — as a volunteer and student organizer for Planned Parenthood for three years now, I have learned firsthand that access to both sex education and safer sex supplies is grossly inadequate in the United States, in large part because of long-held stigmas surrounding sex — especially in regard to women. I don’t want to fully unpack the monolith that is “hookup culture,” in part because it is a subject that has already been exhausted, and also because the hype is unsubstantiated. A recent publication by the International Academy of Sex Research reports that millennials born in the 1990s are more than
twice as likely to be sexually inactive as young GenX’ers born in the late 1960s. Further, the study shows that 15 percent of young adults aged 20 to 24 reported having no sex since turning 18, compared with just six percent of the previous generation at that age. Previous research has also found that millennials – born between the 1980s and 2000 – have fewer sexual partners than Generation X’ers or baby boomers – hardly the explosive phenomenon depicted by mass media. That being said, sexuality is arguably more openly discussed than ever, which in many ways helps to destigmatize something people have always been doing; ideally, this openness has the potential to eliminate double standards held for men and women. Unfortunately, individuals who do not fall into those categories of sex or gender are usually left out of the conversation. “Sex-positive” feminism tends to underestimate or misrepresent the experiences of non-heterosexual women, in the sense that it rarely questions who is allowed to be experimental and who is not. As a queer but straight-passing woman, I have often had to reconcile my own identity with the reality that “experimentation” is much more acceptable for women than it is for those who appear male or genderqueer, but not necessarily because women are more sexually free. Rather, female “experimentation” is largely permissible because of expectations about who or what is supposed to be sexually dominant, and because female “experimentation” is sometimes co-opted through the male gaze. Further, if anything, sex-positive language can worsen the experiences of so many by invalidating or isolating those who identify as asexual, those with difficulties interacting sexually due to neurological or physical disability, those who have endured trauma or those who have suffered from eating disorders and body dysmorphia; the list goes on and on. It is tempting to want to make your movement cool, especially in attempts to help broaden its reach. As an executive board member of the Consent Culture Network (CCN), I’ve often wanted to follow in the footsteps of other sex-positive activists, in order to gain the attention of those less likely to listen otherwise. I think about messages proclaiming that consent can be fun, can be cool, can be sexy. The problem is, consent
doesn’t have to be sexy. It doesn’t need to be cool, to be fun, to be anything at all. Consent just needs to happen. To suggest that sex is always good is just as ignorant as the notion that sex is inherently bad, dehumanizing or shameful. Sexuality can encompass many positive attributes, but like all activities that rely upon human interaction, it is far more complex. Sexuality often grapples with the repercussions of previous lived experiences, as well as narratives reaching far beyond the two or more individuals engaging in any given action. Likewise, if we look at parties who are frequently sexualized (women of color, transgender women, etc.) we notice that these are often groups with little political power. This is not a coincidence. Today’s activities have been informed by thousands of years of deeply entrenched power dynamics, cultural norms and expectations, including those surrounding sexuality. As much as the call to make sex “free” and consent “sexy” is luring at face value, it unfortunately dismisses this intricate and often ugly history. Sex is not always a positive experience, nor is it necessarily instrumental to female or femme liberation, especially so long as greater oppressive forces are still at play. Until feminism has eradicated the expectations on women and femme people to be sexually subservient, to appear a certain way or to fulfill the demands of others, it seems difficult to exclaim that sexuality is inherently liberating. Instead of dismantling the culture that objectifies women, or fetishizes women of color, trans women and non-binary people, “sex positivity” sometimes appears to suggest, “Hey, it’s ok — you can objectify yourself now!” We need to be able to recognize that while sex may be great, it may also be average, awkward or even unwanted — and that’s okay. A true acceptance of sexuality requires acknowledging the continuum of sexual experiences one can have, as well as accepting the ability to say yes, to say no, to say, “not right now, but maybe some other time” or “I changed my mind.” The way we talk about sex is bound to evolve, alongside feminism as a whole. It may not always be easy to digest. It shouldn’t have to be. Editor’s note: If you would like to send your response or make an op-ed contribution to the Opinion section, please email us at tuftsdailyoped@gmail.com. The Opinion section looks forward to hearing from you.
The Tufts Daily wants to hear from you! Have a problem with our coverage? Upset about something happening at Tufts or in the community? The Daily welcomes all thoughts, opinions and complaints from all readers. Have your voice heard! Send op-ed submissions, 800-1200 words, to tuftsdailyoped@gmail.com. The Tufts Daily is a nonprofit, independent newspaper, published Monday through Friday during the academic year, and distributed free to the Tufts community. The content of letters, advertisements, signed columns, cartoons and graphics does not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Tufts Daily editorial board. EDITORIALS Editorials represent the position of The Tufts Daily. Individual editors are not necessarily responsible for, or in agreement with, the policies and editorials of The Tufts Daily. OP-EDS The Op-Ed section of The Tufts Daily, an open forum for campus editorial commentary, is printed Monday through Thursday. The Daily welcomes submissions from all members of the Tufts community; the opinions expressed in the Op-Ed section do not necessarily represent the opinions of the Daily itself. Opinion articles on campus, national and international issues should be 600 to 1,200 words in length and submitted to oped@tuftsdaily.com. The editors reserve the right to edit letters for clarity, space and length. All material is subject to editorial discretion and is not guaranteed to appear in the Daily. Authors must submit their telephone numbers and day-of availability for editing questions. ADVERTISING All advertising copy is subject to the approval of the Editor-in-Chief, Executive Board and Executive Business Director.
Thursday, October 13, 2016 | Opinion | THE TUFTS DAILY
Opinion
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POINT-COUNTERPOINT
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Legalizing Marijuana in Massachusetts
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‘Point-Counterpoint’ juxtaposes two opposing perspectives on polarizing issues and debates. The following responses, written by the Daily’s Opinion section, address two sides of the debate on marijuana legalization in the state of Massachusetts. The Massachusetts Marijuana Legalization Initiative, or ballot Question 4, would legalize marijuana for recreational use and create a regulatory system for taxation and commerce. Question 4 will appear on the Massachusetts ballot in November.
In Favor of Legalization
his November, Massachusetts will join four other states in voting for the legalization of recreational marijuana. Despite the opposition of Governor Charlie Baker and Boston Mayor Marty Walsh, this policy change could bring significant benefits to the state, including economic improvement and a reduction in racial disparity within the criminal justice system. Recent polls indicate that 50 percent of Massachusetts voters are in favor of legalization, while 45 percent are not in favor and 5 percent are undecided. One of the primary reasons legalization has so much support is due to the poten-
Furthermore, the legalization of marijuana would lead to a more effective and efficient criminal justice system.
tial for significant economic benefits. For comparison, one may look to the state of Colorado, which, since the legalization of marijuana in 2012, has generated significant amounts of tax revenue from the industry. In the last fiscal year alone, the state generated about $70 million, surpassing alcohol tax revenue by nearly $30 million. In addition to tax revenue, the legalization of marijuana could also introduce
a surge of highly profitable businesses, creating thousands of new jobs for Massachusetts residents. Advocates of marijuana legalization also cite a possible decrease in racial disparity. Despite fairly equal rates of usage among black and white individuals, blacks are almost four times as likely to get arrested for possession of marijuana in the United States, according to data from the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). Marijuana legalization could significantly decrease these disparities, and thus “remove a significant barrier to racial equality,” a claim supported by the ACLU in a report published this month. Carol Rose, the Executive Director of ACLU Massachusetts also supported this claim, stating that “legalization is the smartest and surest way to end targeted enforcement of marijuana laws in communities of color.” Furthermore, the legalization of marijuana would lead to a more effective and efficient criminal justice system. With less time and money spent on arrests for marijuana possession and usage, law enforcement in Massachusetts could focus their resources and efforts on the prosecution of larger crimes, such as murder and rape. If passed, the Marijuana Legalization Initiative would highly regulate the recreational marijuana business, decreasing black market crime, generating economic profit for the state and potentially reducing racial disparity. For these reasons, Massachusetts should vote yes on Question 4 this November.
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Against Legalization
his November, five states, including Massachusetts, will vote to legalize recreational marijuana. While a multitude of Massachusetts voters are strongly in favor of legalization, there are several potential issues that voters must consider. First, the legalization of marijuana is particularly concerning when it comes to young people. Many fear that the marijuana industry will follow in the footsteps of the tobacco industry, releasing advertisement that appeals primarily to children and young adults. While the current ballot initiative does address this concern, it does so in a vague manner, calling only for “reasonable restrictions” on advertisement. What is even more concerning is marijuana’s potential to act as a “gateway drug” to harder substances. Under Massachusetts’ proposed initiative, individuals would be permitted to grow up to 12 marijuana plants in a single household. This amount could render an enormous amount of product, creating plenty of opportunities for young people to get their hands on the drug, and potentially encourage them to move onto more serious substances. Governor Charlie Baker has voiced the gateway concern, saying that legalization would “threaten to reverse our progress combating the growing opioid epidemic.” Corey Welford, a spokesperson for the Campaign for a Safe and Healthy Massachusetts, agreed with Baker’s concern, stating, “We are in the midst of an addiction crisis, and now is not the time to create an industry whose business model is predicated on promoting and selling another harmful, addictive drug.” Moreover, children could unintentionally consume marijuana through what are commonly known as edibles. The ballot
BY ALLIE MEROLA
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initiative does not address the regulation or labeling of edible marijuana products such as beverages, baked goods or candy. If these products are not carefully labelled, a child could easily consume a marijuana-infused edible product unknowingly. This was a significant problem in Colorado after it was legalized and required substantial time and effort from law enforcement to establish
Governor Charlie Baker has voiced the gateway concern, saying that legalization would “threaten to reverse our progress combating the growing opioid epidemic.”
regulations concerning edible products. Lastly, the economic arguments that many proponents of marijuana legalization often cite may not be applicable in the case of Massachusetts. Although Colorado has seen significant increases in tax revenue in recent years, the tax imposed on marijuana sales in Massachusetts would be about one third of what is imposed in Colorado, when taking into account extra sales and excise taxes. All of these concerns lead to a general conclusion that marijuana legalization could be more costly for the state than advantageous, and thus Massachusetts residents should vote no to Question 4 come November.
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THE TUFTS DAILY | Sports | Thursday, October 13, 2016
tuftsdaily.com
Editors’ Challenge | Week 6 Our guest last week, Executive Photo Editor Max “Viserys” Lalanne was the lowest scorer in Week 5, receiving the dubious honor of a golden crown and allowing the guest slot to drop back into last place. David “Theon” Westby has had a run of bad luck, but just beat the average score (7.4) this week for the first time with eight correct picks. We’ll find out in Week 6 whether Westby’s change of fortune is permanent or if he’s missing a certain something. Sitting on the iron throne is the veritable triumvirate of Zach “Stark” Hertz, Maclyn “Lannister” Senear and Evan “Walder” Sayles. “Walder,” true to his name, is playing all sides with increasingly complicated formulas that randomly pick between the Stark and Lannister choices or, this week, select the
mode once everyone else’s picks are in. Will we see a Red Wedding orchestrated by this computer science villain? Probably. But Sophie “Arya” Lehrenbaum is only a few picks behind and poised to give Sayles a taste of his own medicine, or flesh. This week, our Executive Layout Editor Allie “Bran” Merola joined the challenge and demonstrated her unique wörg perspective by being the only editor to select Cleveland. An ill-omen for my own picks is the company I share on my Jaguars pick, Westby. I’ve also been named Phil “Brienne” Goldberg and I don’t know why. On that note, may our oblong balls bounce favorably, may we pick the winningest teams and may Eddie “Sam” Samuels lose.
ZACH
MACLYN
EVAN
YJ
SOPHIE
PHIL
EDDIE
DAVID
GUEST: ALLIE
DEN at SD PHI at WAS PIT at MIA JAX at CHI CLE at TEN CIN at NE SF at BUF BAL at NYG LA at DET CAR at NO KC at OAK DAL at GB ATL at SEA IND at HOU NYJ at ARI
SD WAS PIT CHI TEN NE BUF NYG DET CAR OAK GB SEA HOU ARI
DEN PHI PIT CHI TEN NE BUF BAL LA CAR OAK DAL SEA IND ARI
DEN PHI PIT CHI TEN NE BUF BAL DET CAR OAK GB SEA HOU ARI
DEN PHI PIT CHI TEN NE BUF BAL DET CAR OAK GB ATL HOU ARI
DEN WAS PIT CHI CLE NE BUF BAL DET CAR OAK GB ATL HOU ARI
DEN PHI PIT JAX TEN NE BUF BAL DET CAR OAK GB SEA HOU ARI
DEN PHI PIT CHI TEN NE SF BAL DET CAR KC GB ATL IND ARI
DEN PHI PIT JAX TEN NE BUF NYG DET CAR KC DAL SEA HOU ARI
DEN PHI PIT CHI CLE NE BUF BAL DET CAR OAK GB ATL IND ARI
SCORE:
50
50
50
47
46
46
45
41
39
Passionate about sports? Have a unique perspective on student athletics? Interested in covering the intersection of sports and the larger Tufts community? Write for us! Contact dailysports@gmail.com!
Sports
Thursday, October 13, 2016 | Sports | THE TUFTS DAILY
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Vinny Donofrio Vinny’s Variety Pack
Dak dynasty
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nother eventful week of football is behind us. In case you missed it, here’s a quick recap: Brady is back, the Giants still suck, the Falcons are actual contenders, the Giants are terrible, the Vikings are the scariest team in football and the Giants gave me a stomach ulcer. *Sigh* Ah, well. Here’s to hoping this week’s column is better than Eli Manning was against the Packers. Dak Prescott QB, Dallas Cowboys Oh boy. This kid is the real deal. Prescott has 155 throwing attempts and zero interceptions to start his career. Is that any good? Uh, yeah. He holds the NFL rookie record for most throwing attempts without an interception. Prescott faces the Green Bay Packers this week, who have a weak secondary that should be exploited by the young QB. CJ Anderson RB, Denver Broncos Denver plays the San Diego Chargers this week, a team that has given up seven touchdowns to running backs this year. Anderson has had a slow few weeks after his explosive start, but expect him to have a great week this week with his starting QB being questionable. Anderson is also a red-zone machine, so he will likely be gouging the Chargers inside the 20. PPR: Jamaal Charles RB, Kansas City Chiefs Week 6 is the highly anticipated arrival of Charles, who is finally starting after his 2015 ACL tear. Charles is coming off a bye and should have his fantasy owners drooling over this week’s match-up against the Oakland Raiders, who have given up the eighth most fantasy points to running backs this year. Eddie Royal WR, Chicago Bears Royal, the number one waiver wire pickup last week, is poised to have a big Week 6. The Bears face a poor Jacksonville secondary who will be having their best corner lock down Alshon Jeffery, the number one receiver on the Bears. This leaves Royal free to exploit the Jaguars, who have allowed 25 fantasy points to receivers in three of their outings this year. PPR: Michael Crabtree WR, Oakland Raiders Last week, Amari Cooper looked like the stud we all remembered from last season. However, he will be matched up against Marcus Peters, the Chiefs’ best cornerback. This leaves Crabtree wide open to terrorize the secondary. Crabtree is also a red-zone threat with sure hands who Derek Carr (QB for the Oakland Raiders) loves to target late in games, which only adds to his upside. Jimmy Graham TE, Seattle Seahawks Remember when Graham used to be a first round fantasy pick? Well, this year he went undrafted in a majority of leagues, but is performing like he used to in his last two starts: catching 12 passes for over 200 yards and a touchdown. After watching the last two games, it is clear Russell Wilson (QB for the Seattle Seahawks) has built a rapport with the veteran tight end. The Seahawks face the Falcons, who have allowed a TD to tight ends in weeks one through four this year and who will most likely allow another in Week 6. Vinny Donofrio is a senior majoring in clinical psychology. Vinny can be reached at vincent.donofrio@tufts.edu.
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Sports
Thursday, October 13, 2016
VOLLEYBALL
Jumbos tack on three more wins, extend streak to seven by Sam Weidner
Contributing Writer
Adding three more wins over the last week, the women’s volleyball team extended its win streak to seven. Tufts now rests at 15-1 overall and first place in the NESCAC with a 7-0 record. The Jumbos won in straight sets against Babson on Tuesday night in Cousens Gym after falling to their regional rival the Babson Beavers in four sets last year. Babson is now 12-8 on the season. Tufts took control of the match from the start, winning the first set 25-12, and kept hold of that momentum for the rest of the night taking the next two sets 25-15 and 25-14 respectively. Babson was unsuccessful in its offense, recording 19 kills to Tufts’ 36. Senior co-captain middle hitter Elizabeth Ahrens, first-year outside hitter Brigid Bell and first-year opposite Christina Nwankpa all finished the match with six kills to pace the Jumbo offense. Senior middle hitter McKenzie Humann added four blocks, along with three from Ahrens, and anchor a Tufts front line that was dominant against Babson’s hitters. Tufts continued to prove itself against the other teams in the NESCAC as well, defeating Middlebury, which has a 12-4 record, in five sets on Saturday in a key conference matchup. The Jumbos showed their mettle on the road, all the way down to a crucial run late in the fifth set. Tufts scored six of the final eight points after the game had been knotted at 9-9 to win the last set 15-11. Middlebury came into the game riding an eight game win streak and with a 4-1 record in conference play. The Panthers’ only other NESCAC loss came at Wesleyan back on Sept. 17. Junior outside hitter Katie Kim led the Jumbos in kills by a wide margin with 16 and sophomore setter Angela Yu did the bulk of the setting work, leading the team with 25 assists. “Playing away is always [going to] be a bigger challenge than playing in your home, but Middlebury is a very good team and we knew it was gonna be a challenge right when we got there,” Yu said. “We just really had to stick together as a team throughout all five sets and
EVAN SAYLES / THE TUFTS DAILY
Middle / opposite hitter Christina Nwankpa, a first-year, spikes the ball in the 3-0 game against Babson on Oct. 11. really reduce errors on our side rather than focus on what they’re doing on their side, and I think that’s what helped us pull out the win.” The Jumbos defeated the Hamilton Continentals on the road in Friday three sets to one. After dropping the first set 26-24 in extra points, the Jumbos went on to dominantly win the next three in a row 25-13, 25-16 and 25-3. Junior co-captain defensive specialist Alexandra Garrett earned seven service aces as a part of Tufts’ overall dominant serving night. The Jumbos had 15 service aces to the Continentals’ five. A big part of Tufts’ success this year has been the way it has adjusted to different opponents, switching around lineups between and even during matches to exploit the weaknesses they see in different teams.
“We do scout [teams] and at least know what we are getting ourselves into,” Nwankpa said. “Obviously teams play differently against every opponent, so we do a little homework on our opponents.” Whether it involves playing hitters at different positions to exploit blocking match-ups, changing the rotations to spread out the big hitters or subbing in bench players to provide a spark, the Jumbos have seemingly had little trouble adjusting and working their opponents. “Being able to match our players up match to match has been a nice advantage to have and something we work hard to maintain in practice,” coach Cora Thompson told the Daily in an email. “Our team is very comfortable with the strategic planning we do as a coaching staff and they come to the gym ready to execute the plan of the day.”
Tufts is now looking to sweep the rest of its NESCAC schedule with two conference matches against Bates and Colby coming up this week and a match against Connecticut College on Oct. 29 to finish the regular season. “Right now we really want to host the NESCAC tournament and we’re in a good position to do it, but we really [have got to] just secure it,” Yu said. “The next three NESCAC games are [going to] be huge.” The Jumbos hosted the NESCAC tournament in 2014 after posting a 9-1 conference record to finish first and they hope to bring it back to Cousens Gym again this year. Undefeated at home, Tufts has only dropped three sets in Cousens all season, so bringing the NESCAC tournament back home would be an advantage for Tufts and its ambitions for well beyond the regular season this year.
MEN'S TENNIS
Multiple Jumbos advance to semi-finals at Bates Invitational by Noah Schwartz Staff Writer
Following the graduation of half of the men’s tennis team’s singles lineup last season, the team was plagued with injuries — ranging from nagging to severe — during the team’s formative fall months, which are crucial for deciding who steps into the vacant positions. Going into this season, the team had far more questions than answers as to where it would progress. However, this fall season fits the model coaches hope for when thinking about building toward a conference schedule. The results have only gotten better since the season’s start, and players have dramatically improved. No. 13 Tufts has shown a steady growth, rather than isolated erratic results, which suggests the improving play is supported by improving mechanics and conditioning, according to junior Danny Coran.
“I think one of our strengths is the way we practice,” Coran told the Daily in an email. “Our coach, Karl Gregor, always stresses the importance of ‘practicing like you play.’ This means maintaining the level of intensity and focus that you would normally bring to a match. Karl is a great coach and runs practice very efficiently. He also has incorporated more conditioning and fitness into our practices, which is crucial in tennis. Our guys always support each other during practice. We try to get loud to replicate the atmosphere of a dual match.” The results last weekend at the Bates Invitational prove just how much growth has taken place for this team over the course of the fall season. Sophomore Ethan Chen, the standout of the fall season, made a finals run in the singles B flight falling to Skidmore College junior Lucas Pickering in two
sets. Coran came away with a semifinals appearance in the singles C flight after dispatching his first two opponents 6-1, 6-2 and 6-1, 6-1 respectively. Junior Rohan Gupte, coming off an injury, made the final in the singles A flight. “Ethan [Chen] has been playing great tennis and I know he will be an important piece for us come spring,” Coran said. Ethan Bershtein, one of the firstyears at the tournament who played both singles and doubles, defeated his first singles opponent 7-5, 6-4 but fell in the second round. The pair of Bershtein and Chen advanced to the semi-finals of the B bracket in doubles as well. “My proudest moment was definitely winning my first career match with Ethan Chen in doubles,” Bershtein said. “That first doubles match was also my toughest one as we were not
playing our best to start and got down a pretty big deficit before staying positive, pulling it together and making a comeback victory.” With the fall season winding down, the team has begun to cast its sight on the spring, when competitions will matter more towards the team’s rank rather than for individual accolades. “[I’m] definitely a bit nervous for my first season, but I think that if we trust the work we put in every day at practice we should be fine and reach our potential as a top team in the country,” Bershtein said. The MIT Invitational, which is being held this weekend, is the last tournament of the fall season. The Jumbos have shown the steady growth looked for in improving teams but have yet to win a flight. Proving they can outlast all competitors in the tournament is a major hurdle to overcome this season.