The Quad 107-09

W W W. W C U Q UA D. CO M

V O L U M E 1 0 7 , I S S U E 9THE STUDENT NEWSPAPER OF WEST CHESTER UNIVERSITY

MONDAY, NOVEMBER 10, 2014TheQuad

President Weisenstein Addresses Future ChangesRead more on Page 2. Jose Mestre/ Photography Editor

PAGE 2 THE QUAD NEWS NOVEMBER 10, 2014

[email protected] hosts Council of Organizations

meetingAdam Farence

Editor-in-Chief

On Tuesday, Nov. 4, SGA held their third Council of

Organizations meeting. This meeting is required for every organization on campus that receives SGA funding, and should an organization fail to send a representative without an excuse, SGA’s bylaws allow the governing asso-ciation to freeze funding for those organizations.

West Chester Universi-ty President Weisenstein spoke to the students about the university’s current standing in the United States. His mes-sage was optimistic. He noted how West Chester University was “bucking the national trend” in terms of graduate student enrollment and how the university had moved up nine spots in U.S. news and world reports.

President Weisenstein also spoke of plans for the university, saying that the university has allo-cated up to $300 million for capital improvement, and that the average high school GPA to get into West Chester University has risen to the 3.5 – 3.7 zone. He also stressed that a great area of the university’s growth would

take place through dis-tance education.

During the question and answer session that followed, several students voiced their concerns on a variety of issues. Most is-sues were common ones, such as parking and off-campus housing. English Club president Matthew Holmes asked why there were chains surrounding the new academic quad, to which Weisenstein stated that while he did not know specifically. However, he stressed that the new Quad helps collect storm water, which reduces the tax the uni-versity must pay on storm water runoff.

Kathryn LeConey, the president of Gradu-ate Student Association, raised one of the final con-cerns. She asked about developing a mechanism for graduate students to pay an optional SSI ac-tivities fee. Currently, graduate students can-not take part in various campus activities, such as intramural sports, since graduate students do not pay the activities fee. Re-cently, there has been a push to allow graduate students to pay an op-tional fee in order to allow them to do so.

Adam Farence is a fourth-year stu-dent majoring in history and French. He can be reached at [email protected].

Delta Phi Epsilon to host Deepher Dude competition

By Nick CardilloSpecial to The Quad

On Tuesday, Nov. 18 at 7:30 p.m., West Chester Universi-

ty’s Alpha Alpha chapter of Delta Phi Epsilon will be hosting their annual Deepher Dude competition to benefit cystic fibrosis research. The event will be held in the historic and iconic Emilie K. Asplundh Concert Hall. The Deepher Dude competition consists of three criteria: a talent portion, a formal portion, and a question and answer portion. This year’s Deep-her Dude competition, dubbed “Deepher Dude: Once upon a Deepher,” is an opportunity to support a great cause while the women of Delta Phi Epsi-lon crown their new Prince Charming. There will also be some big-ticket raffle baskets, including a Go-Pro Camera, an iPad Mini 3, and a FitBit wristband.

All around the coun-try, countless Delta Phi Epsilon chapters host an annual Deepher Dude competition to raise funds for cystic fibrosis (CF) re-search. Since 1967, Delta Phi Epsilon has raised well over $1 million to re-search a cure for CF. Ac-cording to the Cystic Fibrosis Foun-dation, “Cys-tic fibrosis is a life-threatening genetic disease that primar-ily affects the lungs and di-gestive system. A n estimated 30,000 children and adults in the United States (70,000 worldwide) have CF. In people with CF, a defective gene and its protein product cause the body to produce un-usually thick, sticky mu-cus that clogs the lungs and leads to life-threaten-ing lung infections and ob-structs the pancreas and

stops natural enzymes from helping the body break down food and ab-sorb vital nutrients.”

“West Chester’s Deep-hers are super pumped to see everyone come out to the event this year,” Delta Phi Epsilon’s New Mem-ber Educator of Sister-

hood, Anjelica Finore, said. “This cause is held very close to the hearts of the Alpha Alpha

chapter because an alumni sister, who was diagnosed with CF at an ear-

ly age, has truly affected the immediacy and impor-tance for everyone.”

Finore went on to say how the women of Delta Phi Epsilon have had a unique opportunity to see how much of an effect the funding for CF research and awareness has on an individual level. Recent funding has increased the life expectancy of people

suffering from CF to new levels. Finore also said that her Delta Phi Epsilon sister’s condition “never stopped her ambition,” as she continues to fight ev-ery day while maintain-ing support for the fight against CF.

If students are unable to attend the event on Nov. 18, but would still like to have an impact against Cystic Fibrosis, they can look for the Delta Phi Ep-silon table in Sykes during the week prior to the event to make a donation. The women will also be selling tickets for the event for only $3 prior to the event, opposed to a $5 ticket at the door. Students can clear their calendars for Tuesday, Nov. 18 and come out to Emilie K. Asplundh Concert Hall at 7:30 p.m. to help fight cystic fibrosis.

Nick Cardillo is a second-year student majoring in communica-tion studies. He can be reached at [email protected].

On Wednesday No-vember 12th, two u p - a n d - c o m i n g

clothing brands are com-ing to West Chester Uni-versity.

PhillyHats.com sells their own line of unique snapback hats inspired by Philadelphia history and culture. As they say on their instagram page @phillyhats - 'We make fly hats'. Currently they are in the midst of a 70 day promotion in which they are adding a new vin-tage philadelphia eagles hat to PhillyHats.com every day until Christ-mas. The Philadelphia hat brand will bring their floral 'jawn' snapbacks,

'fly' bucket hats, as well as their best selling bean-ies to the WCU campus. In addition to selling unique Philadelphia hats, PhillyHats.com also offers embroidery services to upstart clothing brands, sports clubs, and fraterni-ties / sororities. Their dis-count wholesale packages enable groups of people to get custom hats for their communities. Philly hats

will be accompanied by Rare VNTG.

Locally based clothing retailer Rare VNTG fea-tures a wide variety of premium vintage sports-wear clothing from the 80’s, 90’s and early 2000’s. The brand focuses on pro-viding an elite selection of vintage name-brand authentic sportswear including jerseys, jack-ets, t shirts, crew necks,

headwear, and more. Af-ter launching their eBay store 7 years ago, Rare VNTG opened their own webstore, rarevntg.com a year and a half ago. In addition to their website, Rare VNTG is stocked exclusively at clothing boutiques in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh. Recently, the brand has garnered publicity for their custom vintage “Gin And Juice” Snoop Dogg jersey as well as some celebrity clientele including Mac Miller. Rare VNTG is on social media @rarevntg.

Vending will occur from 10AM - 4PM in the Sykes student Union.

Andrew Rufo is a third-year stu-dent majoring in Professional Studies. He can be reached at [email protected].

Startup clothing brands in Sykes this weekBy Andrew Rufo

Online Editor

NOVEMBER 10, 2014 THE QUAD NEWS PAGE 3

WCU to commemorate 50th anniversary of Vietnam WarAdam Farence

Editor-in-Chief

On Nov. 12, West Chester University will host a commem-

orative event in honor of the 50th anniversary of the Vietnam War. Formally named “The Vietnam War: a 50th Year Commemo-ration of the Helicopter War,” this event will be co-hosted by both West Ches-ter University and the American Helicopter Mu-seum and Education Cen-ter. The opening ceremony will take place in Philips Autograph Library where West Chester University’s ROTC Dauntless Battal-ion will present the colors

to start the event. Among the distinguished guests will be Patrick “Pat” Toom-ey, United States Sena-tor; Yahia H. Al-Dhahraa, the President of the WCU Student Veterans Group; Lawrence R. Davidson, Di-rector of Veterans Affairs, Chester County; Dr. Glenn K. Cunningham, Associ-ate Provost, US Army War College; and Lieutenant Colonel Chauncey Hous-ton, United States Air Force, Vietnam War Com-memoration, Department of Defense.

In honor of the event, the exhibit cases in the Francis Harvey Green Li-brary have a collection of items displaying the devel-opment of the helicopter. The cases were curated

under the supervision of Special Collections Librar-ian Tara Wink. Also on display are items from the privately owned Wilford collection depicting the work of E. Burke Wilford.

The commemorative event will also consist of a panel by Larry Barrett and Mike Folse, two men who have both worked on heli-copter development. Bar-rett worked on the CH-47 Chinook and Folse made the original drawing for the AH-1 Cobra. At 1 p.m., the keynote speaker, Dr. John Bonin, a professor of concepts and doctrine from the United States Army War College is scheduled to speak in Philips Auto-graph Library. At 2 p.m. in the Philips Conference

Room, Vietnam War Vet-eran Charlie McManus and United States Marine Corps Col. (ret.) Leonard C. “Len” Biebarbach, and United States Army Briga-dier General (ret.) Charles E. Weber will give p r e s e n t a -tions.

O t h e r events in-clude a post-V i e t n a m discussion facil itated by West C h e s t e r University’s Dr. Robert K o d o s k y , with United States Army Colonel Da-

vid Fee and Dr. Daniel Schrage presenting.

For the duration of the event, a helicopter will be parked out in front of Phil-ips autograph library, and at 5:30 p.m., the American

Helicopter Museum and Education Center will be hosting a reception.

Adam Farence is a fourth-year stu-dent majoring in history and French. He can be reached at [email protected].

wikipedia.org

suffering from CF to new levels. Finore also said that her Delta Phi Epsilon sister’s condition “never stopped her ambition,” as she continues to fight ev-ery day while maintain-ing support for the fight against CF.

If students are unable to attend the event on Nov. 18, but would still like to have an impact against Cystic Fibrosis, they can look for the Delta Phi Ep-silon table in Sykes during the week prior to the event to make a donation. The women will also be selling tickets for the event for only $3 prior to the event, opposed to a $5 ticket at the door. Students can clear their calendars for Tuesday, Nov. 18 and come out to Emilie K. Asplundh Concert Hall at 7:30 p.m. to help fight cystic fibrosis.

Nick Cardillo is a second-year student majoring in communica-tion studies. He can be reached at [email protected].

headwear, and more. Af-ter launching their eBay store 7 years ago, Rare VNTG opened their own webstore, rarevntg.com a year and a half ago. In addition to their website, Rare VNTG is stocked exclusively at clothing boutiques in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh. Recently, the brand has garnered publicity for their custom vintage “Gin And Juice” Snoop Dogg jersey as well as some celebrity clientele including Mac Miller. Rare VNTG is on social media @rarevntg.

Vending will occur from 10AM - 4PM in the Sykes student Union.

Andrew Rufo is a third-year stu-dent majoring in Professional Studies. He can be reached at [email protected].

PAGE 4 THE QUAD NEWS NOVEMBER 10, 2014

Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo destroyed

in fatal crashBy Collin Heatley

Practicum Writer

Virgin Galactic’s S p a c e S h i p T w o rocket plane broke

up in midair and crashed, leaving one test pilot dead and another seriously in-jured during a test flight on Friday, Oct. 31.

At approximately 9:20 a.m. last Friday, the Whi-teKnightTwo carrier plane took off from the Mojave Desert at the Mojave Air and Space Port with the SpaceShipTwo rocket plane attached and ready to be tested for a success-ful flight. After the paired planes reached an eleva-tion of around 50,000 feet, almost an hour after take-off, the SpaceShipTwo was released.

Stuart Witt, CEO and general manager of the Mojave Air and Space Port in California said that several min-utes after the Space-S h i p T w o was re-leased from the carrier plane and at tempted to fire its hybrid en-gine, the malfunction o c c u r r e d . Witt, how-ever, said that he did not see an exp los ion , but debris can be found all over the crash site.

One pi-lot aboard the Space-S h i p T w o was killed in

the crash. He is identified as Michael Alsbury, 39, by the Kern County Coro-ner’s Office. The second pilot, indentified as Peter Siebold, 43, escaped the crash using a parachute but was still seriously in-jured in the accident. He was transferred to a near-by hospital following the crash. Both pilots from the WhiteKnightTwo carrier plane landed safely.

Virgin Galactic’s CEO, George T. Whitesides, said in a statement follow-ing the crash: “The future rests in many ways on hard, hard days like this. But, we believe we owe it to the folks who were fly-ing these vehicles as well as the folks who are work-ing so hard on them to understand this and move forward.”

Virgin Galactic was test-ing the hybrid rocket en-gine in flight in hopes that

the SpaceShipTwo could be used for commercial flights to the edge of space. The company has already sold 700 tickets to people that want to experience space, with some paying amounts up to $250,000.

Virgin’s billionaire founder Richard Branson and his investors have put nearly half a billion dollars into the spaceship venture over the last ten years, according to NBC. Following the crash, Bran-son said “This was a hor-rible setback, particularly for the family” of the de-ceased pilot, but “the risk is worth it.” He also as-sured that there would be a “whole massive series of test flights” before any paying customers would be taken into space.

Collin Heatley is a fourth-year stu-dent majoring in history. He can be reached at [email protected].

wikipedia.orgWEIRD NEWSA millionaire investor from South Korea who lives in

Bahrain wakes up every morning around 5 a.m. to pick up trash and sort recyclables in his city. The

man, who joked his last name is “The Boss Of Cleaning,” has been doing his part to keep the earth cleaner and safer for his community for 11 years. “There is a lot of garbage,” he said. “And this makes people sick. It causes problems.”

A man who went out to dinner at Bobby Flay Steak at the Borgata Hotel and Casino in Atlantic City last week reportedly asked a waitress for a wine recom-

mendation. After she pointed to a bottle on the menu, the man reportedly was not wearing his glasses so he asked how much it was. The waitress replied, “3750.” The restauar-ant patron took that to mean $37.50, and ordered a bottle. Imagine his surprise when he discovered that the wine cost $3,750. The man and his two fellow diners were able to get the restaurant to agree to a discounted price of $2,200.

On Dec. 7, Discovery Channel will release a special en-titled “Eaten Alive” that shows a man covered in pig’s blood who is swallowed whole by an anaconda. The

man wore a special suit and was tethered to an anchor before approaching the snake. The special has already been filmed, and the man survived the terrifying endeavor.

Gas prices at lowest since 2010By Maddie BallPracticum Writer

People across America are overjoyed that they can completely

fill up their car at the gas station without having to worry about spending too much. Gas prices all over the nation reached prices lower than $3 per gallon last week. While a select few are outraged that gas has become cheaper than a gallon of milk, for the ma-jority of Americans, people are thrilled to be saving money on gas.

In a statement released from AAA spokesperson Michael Green, he an-nounced that gas has not been this cheap since 2010. He continued to say that 56 percent of gas sta-tions in America are sell-ing gas for under $3 per gallon, compared to last year when only 11 percent

of gas stations were selling gas for that same amount.

Every year, gas prices drop due to the chilly weather outside and not as many people making road trips, but no one ex-pected gas to drop as fast and as low as it currently is. This has people asking questions. Why is gas all of a sudden so cheap?

There are a few reasons why gas is cheaper this fall than in previous years. First, it has been reported that crude oil prices have been lowered. The price of a gallon of gasoline is determined by the price of oil, taxes, refining, and distribution costs. With the price of oil taking up two-thirds of the price of gas, when oil prices are lowered so does the price of gasoline.

Furthermore, it has been speculated that gas

prices have dropped be-cause of the amount of oil that America is collect-ing. America is removing more oil out of the ground than anytime since the 1980s. Senior petroleum analyst Patrick DeeHaan said, “We have all these sources of new crude oil in the U.S., and that’s add-ing to the global oil supply, which naturally pushes prices down.”

For many, this could not be more of a perfect time for gas prices to be drop-ping. With the holidays being right around the corner, many households may splurge a little extra this year simply because of the extra cents they are getting back on their gal-lon of gas.

Maddie Ball is a fourth-year student majoring in communication studies. She can be areached at [email protected].

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Jeffery HolmesVeronica Mattaboni

The Student Newspaper of West Chester University 253 Sykes Student Union | West Chester, Pennsylvania 19383

610.436.2375 | [email protected] | www.wcuquad.com

Adam Farence [email protected]

Clare HaggertyNews EditorDrew MattiolaOp-Ed EditorTheresa KellyFeatures EditorMolly Herbison Entertainment EditorRyan CalpinSports EditorJose MestrePhotography Editor

EDITORIAL BOARDColleen Goldhorn

Asst. Photography Editor

AJ ArcainiAsst. Sports Editor

Colleen CurryAsst. News Editor

EDITORIAL STAFF

Drew SchmitzBusiness ManagerAndrew MillerAdvertising Manager

BUSINESS & ADVERTISING STAFF

COPY EDITORS

Michael LeisenringDISTRIBUTION

Andrew RufoONLINE EDITION

Dr. Philip A. ThompsenFACULTY ADVISOR

Submissions PolicyGuest and opinion columns, letters to the editor, political or social commentary, and artwork is accepted during the academic year. All material may be sent to the attention of the editor in chief, The Quad, 253 Sykes Student Union Building, West Chester University, West Chester, Pa. 19383, Material may also be dropped off in our office, Sykes 253 or e-mailed to [email protected]. An electronic copy of all work is necessary for publication and should be sent to the aforementioned e-mail address.All submissions must include a name and at least two forms of contact information, such as an e-mail address and phone number, for verification purposes. Students should include information such as an on-campus address, class standing, area of study, and/or organizational position. Material is only published if the author/artist can be confirmed as a standing member of the University. Such distinctions include students, staff, faculty, administra-tion, and alumni. We do not accept submissions from members of the community who are not associated with West Chester University.Letters to the editor should not exceed 250 words; columns and commentaries should be between 500 and 1,000 words. All material may be edited to adhere to our policies, AP style, and space restraints. We do not edit for content unless it is libelous, excessively profane, or harmful to a particular individual or group thereof.Opinions expressed within the letters to the editor, columns, and commentaries are those of the author and not necessarily those of The Quad, its editorial board or the student body, faculty, or administration of West Chester University.The deadline for all Op-ed submissons is the Saturday before Monday’s publication by 2 p.m.

Copyright ©2014 The Quad. No work herein may be reproduced in any form, in whole or in part, without the writ-ten consent of the editor-in-chief. Opinions expressed within the letters to the editor, columns, and commentaries are those of the author and not necessarily those of The Quad, its editorial board or the student body, faculty, or administration of West Chester University.Founded in 1932 as Quad Angles, The Quad was re-named as such in 1975. The Quad is the independent, student-run newspaper of West Chester University of Pennsylvania. The Quad is published on 10 Mondays each academic semester and has a weekly newsprint circulation of 3,000. The Quad is funded primarily through advertising sales and, although we receive a budget through SGA and the student activity fee, The Quad is run solely by students and is not edited or altered in any way by University faculty, staff, or administration. The University has no prior review of the content.Rates and mechanical requirements for display advertising can be found on our website at www.wcuquad.com. Inquiries may be placed at the addresses or phone numbers listed above. Classified advertising may be purchased on our website at www.wcuquad.com. The Quad reserves the right to refuse any news items, letters, or advertising thought to be offensive or inappropriate.The Quad exercises care to prevent omissions and factual errors. Corrections for any published error will not ex-ceed the space or prominence of the error that occurred. Claims for adjustment must be made within five days of publication.

The Quad is printed by Journal Register Offset in Exton, Pa.

Disclaimers

The QuadNOVEMBER 10, 2014 THE QUAD OP-ED PAGE 5

Now that we’re knee deep into November, and delicious home-cooked Thanksgiving dinners are but a few short weeks away, the last thing anyone wants to do is work. So why not take a break and

watch WCU Weekly, listen to WCUR, or read The Quad? Two of the Quad’s sports editors, Ryan Calpin and AJ Arcaini, are starting a new video series with help from Amber Key and her sports talk live crew. The show, titled “Not-So-Golden-Rams”, has Ryan and AJ challenging ath-letes from West Chester University’s sports teams.

Their first episode has Ryan and AJ competing against the kicker on the football team, Rich Bruno. You can watch a preview of their first episode on WCU Weekly Tuesday morning, and you can watch the entire episode on The Quad’s website.

Take a quick study break and see what some of your fellow West Ches-ter students have done.

Adam FarenceEditor-In-Chief

PAGE 6 THE QUAD OP-ED NOVEMBER 10, 2014

I did not vote on Elec-tion Day. I am proud of my decision. Many

people have either been criticizing my decision of not voting in this past election or have been won-dering what my rationale is for “doing nothing.”

Firstly, I did not like any candidates on the bal-lot. That should be reason enough not to vote. Many will suggest that I vote for the lesser of two evils, but in this election, I did not even believe there to be a lesser of two evils avail-able. Others suggested that I “voice my opinion” by writing in a candidate. Unfortunately, no write-in candidate had a real-istic show at winning or upsetting an election. It would have been inconve-nient to register in West Chester only to voice my opinion, when I can and have voiced my opinion through more convenient and accessible outlets. For example, I reach more people through Facebook, Twitter, and this very Quad article than I do through writing in a can-didate.

Secondly, many argue, “If you don’t vote, you have no right to com-plain.” Aside from the fact that I, as a human being, always have the right to speak my mind, George Carlin put it best when he said, “If you vote, and you elect dishonest, incompetent politicians, and they get into office and screw everything up, you are responsible for what they have done. You voted them in. You caused

the problem. You have no right to complain. I, on the other hand, who did not vote -- who did not even leave the house on Elec-tion Day -- am in no way responsible for what these politicians have done, and have every right to com-plain about the mess that you created."

Thirdly, my vote will not have an effect on the election outcome. My vote, even in local elections, is so statistically unlikely to change the election outcome, that my vote is meaningless for all in-tents and purposes. Thus, to say, “Your vote mat-ters, Tom,” is like saying that whether or not I ate at McDonald’s on Tuesday “matters” this election season. Both have no sta-tistical impact on election results.

Fourthly, many ar-gue, “What does not vot-ing accomplish?” Simple:

We’ve all heard the rule: “30 min-utes of exercise

a day keeps the doctor away” (ok, so I may have improvised a little bit). In reality, exercise offers so much more than weight loss. When you exercise, you let off endorphins, or “feel good hormones”- you can’t help but feel better after a workout! It also al-lows you to meet people, whether at the gym, run-ning group, etc. Some-times, though, life gets in the way, and you can’t “find the time” to exercise.

When I first came to college, I was terrified of the Freshman 15. But I was also aware of my lack of individual moti-vation to exercise, which was the reason I played sports in high school- I didn’t have a choice but to come to practice. How-ever, I certainly was not good enough to play for a college, nor did I want to. I had older friends who played sports for their col-leges, and I knew their classes were a nightmare due to their demanding practice schedule. So, dur-ing my first Involvement Fair, I came across a table with the words, “Ultimate Frisbee” across the top. I asked about it, and was told it was a club sport. It sounded interesting so I decided to sign up.

Joining the Ultimate Frisbee club was the best decision I have made thus far in college Not only did I make friendships that will last a life time, but my time management skills improved exponen-

tially; I even managed to LOSE weight, not gain it. I believe joining a club sport can positively im-pact anyone’s college ca-reer, so below I have listed a few reasons why you too should join one!

1.) Making friends and networking: When you are a member of a sports team, you instantly have an automatic group of 30+ friends, people you have something in com-mon with. It is easy to get together and scrimmage and have fun. For Fris-bee, there are additional leagues we have the op-portunity to play in out-side of West Chester Uni-versity. Players from West Chester, Philly, and sur-rounding areas join these leagues, so I have made friends from all over, of all different ages and back-grounds. Also, much like sororities and fraternities, you have a solid network-ing background for after college. Club alumni are involved in all different types of career fields, so there is sure to be some-one you can connect with after college who is doing something similar to what you want to do.

2.) Doing well in school: We practice six hours a week and often have tour-naments on the weekends that take place all day. That does not leave you with a lot of free time. For some people, this is a struggle, and the reason why they choose not to do a club sport. For me, how-ever, it helps. If I did not have practice from 7- 10 on Mondays and Thurs-days, I know I would put off doing my homework/ studying until late and rush through it. Knowing

I have practice and will be tired afterwards mo-tivates me to get it done early! It also helps me to take care of the most im-portant assignments first. Time management is a wonderful skill to have, something that will ben-efit you immensely in the future.

3.) Staying healthy: be-tween practice, league, and tournaments, I have the opportunity to exer-cise a lot. On the days I have off from Frisbee, I find myself at the gym as well. My body has got-ten to the point that I feel gross if I DON’T ex-ercise! If you really love your sport, you’ll find that you want to go to run and workout every day, so you can get better and build your endurance. I also tend eat a lot healthier. If I go to the gym, I don’t want that chocolate bar to wipe out 30 minutes on the elliptical- I worked hard for that!

4.) It’s not the school Team: When a part of a club sport, you have the best of both worlds. You have the opportunity to play a sport you love, but still have time to do what you want. The atmosphere is much more relaxed. Playing a college sport is very time consuming, and I give a lot of credit to any-one on a D1, D2, or D3 col-lege team.

So, at the Spring 2015 Involvement Fair, march over to the sports tables and sign up for one! At-tend a few practices, see if it’s for you. What’s the harm in that? Ashley Cantasano is a third-year student who is majoring in mar-keting and adverisement. She can be reached at [email protected]

By Tom MandracchiaSpecial to The Quad

West Chester students reluctant to vote on Election Day

1) I keep my integrity knowing that I in no way showed support for politi-cians who I do not want in office. 2) I can hope I made a statement to those around me that, if one considers the candidates to be mediocre, we should not support mediocrity. 3) I saved gas by not driving to the polls, hence slowing the progression of global climate change.

If you really believe that candidates up for election will be be good for the area under their jurisdiction, vote. Do whatever your heart desires. Just keep in mind that your individual vote will never change an election outcome. Also, do not tell me that I am do-ing something wrong by not voting. Thank you.Tom Mandracchia is a fourth-year student who is the vice president of Students of Liberty. She can be reached at [email protected].

West Chester encourages students to

participate in sportsBy Ashley Cantasano

Staff Writer

Train service long used to be a staple for West Chester

and its surrounding com-munity. In 1986, SEPTA shut down the West Ches-ter train line, which had serviced riders to and from Philadelphia with 18 daily trains. Although lo-cal residents have always yearned for revitalizing the service, Borough gov-ernment had not had a concerted effort to restore the service. This policy changed earlier this year, with the creation of an ad-hoc commission focused on restoring rail service to the West Chester bor-ough.

The West Chester rail station was originally opened in 1875 by the West Chester & Phila-delphia Railroad. As the main stop on the Penn-sylvania Railroad’s West Chester line, the station transitioned to be under SEPTA’s control and ul-timately became a part of the R3 route. Due to deteriorating track condi-

MCT Campus

NOVEMBER 10, 2014 THE QUAD OP-ED PAGE 7

Train service long used to be a staple for West Chester

and its surrounding com-munity. In 1986, SEPTA shut down the West Ches-ter train line, which had serviced riders to and from Philadelphia with 18 daily trains. Although lo-cal residents have always yearned for revitalizing the service, Borough gov-ernment had not had a concerted effort to restore the service. This policy changed earlier this year, with the creation of an ad-hoc commission focused on restoring rail service to the West Chester bor-ough.

The West Chester rail station was originally opened in 1875 by the West Chester & Phila-delphia Railroad. As the main stop on the Penn-sylvania Railroad’s West Chester line, the station transitioned to be under SEPTA’s control and ul-timately became a part of the R3 route. Due to deteriorating track condi-

tions, SEPTA decided in September 1986 to dis-continue service to West Chester. SEPTA decided to focus resources on the nearby station in Exton, a part of the Paoli/Thorn-dale line, and on its Route 104 bus line.

West Chester’s station saw new light in 1997 when a private company, the West Chester Rail-road, began operating tourist rides between Glen Mills and West Chester. The company currently operates Santa rides dur-ing the holiday season and offers train rides for birthday parties or other special occasions.

Created earlier this year, the Rail Service Restoration Committee had its first meeting in July, and meets once ev-ery month. Currently, the Committee has been seeking suggestions and comments from local resi-dents who would be using the service, but also from local businesses and orga-nizations who may benefit from additional incoming foot traffic from the sta-tion.

Thoughts from the Mayor’s Office; West

Chester railroad projectBy Kyle Phillips

Special to The QuadThe restoration of the

West Chester line has not been confirmed by SEPTA officials, but it is something that they are actively considering. It is the job of the Commit-tee to gather local inter-est, flesh out every detail about what type of train, electric, hybrid, or diesel, where to put the station, where should the line ac-tually go, provide data to SEPTA about ridership potential, and to perhaps raise interest from pri-vate investors to provide the necessary capital that may be necessary to actu-ally get this project going.

This project is consid-ered a great idea by many individuals, groups, and businesses in the Borough and surrounding commu-nities.

To learn more about the railroad project, head over to the Borough of West Chester’s website at http://www.west-chester.com/ Kyle Phillips is an intern for the Mayor at West Chester, PA. He can be reached at [email protected].

In 1943, American bot-anist and bioethicist, Arthur Galston devel-

oped a chemical known as Herbicide Orange consist-ing of a mixture of equal parts of two herbicides, 2,4,5-T and 2,4-D., in a British military labora-tory that would increase the speed and growth of soybeans, allowing them to be grown in sporadic areas around the world where short seasons were prominent. In what he identified as a defoliant effect, Galston was able to successfully deliver these findings to an international agri-culture project that was headed by U.S. and British Intelli-gence. Due to the de-forming health and ecological effects of Her-bicide Orange, the U.S. and British collaborated to test the effects of the chemical before introduc-ing them to indigenous regions of their respective nations and territories. Little did Galston know, the herbicides were wide-ly-considered by the mili-tary as potential applica-tions in warfare similar to Jewish scientist Fritz Haber’s creation of Zyk-lon B, which became Ger-many’s preferred method of execution in gas cham-bers during the Holocaust when it was initially de-signed to stimulate nitro-gen in fertilizer.

During the 1960s, the

herbicides laid the ground-work for Agent Orange, in which the chemical was famously labeled, thus en-tering the Vietnam War. After the British military became the first to employ herbicides on Malaya Pen-insula, dismantling com-munist insurgents and devastating the ecological equilibrium of 3.1 million hectares of tropical forest, it became relatively clear

that Agent Orange was not the product of revolu-tion as Galston envisioned it to be. Despite being one of the most subversive synthetics ever devel-oped, Agent Orange was ultimately exploited by means of military combat as opposed to benefiting the fields of botany and agriculture. Unfortunate-ly according to U.S. mili-tary reports in the 1960s, high concentrations of Agent Orange would slowly eradicate any liv-ing organism from flora to fauna, Galston had grave concerns about its effects on humans. It was sup-plied to the U.S. govern-ment in orange-striped

barrels and 77 million liters of Agent Orange were sprayed on Vietnam causing 400,000 deaths and trending disabilities ranging 3 million Viet-namese diagnosed with assorted genetic diseases to 500,000 children deliv-ered with birth defects.

Agent Orange is a fa-mous example of a great invention gone wrong. It was solely produced to

enhance the growth of international agri-culture and expedite the tedious process of horticulture in poor climates, and yet it became a global threat once the military in-appropriately admin-istered the chemical into lethal weaponry. It had great inten-tions upon Galston’s discovery, but was quickly misused and tampered with when the military became

involved with its trial run. While not at the exact magnitude of Agent Or-ange, Mark Zuckerberg’s renowned social network-ing service, Facebook, can definitely be character-ized as a mammoth ap-paratus whose innovative splendor and raw contri-butions have been greatly overshadowed by its grow-ing incapacity and sudden disapproval.

While not the end of everything that is good, Facebook continues to be a very popular form of social media with over approximately 1.3 billion active users, reaching a

By Drew MattiolaOp-Ed Editor

Midwest poet, Prince Ea, examines the

negative and positive qualities of Facebook

See Facebook Page 8MCT Campus

MCT Campus

PAGE 8 THE QUAD OP-ED NOVEMBER 10, 2014

peak market capitaliza-tion of $104 billion, and in many ways transform-ing into the avenue for antisocialism. As a user of Facebook myself, I find it difficult to remember that at one point of time when it didn't exist. Although I try my best to push away from social media in gen-eral as it has the tendency to become unhealthy and a waste of time, it is very much an illusionary and technological append-age to my life. In fact, it has greatly become such a significant part of our lives that you can imme-diately learn someone’s life story just by clicking a link to their page, and in the blink of an eye us-ers immediately have ac-cess to friends, likes and dislikes, relationship sta-tuses, phone numbers, ad-dresses - everything. This is where Facebook starts to become the very defi-nition of unconventional and problematic. If you haven’t realized it by now, Facebook, since its incep-tion in 2004, has slowly transformed into a plat-form for narcissism, dra-ma, ignorance, and most importantly poor self-es-teem. The negative side effects of Facebook range from so many to so few, that like great achieve-ments of Agent Orange and the Gatling Gun, their insufficiencies and pitfalls sadly outweighs the defin-ing qualities of the social network. Everyone is so quick to judge and hesi-tate to conform that Face-book quickly becomes dis-missed as a soulless realm where people endlessly feed on their own egos.

According to spoken word artist, Prince Ea, in his perspective Facebook has rendered a discon-nected society. In a video he released on Facebook and YouTube on Sept. 30, the American poet de-clares, "Why I Refuse to Let Technology Control Me." Some harsh truths

he shares in his "Can We Auto-correct Human-ity" viral video include uncomfortable facts. Did you know that a person spends an accumulated four years of his or her life looking down at their cell-phone? That's a virtual life of pixels on a screen, rather than a real life with real circumstances.

Prince Ea continues to describe how Facebook has become the epitome of an antisocial network due to its emphasis on separa-tion and disconnection of people rather than solidi-fication of human connec-

tion. Even when people are in the same room or bedroom, iPhones or iPads are still the center of attention.

"So many 'I's, so many 'selfies,' not enough 'U's and 'We's," informs Ea, who ultimately feels the conception of social net-work has become time and self-absorbing. The St. Louis native divulges on what society has been reduced to: instead of friendships and real life interactions with loved ones, the idea of self-worth has only become measured by the number of online likes and follow-ers one can attain. The silver lining within this message is quite a simple solution.

After all, his critique in pertinence to the pitfalls of social media, strongly suggest that we as indi-viduals all still have the willpower to take control instead of being controlled ourselves by the enticing qualities of modern tech-nology. With that being said, the irony is that in order to reach the masses, the poet had to use social media to spread his mes-sage. Although Prince Ea himself says, “there is no auto-correct for what is happening; everyone has to make the choice to pow-er down their cellphones

at the end of the day and take a break from human-ity.”

While Ea’s attitude to-wards Facebook reflects that of many, the social network has plenty of up-side that tends to be vast-ly overlooked. Nowadays we associate Facebook as overly-dramatic and time-consuming and while that may be true hand in hand, the platform has the ca-pability to become a great tool in education and self-prioritization. We eas-ily forget that Facebook was primarily designed to bring people together through mutual inter-ests. We also forget that Facebook is an important instrument for consum-er-based marketing and

information in which ma-jor companies and local businesses can improve their image, profiting, and demographic through posting announcements and updates online. Face-book, in other ways, can also act as a database to scholarly information via through sources on Wikipedia and newswor-thy directory sites such as ESPN and CSPAN in which users can obtain updates to trending news and stories. There are so many redeeming quali-ties to Facebook that go unnoticed, that as an end

result it just becomes nar-row-minded of us to make quick negative assess-ments before we can even fully grasp a complete un-derstanding about what something truly is inside and out.

Facebook is a great way to keep in touch with your family and friends that live far away. With in-stant messaging and even video chat, Facebook is the perfect environment to stay connected. With the status updates, pho-tos, and profile informa-tion, it can keep you up to date on the happenings of all of your close ones.

Although critics claim that Facebook isolates people from one another by putting users behind a

computer screen, a 2011 article in Psychology To-day explains that Face-book allows members to quickly and efficiently ex-change information they once held private. For business users, this open communication channel means that customers can ask questions they may feel uncomfortable asking in person or even over the phone. In addi-tion, the nearly real-time communication facilities available on Facebook al-low business owners to provide customer service and answer sales ques-tions directly though the social networking service.

Networking has always been a key component of business, but Facebook’s massive social network contains significant re-sources for people seeking exposure. With just a few keystrokes, business own-ers can quickly update key contacts, suppliers, investors, and high-value customers. When pub-licly posting news about a company’s services or offerings, though users should remain aware that competitors can see this information; for this reason, business owners should use discretion with sharing.

Facebook offers a num-ber of benefits to mar-keting professionals and small business owners alike. With its massive user base, Facebook gives marketers a nearly lim-itless audience for com-mercial messages. In ad-dition, Facebook ad tools allow business users to target message delivery using a variety of demo-graphic information that ranges from geographic location to age, relation-ship status and even sex-ual preference. Facebook also provides an array of analytical tools that mar-keters can use to gauge advertising effectiveness and adjust ads as neces-sary.

Just as business owners

Facebook from page 7must remember that com-petitors can see publicly posted information, savvy entrepreneurs can use the service’s public communi-cation venues to research offers from other compa-nies. Some organizations use Facebook pages to post newsletters and oth-er updates, and business owners can use this infor-mation to keep abreast of competitor activity. In ad-dition, Facebook users fre-quently share interesting details about their lives with hundreds of friends; business owners can use this information to keep track of popular culture and emerging trends. By staying up to date on cus-tomer interests, business-es can adapt to changing environments.

While these are only a small handful of traits compared to the massive serving-size Facebook has to offer, the platform has numerous capabili-ties that have either gone unaddressed or were sim-ply blackballed from the beginning of the conver-sation. With that being said, Facebook can be a brilliant asset to a savy business mind or simply an average Joe. The secret to operating Facebook cor-rectly and appropriately is to not become attached to its glimmering pixels. People have the tendency to abuse it functions and therefore cast themselves at the stake when their selfish urges become too much to handle. It must be utilized in moderation in order to reestablish its reputation as well as our own. In conclusion, Face-book offers a world of re-sources but in order for us to find these elements we must explore the world itself instead of staring aimlessly at your inbox awaiting the crimson no-tifications.

Drew Mattiola is a third-year student majoring in communica-tion studies. He can be reached at [email protected].

MCT Campus

[email protected]

NOVEMBER 10, 2014 THE QUAD FEATURES PAGE 9

Tree planting offers valuable experience

By Kristen B. CrossneySpecial to the Quad

Saint Bernard de Clairvaux once said, “Believe one who

knows: you will find some-thing greater in woods than in books. Trees and stones will teach you that which you can never learn from masters.”

There are many ben-efits of trees, and planting

a tree can be a personal and satisfying experience. Trees provide shade and windbreaks around build-ings, which can reduce heating and cooling costs. There are many additional benefits to the natural en-vironment, including soil protection and improving the quality of surface wa-

ter. Trees are a relatively simple approach to com-bat climate change and reduce carbon dioxide.

The Gordon Natu-ral Area on South Campus provides a deciduous woodland buffer in the Plum Run watershed, sur-rounded by develop-ment. The preser-vation of the Gordon

Natural Area (GNA) is im-portant for both environ-mental vitality and sustain-ability. Seasonal tree plantings are a crucial step in the restoration and pro-tection of forests, especially the GNA.

The most recent tree planting in the GNA was Saturday, Oct. 25. The Pennsylvania De-partment of Community and Economic Develop-ment’s Watershed Resto-ration & Protection Grant and the Brandywine Con-servancy’s Reforestation Campaign funded this ef-fort. Trees and stakes that

would be used for protec-tion were delivered earlier

in the week. The planting area was then organized and marked in prepara-tion for the volunteers’ ar-rival.

Approximately 75 stu-dents and Rotary Club members joined together to plant 300 trees. White oak, sugar maple, horn-beam, hackberry, eastern red cedar, and gray birch trees were grown at the Octoraro Native Plant Nursery.

There are many envi-ronmental benefits of tree plantings in the GNA. These trees will provide

Goshen Hall competed in

brownie bakeoffBy Abby Goss

Staff Writer

Imagine this: after a long Monday of 8 a.m. classes and afternoon

lectures, you head back to your dorm building and it smells like deli-cious, homemade brown-ies. Then, you look in the lobby and you see tables covered in brownies and ice cream. Sounds pretty awesome, right? Well, this was what Goshen Hall residents came inside to find on Monday Nov. 3 at 8 p.m.

Goshen Hall hosted a brownie bakeoff last Mon-day. Teams from almost every floor gathered in the kitchen to compete for a prize. The floors that com-peted were the second, third, fourth, sixth, and seventh. The fifth floor decided to sit this compe-tition out.

Goshen Hall provided brownie mix, eggs, sugar, milk, and oil as well as the kitchen. The rest was up to the creativity of the bakers. Also, absolutely no nuts were to be includ-ed in the recipes due to al-lergies.

Each floor created their own unique brownies. The second floor baked “pop brownies.” They were classic brownies with pop tarts baked on top.

The third floor made “gimme s’more.” These were homemade s’more brownies with graham crackers, chocolate, and marshmallow.

The fourth floor created “classic sprinkle brown-ies.” They were classic brownies with sprinkles on top.

The sixth floor baked “pretzel and M&M”

brownies as well as “Oreo brownies.”

Finally, the seventh floor created “black and white” brownies, which were brownies filled with milk chocolate chips and topped with white choco-late chips.

As soon as the tables were set and brownies were cut into bite size pieces, students rushed downstairs to get a taste. The lobby was packed with lines snaking around the entire first floor. Everyone could not wait to try these delicious treats.

Each student got to taste each type of brown-ie and then vote on their favorite kind. There was also vanilla and neapoli-tan ice cream to wash down the rich chocolate taste.

I was a member of the seventh floor team. We had a great time attempt-ing to achieve the perfect brownies. However, next time we need to remember to keep the brownies in for the full amount of time. One of our batches ended up rather undercooked.

Congratulations to the third floor for winning the brownie bake off! The “gimme s’more” brownies were delicious, and they achieved a well-deserved win. Great job, every-one!

If you are interested in having an event like this in your building, contact your RAs. Hopefully there will be more brownie bakeoffs in the future!

Abby Goss is a first-year student majoring in English with a minor in journalism. She can be reached at [email protected]. Follow her on Twitter at @AbbyGoss.

wildlife habitat and re-duce the amount of wa-ter going into the East Branch of Plum Run. Ad-ditionally, trees take in and store carbon, produce oxygen, and reduce air pollution all of which will improve the environmen-tal quality of the GNA, and subsequently WCU.

There are many oppor-tunities to participate in community tree plant-ings. Three hundred more trees will be planted in the spring in the Gordon Natural Area.

This fall, the Brandy-

wine Conservancy worked with almost 500 volun-teers to plant 3,400 trees.

“Like” the Facebook pages of The Gordon Nat-ural Area, Brandywine Conservancy and WCU Sustainability to keep up to date on volunteer op-portunities and other tree news.

Kristen B. Crossney, PhD is an Asso-ciate Professor in the Department of Geography and Planning and she is the Communications Subcommittee Chair for the Sustainability Advi-sory Council. She can be reached at [email protected].

Photo by Gerry Hertel



PAGE 10 THE QUAD FEATURES NOVEMBER 10, 2014

Monsters, ghosts, and ghouls occu-pied the streets in

the city that never sleeps as I visited New York for the weekend.

On Friday, I touched down a little before noon, in time to enjoy the lunch-time rush from a small cof-fee shop table on 33rd St. From there, I indulged in some shopping and sight-seeing around 7th Ave and Broadway. Be sure to wear comfortable shoes in New York because the blocks seem to never end.

After lunch and shop-ping, I made my way up to the East Village area which was home for the weekend. The area is pleasantly quaint in size and has every single type of Asian cuisine you can imagine. I found myself in Klong, a small Tai res-taurant in Soho, for din-

ner where the food was excellent and the service was very nice. I strongly recommend it.

As I walked home from dinner, I ran into many runaway convicts, axe

Student visits NYC for Halloween

By Shawn K. TrawickSpecial to the Quad

murders and hockey mask killers - all costumes, of course. The streets were filled with traditional Halloween activity in ad-dition to the usual ram-bunctious nightlife New York City offers.

Celebrities such as Be-yonce, Heidi Klum and Jay-Z showed up, dis-guised as Frida Kahlo, a butterfly, and Jean- Michel Basquiat, at the city’s annual Halloween Parade.

Later that evening, a friend of mine secured us backstage tickets to an electronic dance music (EDM) concert and party at New York’s Pier 94. The show was amazing with acts like DJ Snake and DJ Tchami from Par-is providing music so that every little monster in the building could dance the night away.

The following day came with gloomy skies and cold rain, but that did not stop

us from riding the subway through the city’s precious boroughs in search of piz-za and winter garments. It was essential to check out New York’s vast variety of flagship stores like the

Ralph Lauren Lounge or the amazingly affordable UNIQLO, a relatively new Japanese superstore that offers quality clothing for minimal prices.

We also succeeded in scoring some famous Big Apple pizza slices at Man-hattan’s Famous Fami-glia.

On Sunday, my last day in the big city, I started the day early with a walk through Time Square to Central Park where the 2014 New York City Mar-athon was taking place. Over 50,000 runners par-ticipated in the 26 mile trek through all of New York’s boroughs.

On the way back from the park, I passed through a cultural festival that blocked off over half of 6th Ave. in order to make space for the festivities such as various food ven-dors and merchants.

A typical New York Sunday would not be

complete without a trip to a museum so I stopped at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), where I received a 60 per-cent discount for be-ing a student. That’s right; it only cost me fourteen bucks to view some of most recognizable mod-ern art and exhibits from artists such as Warhol, Picasso and Van Gogh.

The experience was a time well spent and New York, as well as Hallow-een, never ceases to entertain me. I am

very glad I got to mix the two during a great week-end getaway.

Shawn K. Trawick is a third-year student majoring in communication studies and political science. He can be reached at [email protected].

Student equity matters

By Kirsty PaloPracticum Writer

College is only four years, but a lot can happen in that

amount of time. Most stu-dents struggle to gradu-ate on time, whether it is due to getting off course because of life problems, switching majors, or sim-ply feeling overwhelmed with making college de-cisions. Some students do not even manage to graduate at all, and it is a concern at WCU. The sta-tistics in these two areas are being closely watched, and WCU is focused on finding solutions to clos-ing the equity gaps that cause these problems for students.

On WCU’s campus, various departments help run the Equity Matters campaign. What is the Equity Matters campaign really about? It’s the com-mitment to closing the persistent a c h i e v e -ment gaps b e t w e e n s t u d e n t s due to eth-nicity and income.

L a s t week, the Council for Diversity, Inclusion, and Academic Excellence as well as the Retention/Graduation committee teamed up to give a presentation that was useful to both profes-sors and students about being aware of issues that pertain to diversity.

WCU prides itself on be-ing a diverse campus, and sometimes within those diversities are minorities that seem to either fall behind or face barriers. One of the ways that the presenters talked about lessening the barriers was

doing away with applica-tion fees.

The first issue touched upon was announced by keynote speaker and pro-gram director of Educa-tion Delivery Institute, Ellyn Artis, who said, “It’s not about why students make poor decisions; it’s about why we as admin-istrators take it by sur-prise.”

The key phrase of the presentation was that graduation rates and eq-uity gaps were “every-one’s business.” This idea of the welfare of WCU’s students being “every-one’s business” was said to be just that - the job of everyone; including not only administrators, but students too.

America is one of the only countries where old-er people are more likely to have credentials than younger people, and in our growing society that is simply not acceptable.

While WCU has a 68.8 percent gradu-ation rate, eq-uity gaps still exist. Some steps that were consid-ered useful to administrators were to use data to un-

derstand barriers, clarify pathways for students to progress easier, ensure consistent and accurate communication, and make it “everyone’s business.”

The most important part about having a goal is having a plan to deliver the goal. One of the worst ways to fall into an equity gap is by being undeclared in one’s major. “Without a declared major, students are missing an academic home,” said Artis. It only becomes harder for stu-dents to navigate college,

leaving it easy for them to become confused and hopeless.

Another way to help students, as pointed out by an administrator in the audience, is to take note of how different ways of phrasing things to stu-dents can make them open to receiving help. It was said that more stu-dents respond positively to a simple “how’s it go-ing?” rather than “do you need help?” Although much of the presentation was centered around sta-tistics and strategies that professionals can do to help lessen equity gaps as educators, there was still a lot of students in the au-dience.

When it came time for Q&A, students were left wondering what it was they could do to help.

Students found that what they could do to help was make sure their student leaders are well informed. Student Gov-ernment is crucial to the well-being of the student body because they have the largest voice, and that organization also has the money and power to affect change.

The students on cam-pus are the ones paying for their education, and they are the ones that know firsthand the bottle-necks that occur on cam-pus, much more so than any administrator.

There is power in stu-dents’ collectiveness, and students have to make it known to advisors or professors when they are having trouble getting the classes that they need, or if they feel they’re not be-ing offered enough intel-lectual stimulation and exploration.

It is only through the necessary teamwork of both students and admin-istrators that graduation rates will increase and eq-uity gaps will close.

Kirsty Palo is a fourth-year student majoring in English with a minor in journalism. She can be reached at [email protected].

Photo by Shawn K. Trawick

Photo by pixabay.com

NOVEMBER 10, 2014 THE QUAD FEATURES PAGE 11

CRU reaches out to the campus with Fall Fest

By Mike RomanSpecial to the Quad

CRU, Campus Cru-sade for Christ, is an interdenomina-

tional evangelical Chris-tian organization founded in 1951. Since then, it has expanded through out the whole world.

The group holds many different local confer-ences and national con-ferences throughout the year designed for college age Christians desiring to learn more about the bi-ble. CRU has one ultimate goal: to share the story of the Bible and Jesus Christ internationally to men, women, and children of all ages.

WCU’s chapter of CRU held their annual Fall Fest in the Academic Quad from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Wednesday Nov. 4. Fall Fest is designed specifically for college stu-dents to come and get a chance to meet Christians of campus.

Every fall semester, CRU holds this event hop-ing to draw students out who wouldn’t normally at-

tend a CRU meeting. The ministry provides

the campus with food and

fun for the five hours they are set up in the Quad. This semester there were stations set up with chili and deserts, pumpkin painting, and different

games like Kan Jam and Spike Ball.

The main draw, though, was a circle of couches set up off to the side of the food and games. These couches had bowls on them with different ques-tions designed to act as icebreakers. The hope was to set up and provide a comfortable atmosphere to sit down and talk with leaders from the ministry

who were eager to answer any questions other stu-

#WCULifeSkills educates students

about loansBy Jessica PeoplesSpecial to the Quad

When not in classes here at WCU, I spend my time

working inside the Fi-nancial Aid office as a WCU Life Skills Ambas-sador. In order to become qualified for the position, I was obligated to pass a series of online courses regarding student loans. Through the courses, I was able to gain a great deal of knowledge that I would have otherwise been oblivious to.

Prior to this experience, I was unfamiliar with the nature of student loans, and the way in which they function. However, through the knowledge that I acquired, not only do I understand the infor-mation, but I also feel con-fident enough to explain it to others.

With that being said, I had learned four crucial aspects that pertain to student loans.

First, there are differ-ent types of student loans, such as Direct, Private, Perkins, and PLUS. Each type of loan possess char-acteristics that influence the decision of certain individuals regarding which type of loan to bor-

row. The student, must sit down and research which option is best for them.

Furthermore, there are various methods to repay student loans including standard, graduated, ex-tended, income-based, in-come-contingent, and pay as you earn.

Upon graduation, it is crucial that you research each of the options named above, and then choose the best one that corre-lates with your financial capabilities. If you are unable to pay your stu-dent loans at the time of repayment, do not hesi-tate to call your servicer; you may qualify for for-bearance or deferment. The worst possible thing that you can do is ignore the situation, because then your account goes into default, which could potentially result in your wages being garnished, the loss of any profession-al license(s) that you have previously obtained, a sig-nificant decrease in your credit score, as well as a few other consequences.

Lastly, student loan interest can potentially start accruing now! If you have an unsubsized loan, the interest on that loan begins to accrue the day

that the loan is disbursed, not after you graduate. Therefore, if you pay on it now then the interest does not seem as intimidating as it could be.

Through Life Skills, I have become more aware of the importance of being educated on student loans. Before this program, I had based all of my knowledge off of assumptions rather than factual information; however, now I am able to graduate with confidence knowing that I am educat-ed on the various aspects of student loans.

If you would like to learn more information about student loans, I will be holding weekly workshops on the follow-ing dates to share with you what I have learned: Wednesday, Nov. 12 at 6 p.m. (Brandywine 004A), and Thursday, Nov. 20 at 3 p.m. (Sykes 10B, ground floor). You can register for each of the events on-line at www.wcupa.edu/lifeskills. If you have any questions feel free to e-mail me at [email protected]. I look forward to seeing you!

Jessica Peoples is a third-year stu-dent majoring in middle grades preparation with concentrations in reading and mathematics. She can be reached at [email protected].

dents might have about CRU as a ministry or Christianity in general.

The event drew out a good number of students who came out for many

different reasons. While a lot of them were drawn in for the food and fun, many stayed and heard what the ministry members had to say about their views on the Bible and all that it teaches.

Though not all of the visiting students agreed with the views shared, many were willing to lis-ten and participate in a civil conversation.

CRU is held on Thurs-day nights at 8 p.m. in Main Hall room 168. The ministry also holds com-munity groups intermit-tently through out the week separated by school year (freshmen, sopho-more, junior, and senior).

Everyone in the minis-try eagerly invites all stu-dents out to their meet-ings. It is a welcoming atmosphere where anyone can seriously and comfort-ably hear more about the Bible and ask any ques-tions the like with out fear of judgment. We are certain that this will be a positive experience for all.

Mike Roman is a third-year student majoring in music education. He can be reached at [email protected].

Photo by Mike Roman

Photo by thewhizzer.blogspot.com

Photo by pixabay.com

PAGE 12 THE QUAD NOVEMBER 10, 2014

Indian Student Organization: Diwali CelebrationColleen Goldhorn/ Asst. Photography Editor

Student Goverment Association Monthly MeetingJose Mestre/ Photography Editor

NOVEMBER 10, 2014 THE QUAD PAGE 13

Student Goverment Association Monthly MeetingJose Mestre/ Photography Editor

Social Work Career FairColleen Goldhorn/ Asst. Photography Editor

VISIT WCUQUAD.COM TO SEE YOUR AD HERE

Classi� edsPAGE 14 THE QUAD NOVEMBER 10, 2014

HIRING SERVERSThe Duling-Kurtz House, an established restaurant in Exton, Pa is now hiring experienced servers and bussers. Please call 610-524-1830 or email us at [email protected].

HOW TO PLACE CLASSIFIED ADS

To place a classified ad, visit www.wcuquad.com, click on the link for “classifieds,” enter the wording of your ad exactly as you wish it to appear, select a category, choose dates of publication, and pay for your ad with any major credit card. Your ad will appear on our website, published in print and in our mobile edition. The rate is 30 cents per word, minimum of 20 words ($6 min. charge). Deadline is 11 a.m. on the Sunday before publication.

SERVICESPHILADELPHIA

INQUIRER dated 12/15/2013:

Chief SERS investor with-held information about a $3,000,000.00 loss in a pension fund investment. Despite its outside man-agers, SERS has faced a growing gap between its assets and its expected pension payouts, which the state had to meet by increasing taxpayer con-tributions to the system - about $1 billion in 2013, more than twice the level of two years ago. That has prompted Corbett to refer to SERS as a “tapeworm” in his budget... When you separate from service at WCU, transfer your funds immediately, to an SIPC insured retirement account, by calling Vance Usher, Securities Service Network 610-329-1056

Last Week’s Solutions

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2 8 9 3 6 7 4 5 13 4 5 8 9 1 7 2 66 7 1 2 4 5 3 8 95 9 3 6 7 8 2 1 44 1 8 5 2 9 6 7 37 6 2 1 3 4 5 9 88 2 7 4 1 6 9 3 59 5 6 7 8 3 1 4 21 3 4 9 5 2 8 6 7

Difficulty level: Challenge - 12.5

2 8 9 3 6 7 4 5 13 4 5 8 9 1 7 2 66 7 1 2 4 5 3 8 95 9 3 6 7 8 2 1 44 1 8 5 2 9 6 7 37 6 2 1 3 4 5 9 88 2 7 4 1 6 9 3 59 5 6 7 8 3 1 4 21 3 4 9 5 2 8 6 7

© Philip A. Thompsen, Ph.D.

Solutions will appear in the next issue of The Quad

The Quad SuDoKuFill in the grid so that each of the numbers 1 - 9 appears

once and only once in each

row, each column, and

each 3x3 square.

Read The Quad on your phone or tablet! Just visit wcuquad.com or scan this QR Code!

5 7 2 6 8 3 9 1 43 6 9 1 7 4 5 8 21 8 4 5 2 9 3 6 74 5 8 7 3 1 6 2 96 9 7 8 5 2 4 3 12 1 3 4 9 6 7 5 87 3 1 2 4 5 8 9 68 2 5 9 6 7 1 4 39 4 6 3 1 8 2 7 5

Difficulty level: Easy - 3

5 7 2 6 8 3 9 1 43 6 9 1 7 4 5 8 21 8 4 5 2 9 3 6 74 5 8 7 3 1 6 2 96 9 7 8 5 2 4 3 12 1 3 4 9 6 7 5 87 3 1 2 4 5 8 9 68 2 5 9 6 7 1 4 39 4 6 3 1 8 2 7 5

© Philip A. Thompsen, Ph.D.

Across1 Loop in old Westerns6 Kind of purpose10 Future J.D.’s exam14 Putting green border15 Welding sparks16 Sicilian smoker17 *Arm, to an ace pitcher19 Turkey or fox follower20 Opposite of ecto-21 “Moonstruck” Oscar winner22 Valerie Harper role23 Statement of agreement24 *Issue that halts negotiations26 Sluggish28 What a goldbrick does29 Cooking aids30 Cry of surrender33 *Monetary love, in Timothy38 French wine region39 “Hands o� !”40 Deck crew boss43 Full of spunk45 *One in the infantry49 __-Aztecan languages50 Finish by51 Bird along the coast52 Beat it

53 Pinball goof54 Unswerving, and a hint to the

starts of the answers to starred clues

56 Fit to __57 “Come Back, Little Sheba”

playwright58 Asian vine leaf59 Stockholder’s concern60 Former OTC watchdog61 Bobrun runners

Down1 “You’ve got carte blanche”2 Nondiscriminating immigration

policy3 Mendelssohn’s “Elijah,” for one4 Unaided5 Tolkien giant6 Russian country home7 “Family Matters” nerd8 Biting9 WWII carrier10 Deadly11 Butter� y, e.g.12 Voltaic cell terminals13 Golden Horde member18 Treated, as a sprain

22 Christ the __: statue in Rio24 Have little faith in25 Little stream27 Gaza Strip gp.30 Sci-� vehicle31 One of the Bobbsey twins32 A.L. Central team, on score-

boards34 Cry of woe35 Sundial number36 Protect against heat loss, say37 Made it big, as in school

athletics40 Mackerel relative41 Truckloads42 Conditions43 Charges for services44 Alpine airs45 Like a curled-up position46 Soprano Mitchell47 Pharmacy inventory48 How a 59-Across is typically

shown52 Pumped product54 Five smackers55 Ones taking hikes: Abbr.

Email [email protected] TO SEE YOUR EVENT HERE

CalendarNOVEMBER 10, 2014 THE QUAD PAGE 15

Ongoing Knaur Art GalleryVictor Spinski/Retropective On exhibit at the Knaur Art Gallery in Swope Hall through Friday, November 14. For more info see www.wcupa.edu/cvpa.

Ongoing New GalleryLost and Found: Philadelphia Dumpster Divers On exhibit at the New Gallery in the E.O. Bull Center for the Arts through Friday, December 12. For more info see www.wcupa.edu/cvpa.

Ongoing Veteran’s CenterStockings for Soldiers Help support the troops that are overseas during the holidays by donating items that will be stu� ed into stockings and sent to the troops to let them know they are in our thoughts and to remind them of home. For more info visit www.wcupa.edu/_Services/stu.slv

Ongoing Around CampusThe 18th Annual Bear Fair By donating a new teddy bear in any of the designated collection bins on campus, you can help children who are in local hospitals, living in homeless shelters, or from low-income families that can’t a� ord presents this holi-day by providing them with a comforting and supportive teddy bear. For more info and for bear drop-o� locations, visit wcupa.edu/volunteer or contact Sierra Calaman at [email protected].

Weather OutlookClear / Hi 58 / Lo 41

4:15 PM Sykes 115Post Election Discussion Panel The panel will consist of a number of recent WCU grads (and one or two) current students who were involved in managing or working on political campaigns this election season. They will be able to share their experiences with the audience. The event is hosted by the political science department

7:30 PM Philips Autograph LibraryFaculty Recital Emily Bullock, mezzo-soprano. Musical selections by Granados, Duparc, Crescenz and others. For more info see www.wcupa.edu/cvpa.

All Day BarnabysDine and Donate You’re Invited to Dine And Donate With the Students In Communication Club! Join Us for a night of food, drinks and the Eagles. 15% of receipt goes to the mem-bers of S.I.C.


11:30 AM- 1:30PM Sykes 115Wonder Woman of West Chester Lunch and Learn Meet and talk with in� uential women of West Chester

Nov. 11-13 Sykes BallroomGood Cause Cafe The Abbé Society invites you to the annual Good Cause Café book sale (there will also be co� ee available as well as baked goods for sale). All proceeds bene� t Family Services of Chester County’s Project ONE, which provides counseling, health and wellness services, housing information, and food to individuals impacted by HIV/AIDS in and around Chester County. For more infor-mation about how to volunteer, please con-tact Sarah Walker at [email protected]

7:15 PM Sykes 115SGA General Assembly meeting All WCU students are invited to this weekly meeting of your Student Government Association.

7 PM Hollinger Field House Women’s Volleyball vs PSAC quarter� nals

8:15 PM Ware Family RecitalInstrumental Honors Recital Directed by Dr. Chris Hanning

9-11 PM Sykes Open Mic Night English Club’s monthly open mic night welcomes all performers: poets, musicians, comedians, and more. Simply show up and sign up to perform. For more info: [email protected]

Read The Quad on your phone or tablet! Just visit

wcuquad.com or scan this QR Code!

Weather OutlookPartly Cloudy / Hi 56 / Lo 33

6 PM Friends AssociationFamily Night Line Dancing at Friends As-sociation for Care and Protection of Children, 113 W Chestnut St, West Chester, PA 19380, United States. Volunteers are needed to help with this fun event from 6-8 p.m. For more details, please contact Robin Meixner at [email protected] to sign up.

5:30-7:30 PM Philly LocationWCU Philadelphia Info Session Flexible courses, 10% tuition reduction, ideal for working professional

11 AM Sykes Common GroundsSAC Superhero Event Come be your inner superhero. There will be cape and mask mak-ing, as well as, free food

10 AM- 5 PM Around CampusThe Vietnam War: A 50 Year Commemo-ration of the Helicopter War The day will feature a series of prominent speakers, both scholars and practitioners, and a special ex-hibit highlighting the history of helicopter development in the Delaware Valley. For more info: [email protected]

7:30 - 9:30 PM Main Hall 168Holocaust and Genocide Studies in Aca-demic Year 2014-2015 Music, Protest, and Revolution Lecture by Dr. Ingrid Bianca. Dr. Byerly is working on two books, one for stu-dents entitled, To a Certain Degree: The Art of Graduating, and one in ethnomusicology, entitled Things Come Together: The Music Indaba of Late-Apartheid South Africa. In her speech, Dr. Byerly will be examining the use of popular music as a method of political and social protest. For more information contact: 610-436-2972


8:15 PM Ware Family RecitalKeyboard Honors Recital Directed by Dr. Patricia Powell

8:15 PM Ware Family Recital HallFaculty Recital Musical selections by Turks, Head, Knot; directed by Peter Paulsen

7:30 PM Sykes TheaterSuperheroes A look in to the world of Real Life Superheroes (RLSH) – a national phe-nomenon comprised of hundreds of men and women who have superhero alter-egos. This � lm delves into what inspires real life superheroes to patrol city streets with the goal of deterring violent crime and, if neces-sary, taking the law into their own hands. We are introduced to dozens of real life superhe-roes across the country. Discussion to follow. This � lm co-sponsored by the Department of Criminal Justice.

7:30 PM Lawrence CenterBook by Book: Bananeras - Women Transforming the Banana Unions of Latin America Over the past 20 years, Bananeras, women banana workers, have organized themselves and gained increasing control over their unions, their workplaces, and their lives. This highly ac-cessible and narrative book recounts the history and growth of this vital movement. Co-Sponsored by Gender Studies Club and the Women’s Center. For more information contact 610-436-2122.


1-3PM Lawrence Center 225Workshop Ask An Employer Come and meet an employer who will answer your questions. Get the employer’s perspective on interviewing, resumes, experience, pro-fessionalism or any question related to your career! ALL STUDENTS & ALUMNI WELCOMEEmployer will be available on a � rst-come-� rst serve basis (15 minute increments)

4 PM Phillips Autograph Library Actuarial Science Academy Scholar, Stu-dent, & Alumni Reception You’re invited to the Actuarial Science Academy Program: Scholar, Student, and Alumni Reception with Keynote Speaker Sta� ord Thompson! Join Actuarial Sciences Students, Faculty, and Alumni for refreshments and networking

7:30 PM Hollinger Field HouseWomen’s basketball vs Concordia College

6 PM Hollinger Field HouseMen’s basketball vs West Virginia Wes-leyan College

7:30 PM Emilie K. Asplundh HallVoca People You won’t believe your ears! No instruments, no sound tricks. Just eight incredible talents breathing life into the greatest music on Earth! Tickets: $15-$25

7:30 & 10:30 PM Sykes TheaterSAC Movie of the Week Guardians of the Galaxy. A group of space criminals must work together to stop the fanatical villain Ronan the Accuser from destroying the galaxy. Di-rected by James Gunn.

8 PM Madeleine Adler TheaterImprints, a dance concert University Dance Company’s annual fall concert, Im-prints, includes work by current WCU dance faculty and professional guest dance artists from the Philadelphia metro area and be-yond. Tickets: $12-$15

9 PM Sykes Sykes After Dark: WCU Hunger Games Part 1 In preparation for the new hunger games movie Mockingjay Part 1, we will have a hunger games themed night com-plete with merchandise give-a-ways and tickets to see the movie!


12-10 PM Sykes BallroomGeek Out Day First annual celebration of all things nerdy and geeky with a focus on doing some good. If you’re a hardcore nerd or just want to embrace your inner geek for a little while, all are welcome to attend. There will be live musical performances by the Suspensions and the Gamer Symphony Orchestra, a cosplay contest, a green screen photo room, the opportunity to challenge a real-life Pokémon Elite Four and Champion Open tabletop gaming just to name a few!! O� cial Geek Out Day t-shirts available for purchase as well. Proceeds from the event will be donated to Child’s Play

2 & 8 PM Madeleine Adler TheaterImprints, a dance concert University Dance Company’s annual fall concert, Im-prints, includes work by current WCU dance faculty and professional guest dance artists from the Philadelphia metro area and be-yond. Tickets: $12-$15

7:30 PM Hollinger Field HouseWomen’s basketball vs University of the Sciences in Philadelphia


6 PM Ware Family Recital HallCello Studio Recital Directed by Ovidiu Marinescu

3 PM Madeleine Adler TheaterHarp Festival Directed by Ms. Gloria Galante.



7 PM Emilie K. Asplundh HallWind Symphony and Concert Band Di-rected by Dr. M. Gregory Martin


Ongoing New GalleryLost and Found: Philadelphia Dumpster Divers On exhibit at the New Gallery in the E.O. Bull Center for the Arts through Friday, December 12. For more info see www.wcupa.edu/cvpa.

[email protected]

PAGE 16 THE QUAD ENTERTAINMENT NOVEMBER 10, 2014

Follow the Quad on Twitter!@TheQuadWCU

Kindergarten Shows works to grow WC’s music scene

“Interstellar” shines as a visual and intellectual masterpieceRob GabeStaff Writer

Christopher Nolan’s “Dark Knight” Tril-ogy and “The Pres-

tige” are often cited as art-house pictures mas-querading as big Holly-wood blockbusters. The case has never been truer for his most recent inter-galactic traveling space film, “Interstellar.” As a matter of fact, there’s an argument to be made that this is Nolan’s most challenging work from a conceptual and theoreti-cal standpoint, even more so then the reversed, fractured narrative of “Memento” (2000) and the mind-bending “Incep-tion” (2010). Interstellar is one confounding space odyssey. Quite honestly, this is a film I’m still reel-ing from, so any opinion stated here is likely sub-jected to change, for bet-ter or worse, and that may take anywhere from a few months to a few years, or maybe it’s all the same de-pending on how we choose to interpret the space-time continuum.

Unquestionably in-spired by Ken Burns’ documentary series on the 1930s Dustbowl, a near-future vision of Earth has been made irreparable by violent dust storms. Areas have begun to depopulate and the sustainability of our food sources has dropped significantly, the only lasting crop used for agriculture being corn. Now facing a global apoc-alypse due to starvation and inhabitable condi-tions, Earth’s population is faced with a bitter re-

ality: Leave now, or die out. Meanwhile, Cooper (Matthew Mcconaughey), father of two and former NASA pilot, now farmer, follows a cryptic trail that leads to a finding that just might require him to partake in a near sui-cidal mission through the cosmos in order to save the planet. The only set-back is that he’ll have to leave his kids behind, one of which, Murph (Mack-enzie Foy), named after Murphy’s Law, who might never forgive him for say-ing goodbye.

After the semi-disap-pointment of 2012’s “The Dark Knight Rises,” a solid standalone film, and a great Batman film, but a poor end-cap that was overly campy and comic-bookish in tone as the follow up to the ultra-brooding, realistic and serious police drama “The Dark Knight,” I was looking to see Nolan back in top form. His films aren’t mere casual week-end matinees, they’re events, and whether or not his previous film was problematic is beside the point. If Nolan’s name is attached, it’s a day-one showing, no question. But gathering the reception so far, it’s safe to say this is Nolan’s most polarizing film. While two-thirds of “Interstellar” are desig-nated to be a gratifying experience, the first thirty minutes being pure Spiel-bergian, its last act aims to divide viewers with abstruse, meta-physical head games.

I’ll preface this by say-ing I have no affinity for the science being present-

ed in “Interstellar” outside of the general understand-ing of a scientific theory introductory course, how-ever, astrophysicist and cosmologist Neil deGrasse Tyson seems to be in uni-son with the film’s hypo-thetical accuracy, even if some of it is entirely fabricated, so that’s good enough for me.

This is a film that re-quires viewers to put on their thinking-hat. Time, a reappearing theme No-lan’s been exploring ever since “Inception,” is fur-ther analyzed to a brainy-magnitude and viewed as a non-linear, quantum construct. When grav-ity shifts slow the passage of time, the task of keep-ing up n a r r a -tively is h a r d l y u n l i k e the in-dividual dreams levels of “Inception.” Until “In-terstellar,” Alan Moore’s “Watchmen,” specifically Chapter 4: Watchmaker, was the only popular fic-tion piece to radically al-ter my perception of time.

Moreover, regarding plot on their spacecraft named “Endurance,” Cooper is sent hurdling through space and kalei-doscopic worm holes, in company with chief scien-tist and biologist, Amelia Brand (Anne Hathaway) in search for a new, habit-able planet. Tagging along are Doyle (Wes Bentley), Romilly (David Gyasi), and a Tetris, jenga piece

resembling Robot named TARS whose offbeat hu-mor can be adjusted in percentages. Upon reach-ing an oceanic planet, circumstances turn dire and the sense of danger becomes overwhelming. At least they have TARS, who’s sarcastic jokes nev-er miss the mark.

There’s simply no de-nying that “Interstel-lar” is a visual extrava-ganza. Darting through worm-holes, attempting to optically comprehend extra-dimensional phys-ics and 5th dimensions is an experience that goes unmatched. Alfonso Cu-arón’s “Gravity” might’ve

h a d moviego-ers on the edge of their s e a t s , and “In-t e r s t e l -lar,” is prone to do the s a m e ,

but the paradoxical out-look of Nolan’s film is far more visionary. Chaper-oned by Hans Zimmer’s God-like church cathedral score, “Interstellar” near-ly becomes some sort of religious experience.

Above all, the film is about love, especially the parental kind, and finding spirituality and existen-tial meaning in a universe of binary. Nolan aims to cast humanity in a flat-tering light and it’s quite beautiful. Hathaway spills out in big, weepy tears, “Love is the one thing that can transcend time and space.” Even if it’s laid on a bit thick, the spiritual

gushiness of “Interstel-lar” is affecting. Nolan’s been criticized previously for leaving his audiences cold emotionally, here the sentimentality is through the roof and consequen-tially has also come under objection. I guess the man can’t win. I do agree that “Interstellar” has a few forceful “who’s peeling onions in here?” moments that are a bit reaching, nevertheless it’s hardly a knock against the film it-self that’s big heart never quits penetrating our soul emotionally. And even if Mcconaughey’s rambling, southern twang voice has become a parody of itself at this point (It has: See Jim Carry’s SNL spoof of Mcconaughey’s Lincoln Commercial), the actor generates an incredibly poignant performance of a father being placed at op-posite ends of the universe from his daughter, whose grown-up counter part is played by the equally mel-ancholy Jessica Chastain.

Just shy of three hours, “Interstellar” is a seat-shifting long haul made all the more bear-able by how astonishing a near ninety percent of it is. Even so, there are momentary pauses and stretches of dullness that I’ve never experienced in the past while watching a Nolan film. Although the writing is frequently substantial and weighty, there are scenes of verbal Ping-Pong that fall into the trap of plot exposition, Nolan telling us, rather then showing us. That’s to be expected by a film so permeated in abstract scientific theories, so it’s

hardly a heavy blow to the film’s sturdy legs.

“Interstellar” simply has to be seen, prefer-ably in theaters if you can make it out to your local IMAX. Seek out a 70mm IMAX projector screen-ing to take in every inch of its spectacular glory. I found myself caught up in the film’s more intellectu-ally heady ideas rather than its set-up, especially since the world building, at least on the home front, felt rather muted, the stakes not feeling nearly as high as they should. As a meditation on the human experience, and how both simultaneously frightening and angelic our place in the universe is, “Interstellar” works best when it makes the sensation of astronomical insignificance seem awe-inspiring and tear-jerking. Leaving the theater, I felt so negligible set against the boundless backdrop of our star system, and there was something celestial, rather then terrifying about that. A film that produces that type of con-templative reflection has to be commended in one way or another. Time will tell how it stacks up to classics such as Kubrick’s “2001: A Space Odyssey” (1968) and Tarkovsky’s Solaris (1972). It doesn’t quite reach the heights of Nolan’s bests (“The Dark Knight”, “The Prestige” or “Inception”), but for all its imperfections, “Interstel-lar” still remains one of a kind.

Rob Gabe is a fourth-year student majoring in communication studies. He can be reached at [email protected].

mctcampus.com

NOVEMBER 10, 2014 THE QUAD ENTERTAINMENT PAGE 17

Kindergarten Shows works to grow WC’s music sceneTyler Asay

Special to The Quad

In the Foo Fighter’s ongoing documen-tary series on HBO,

“Sonic Highways,” fa-mous ex-Nirvana drum-mer Dave Grohl and his crew of bandmates drive across the United States to explore what makes America’s music so spe-cial while recording their new album. So far they’ve sang the blues in Chica-go, riffed hardcore punk in Washington D.C., and twanged country in Nashville. These sepa-rate music scenes are all so special in their own way, but they all make up what makes our collective American music sensibil-ities so important.

Success always has to start somewhere. Every band has its origin, and every artist has his or her roots. Even Nirvana owes a large bit of debt to their local music scene of Se-attle, the motherland of grunge.

West Chester, Penn-sylvania, is no different. There is a thriving mu-sic scene right under our noses, just waiting to ex-plode. Its close location to Philadelphia creates great opportunities for young bands to start up and find success of their own. I recently sat down with Mitch Koehler and Kenny Miller, two indi-viduals who are work-ing to improve the scene along with others by creating Kindergarten Shows, a collective that is booking a variety of different shows and op-portunities for bands in the West Chester/Phila-delphia area. Their most recent event featured the bands Casual, Ratburn, Pocket, and Uncle/Father Oscar at Fennario’s on October 24.

“Like most of my ideas, I made a stupid joke. And then I think about it until

it’s finally a reality,” said Koehler regarding the for-mation of Kindergarten Shows. He then went to Miller, who he had known for many years because both of them have been playing in the area for many years. “We have al-ways seen eye to eye when it comes to building an inclusive music scene in town,” said Miller about their idea.

Koehler, 22, grew up in Bensalem, Pennsylvania, and is currently a stu-dent at WCU where he has been “living rich” for about a year. He current-ly plays bass in the band Scuzbot, who have been together for about 4 years. Scuzbot, who plays gritty, guitar-slaying punk rock, have released one record and are getting ready to release another that they have just finished record-ing. Koehler said it will be out by “mid 2015.” He also plans on releasing music with Andrew Huston.

Miller, 23, is originally from Doylestown, Penn-sylvania, and has been playing music since he was 12 years old. He plays in multiple bands: Broke-head, Spumoni, and Pi-ranha, but also releases music under the names Between Days and Glenn Matthews.

Regarding the state of the West Chester local music scene, Koehler said, “It doesn’t get enough credit.” Venues such as Fennario’s up on Church Street and the West Ches-ter VFW located near Paoli Pike offer great locations to see local or touring bands in the area that Kindergarten Shows has booked. “My Parents’ House, The Note, and The New Button all came and went, but I hope Kinder-garten Shows can serve the same purpose,” he said.

“I think that in some cases, having a lack of

venues can dampen a music scene, but in West Chester, I don’t think that’s the case,” said Mill-er. “West Chester has mu-sic lovers within the town limits; they just don’t al-ways know that the mu-sic is happening. Before you even know it’s there, a great spot like My Par-ents’ House disappears and you missed out.” This “community of music” is part of what makes Kin-dergarten Shows so spe-cial: individuals going out of their way to bring music to the people in any way possible.

“I think that the strength of community lies within the people that it consists of, not the nos-talgic value it holds or the personal ambitions of in-dividuals that contribute to it temporarily. At the same time, I’m entirely conflicted by those strong feelings of nostalgia and ambition outside of West Chester,” said Miller. “It’s what makes a local music scene such a deli-cate community effort.”

Also, bars such as The Social Lounge and Landmark offer open mic nights and jams for a more diverse audience.

West Chester’s close location to Philadelphia also offers great oppor-tunities for bands at-tempting to get a name out there. However, what people do not know is how important West Chester’s scene is to Philadelphia as well. “Philadelphia has a lot going on, but West Chester is a clean-er, more secluded town,” said Koehler. “I feel a little closer to the town because Scuzbot has been playing a lot of the Philly house shows, but I’m a fan of the suburbs.”

“There are lots of great bands from West Chester that play out in Philadel-phia,” said Miller. “One of my goals is to make that

relationship reciprocal,” Koehler said.

West Chester has every-thing that is necessary for a music scene to thrive: the people, the places, the environment, and the music. “I think people ap-preciate what we’re doing as far as live music goes,” said Koehler. All it takes is a group of people in the area who want to find that “community of music” and carve West Chester into the greater American mu-sical history.

Some upcoming events Kindergarten Shows wants locals to know about are as follows: Nov. 15 at the Golden Tea House in Philadelphia, with Scuz-bot, Mike Bell, Danger O’s, Lures, and Spumoni; and Nov. 21 at the West Chester VFW featuring Good Times, Steel Nation, and many others.

If you are a band look-ing to be booked by Kin-dergarten Shows, send an email to [email protected] or [email protected]. You can find them on Facebook as well along with information and the music of the various bands that will be play-ing at the shows, such as Scuzbot and Brokehead. Even if you don’t play in a band and just want to help out the scene, get in touch with them for up-coming shows and spread-ing the word.

Some advice that the guys from Kindergarten Shows offered individu-als trying to get started in the West Chester mu-sic scene: “If you can’t put your instrument down and all you hear is mu-sic in your head then run with it and do what makes

you happy,” said Miller. Koehler said, “Anyone can start a band, really. Bands only get better as they perform.”

By going out and sup-porting your local music scene, one can find more than just new, exciting music. “I felt included by strangers who had no obligation to include me, which was a new feeling for me,” said Miller. “I was inspired by that.”

“There are only so many of us keeping the torch alive,” said Koehler. “Ei-ther way, things are pick-ing up. As long as shows happen every month, it keeps the fun around the college and West Chester in general.”

Tyler Asay is a third-year student majoring in communication studies. He can be reached at [email protected].

Top Ten Artists of the Week

6. We Were Promised Jet-packs, “Unravelling”

RIYL: Frightened Rabbit, The Twilight Sad, Admiral Fallow

7. Stars, “No One Is Lost” RIYL: The Blow, Tanlines, Givers

8. Ben Howard, “I For-get Where We Were”

RIYL: Noah and the Whale, Mum-ford and Sons, Passenger

9. Hozier, “Hozier” RIYL: Vance Joy,

Broods, Dan Croll

10. Cold War Kids, “Hold My Home” RIYL: The Strokes, Lo-

cal Natives, The NationaL

1. Dads, “I’ll Be The Tornado” Recommended If you

like: American Football, Pity Sex, Tigers Jaw

2. Caribou ,“Our Love” RIYL: Jamie xx, Gold

Panda, Glasser

3. Flying Lotus, “You’re Dead” RIYL: Nosaj Thing,

Gold Panda, Shlohmo

4. Alt-J , “This Is All Yours” RIYL: Radiohead, Animal

Collective, Grizzly Bear

5. Broods , “Evergreen” RIYL: Mikky Ekko, Char-

lie XCX, MisterWives, Wet

PAGE 18 THE QUAD ENTERTAINMENT NOVEMBER 10, 2014

Serving Delaware and Chester CountiesFind yourself here.

TO REGISTER:Visit dccc.edu/winter or call 1-877-912-DCCC (1-877-912-3222).

Online Winter Classes Now AvailableOur winter session classes run December 19 through January 18.

■ Earn credits between semesters■ Enjoy the convenience of online learning■ Visiting students are welcome■ Seats are limited

WCU student tests out Lancaster’s Field of ScreamsClare Haggerty

News Editor

Finally, the time had come: I was going to Field of Screams. I

had wanted to go to Field of Screams for years, and it had never worked out. Last year, my friend and I made plans to go, but life got in the way. However, this was our year, and we were finally going.

The aforementioned friend lives in Lebanon, Pa. and Field of Screams is in Lancaster, so we had to drive around half an hour to get there. I could feel my excitement build-ing during the drive. Plus, this was an especially ex-citing outing because my friend and I were going for free.

I had gotten in touch with the Field of Screams staff earlier in the week,

offering to write an article about them in exchange for a ticket for my friend and me. They could not have been more generous, and they informed me that I simply had to visit the information booth upon my arrival; our tick-ets would be waiting for me.

When I went to pick up the tickets, imagine my surprise when I discov-ered that they were VIP tickets, meaning that we would not have to wait in any lines. This was such a nice gesture; I could not believe our luck. I have actually written about several other haunted attractions in a similar fashion, and I have never gotten VIP tickets before. However, the joke was on us because my friend and I brought her boyfriend and another friend with us, who did not have VIP tickets. Alas, we could not

use the VIP perk of the tickets, but I sincerely ap-preciated the gesture.

Field of Screams has four attractions: the haunted hayride, the Den of Darkness, Frightmare Asylum, and Nocturnal Wasteland. We started with the haunted hayride. As I settled into the hay, I could not deny my excite-ment. As we were pulled along through the attrac-tion, I was so impressed by the sets. The sets throughout the entirety of Field of Screams were actually some of the best I have ever seen—and take it from me that is saying something, because I have visited quite a few haunt-ed attractions. The sets notwithstanding, I have to admit that the hayride was a bit of a letdown. There were surprisingly few actors throughout the hayride, so the scares on the hayride were minimal.

However, the sets made up for the lack of scares, because I was genuinely impressed.

Next, we went to Noc-turnal Wasteland. My friends thought that this tour through a nuclear wasteland was the scari-est part. I cannot say that I agreed, but it definitely had its high points, and the set, yet again, was amazing. My own per-sonal Most Terrifying Mo-ment was when we were on a bridge—and it sud-denly tipped to an angle. I legitimately thought I was going to tumble into the “radioactive waste” below.

We next went to the Frightmare Asylum. Would I sound like a bro-ken record if I said that here, too, the sets were amazing? The Asylum was full of dismembered body parts and there were many corners around

which our worst night-mares lurked. I got scared several times in the Asy-lum. However, for me, nothing held a candle to the Den of Darkness.

We ended with the Den of Darkness, and boy, was it worth the wait. The vi-suals here were just as good as in the rest of the attractions until we hit a pitch black maze. As silly as it may seem, I was undaunted in the face of axe-wielding murderers, but when it came to the dark, I was like a snivel-ing schoolgirl. And, natu-rally, I had been leading the group throughout the attractions, based on my aforementioned brave face, so I led the way into the darkness. To say that I was nervous in the maze would have been an un-derstatement. I was ter-rified that someone was going to grab me from the dark and I literally would

not see him/her coming, or that I would make a wrong turn and send us into the clutches of a maniac. However, we made it out of the maze alive. Just as my heart was starting to go back to a normal pace, a chainsaw roared to life and a man came charging out of a dark corner of the last room in the house. I booked it out of there as quickly as I could.

All in all, I have only nice things to say about Field of Screams. I thought that the haunted hayride was a little cheesy, but the set was genuinely impressive. I really enjoyed all of the other attractions, particu-larly the Den of Darkness. I would love to go to Field of Screams again some-time, and maybe next time, I will get to do it as a VIP.

Clare Haggerty is a fourth-year stu-dent majoring in English. She can be reached at [email protected].

NOVEMBER 10, 2014 THE QUAD SPORTS PAGE 19

[email protected]

Golden Rams take down Warriors, 35-24

Brandon Monk and the West Chester University Gold-

en Rams football team trampled over the East Stroudsburg University Warriors on Saturday, winning by a score of 35-24.

Despite a late rally from the Warriors, the ground attack of the Rams was just too much for ESU to handle. Monk had a career day, carry-ing the ball 36 times for 257 yards, a career high. Monk also found the end zone twice in his domi-nant day, scoring two touchdowns. Glimpses have been sighted by Ram fans of Monk’s killer instinct through-out the season, but after Saturday, Golden Rams faithful can be confident in their running back as the postseason quickly approaches.

Standout senior quar-terback Sean McCartney held somewhat of a quiet role for the Rams Satur-day afternoon, outshined by the performance of Monk. McCartney still posted a solid stat line, throwing for 171 yards on 12-21 passing. He also capitalized three times on touchdown passes. McCartney, who has been struggling as of late, threw one inter-ception on Saturday, but with the help of his run-

ning game opening up the Rams play-action, McCartney found a way to still get the job done.

The Golden Rams of-fensive line played one of their best games to date. If there was a specific stat-line for an offensive lineman, you can surely believe that West Ches-ter’s would have been great. Whether keeping McCartney protected in the pocket, or provid-ing holes for Monk to explode, the offensive line certainly pounded away all day at the ESU defensive line, taking them out of the game as best as they could. Offensive lineman and their importance to a football team often go unnoticed, but this group of individuals deserves all the credit in the world for the job they have done in the trenches this year.

Tim Brown also pro-vided another excellent game for the Rams at tight end, catching three passes for 43 yards and two scores. Brown now has 12 touchdown recep-tions on the year, a team high, and has certainly become one of McCart-ney’s most consistent, and favorite targets.

Aiding Brown in the receiving core was Mike Doty. Doty caught four passes for 72 yards, along with a touchdown. Doty has been a strong receiver for West Ches-ter all season, despite sometimes flying under the radar compared to

Erick Brundidge. Brun-didge finished with just two catches for twenty yards.

The Golden Rams’ powerful defense came up big down the stretch on Saturday, holding

off ESU in their late at-tempt at a comeback. Leading the way for West Chester was the dynamic linebacker duo of Mike Labor and Ronell Williams. Labor and Williams combined for 13 tackles in the middle, while attempt-ing to shut down ESU running backs Robert Healy and Derrick Dyer. When at their best, La-bor and Williams are

one of the most danger-ous linebacker pairs in the conference. Both are still climbing the West Chester record books, in hopes of going down as two of the all-time greats to suit up in the purple and gold.

Despite throwing for 266 yards and three touchdowns, Warriors quarterback Bruce Campbell was picked off three times by the West Chester defense. Al-Hajj Shabazz grabbed his team-high third inter-ception on the season, along with two more coming from Blaise Schieler and Brandon Pepper.

Pepper had a chance at an interception at the

six-minute mark of the fourth quarter, but it fell through his hands. Pep-per didn’t have to wait long for another chance due to a lobbed pass down the sideline from Campbell, making an extremely athletic play to intercept the pass right in front of the West Chester goal line. The West Chester defense jumped on the opportu-

A.J. Arcaini Asst. Sports Editor

nities present by ESU mistakes, and certainly made them pay.

West Chester jumped out to an early 14-0 lead in the first quarter, but a strong third quar-ter from the Warriors landed the score at 28-24 entering the fourth quarter. After an ESU punt, the Rams received the ball right around the 11-minute mark. A time-consuming five-minute drive, orchestraed by McCartney and Monk, finished with a Brown touchdown from Mc-Cartney, the last score of the game, which left the score at 35-24 as time expired. Peppers inter-ception came after the Brown score, as ESU at-

tempted to march back down the field.

Still feeling the reper-cussions from the tough loss at Bloomsburg, a big conference win against a strong opponent could not have come at a better time. As the postseason approaches, this win will surely be taken into ac-count by national tour-nament voters.

West Chester current-

ly sits at second in the PSAC conference, trail-ing Bloomsburg due to the loss two weeks ago. All roads seem to lead to a possible postseason showdown between the two teams, who have battled hard against each other in the past seasons.

Last season, after dropping the PSAC championship to arch-rival Bloomsburg, West Chester was present-ed with an opportu-nity of vengence come late-November. When the match-up arrived yet again between the Golden Rams and the Huskies, West Chester did not let their second chance slip away.

Perhaps the win on Saturday was just what the Golden Rams needed to re-fuel themselves as late-November football approaches. With this strong win under their belts, the Rams will look to make a final push and find their way back into the Division II National Tournament.

Next up for West Chester will be Indiana University of Pennsylva-nia (IUP) Saturday. The Rams travel to IUP look-ing to take advantage of an up and down team that currently sits at 6-4. Another PSAC win would be huge for WCU, as the national tourna-ment standing are be-ginning to take form. West Chester must win at IUP on Saturday if they want to have a shot at a spot in the national tournament. Coming off to big-time wins, IUP is the final barrier that the Rams must bust through to reach their ultimate goal.

AJ Arcaini is a third-year stu-dent majoring in communica-tion studies with a minor in journalism. He can be reached at [email protected]

Coach Bill Zwaan paces the sidelines during West Chester’s 35-24 win against East Stroudsburg on Saturday.

wcupagoldenrams.com

Athlete of the Week: This week’s athlete of the week is Golden Rams volleyball player Julia O’Brien. In the � nal regular season weekend of play, she registered 42 kills while helping West Chester win both games, and recieve a playo� bid.

wcupagoldenrams.com

PAGE 20 THE QUAD SPORTS NOVEMBER 10, 2014 THE QUAD SPORTS NOVEMBER 10, 2014

Sanchez to the rescue?

The Eagles are set to take on the Carolina Panthers on Monday

Night Football at Lincoln Financial Field, with Mark Sanchez under center.

Yes, this is the same Mark Sanchez that is infa-mous for the “butt-fumble” incident that was shown on ESPN multiple times a day for months. But ,this is also the same Mark San-chez that led the New York Jets to the AFC champi-onship game two years in a row. So, which Sanchez will show up on Monday night?

That is the question all Eagles fans are ask-ing themselves after the news broke that QB Nick Foles will be out six to eight weeks with a bro-ken collarbone. With Foles sidelined, Sanchez must step up in prime time for his fi rst start in well over a year. Sanchez was out all of last season with a shoulder injury, spending his time mentoring then rookie QB Geno Smith in New York.

This offseason, Sanchez was released by the Jets, and the Eagles signed him to a one year contract. He was signed to be the back-up. Just in case Foles was unable to go, the Eagles would still have an expe-rienced quarterback at the helm. It’s a good thing they signed him.

Foles went down hard on his shoulder with seven seconds left in the fi rst quarter, and it was imme-diately evident that he was not going to be able to get up and continue playing in the game, a nightmare for Philadelphia fans.

Sanchez entered the game, tied at 7-7, and began to show some of the poise and ability he showed in the preseason,

completing his fi rst three pass attempts, capping the drive off with an 11 yard touchdown to rookie wide receiver, Jordan Mat-thews.

The touchdown to Mat-thews was Sanchez’s best throw of the day, lofting it over the Houston de-fender and dropping it perfectly into Matthew’s outstretched hands, hit-ting him in stride where only Matthews could make a play on the ball.

On the Eagles’ next drive, Sanchez delivered a catchable pass to rookie wide receiver Josh Huff, hitting Huff in the hands. Huff was unable to secure the catch, popping it up in the air right into the arms of Texans cornerback Jum-al Rolle. Rolle would inter-cept another of Sanchez’s

passes, this time late in the third quarter.

Sanchez made one other bad pass against the Tex-ans, when, in an attempt to

throw the ball away while alluding a pass rusher, he threw behind his receiver, directly into the hands of the Houston defender. Luckily for Sanchez, the ball was dropped, and he was able to avoid throw-ing his third interception of the day.

Sanchez fi nished the game completing 15 of 22 passes for 202 yards, two touchdowns and the two interceptions.

Overall, Sanchez looked suffi cient in the three quarters he played as the Eagles quarterback. He made some great passes, like the touchdown to Mat-thews and the 74 yard com-pletion to Jeremy Maclin, but he also had some bad decisions, like the dropped interception, and the two interceptions to Rolle.

In the end, Sanchez was able to lead the Eagles on a 15 play, 80 yard drive that took eight minutes off the clock in the fourth quarter

to stretch the lead to a two

By Billy ReardonSpecial to The Quad

Will Mark Sanchez crumble under the pressure as starting quarterback for the Eagles?

Photo by: mctcampus.com

score game, virtually seal-ing the deal for another Eagles victory.

Regardless of the bad passes, which Sanchez has shown throughout his ca-reer will happen, Sanchez was able to come up clutch during the most important part of the game, late in the fourth quarter with the game on the line, and he was able to get the Birds the win. That’s all the fans can ask for.

Monday’s game is a game that the Eagles need to win in order to stay atop the NFC East, and stay in the discussion as one of the top-tier NFC teams. Caro-lina is struggling mightily right now, posting a 3-5 record and currently riding a three game losing streak. The Panthers will be eager to break that streak, so it is essential that Sanchez and the Eagles offense is able jump out to an early lead against the Panthers.

Falling behind could be detrimental for a quarter-back who has not started

a game in over a year, es-pecially considering the game is under a national spotlight.

The Panthers defense looks like a shell of what it was last season, and quarterback Cam Newton is having the worst season of his young NFL career, but the talent level is still there. Newton is a very dynamic quarterback who is not afraid to run the ball and with linebacker Demeco Ryans out for the season, the responsibility to spy on Newton will fall on Mychal Kendricks and Casey Matthews.

Sanchez looks to lead an-other victory for the Eagles over the Panthers Monday night starting at 8:30 p.m. The broadcast will be on ESPN.

Billy Reardon is a third-year stu-dent majoring in communications with a minor in journalism. He can be reached at [email protected]


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Lady Rams heading to the playo� s

a game in over a year, es-pecially considering the game is under a national spotlight.

The Panthers defense looks like a shell of what it was last season, and quarterback Cam Newton is having the worst season of his young NFL career, but the talent level is still there. Newton is a very dynamic quarterback who is not afraid to run the ball and with linebacker Demeco Ryans out for the season, the responsibility to spy on Newton will fall on Mychal Kendricks and Casey Matthews.

Sanchez looks to lead an-other victory for the Eagles over the Panthers Monday night starting at 8:30 p.m. The broadcast will be on ESPN.

Billy Reardon is a third-year stu-dent majoring in communications with a minor in journalism. He can be reached at [email protected]

Ryan CalpinSports Editor

West Chester Uni-versity women’s volleyball team

entered the final week-end of the regular season looking to gain a postseason berth. They had to face a good Kutztown team and a struggling East Strouds-burg team.

The big game was against Kutztown on Friday, they needed to win in order to con-trol the head-to-head, if they would be tied at the end of the regular season.

West Chester did not start off well against Kutztown, as they dropped the first set 25-18. They needed to be able to bounce back in the sec-ond set, so they didn’t face a 2-0 hole. Bounce back is exactly what they did. They came out and dominated the second set 25-17. But as the match continued it became ob-vious that this game was going to be teeter totter game. That being said the third set went to Kutztown 25-19. Again West Chester needed to be able to bounce back from a losing set to keep their postseason hopes alive. West Chester did just that, they fought and won a tough, close set 25-22, to tie it up at two sets apiece. So it would come down to the final set, playing to

15 instead of 25. West Chester came out of that fifth set and took a 6-2 lead that Kutztown was not able to bounce back from, and West Chester took the fifth set 15-9, winning the match three sets to two. A huge win for West Chester, gain-

ing momentum heading into the final regular season game.

The final game of the season was against a poor East Stroudsburg team, and it was senior day for the Lady Rams. The lone senior, Julia O’Brien came out fir-ing, registering 20 kills in the three to zilch match victory over the Warriors. O’Brien was able to register 42 kills over the weekend, while teammate Marina Shar-key registered 20 kills. This weekend went all right for the Rams, and they will now post a 20-13 record heading into the PSAC playoffs.

West Chester will need big play from their biggest players. From the regular season the leaders on the team are Julia O’Brien who has 395 kills, followed by Marina Shareky with 275, and behind her is Victoria Cruciani with

159. Annalee Halbert is also a crucial key on this team. She is the main set-ter for the team, which allowed her to garner over 700 assists on the season. The next clos-est on the team is Macon Frey with just over 200 assists. They are also clicking at the right time, as Sharkey stated, “we have really come together in the last part of the season, and I think we are playing our best volleyball thus far. We are excited and

eager to see what the posteason has in store for us.”

The playoffs will begin on Tuesday when West Chester will travel to Pitt-Johnstown for the first game of the postsea-son. West Chester split the season series with Pitt-Johnstown. They won the match that was at home 3-1. However, they did drop the road match against them, 3-1. So they will need to find a way to play as a team on the road and move onto the next round.

Ryan Calpin is a third-year stu-dent majoring in communications with a minor in journalism. He can be reached at RC784188@wcupa

wcupagoldenrams.com

PAGE 22 THE QUAD SPORTS NOVEMBER 10, 2014

Men’s soccer team loses heartbreaker in PSAC Semi-Final match

Women’s soccer upended in PSAC playoffs

The West Chester University men’s soccer team took

their talents into the PSAC post-season tourna-ment last week, ending their run in the semifinals against Mercyhurst Uni-versity.

West Chester entered the post-season tourna-ment fourth seed and took on Slippery Rock, seeded fifth, during the Quarter-final round on Tuesday, home at Rockwell field. Slippery Rock (11-6-0, 7-4-0 PSAC) closed their regu-lar season the Saturday before with a 3-0 shutout over West Chester and re-turned to the scene of the season finale Tuesday to face an ironic reverse.

On a miserable, rain-soaked Saturday after-

noon where temperatures barely crept into the 40s, the Golden Rams were able to muster very little offense against The Rock. Tuesday, on a beautiful fall afternoon with abun-dant sunshine and tem-peratures challenging the 70-degree mark, the Gold-en Rams’ offense came alive with three goals all in the second half, proving the power and potential of the 2014 squad. Slippery Rock played the matchup without their top scorer Stephen Donnelly, which may have also been an ad-vantage for West Chester’s back line.

Sophomore Brian Schaefer broke the score-less tie in the 65th minute for the Golden Rams when he headed in a corner kick from Brett Glasco. A little over 13 minutes later, Alex Lean took a shot in off a Rock defender in front to

double West Chester’s lead to 2-0. Brett Beaumont slammed home a cross from Glasco moments later into an open net on a 2-on-1 break with five minutes remaining in the tilt, clos-ing the quarterfinal game with a force, 3-0.

Freshman goalkeeper Matt Palmer made four saves in goal for his first postseason win with the Purple & Gold. Palmer made a profound mark during the first 45 min-utes, keeping Slippery Rock off the scoreboard, despite The Rock holding a 7-3 edge in shots and an 8-0 advantage in corner kicks.

West Chester clearly came out of halftime hun-gry for a goal, after having one disallowed in the first half. The Golden Rams limited the Rock to just three shots in the final 45 minutes of play and only

one corner kick. Slippery Rock played the final eight minutes a man down, af-ter having a player sent off and after the matchup Slippery Rock (11-7) saw its 2014 campaign come to a close.

As anticipated all sea-son, The Golden Rams made their way into the semifinals of the PSAC post-season tournament for the third straight sea-son. On Friday morning, West Chester took on regular-season champion and seventh-ranked Mer-cyhurst University in Erie, Pa, leaving with a 2-1 loss and ending their hard-working season.

The matchup trailed with a slow start and an in-tense finish as both squads took the game into double overtime. Tommy Ryan took a feed from Christian Benner and was awarded the first and lone goal for

the Golden Rams when he beat Mercyhurst’s goal-keeper to the top left cor-ner in the 54th minute.

Jack Watson of Mer-cyhurst was awarded a penalty kick in the 89th minute of regulation, just moments before West Chester could’ve taken the game themselves. Danny Deakin of Mercyhurst then converted Watson’s attempt to knot the score 1-1 and trail both teams into overtime.

Back and forth, both squads battled to reach the back of the net but couldn’t seem to find it until a sec-ond round of overtime was set in place. Watson then scored the second goal for Mercyhurst, ending West Chester’s hard earned season. Palmer made 10 saves to keep the Golden Rams in the game.

Mercyhurst (11-2) went on to win the conference

title. The loss for the Gold-en Rams marks the third straight year in which West Chester dropped its conference semifinal match. West Chester has never won the PSAC Men’s Soccer Championship, however the Rams did play for the title in 2004. The squad is now 3-10-2 all time in PSAC Tourna-ment and will rest up for next year’s endeavors.

With various bumps in the road and a young team overall, the Golden Rams have worked for a hard-earned, successful season. The West Chester University men’s soccer team affiliates, specifically the 2014 seniors, have also proved their dedication and will be missed upon next season’s lineup.

Gianna Seeney is a third-year student majoring in communi-cations with a minor in jour-nalism. She can be reached at [email protected]

By Gianna SeeneyStaff Writer

By Dylan HarrisonStaff Writer

Ryan Calpin Sports Editor

West Chester Uni-versity women’s soccer team suf-

fer setback in PSAC tour-nament. The Lady Rams began their PSAC post-season journey at home against Gannon. They de-feated Gannon 3-0 in the Quarterfinal match up. They then traveled to East Stroudsburg to take on the Kutztown Golden Bears in the Semi-Final match, and were defeated for only their second loss of the sea-son, 4-2.

The Lady Rams began their PSAC postseason journey at home against Gannon. They defeated Gannon 3-0 in the Quar-terfinal match up. They then traveled to East

Stroudsburg to take on the Kutztown Golden Bears in the Semi-Final match, and were defeated for only their second loss of the sea-son, 4-2.

West Chester got off to a hot start against Gannon, when Nikki Lynch scored her first goal of the sea-son off an assist from se-nior Carly Yost. In a game where a lot of shots were attempted but few were on goal, West Chester made the most of the opportuni-ties that they had.

West Chester was able to get on the board again before halftime, Marissa Valenti fired a shot that was saved, but Haley Manigiaruga was there for the rebound goal, which gave her four on the sea-son. West Chester was able to go into the half with a comfortable lead against a good Gannon team.

This Gannon team had a lot of chances in the sec-ond half, hitting the post twice, and missing wide a few times as well. But the West Chester defense held strong, and put an excla-mation point on the game when senior Dana Hunt took a corner from fellow-senior Cara Deola. Hunt was able to head it past the diving goalkeeper.

Next up was traveling to East Stroudsburg to take on No. 19 Kutztown in the PSAC Semi-final.

West Chester defeated Kutztown earlier in the season, 2-0. But this was a better Kutztown team lat-er in the season, and West Chester knew they would have to play their best soc-cer. Unfortunately, it was not West Chester’s best game, and they lost 4-2.

The difference in the game was West Chester’s

defense. In a season where they had only allowed more than one goal in a game twice, allowing four goals will never be a recipe for a victory. West Chester feeds off its defense, and capital-izes off opponents mistakes on offense, and then count on their defense to hold out for the game. For some rea-son Kutztown found holes this past weekend, and found them early. They scored two goals in less than three minutes apart from each other. The first one was scored by Kutz-town’s Dana Wong in the 14th minute, assisted by Mariah Dimm from inside the box. The next one was scored just two minutes later by Sam Costello, her 11th on the season. Kutz-town was not done scor-ing in the first half. In the 34th minute Brooke May took a cross from Costello

and was able to beat West Chester’s goalkeeper, Alex Srolis to push the score to 3-0 heading into halftime.

West Chester now had their backs against the wall, knowing they need-ed instant offense com-ing out of the gates in the second half if they wanted a chance to get back into this game. And instant offense is what they got. Senior Dana Hunt took a pass from Cara Deola, and ripped a shot from the right side of the box past Kutz-town’s goalkeeper to get West Chester on the board, 3-1. All of that was done in 43 seconds into the second half. That was what West Chester needed right? The only problem is, Kutztown tacked on another goal just two minutes later. It was Costello again, with her second of the game, this

time a header off of a free kick from 30 yards out. This was all but the dagger in West Chester’s come-back hopes. West Chester added a meaningless goal in the 80th minute when Nikki Lynch was able to finish a rebounded goal from Cara Deola.

West Chester will now sit and wait for the PSAC committee’s decision. It will be hard to believe if a team that posts a 16-2-1 record on the season would be left out of the Division II National Tournament, but they will have to wait and see. The announce-ment will be made early this week. As for now they must get better, and hope they have a chance to prove themselves.

Ryan Calpin is a third-year student majoring in communications with a minor in journalism. He can be reached at [email protected]


Lady Rams finish regular season No.1 in the country

West Chester women’s basketball has once-in-a-lifetime opportunity

Riding a seven-game win streak into the final two

games of the regular season, the West Ches-ter University Golden Rams field hockey team extended the streak to nine games with a pair of wins this week against No. 9 Mercyhurst Uni-versity and No. 10 Slip-pery Rock University.

The newly No.1 na-tionally ranked Golden Rams traveled to Mer-cyhurst University on Wednesday afternoon. Coming off a hat trick in the 10-0 victory ver-sus Mansfield, junior Alayna Brown put West Chester on the board in the 12th minute with her

eighth goal of the sea-son. That would be the lone goal for either side until the 59th minute when freshman phenom Rachal Toppi scored for her team, leading with her 19th goal of the sea-son to put WCU up 2-0. Fellow freshman Mary Spisak scored the final goal of the afternoon in the 62nd to secure the 3-0 victory for the Gold-en Rams. Sophomore Sarah Krause recorded seven saves in the cage, improving to 12-2 on the season and picking up her fifth shutout of the season.

The victory over Mer-cyhurst came a day af-ter West Chester found out that it moved into the No. 1 spot in both the national rankings

and Atlantic Regional rankings, which is the basis for determining the NCAA Division II Tournament field. The No. 1 ranked team in the Atlantic Region will receive a bye to the na-tional semifinals in Louisville, Kentucky next month. West Ches-ter opens up the PSAC tournament on Nov. 14 after receiving a bye to the semifinals as the top seed. Rematches with either Millersville or Shippensburg, or both, loom in the PSAC tour-nament.

The Golden Rams re-turned home for the fi-nal game of the regular season, and Senior Day, on Saturday against No. 10 Slippery Rock University. Two seniors

were honored before the game, Hannah Davies and Kelsey Cheek. Da-vies has four goals and an assist on the season, while Cheek has three assists helping West Chester to a record of 16-2 in their final sea-son as a Golden Ram. Sophomore Dayle Paus-tian opened up the scor-ing with her sixth goal of the season in the 11th minute, converting on a penalty stroke to give West Chester the 1-0 lead. Junior Alexis Ver-sak continued her MVP-caliber season with her 10th goal of the season off an assist from Kris-tina Scherrer to give the Golden Rams the 2-0 lead in the 44th minute. Slippery Rock attempted a late surge after a goal

by Kylie McCarty in the 66th minute, but the de-fensive group for West Chester held the fort in the final four minutes of the game to secure the 2-1 victory. Krause made two saves in the cage, to improve her record to 13-2 on the season.

With the victory over Slippery Rock, West Chester clinched the regular season PSAC title and has earned a bye into the PSAC semi-finals. The Golden Rams will host the first semifi-nal on Friday, Nov. 14 at 1 p.m. with the opponent to be determined. The path to a PSAC Cham-pionship will be not be easy, with potential re-matches against power-houses Millersville and Shippensburg. West

Chester split its regular season meetings with Millersville, losing 3-2 in double overtime, and winning 2-1 at home in overtime. West Chester defeated Shippensburg 2-1 in their only meeting in the regular season. The Golden Rams close out the regular season on a nine-game win streak, scoring 72 goals in the season, while allowing only 20. The freshman sensation Toppi led the way for West Chester in the regular season, scoring 19 goals, includ-ing seven game winners, while adding two assists in her first season.

Dylan Harrison is a third-year student majoring in communica-tions with a minor in journalism. He can be reached at [email protected]

By Dylan HarrisonStaff Writer

The West Chester University Women’s basketball team got

the experience of a life-time on Sunday, Nov. 2, traveling to the infamous Gampel Pavillion to take on the two-time defend-ing national champion UConn Huskies. A slight difference from their usual competition, the Huskies put their divi-sion I power on display, and dominated the Lady Rams 115-26.

UConn is one of the most dominant basketball programs in history, on both the men and wom-en’s side. Last season, the UConn basketball pro-gram was the first in his-tory to win national titles in both men and women’s division I basketball in

the same season. Along with a list of accomplish-ments and awards, the UConn women’s team has achieved greatness, going undefeated for two straight seasons.

Putting the score aside, the game was seen as an opportunity for an overall experience of a lifetime. First-year head Coach Kiera Wooden took her team to face off against West Chester alumni and head coach of UConn, Geno Auriemma. Auriemma graduated from West Chester in 1977, going on to the role of assistant coach at Saint Joseph’s University and the University of Virgin-ia. He eventually landed the spot as UConn head coach in 1985, and the rest is history. Combining for nine national champi-onships since 1985, Au-riemma holds the highest winning percentage (.869)

in all of division I basket-ball, men or women’s.

For Wooden, this is her first year at the reigns. Af-ter long time head coach Deirdre Kane stepped down during the offsea-son, Wooden stepped up to the plate, accepting the job passed to her from Kane. Wooden worked as an assistant under Kane for the past ten years, and has been helping the Lady Rams basketball programs winning ways since her years as a play-er. Wooden played under Kane for four seasons, spanning from 1999-2003. During her time as a player Wooden received numerous awards, in-cluding PSAC East rookie of the year.

In a battle of legend versus rookie, the divi-sion I powerhouse Hus-kies gave it their all. Forcing 24 turnovers leading to 45 points, the

Huskies imposed their game speed on the Rams, which was too much for them to handle. All five starters for the Huskies finished in double figures.

For the Rams, Serifat Junaid scored six points, which led all West Ches-ter scorers. Red-shirt freshman Portia Speller contributed with five points and two assists. Despite the Rams strug-gling all afternoon, the learning experience was one they will never forget.

Junior guard Jasmen Clark commented on the experience, “It was an awesome experience. At first we were kind of nervous, but after all the jitter everyone had were out, we just went out there to play for fun and the love of the game.”

Clark seemed to enjoy the experience, despite the lopsided loss, stating “We played hard, and if

we played as hard as we did against them, we will be great this year. It was a learning experience and we never gave up.”

A UConn media outlet commented on the loss, saying that Auriemma was “running up the score” and humiliating West Chester by doing so. It seems as if West Ches-ter did not take it as hu-miliating, but kept their minds straight on the learning aspect.

As the season ap-proaches, the Rams will look to top an impressive 2013-2014 season. Finish-ing the season 19-9 with a strong run in the PSAC tournament that came to and end at the hands of PSAC champions Edin-boro, the Lady Rams will look to Junaid, along with Juniors Dallas Ely and Brittany Sicinski to take charge of the young Gold-en Rams team.

With five starters re-turning, the Rams have their sights set quite high for the rapidly approach-ing season. Ely returns as a Division II All-Amer-ican honorable mention, along with Sicinski who has been a force on of-fense and defense for the Lady Rams since her freshman year. The two will likely be the corner-stones for this West Ches-ter team.

As for keys to matching, Clark made it sound quite simple. “Communication will be the key this year, and playing together as a team.” If the Lady Rams can accomplish those two main points, another ex-citing season is certainly brewing for Rams basket-ball fans.

AJ Arcaini is a third-year student majoring in communication stud-ies with a minor in journalism. He can be reached at [email protected]

A.J. Arcaini Asst. Sports Editor

[email protected]

Jose Mestre/ Photography Editor

Lady Rams finish regular season in style- Page 23

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