By Mark rayMondSenior Staff Writer

As stimulus funds run dry and federal agencies tighten their budgets, the University plans to increasingly turn to corporate-sponsored research.

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 stimulus offered increased funding through federal agencies such as the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation, but elevated funding levels provided only a brief respite from ongoing financial strain. Federal agencies are all expected to have “flat budgets” in the near future, and the short-term surge in funds is nearing its end, said Clyde Briant, vice president for research. “In order to expand research opportunities, uni-versities everywhere are looking for new sources of funding, and certainly industry is one possibility,” he said.

Facing scarce funds from the pub-lic sector, the University will “expand corporate support of research, in-cluding the possibility of a corpo-

rate associates program in the newly established School of Engineering,” according to the October update of the Plan for Academic Enrichment.

Rod Clifton, interim dean of en-gineering, said the University and industry alike benefit from the part-nerships that emerge from corporate-sponsored research.

“As we expand our research capa-bility, we become more attractive for industry,” he said. “It is certainly in the spirit of academic enrichment.” The University wants to contribute to knowledge growth rather than focus solely on teaching, he added.

He pointed to the University’s cur-rent partnership with General Mo-tors, which is researching methods to manufacture lightweight cars. “They come here and spend some time, we go there and spend some time,” he said. “It is a good example of truly industrial collaborative research.”

Corporate partnerships will help make up for the decrease in federal research funding, said Ed Wing, dean of medicine and biological sciences.

“We had a huge boost from stimulus funding, but that is going to go away,” he said. “Funding from the NIH will decrease, especially with the Repub-lican congress.”

Sponsored funding is a crucial part of the University’s research ef-forts, Wing said. “It’s a very important

Wednesday, March 23, 2011Daily Heraldthe Brown

Since 1891vol. cxlvi, no. 39

39 / 28

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news...................2-5editorial.............6opinions.............7insid

e

OpiniOns, 7

academentedGrad school is a bit like ‘Friday,’ and other musings

students reactivate Kappa Alpha psi frat

CAmpus news, 8 wea

therPledged

Bands hope to drum up more space

By Leah BroMBergContributing Writer

The Coalition of Bands at Brown is hoping to increase funds and equip-ment to better accommodate inde-pendent musicians on campus.

There is currently only one available drum set on campus — in a small, windowless room in T.F. Green Hall, where broken drum heads, splintered drumsticks, rotting batteries, old earplugs, pedals and broken stools litter the floor. There is no cleaning staff, and the room is often overbooked.

But the room is the only suf-ficiently equipped venue on cam-pus for independent musicians to practice. The Underground in the Stephen Robert ’62 Campus Cen-ter recently tightened its rules for booking the room — only musicians sponsored by a student group can practice there. The smaller rooms in the Steinert Practice Center are more suitable for solo pianists and classical musicians.

Student bands hoped the Perry and Marty Granoff Center for the Creative Arts, with its mission and design conducive to musical collabo-ration, would provide practice space, said Sam Rosenfeld ’12, a Herald edi-torial cartoonist, former member of the coalition and co-founder of

U. looks to industry for sponsored research support

Panelists offer perspective on earthquake and effectsBy CLaire sChLessinger

Contributing Writer

A panel of four professors with ex-pertise relating to the Japanese earth-quake and tsunami met yesterday evening to ask how a country should preemptively prepare for an event that may or may not happen — but could have a catastrophic effect. In front of a half-full MacMillan 115, the professors gave an account of the science behind the recent disaster and how the question of “money versus likelihood” affected preventive measures in Japan.

Kerry Smith, associate professor of history and East Asian studies, outlined the geography of Japan, stressing its extensive coastline, to explain why the effects of the tsunami were so devastating. The shoreline

is relatively flat up to the mountain ranges about 10 miles in, he said, so there are no high mountains or cliffs to stop the waves of the tsunami, and it “doesn’t take much” to get past the coast.

The panelists said Japan had some of the most effective preventive mea-sures in place, but the force of the

March 11 earthquake — which had one of the highest magnitudes on the Richter scale in history — was devastating.

Japan had built sea barriers to protect against tsunamis, one of which — the deepest breakwater in the world — was completed in 2009. But “the amount of concrete and

money poured into this project … was essentially proved pointless” as the waves swept over the wall, Smith said. Though the barriers were con-structed to withstand the significant height of tsunamis, the amount of water and sheer force of the tsunami were enough to overcome the walls.

Smith briefly spoke about the ca-sualties, though he said he did not want to appear “callous” in defining the tragedy of this event in terms of numbers. To offer a “sobering sense of the dimensions of this disaster,” Smith said the population of the United States is two and a half times that of Japan, and Hurricane Katrina caused 1,800 casualties, compared to an estimate by the Japanese gov-ernment Monday that the tsunami

Off the mark: ditching grades for S/NCBy reBeCCa BaLLhaus

City & State editor

During finals season, throngs of bleary-eyed students flock to the libraries and do not emerge for what seems like eons. People stare angrily at textbooks, willing themselves to absorb the information — and pray-ing to just get a good grade in that class.

Now imagine a world devoid of report cards, transcripts and the frantic checking of Banner during vacation to see if dawdling profes-sors have updated the site. Imagine taking all classes Satisfactory/No

Credit.Jake Heimark ’11, a fifth-year

student pursuing a joint bachelor of arts and bachelor of science in human biology and economics, did just that.

“In my senior year of high school, I was trying to decide which school to go to,” Heimark said. “When I visited Brown, I saw a unique op-portunity to pursue an education that was self-designed and self-mo-tivated.” Heimark asked his parents — who also attended Brown — if they would be okay with him tak-ing all his classes S/NC. When they assented, he applied early decision.

“My parents … had always em-phasized that high achievement and good grades can go together but don’t always,” Heimark said. “What removing grades from the equation does is it forces the student to focus more on learning and education.” He credited his fellow students with creating an environment where his learning style has flourished.

Heimark emphasized that not taking his classes for grades has not made his college experience less stressful despite many students’ assumptions. “I crammed for orgo

Anna Gaissert / HeraldProfessors discussed the effects of the Japanese earthquake and tsunami in MacMillan 115 yesterday.

continued on page 2

continued on page 3

continued on page 4

continued on page 4

By shefaLi Luthra Senior Staff Writer

The University will not allow stu-dents to study abroad in Japan this spring, Kendall Brostuen, associate dean of the College and director of international programs, wrote last night in an email to The Herald. The six students who would have stud-ied in Japan will be offered spots at Dartmouth for its spring quarter.

The University felt “genuine re-gret” about suspending the program, Brostuen wrote, but “with the un-predictability of the circumstances” — caused by the recent tsunami and ensuing nuclear crisis in the country — “suspension of the term is the most prudent course of action.”

Because Dartmouth operates on the quarter system, students will be able to transition into Dartmouth’s spring term, which begins March 28. Brostuen wrote that students who complete a Brown indepen-dent study program as well as the quarter at Dartmouth can count the combination as a semester of credit.

Jack Boeglin ’12, one of the stu-dents who was planning to go to Ja-pan, said he is leaning toward taking the quarter at Dartmouth, though he still has to consider factors such as the dates, his options for the summer and the costs before he commits.

Boeglin learned of the Univer-sity’s decision yesterday through a phone call from Ned Quigley, as-sociate director of international pro-grams. Quigley could not be reached for comment late last night.

Gili Kliger / HeraldResearch grants from the National Institutes of Health have become increasingly competitive in the past ten years, as the agency’s funding has been steady or declining. In 2010, just 21 percent of grant proposals reviewed were approved. Data does not include awards made under the 2009 stimulus package, which provided a temporary uptick in funding levels. data from the niH data Book.

NIH research grants

Japan study abroad canceled

continued on page 5

Are we more motivated by Diddy than duty?

OpiniOns, 7

Brunonertia

Ben Schreckinger, PresidentSydney Ember, Vice President

Matthew Burrows, TreasurerIsha Gulati, Secretary

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Campus news2 the Brown Daily heraldwednesday, March 23, 2011

5 P.m.

“Governing through the Non-

Governmental,” Watson Institute

7 P.m.

UCS General Body Meeting,

Petteruti Lounge

8 P.m.

Licki Ucrog “Valencrimez,”

T.F. Green Hall 205

8 P.m.

“Afghanistan: Defying Silence,”

Petteruti Lounge

SHARPE REFECTORY VERNEY-WOOLLEY DINING HALL

LUNCH

DINNER

BBQ Chicken, Mac and Cheese, Collard Greens, Spinach Strudel,

Steak Teriyaki, Peach Cobbler

Roast Turkey with Gravy, Shells with Broccoli, Mashed Potatoes, Glazed

Carrots, Fudge Bars

Buffalo Wings, Spicy Wings, Chinese Chicken Wings, Polynesian Wings,

Vegan Nuggets, M&M Cookies

Saturday Night Jambalaya, Spinach Strudel, Mixed Vegetables, Italian Marinated Chicken, M&M Cookies

TODAY mARCH 23 TOmORROW mARCH 24

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resulted in 8,800 deaths and over 12,000 missing.

Terry Tullis, professor emeritus of geological sciences, addressed the technical aspects of the earth-quake and Karen Fischer, professor of geological sciences, explained the tsunami. Tullis and Fischer said when the earthquake occurred deep under-water 120 kilometers offshore, the stress accumulation built up, pushing up on the ocean water and moving it upward and outward. Though the waves started off only one meter high, they were very long. The movement of the water approaching the shore compressed the waves, increasing amplitude and speed, and decreas-ing length.

Fischer said though a warning was issued just three minutes after the earthquake, it took only 15 minutes for the tsunami to reach land, leaving a mere 12 minutes for people in the most vulnerable areas to reach safety. She showed a CNN video of the water washing away all structures in its way.

An audience member asked the geologists what good their work was if, despite being so prepared, Japan was still unable to protect the popula-tion. Being adequately prepared is a question of “how much money you’re willing to spend and whether you can politically convince people if you should prepare for an unlikely event,” Tullis said. In Japan, it is obvious to everyone that they are sitting on a “plate” and the “national psyche is much more willing to put resources

into” preparation than, for example, people designing building codes in Haiti, Tullis said.

George Seidel, professor emeritus of physics, gave the technical details of nuclear reactors and what hap-pened to the Fukushima power plant. “The consequences of the disaster of the reactors are very serious,” he said, but “on the scale of things, this is minimal” compared to the earth-quake and tsunami. The reactors affect a few workers whose lives will be potentially shortened, but that number is smaller than the number affected by the natural disasters.

Seidel also discussed how the coverage is being handled by the media — of the five articles he saw on the Japanese disaster in Tuesday’s New York Times, five dealt with the nuclear reactors and only one dis-cussed the actual geological disaster.

Smith asked the audience if they knew people in Japan who had been in contact with them about how the disaster is affecting their lives. One student whose parents and brother live in Japan said there is a discrep-ancy in reactions to the earthquake between people in Japan who read international media who are very concerned, and those who read only Japanese newspapers, who are calmer.

Smith said he thought the Japa-nese are probably underreacting the Western media is probably overreact-ing and the truth is probably some-where in between.

Profs discuss science behind quakecontinued from page 1

Campus news 3the Brown Daily heraldwednesday, March 23, 2011

tests, I stayed up late for presenta-tions just as often as anyone else,” he said. “It’s one thing if a bad score means you get a B instead of an A. It’s another thing if you feel like you’re letting yourself down.”

Rafael Juliano ’12, who is taking all his classes S/NC for the first time this semester, said he discovered a similar trend.

“I don’t think the work changes at all — I’m still concerned about my homework,” he said. “I fell sick recently and stressed about getting a doctor’s note.”

Juliano said he was not confident he could earn an A in every class he is taking this semester, all of which fall outside his concentration. By taking them S/NC, he said he could “focus more on learning about them and really getting to know the sub-ject than stressing over a grade.”

Heimark and Juliano’s choice is not a common one. In a random subset of 1,500 students enrolled in at least three classes this semester, only 22 students — less than 2 per-cent — are taking every class S/NC, according to University Registrar Robert Fitzgerald. “I would imagine that the percentage, if looking at the overall population both currently and over time, would not deviate from that relatively low figure,” he wrote in an email to The Herald.

Lauren Kessler ’11.5 said taking all her classes S/NC would be “very

personally embarrassing.” “I would never show up,” she said.

“If I was on a pass/fail standard, I wouldn’t be able to hold myself to a higher standard of learning. … Maybe it’s just because I don’t trust myself,” she added. “I need to be validated by the system.”

Heimark said he has encountered surprise and encouragement from professors, and most have been very supportive. “My advisers were sometimes hesitant because they were worried about what would happen after college,” he said. But Heimark said his advisers accepted his choice because he “wasn’t doing it on a whim.”

Heimark did not ask for course performance reports from his pro-fessors, an option many students taking classes S/NC embrace. In-stead, he said he makes an effort to develop personal relationships with professors.“That’s helped as I look for stuff to do after university,” he said.

Frank Altman ’75 made a similar choice during his time at Brown. Like Heimark, he was drawn to the New Curriculum and decided to take full advantage of its freedom. He concentrated in public policy, which at the time was a very small, interdisciplinary concentration.

Altman asked his professors for course performance reports, which he found “much more thorough and understandable” than grades.

“The worst thing I can imagine is going to Brown and treating it as

if you’re not at Brown,” Altman said. “You should take advantage of as much of what that curriculum has to offer as possible.”

Job concerns often deter students from considering the S/NC option. Camille Duhamel ’13 said he feared the repercussions of such a choice. “It wouldn’t look good on my tran-script with applying to jobs or to graduate school,” he said.

But Altman said his lack of grades did not affect his options after gradu-ation — he was accepted to all but one of the graduate schools he ap-plied to. Altman took his classes for grades in graduate school and is now the CEO, president and co-founder of Community Reinvestment Fund, a national nonprofit.

“I think that learning to be self-reliant, to look inside of what you can do, was a character-building ex-perience for me,” he said. “I learned how to take risks, and that has fol-lowed me all through my career.”

He added that Brown alums have a “full institutional brand” behind them that they might not get from other universities. “That’s definitely a consideration that graduate schools gave me.”

Heimark said he has not had difficulty in his job search in the high-technology, biotechnology and consulting industries. “There are certain industries where being traditional is important, but there are others where it’s not,” he said. “It can be hard to get my foot in the

door, but once I’m in, it can help that I don’t really fit the mold.”

Heimark said he fears students are not taking advantage of the New

Curriculum. “It’s like you have a re-ally high-powered car, but you’re not driving it,” he said. “I would’ve felt like I was wasting my time.”

Despite option, few choose to take all classes S/NCcontinued from page 1

Campus news4 the Brown Daily heraldwednesday, March 23, 2011

As stimulus dries up, U. aims to increase corporate partnerships

part of every medical school’s profile,” he said. “We don’t have enough of it, and we are actively searching for partners.”

The Alpert Medical School is partnering with the pharmaceutical industry to develop treatments for infectious diseases, Wing said. He said he hopes research will expand

into other fields.Incoming Dean of Engineer-

ing Lawrence Larson said he plans to continue to push for corporate-supported research when he arrives at Brown this summer. He said he would support a corporate associ-ates program, in which companies pay a fee to see presentations about University research and are allowed to take the ideas for development.

A program like this is “a very com-mon thing at most research universi-ties” and can serve as a “pretty effec-tive tool for highlighting the great research that the University does,” Larson said.

But Clifton said he is hesitant about such a program. Though it could serve as a “possible revenue source for the University,” he said he is “not sure that is the best current

model for interacting with industry.”Most corporate research opportu-

nities involve companies who work with technology, so the University is most likely to form industry partner-ships with the School of Engineering, the Department of Computer Sci-ence and the medical school, Bri-ant said. The University already has established partnerships with IBM and Microsoft.

Public health could increasingly

be an area of focus for corporate-supported research, he said.

Though the expansion of research offerings is often focused on graduate students, Briant said undergraduates will also benefit from an increased number of research opportunities. “The whole research picture at Brown involves graduate and undergraduate students,” he said. “There’s nothing that would prohibit an undergradu-ates from participating.”

Musicians@Brown, a networking site for student musicians. But there are no drum sets in the building, mak-ing it difficult for bands to take full advantage of the space.

The coalition oversees the practice space in T.F. Green, rents equipment to student groups, puts on concerts featuring student bands and sends out a weekly newsletter highlighting musical events on and off campus. “I think the space is great,” said Michael Frauenhofer ’11, a member of the coalition, adding that the room has “helped the live music scene grow.”

Student rock musicians face dif-ficulties finding practice space and equipment. The coalition’s practice room provides a drum set, ampli-

fier and sound-proof walls. For $10 a semester, members can book the room for eight hours per week, In-drayudh Shome ’11, co-director of the coalition, wrote in an email to The Herald. COBAB raised the fee from $5 per semester in hopes of better funding the room.

Coalition members expressed concern over the state of the room and equipment. Because of over-booking, Frauenhofer can only prac-tice early in the morning or very late at night, he said.

“The community of independent musicians here was really lacking when I got here,” Shome wrote. “There’s no dean or director with in-dependent bands. There needs to be some level of community and aware-ness for it to function and grow.”

Independent musicians seek University support

continued from page 1

continued from page 1

are invited to present their ideas to people interested in the entrepre-neurial process. Peer critiques allow students to hear critical questions and suggestions and force them to see the gaps and strengths in their models, Harlam said.

“What we’re in the process of creating is a true entrepreneurial community,” Beckman wrote. “The programming tied to the launch fund will bring entrepreneurs to-gether to share their ideas — and when entrepreneurially minded people get together to do that, the results are often amazing.”

Though a safe place for discus-sion is crucial, the fund also helps students improve their pitches — honing the ability to sell an idea, not just trying to expose its flaws — said Roger Nozaki, director of the Swearer Center.

Tim Natividad ’12 plans to apply with his project, Social Exposures. The project is work in progress, he said, but involves combining mobile applications with non-profit organizations. It will solicit photo essays from a different nonprofit each month, later compiling the photo essays into a publication.

The fund’s three-tiered system

makes sense , he said. Projects get the funding they need to leave the ground, and more money is avail-able later if necessary.

The application process tries to gauge the viability of each project, he said. “Can we transfer this from paper to practice? That’s the big take home question.”

Hao Tran ’14, who is work-ing with an organization called FUNDaFIELD, is also applying to the fund. FUNDaFIELD, run exclusively by students, aims to build soccer fields near primary schools in South Africa, Uganda and Kenya. The organization has built seven fields, with an eighth in a fundraising stage, Tran wrote in an email to The Herald. It has raised $140,000 since 2007. “An-other goal of FUNDaFIELD is to provide children with a safe place to play and to reintegrate former child soldiers (and) victims of HIV/AIDs … back into the community through sport,” he wrote.

Tran plans to travel to Uganda this summer and hopes to receive support from the fund, he wrote. He has gained support from the Sport and Development Program at the Watson Institute for Inter-national Studies, and he has been working with Eli Wolff ’00, a visit-

ing fellow in international studies. To receive the first level of fund-

ing, Tran must quantify the poten-tial social impact of his program. The goal is to show the number of kids who have access to fields, the change in attendance and en-rollment at schools, the number of students moving onto secondary school and officials’ reactions to the

program, he wrote. If he receives additional funding, Tran can inves-tigate how FUNDaFIELD impacts communities at large.

He wrote he is optimistic he will move on to the second- and third-level grants and expand the initia-tive’s operations to South Africa and Kenya, where FUNDaFIELD has already begun its work.

The fund is looking forward to its first round of applications, which will be evaluated on a rolling basis. There is a two to three week period before applications are accepted to assure ideas are not simply based on early applications. Harlam pre-dicts that the first official review process will begin just after spring break.

Boeglin said affected students he had talked to are also leaning toward enrolling for a quarter at Dartmouth.

The Office of International Pro-grams will help students transition into Dartmouth with the help of specific departments at Brown and colleagues at Dartmouth, Brostuen

wrote. “These students will continue to receive support throughout their study experience at Dartmouth and until their return to Brown for the fall semester,” he added.

Boeglin said digesting the Uni-versity’s decision was definitely dif-ficult.

“It’s a lot of crazy news in a very short period of time,” Boeglin said.

Campus news 5the Brown Daily heraldwednesday, March 23, 2011

BB & Z | Cole Pruitt, Andrew Seiden, Valerie Hsuing and Dan Ricker

Dot Comic | eshan Mitra and Brendan Hainline

Gelotology | Guillaume Riesen

Co M I C S

New fund to help create ‘entrepreneurial community’continued from page 8

Students offered spring quarter at Dartmouth

continued from page 1

editorial & Letter6 the Brown Daily heraldwednesday, March 23, 2011

L e T T e R To T H e e D I To R

C O R R E C T I O N S P O L I C YThe Brown Daily Herald is committed to providing the Brown University community with the most accurate information possible. Corrections may be submitted up to seven calendar days after publication.

C O M M E N TA R Y P O L I C YThe editorial is the majority opinion of the editorial page board of The Brown Daily Herald. The editorial viewpoint does not necessarily reflect the views of The Brown Daily Herald, Inc. Columns, letters and comics reflect the opinions of their authors only.

L E T T E R S T O T H E E D I T O R P O L I C YSend letters to letters@browndailyherald.com. Include a telephone number with all letters. The Herald reserves the right to edit all letters for length and clarity and cannot assure the publication of any letter. Please limit letters to 250 words. Under special circumstances writers may request anonymity, but no letter will be printed if the author’s identity is unknown to the editors. Announcements of events will not be printed.

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Herbal remedies are drugs tooTo the Editor:

In Monday’s Herald, you ran an article (“Local apothecary supplies herbal remedies, legally,” March 21) by a student detailing her discovery and later use of herbal remedies from a local supplier. After finish-ing the article, I lamented at the lack of anything but token skepticism from the author’s friends. The author treated the subject with credulity, never mentioning the possible counterpoints to using herbal and alternative medicine. Not once did the author state that herbal remedies such as echinacea and St. John’s wort have proven to be ineffective or even dangerous in some cases. While the herbalist herself states that herbs “do not treat disease,” a source later in the article specifi-

cally calls the herbs “medicines.”My main objection to the author’s work is this —

herbs are drugs. A substance used to alter the func-tioning of the body is a drug regardless of its source or character. Natural does not mean safe. The lack of regulations on herbs and herbalists leaves the door wide open for harmful and counterproductive treat-ment.

The author implies that she will continue to use herbal medicines since they “haven’t killed me yet” — the same refrain used by smokers, alcoholics and drug addicts worldwide. Should this sort of sentiment really accompany a supposed system of healing?

Tim Dingman ’11

e D I To R I A L Co M I C b y s a m r o s e n f e l d

“I need to be validated by the system.”— Lauren Kessler ’11.5, on taking classes for grades

see off the mark on page 1.

e D I To R I A L

It is easy to forget that the University Library, occupying multiple locations and offering a staggering array of books as well as computers and study spaces, had humble beginnings. Brown’s first president, James Manning, wrote in 1772, “At present we have but about two hundred and fifty volumes and those not well chosen, being such as our friends could best spare.”

Today the Library offers us an enormous amount of information, be it in books, audio and visual materials or online content. But as former President Vartan Gregorian recently noted in a speech at the John Hay Library, there is a “difference between information and knowledge.” Indeed, the Library serves to provide not only information, but also the tools necessary to transform it into knowledge. It is heartening, therefore, that the library is undertaking initiatives aimed at helping students succeed in the digital age.

As The Herald reported earlier this month, the Library plans to hire digital humanities and e-science librarians. The former will play “a central role in the integration of digital resources and methodologies with current teaching and research,” while the latter will assist faculty and students working with large data sets. These new hires should help the Library make it easier for students and professors to utilize digital resources. Andrew Ashton, the Library’s director of digital technologies, told the editorial page board that the Library also remains focused on developing the Center for Digital Scholarship and Brown Digital Re-pository, which will help students pursue new uses of technology and access even more digitized data.

We are also less than a year into the debut of MoBUL, the Library’s smartphone application. This application enables users to easily search Josiah, renew books and even see if more computers are available at the Rockefeller Library or the Sciences Library. There is room for improve-ment — a comprehensive display of computer availability including locations like the Center for Information Technology would be nice — but even in its early stages MoBUL is a useful tool. We recognize that many students do not have smartphones, but those who do should try the application. According to Bonnie Buzzell, senior knowledge systems librarian, only about 500 people per month use MoBUL.

Within days we should hear more about the Library’s effort to get students access to the New York Times’ online content after the paper establishes a pay wall. That the Library’s plan was reported only a day after the Times announced the pay wall again highlights a praiseworthy commitment to helping students take advantage of digital resources.

We hope administrators and departments work with librarians to ensure that students are fully aware of the Library’s resources. Music Librarian Ned Quist told the editorial page board that the Library is working to get more resource librarians into first-year seminars, and some librarians are themselves serving as first-year advisors. But there clearly remains a lack of awareness about Library resources — just think of how many first-years arrive on campus without realizing that printing is one of the Library’s most basic services.

Students have a role to play as well. Without our feedback, librarians will have a difficult time making our research easier and more effective. The new quiet spaces at the SciLi and Rock came to fruition thanks to student input. Working together, students, librarians, faculty and admin-istrators can continue to improve our libraries, which former President Henry Wriston called “the heart of the University.”

editorials are written by The herald’s editorial page board. Send comments to editorials@browndailyherald.com.

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Old books and new technology

An article in Monday’s Herald (“Revelry, deception and arias intoxicate opera audience,” March 21) incor-rectly identified the prison director as Nathan Weinberger ’13. In fact, the prison director was played by Phil Arevalo ’11. The Herald regrets the error.

Co R R e C T I o N S

An article in Tuesday’s Herald (“Herald poll: students divided on ROTC’s return,” March 22) reported the margin of error for the Herald poll was 2.3 percent. In fact, it was 2.8 percent. The corrected margins of er-ror for subsets of students are 4.4 percent for males, 3.8 percent for females, 12.9 percent for transfers, 3.0 percent for non-transfers, 6.1 percent for seniors, 3.4 percent for non-seniors, 5.6 percent for first-years and 3.4 percent for non-first-years. The Herald regrets the error.

opinions 7the Brown Daily heraldwednesday, March 23, 2011

In a recent discussion section of my histo-ry course, the teaching assistant asked the class if we thought that there would ever be a community or political entity that would put an end to the strife that grips our world today. The argument ran that if there was no defined “other,” then there would be no need to blow oneself up in a market square, to hijack a plane or to occupy a distant na-tion. The sense of the “other” is distinctly confrontational, as any literature class at Brown will demonstrate. If we could end the cycle of oppression-rebellion-oppres-sion, the world’s ills may fall by the wayside over time.

The class came up with only two situ-ations in which the people of the world would set aside their deep-seated prejudic-es and conflicts in the interest of the com-mon good of the planet and of one’s fel-low humans — alien invasion of Earth and global capitalism. Only the fear of immi-nent death at the six hand-flippers of the legions of Zarquon could make the people of this planet stop stealing cars, firing rock-et-propelled grenades and questioning the role of unions.

Then the TA brought the issue home for us — was there even a community at Brown? Was there any sort of cause or

commonality that brings to bear the pow-er of the incredible campus diversity that the Admission Office touts at every turn? The students sitting in a circle on the Main Green could only look at each other in fu-tile thought. “Spring Weekend,” one stu-dent muttered under his breath. To laugh-ter, another offered, “Fish Co. going under.”

It was a little disheartening to see my-self and my classmates flounder in the face

of such an simple question. Why are we all here? Not in the philosophical nature of the question, but why are we all at Brown? Are we here to make sure Nike sweatshirts are tossed out of the bookstore? Are we here to throw a ladder up against the ivory tower of the Corporation? Are we here to drink on Wednesday and talk about drinking on Thursday? When I see the Brown campus, I see a campus without a purpose.

In 1968, students around the entire world rose up against what they saw as the oppression and imperialism of the self-pro-claimed “greatest generation.” Engagement in a foreign war that had no redeeming

qualities and, for American students, a gov-ernment-promoted atmosphere of para-noia led to the creation of a cohesive group. Students watched other students dying on TV and felt for them, rather than disre-garding them as the fringe that was fool-ish enough to act. They saw the fear grip-ping the nation and reversed it, believing that governments should fear their people, not vice versa.

We have no such unifying mentality. When we walk past the protesters on the Main Green, they are the fringe. While we support their right to protest, as long as it is in a safe and non-threatening man-ner, there is no pledge of solidarity behind a common purpose. We are a generation without motivation. The year 2008 showed a glimpse of the power of our generation, when we rejected the politics of fear and of the old guard and dared to hope for a brighter future. But where is that genera-tion now? Fragmented and splintered until the greatest issue on campus is whether or not Diddy will be better than Snoop Dogg.

The lack of a cohesive and definable community on campus is one of the only criticisms that I have of my Brown experi-ence. This is a wonderful University, filled with vibrant and brilliant students who have both the power and will to change the world around us. There are countless student agencies that provide charity and compassion to frequently ignored groups around the globe. We have the duty to build in Providence a new identity, one that will last beyond Wickenden Street and past graduation into our custodianship of this wide world.

There are serious problems facing our nation. How will we deal with the violent revolt in Libya? How will we treat the new self-determined regimes in other Middle Eastern nations — with suspicion or with open arms as we welcome them to the fam-ily of democracy? How will we respond to the looming economic and humanitarian crisis in Japan? Will we allow our govern-ments to continue to infringe upon rights that took decades to secure?

This May, Brown will thrust into the un-certain world outside the Van Wickle Gates another 2,000 students that will have to come up with the answers to these ques-tions. It remains to be seen whether or not the only unifying principle among them is the Latin on their diplomas.

Mike Johnson ’11 is just fine with the great Zarquon’s benevolent rule.

Building a Brown community

This, dear reader, is the column I have been putting off since I first started writ-ing for The Herald.

Cynical, pessimistic and darkly sex-ual as I might often appear, I don’t want to waste time and space grumbling about the plight of the graduate student. I my-self am approaching the end of my sev-enth year of graduate school and my fifth at Brown. In that time, I have, among oth-er things, studied some fascinating top-ics, met some brilliant people, made some wonderful friends and even had the occa-sional free lunch. Much, much more im-portantly, I met my wife on the steps of Sharpe House on our very first day. For this alone, I would do the last seven years all over again, though on replaying that particular day, I might not choose the same shirt that has had her mocking me for years.

On the other hand, I don’t think that I could, in good conscience, recommend graduate school, especially a doctoral program, especially in the humanities, to another soul.

The prevailing culture of graduate school, if not always the experience it-self, is one of misery and deprivation. Most grad students genuinely believe that theirs is a particularly difficult existence. I myself have been guilty of this. My theo-ry is that this is partly due to the discrep-ancy between high seriousness and low stakes. One spends a lot of time racking

one’s brains about serious questions with-out anyone particularly caring about the answers. One can devote anywhere from two years to a decade on a dissertation, pouring all one’s intellectual energy into the project, for the reading pleasure of ex-actly three people, two of whom will only pretend to read it.

Sadder still is the way in which the horrible process of academic profession-alization encourages grad students to de-fine themselves by their work. Confer-

ence rooms and seminars resound with the sound of socially inept people intro-ducing themselves by their subjects. In one of the most heinous crimes against humor since the last time Dane Cook opened his inexplicably large mouth, I once heard a political scientist respond to a colleague’s remark with, “You would say that — you’re a comparativist!” The semi-nar room exploded with laughter, making me drop the free sandwich I was there for. You want no part of this.

Not only is graduate school the so-cial and emotional equivalent of sitting through Rebecca Black’s “Friday” video for five to 10 years, but it is also a finan-cial mistake worthy of a National Foot-ball League player. But in this case, there are neither lucrative contracts nor op-portunities to go clubbing with an auto-matic weapon in your trousers. At best, you will spend your 20s earning a meager salary — at worst, you will emerge from grad school in significant debt. For a long

time, this was the model for law and med-ical students — borrow and scrape now to earn astounding amounts later. Now even law schools are telling prospective stu-dents that now is not a good time to ap-ply. Let me reiterate — lawyers are telling impressionable people not to spend mon-ey they don’t have. It’s serious stuff — and what’s the deal with airline food?

Most importantly, the academic job market is a mess of epic proportions. Qualified candidates outnumber full-

time professorial jobs like moronic You-Tube comments outnumber everything else in the universe. The chances of get-ting a real academic job in the humanities are now just short of the odds of spending a night in Seaside Heights, N.J. without contracting herpes.

Instead, those wanting to pursue a career in teaching and writing have to juggle multiple adjuncting jobs, rush-ing between campuses desperately, hop-ing against hope that they might one day soon find half an hour in which to plan how they might eventually find a whole week in which to do their own research. Worse still, getting by on these class-by-class appointments for too long essential-ly invalidates scholars in the eyes of po-tential longer-term employers. After all, why buy the milk when you can get the desperate and socially inept cow for free?

As I mentioned above, I don’t mean to suggest that every second of graduate school is a waking nightmare. It’s not. But the way in which academic work expands to fill all the time available to it tends to make one feel guilty even when doing other things. It’s hard enough to have fun in the nuclear bunker atmosphere of the Grad Center Bar without miring oneself in self-condemnation. That’s what Narra-gansett is for.

Oh, bugger it, what do I care what you do with your 20s?

Stephen Wicken GS, a fifth-year doctor-al candidate in the history department, firmly believes that there is such a thing

as a free lunch but that there are only three or four of them out there, some of

them guarded by political scientists.

Grad school: (pros and) cons

one can devote anywhere from two years to a decade on a dissertation, pouring all one’s intellectual energy

into the project, for the reading pleasure of exactly three people, two of whom will only pretend to read it.

When I see the Brown campus, I see a campus without a purpose.

By STePHeN WICKeNopinions Columnist

By MIKe JoHNSoNopinions Columnist

Daily Heraldthe Brown

Campus newswednesday, March 23, 2011

New fund targets student start-ups

By hannah LoeWentheiLContributing Writer

Innovative students now have access to a new source of funding, as the University continues to increase its entrepreneurial support. The Brown Venture Launch Fund — a collaboration between the Dean of the College, the Social Innovation Initiative at the Swearer Center for Public Service and the Entrepre-neurship Program — has received about six inquiries from students since its official launch March 7, according to Alan Harlam, director of social entrepreneurship.

The fund provides students with capital to transform their ideas into new enterprises. Funding is allo-cated in three intervals — $1,500, $3,500 and $7,500. Students apply for the first level of funding and are eligible to receive more money as their idea progresses.

“The Brown Venture Launch Fund is like a pipeline providing students with a platform to take the first steps. As the idea grows, students need more resources,” Harlam said. “As the idea passes through new gates, if students ac-complish the task they set out to do, (the fund) will support them even more.”

The fund will build on two exist-ing programs — the Entrepreneur-ship Program, which holds office hours to give students advice, and the Social Innovation Initiative, which offers boot camps focused on skill-building workshops. “Nothing exists in a vacuum. (The fund) is the first step for students to act out ideas that have been developed in a host of ways,” Harlam said.

The fund has enough money to allot six to eight $1,500 grants, three to four $3,500 grants and one to two $7,500 grants each year, Har-lam said. But, still in its early stages, it is “flexible in the total amount of money that it will provide students.”

Without the fund, Harlam said he fears that many great ideas may never come to fruition and will “sit on shelves collecting dust.”

“It’s often hard as an entrepre-neur to find out where to go for funding, and when you do find funding sources and the criteria are different,” Jason Beckman ’11, co-president of the Entrepreneurship Program, wrote in an email to The Herald. But the fund is “building a consistent set and aiming to make the information very accessible.”

Monetary support is just one goal of the fund. It also provides student entrepreneurs with a com-munity and a network to discuss and develop ideas, Harlam said. The Social Innovation Initiative holds peer critiques, or round table discussions, where entrepreneurs

Students reestablish historically black frat

By saMier saeedContributing Writer

Two students have reactivated the Brown chapter of Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity, Inc. this year. The historically black fraternity was deactivated in 2003 — when its last member graduated — but has been revived by Raymond Jackson ’12 and Marc Howland ’11.

Because there were no Kappa Alpha Psi brothers on campus, the pair sought out members of KAPsi at other Providence schools, including Johnson and Wales University, who helped them go through the process of receiving recognition from the fraternity as a chapter.

“Part of our fraternity’s focus is achievement, and that’s what at-tracted both of us to our fraternity,” Jackson said.

Both have personal connections to KAPsi — Jackson counts his father, uncle and several cousins among fraternity members. How-land is from Cleveland, “where Carl Stokes was the first black mayor of a major U.S. city. … He almost adopted my sister before my family did, and he saw himself as almost a godfather to my sister,” Howland said. “In the course of my life he has always influenced me, and he’s sort of been another father figure to me. And I actually found out in college that he was a member of Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity, Inc.”

Despite the fraternity’s primar-ily black membership, it has never

denied a person initiation on the basis of race or religion, Howland said.

Jackson said the fraternity has a history both on campus and na-tionally. In the 1980s and 1990s, Brown’s race-based fraternities were heavily involved in campus life, particularly through the Third World Center, he said.

Kappa Alpha Psi was founded in 1911 at the University of Indiana, at a time and place when blacks were facing significant discrimination. In the 1930s, the fraternity came together with eight other black fra-ternities and sororities to form the National Pan-Hellenic Council.

Though the context in which the fraternity now operates is in many ways different from the one in which the National Pan-Hellenic Council formed, Jackson said the body is still important to KAPsi’s activities. “Our chapter is never going to have enough members to fill a dorm. … If we wanted to do a project, we would do it through the National Pan-Hellenic Council,” which can provide resources be-yond those available to the Brown chapter, he said.

While current undergradu-ates may not be familiar with race-based fraternities, the reli-gion-based Wriston Quadrangle fixture Alpha Epsilon Pi, a Jewish fraternity, is well-known on cam-pus. “AEPi National is funded by Jewish philanthropists, and they want us to be 100 percent Jewish. But we do not pursue a 100 percent

Jewish rate — we do not turn down guys because they aren’t Jewish,” said Daniel Rome ’13, a brother of the fraternity. Still, the fraternity is based on Jewish values, which AEPi upholds in part by hosting events such as Hillel’s Purim party, a Passover Seder and Shabbat din-ners. “As it happens,” Rome said, “most of the guys who show up to rush happen to be Jewish.”

But it is hard to say much about most of the guys who show up for KAPsi. At the moment, KAPsi’s Brown chapter consists solely of Howland and Jackson, and they are not actively advertising or recruit-ing. “If they’ve done their research, and they want to be a part of it, they’re going to come to us and

they’re going to talk to us about it,” Jackson said.

“Quality over quantity,” How-land added. “Our fraternity will stay true to (its) objectives and is not going to sacrifice its ideals and its values to allow people to come into the organization who aren’t true to those objectives.”

The brothers of both AEPi and KAPsi said choosing a fraternity was a personal choice. “I met two of the founders at Brown, and they started it because they wanted an AEPi — they didn’t want to join Sigma (Chi), they didn’t want to join (Delta Tau), they wanted a Jewish fraternity,” Rome said. “It’s whatever makes you feel comfort-able.”

By eMiLy rosenStaff Writer

Professor of Physics Humphrey Maris will receive the 2011 Fritz London Memorial Prize at the 26th International Conference on Low Temperature Physics for develop-ing a method to track the activ-ity of a single electron in liquid helium.

The prize, first awarded in 1957, is given to scientists who have made significant accomplish-ments in low temperature phys-ics. Maris will travel to Beijing in August to accept the prize at the conference’s opening ceremonies.

“It’s an outstanding award,” said James Valles, professor of phys-ics and chair of the department, adding that Maris is receiving this award for “career achievement in the field.”

Maris’s group began studying the motion of electrons in liquid helium about 10 years ago.

Special chemical properties cause electrons in helium to form extremely small “electron bubbles,” Maris said. When sound pulses from an ultrasonic transducer are used to create a negative pressure environment, the bubbles expand

to the point where they become large enough to be imaged. As a result, their individual positions can be recorded.

“Liquid helium is an amazing substance,” said Maris, adding that it is interesting to “understand electron bubbles” and how they move through liquid.

Maris and his group first made a video of the motion of a single electron in 2006.

“It’s interesting to be able to vi-sualize something that is so small and yet an important part of mat-ter,” Maris wrote in an email to The Herald. He said tracking the motion of electrons could lead to development of a “quantum com-puter,” which is more powerful than current computers.

He is receiving the prize pri-marily for his video of an electron, but he has also conducted notable research in other areas during his career at Brown and other insti-tutions.

The award brings great vis-ibility to the physics department, Valles said. Maris “has been creat-ing results that have been turning heads for over 40 years. People always want to hear him talk,” he said.

Electron tracking yields prize for physics professor

evan Thomas / HeraldUnlike other fraternities, Kappa Alpha Psi does not have enough members to fill a dormitory.

continued on page 5

BCA Spring Weekend ticket policy

Spring Weekend tickets will go on sale the week after spring break on Brown Marketplace. one thousand tickets for each concert will be released to members of the Brown community each day April 6-8 on Brown Marketplace at 8 a.m. There will be an initial limit of one ticket per Brown identification.

ticket distributionTickets will be distributed using Brown Concert Agency’s new electronic ticketing system. Print-at-home tickets will be sent to the email addresses provided in the ticket orders. emails will not be sent automatically after purchases, but in batches at the

end of the day.

Weather callIf weather permits BCA to hold the concerts on the Main Green, additional tickets will go on sale at 1 p.m. April 13.

hope and slaterResidents of Hope College and Slater Hall will receive free tickets if the concert is held on the Main Green. After BCA makes the weather call, residents who have not bought tickets can request free tickets, and residents who have already bought tickets can request a refund.

No tickets will be sold to the general public.