Walla Walla, WAVolume CXXVII Issue 8whitmanpioneer.com

November 4, 2010

WHITMAN COLLEGE

For a portion of every day, Whitman student-athletes set aside their studies to focus on training for their respective sports. For the teams with Whitman alumni as members of the coaching staff, there may be a little extra motiva-tion seeing someone who worked hard for four years, and is still coming back for more.

This year, both swimming and tennis have coaches who were varsity athletes during their time at Whitman.

“Coaching any sport is extremely time intensive,” said assistant swim coach Jamie Kennedy ’96. “Adding ex-tra coaching resources with assistants at practices and meets provides a greater ability to work one-on-one with more athletes and allows more flexibility for head coaches.”

During his time at Whitman, Ken-nedy was a member of the varsity swim team and played club water polo. Ken-nedy has been volunteering as an assis-tant coach since 2003, when he and his wife moved back to Walla Walla. The swim team’s success has given him many good memories to build on.

“As a coach, my favorite memory was seeing the reaction of the team and the crowd when the men’s team beat UPS for the first time in a dual meet,” said Kennedy.

In addition to being another pair of eyes watching over the athletes as they train and prepare for competi-tion, the alums bring a different level of

Harper Joy pres-ents ‘Kid Simple’

Jazz Band experience

Skiiers and cyclists find unique value in their

club sport identity.page 6

The latest Harper Joy produc-tion infuses noir drama with

quriky sound effects.page 4

Shared passion for Jazz connects Ensemble and

Workshop students.page 5

After observing the effects of a 16-unit pre-registration cap on students last se-mester, the Registrar’s Office has reverted to an 18-unit plus activity credits cap for pre-registration for this spring. Both ASWC and the Registrar believe that this will benefit students.

The change to a 16-unit cap for pre-registration was implemented for the fall of 2010. Stacey Giusti, associate registrar, said that President George Bridges formed a group to look specifically at registration changes and how to help make the regis-tration system run more smoothly.

“We ultimately wanted to decrease the number of students dropping classes dur-ing final registration,” she said.

She said that the change was somewhat experimental.

“We weren’t sure what was going to happen in terms of course availability. We

had to find out what the schedule could handle.”

Senior John Loranger, vice presi-dent of ASWC and chair of the Stu-dent Affairs Committee, believes that this movement during the add-drop period was the biggest cause in the original change to a 16-unit cap.

“By only allowing students to register for 16 units, the Reg-istrar was trying to prevent so much movement. They hoped that this cap would force stu-dents to register only for the classes they really wanted.”

However, the good intentions behind the switch to the 16-credit cap were not enough to prevent a few problems.

Giusti explained that a few groups on campus were hit hard by the switch.

“It quickly became obvious that

this cap inadvertently made things diffi-cult for students who wanted to take mu-sic and SSRA credits,” she said.

Susan Pickett, the Catha-rine Gould Chism pro-fessor of music, wrote a document explaining the consequences of the shift

within the music depart-ment.One important issue was

benefits of non-tenure-track faculty in the music department.

These faculty members only re-ceive benefits if teaching 30 or

more credits of applied music lessons. With a 16-unit cap, students often did not apply

for music lessons until after the academic year started. This was prob-lematic for these faculty members who started the year unsure of whether or not they would have benefits.

A second problem came into play for

ensemble directors. Because the 16-unit cap applied to activity credits as well as academic credits, students often did not pre-register for activity credits, like music ensembles, and ensemble directors did not know how many students to prepare for.

Pickett made the comparison of pre-paring for academic courses.

“Imagine not being able to choose your reading list or make your syllabus until af-ter the semester begins,” she said.

The third issue had to do with scholar-ship timing. Some students receive schol-arships in order to take lessons with the college, and these scholarships have pa-perwork and deadlines to be made. When students are not registered for lessons un-til after the academic year begins, Betty Waggoner, administrative assistant for the hall of music, had difficulty making these deadlines.

These “unintended consequences,” to use Pickett’s phrase, were quite

Pre-registration moves back to 18 credits in response to complaintsby KARRAH KEMMERLYStaff Reporter

REGISTRATION, page 2SLOANE

This year’s admission process for the class of 2015 will be the first at Whit-man College to employ a need-sensitive as opposed to a need-blind acceptance policy. For at least 10 percent of students that apply, the ability to pay Whitman’s tuition and fees—currently $49,890 per year—will be one of the factors used to determine their admittance. Not being able to pay could be cause for an appli-cant being denied acceptance.

President George Bridges said that this policy stems from a rise in need for financial aid.

“Whitman has always been sensitive to how much financial aid we can pro-vide students. In effect we have never been fully need-blind,” he said. “We are becoming more sensitive to financial need as the levels of need are rising.”

The process of this switch began about a year ago. According to Dean of Admission and Financial Aid Tony Cabasco, the issue was discussed with senior administrators at the college, the admission staff and with the Govern-ing Board Committee on Enrollment, which comprises faculty and student representation. The Board of Trustees officially approved and adopted the pol-icy last February.

“It was a choice we needed to make based on the financial situation of the college and the needs of our current

by MOLLY JOHANSONStaff Reporter

Admissions changes to need-sensitive

About 600 high school students from the Northwest are expected to flood campus as part of the 38th annual Whit-man College Remy Wilcox High School Speech Tournament on Nov. 4-6, bring-ing with them tubs of evidence and plenty of conflict. The tournament helps fund the debate team financially and is estimated to generate approximately over $130,000 to Walla Walla’s economy.

While the tournament allows hun-dreds of students involved with debate the opportunity to survey the Whitman campus, it is also a source of inconve-nience and tension for Whitman stu-dents and staff.

“While we can accommodate a large number of students in the facility, we quickly run out of tables, chairs, couch-es--things needed to comfortably hang out,” said Barbara Maxwell, the associate dean of students for student programs and activities.

The sudden influx of students is ex-pected to stay on the south end of cam-pus when not participating in debate rounds, at Reid Campus Center and Hunter Conservatory.

Reid staff keeps facility is clean and safe, but must accommodate a much

larger demand than usual.“Staff we hire ensures that the facil-

ity is safe and clean. This is no different from what they are expected to do any-time they work at Reid--it is just done on a much larger scale because of the number of students using the space,” Maxwell said.

Junior Seth Dawson, like many Whit-man students, tends to avoid Reid dur-ing the tournament because it becomes so crowded.

“I actually avoid getting my mail dur-ing the debaters’ weekend; it’s too much work,” he said.

Debate rounds will occur in academ-ic buildings and, most controversially, lounges and study rooms in certain resi-dence halls. According to Jim Hanson, director of forensics, students are al-lowed to come into their lounges quietly to get through to lounge kitchens; still, some students are concerned.

“It’d be a little annoying if I wanted to get into a lounge,” said first-year Becca Peterson-Perry in response to having debate rounds in first-year residence halls.

However, Peterson-Perry feels that

by SHELLY LEStaff Reporter

Whitman debate tournament crowds campus, attracts prospective students

DEBATE, page 2

David Collier ‘14 works with his teammates to plan the upcoming debate tournament.

KLAG

Alumni return to coach for Whitman athleticsby PAMELA LONDONStaff Reporter

NEED SENSITIVE, page 2

Club sport perspectives

COACHING, page 6

Alumna Katie Oost ‘09 during the spring of her senior season. She returned the next fall as the women’s tennis assistant coach.

JACOBSON

KLAG

ELECTION 2010Last weekend, Washington State Senator Patty Murray-D made a last-minute trip to Walla Walla in her final push to retain her seat in the Senate. As of Wednesday night, the Washington senatorial race re-mained undecided, with Murray leading contender Dino Rossi-R by a less than one percent margin. Na-tionwide, Republicans reclaimed the House, while Democrats barely held on to control of the Senate.

Although Oregon Senator Ron Wyden-D easily won re-election, the state’s gubernatorial race was closely contested with John Kitzhaber-D claiming victory late Wednesday night.

In California, another major home state of Whitman students, the highly debated Proposition 19 to legalize marijuana failed by a 53.9 percent vote.

MORE COVERAGE, page 3

2 News November 4, 2010

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“I wear my food goggles every day. It’s a great lens to see the world through,” said Bon Appétit West Coast Fellow Vera Chang, who visited campus on Tuesday, Nov. 2, to give a talk entitled “Stories from the Field.”

As a Bon Appétit Management Com-pany (BAMCO) Fellow, Chang tours the farms with which BAMCO partners. She also visits colleges like Whitman that have Bon Appétit cafes.

Chang displayed an easy way with the audience, which may or may not have been helped by the big tray of locally-sourced desserts made by Bon Appétit and the basket of food documentaries waiting to be raffled off.

Chang graduated from Carleton Col-lege in 2009 with a degree in Global Eth-ics. After graduation, driven by her love of farming, she apprenticed at the University of California Santa Cruz farm.

“Growing food is like watching the best rock symphony orchestra,” she said. “Soil becomes plants, which become food, which become a part of us.”

At the UC Santa Cruz farm, Chang noticed the workers in the neighboring farms. She began to volunteer at a farm up the road and got to talk to some of these farmworkers and hear their stories. Many came from far away and were unable to get back. One man she met was able to pick a flat of strawberries in under five minutes.

For Chang, and for BAMCO as a whole, the ethical treatment of farmworkers is extremely important. Chang is currently researching and working on a BAMCO Foundation report about farmworkers’ rights, which will be published within the next couple of months.

Chang stated that she sees farmworkers as the Atlases of food.

“Just like Atlas holds up the world, farmworkers hold up the food supply chain. Without farmworkers, there would not be very much food at the supermar-ket, restaurants or even farmers markets. They are integral members of society.”

The problems that farmworkers face in America are multitudinous, accord-ing to Chang. They are in one of the most dangerous professions--subject to heat stroke, chemical pesticide and fertilizer

poisoning, seasonal downturn and inju-ries due to lack of training. Farmworkers have been intentionally excluded from many federal and state labor protections, the most prominent being exclusion from overtime payment, minimum wage and child worker laws. Lastly, there is inad-equate public data on farmworkers. Many accidents go unreported and many farm-workers go unaccounted for.

An issue to which BAMCO has been responsive is the slavery of farmworkers at tomato farms in Florida. The model for this enslavement involves worker debt that is impossible to pay off, which is then passed down generationally. BAMCO stopped buying their winter tomatoes from these farms until they are able to agree to a much more ethical and fair situ-ation, as defined by a code of conduct.

Chang went on to talk about some of the local farms which BAMCO works with and which are run completely dif-ferently from the farms she described in Florida.

Full Circle Farm features a break room for workers with a Foosball table. The farm also has a flat rate for workers, in ad-dition to paying by produce picked. They

are also looking into getting health care for their workers, but only if they can af-ford to get it for everyone, even the lowest paid worker.

Shepherd’s Grain is a cooperative of many wheat farmers who have been in the business of farming for generations. Shep-herd’s Grain farmers practice a more sus-tainable form of agriculture (no-till) than most farmers do, and the co-op allows for their grain to have a face and their farm a name, as opposed to earlier when anony-mous grain was deposited in a silo. This grain can be found in the pizza crust and other foods in Whitman’s dining halls.

Each Bon Appétit branch follows their Farm to Fork initiative, which means they source 20 percent of their food locally. This is defined by the farm being owner operated, having less than five million dollars in annual sales and being located within 150 miles.

“We use what we can get as long as we can get it,” said Prentiss Dining Hall Man-ager Susan Todhunter, who was present at the event. “You guys eat a lot. There aren’t very many farms that produce enough of a single thing, so we need to be creative.”

An audience member asked if BAMCO

is planning to raise the 20 percent stan-dard. Chang pointed out that for many schools, especially those in the Midwest, 20 percent is a great goal because of the short growing season and sometimes the lack of many local farms.

However, Chang also pointed out that Farm to Fork began in 1999 “before [be-ing sustainable] was popular.”

“We [BAMCO] like to be cutting edge,” she said.

To conclude, Chang encouraged stu-dents to begin a dialogue about farm-workers’ rights and other food issues. BAMCO’s cage-free shell eggs initiative, she pointed out, began with a student.

“I was really excited to see that Bon Ap-pétit was doing more than I thought they were, and that it’s more in line with my views than I expected,” said sophomore Abby Salzer, who is an environmental studies-sociology major. “I’m excited to see that they want to work with students and that they care not only where their food is coming from but where it’s going.”

Information about what BAMCO’s Fel-lows are seeing and doing can be found on Twitter (@bamco) or on their blog at www.bonAppétit.typepad.com.

Whitman College is taking steps to walk the walk when it comes to a cul-ture of sustainability. The Sustainable Endowment Institute has just come out with its annual College Sustain-ability Report Card (CSRC), which ranks colleges on sustainable prac-tices, and Whitman got a B. The year before, it was a B minus.

“Whitman has been progressing towards a higher grade for some time now, as our campus makes choices like conducting and streamlining the greenhouse gas audit which shows us areas and departments for where we can improve,” said senior Ari Frink, one of Whitman’s two Sustainability Coordinators, in an e-mail.

According to Sean Gehrke, Chair of the Sustainability Advisory Commit-tee, the greenhouse gas audit report revealed that the school has reduced its greenhouse gas emissions by 22 percent since 2008, a statistic that

since it is only for a weekend, it is not a huge conflict.

“It’s a small sacrifice to make for one weekend when it could have a lot of pos-sible influence on a high school debater,” she said.

Hanson’s aim in hosting the tourna-ment is to provide high school students with the means to practice their sport.

“It’s a service to the high school foren-sics community,” he said.

Hanson also sees an increase in high school student interest in coming to Whitman once they have attended the tournament.

“A number of students come specifi-cally to the tournaments because they’re here visit to Whitman,” he said. “It draws attention to Whitman, some of the best students in the nation are seeing Whit-man, and so it’s getting word out to 10,000 of the best students in the nation.”

Sophomore Mitch Dunn, who cur-rently is on the Whitman Debate Team, agrees.

“The tournament offers hundreds of high school students from around the country the opportunity to visit and ex-perience the Whitman campus and at-mosphere,” he said.

Dunn also participated in the Whit-man debate tournament as a high school student, and decided to come Whitman after attending the tournament.

“I had already planned on attending Whitman but the tournament cemented my decision,” he said.

Hanson hopes that his fine tuning of the tournament ensures that both high school debaters, Whitman students, staff and faculty are happy and do not conflict. Last year Hanson had few com-plaints, and he hopes that this continues.

“One of the complaints was too many signs, so I’ve cut back on those,” he said. “Hopefully we’ve done a better job of it

this year.”Hanson’s team has placed pink fluo-

rescent signs with directions to partici-pating debaters in addition to placing guides in Olin and Maxey Halls to direct debaters in-between rounds.

Although Dawson agreed that it can be a struggle sometimes having so many students on campus at once, he noted that the struggle comes from the sheer number of students coming in and out at once rather than the students them-selves.

“Last year I had a class in a space some debaters were using for prep work, but they were courteous and moved out as quickly as possible,” he said.

But those sheer numbers still make the weekend hectic. Peterson-Perry plans to catch up on homework this weekend and steer clear of debate zones to avoid crowds.

“I’ll just stay in and be avoiding Reid that weekend,” she said.

students,” said Bridges. “We felt it was the right choice.”

One aspect of this decision, which af-fects both students and budget, is the school’s discount rate. This is the percent of tuition dollars going towards financial aid for other students.

“We think of ourselves as a school that relies on high tuition and that offers high levels of aid,” said Bridges. “We discount tuition significantly, with nearly 80 per-cent of all students receiving some form of financial aid.”

This year, the discount rate is up to 40 percent, which is much higher than in years past and compared to peer colleges. With this money going to fund student’s tuition, less money is avail-able to pay for other expenses at the college.

“We have to be good stewards of the college’s resources,” said Cabasco.

In reference to whether or not this could accom-plish lowering tuition for students, Cabasco stated in an e-mail that, “Whitman needs to continue to invest in faculty and the academic programs, student services and aca-demic support of the educational experi-ence which benefits all students.”

Based on a study by Bridges of the Whitman budget from 1985 to 2005, the reasons for the higher cost of higher edu-cation has been cited as the cost of student services and technologies that schools have come to depend on.

The rise in tuition may also be due to the fluctuation of Whitman’s endowment during the past few years. Currently, it’s at about $350 million, which is higher than it was last year, but still not as high as in previous years.

“I’m hopeful that [the switch to need-sensitive admissions] will enable us to continue to advance the institution aca-demically and ensure that we can offer students the kinds of experiences that we think they want and need,” Bridges said. “We don’t want to sacrifice the academic quality of Whitman or it’s commitment to school of a culture of innovation.”

Students seem to understand the need for this switch.

“I don’t like it, but it makes sense,” said senior John Loranger, ASWC vice presi-dent and student affairs chair. “[Whitman has] resisted the change for a long time, which speaks to the fact that they would not have done it unless it was 100 percent

necessary for the budget.”Junior Elizabeth Reetz, co-president of

the Whitman First Generation and Work-ing Class group, has a similar view.

“I can see why they did this,” she said. “Whitman needs to maintain itself. How-ever, this is indicative of a greater social pattern of the poor not being as able to move forward.”

Cabasco said that the Office of Admis-sion hopes to minimize any decreases in economic diversity at the school. This year is a trial run for the new method, so full knowledge of its effects won’t be known until next fall.

“The admission decision process will continue to be a highly personalized, holistic and careful process for the ad-

mission office and admission officers,”

he said. “The new fi-nancial aid policy can

make [the selection pro-cess] easier in some ways,

but also more difficult in other ways.”

A positive side to admit-ting slightly fewer students having need-based financial

aid is that it could lead to other students receiving better finan-cial aid packages. In the need-blind model, students who were admitted but couldn’t

pay could end up receiving a gapped package, or one that didn’t fully meet their demonstrated need. This could end up doing more harm than good in the form of large student loans or needing to transfer schools.

About half of last year’s graduating se-niors had debt, averaging about $14,500. The national average debt at graduation is about $19,000 at public colleges and about $23,000 for private schools.

Though the Office of Admission can’t yet promise that 100 percent of all dem-onstrated need will be met, other need-sensitive institutions have been able to.

Of schools that remain need-blind, many are large institutions such as Har-vard and Yale that have large endow-ments. Whitman is one of the last of its peer colleges to switch to the need-sensi-tive method.

“Idealistically, it would be great if we could be need-blind,” said Director of Admission Kevin Dyerly. “But we have to understand there are finite resources and we must be fiscally responsible. We can’t do everything we’d love to do. That said, we feel good about the quality of financial aid awards admitted students will receive, which may improve the overall experi-ence for Whitman students and even re-duce some of the financial stress.”

from page 1

by KARAH KEMMERLYStaff Reporter

by MOLLY JOHANSON Staff Reporter

from page 1

TournamenT: Helps recruit students

“Stories from the Field” highlights Bon Appétit’s farming initiatives

need: Reduced economic diversity

Mr. Whitman raises record contributions

The 9th Annual Mr. Whitman Pageant on Friday Oct. 29 featuring several campus performance groups and eight men danc-ing, singing and modeling to raise money for the Chris Elliot Foundation for glio-blastoma Brain Cancer Research. Under the leadership of Philanthropy chair, ju-nior Abby Neel, Whitman’s Kappa Kappa Gamma sorority chose to put donate all proceeds to the Chris Elliot Fund.

The Fund was discovered by Senior Julie Irvine whose mother was diagnosed with glioblastoma two years ago.

“[Joe Wheeler and Reid Ferris] deserved

their wins. But then, so did the other six contestants,” Neel said in an email. “These eight gentlemen are delightful human be-ings and are positive reflections of the Whitman community as a whole.”

According to Neel, the pageant raised 45,785 dollars and 56 cents, which will go towards the Chris Elliot Fund. Aside from modeling and rehearsing dances, each of the contestants had a responsibility to fun-draise for the effort. Senior Joe Wheeler, the winner of the pageant, raised an unprece-dented more than 7,000 dollars.

Contestants wrote letters, sang and col-lected cans of student donations. The larg-est individual donation the philanthropy event received this year was 1,000 dollars.

This means that a majority of the money came from small donations from members of the Whitman community.

According to the Chris Elliot Fund, the money raised will be enough to launch the Physician Education Pilot Program and to work for research on Avastin chemothera-py treatment.

“The whole experience really made me feel proactive at a time when many things in my life seem uncontrollable,” said Irvine, whose mother inspired the charity dona-tion. “It also really showed me that even a small school like Whitman has the capacity to come together for a collective cause. The whole thing was an honor and an inspira-tion.”

LOOS-DIALLO

by WILLIAM WITWER Staff Reporter

Mr. Whitman participants bravely flaunt their song and dance talents in the name of The Chris Elliott Fund, a non-profit organiza-tion dedicated to raise awareness of brain cancer and to help fund new research. Contributions totaled nearly $46,000.

by ALYSSA GOARDStaff Reporter

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November 4, 2010 News 3

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Whitman College is taking steps to walk the walk when it comes to a cul-ture of sustainability. The Sustainable Endowment Institute has just come out with its annual College Sustain-ability Report Card (CSRC), which ranks colleges on sustainable prac-tices, and Whitman got a B. The year before, it was a B minus.

“Whitman has been progressing towards a higher grade for some time now, as our campus makes choices like conducting and streamlining the greenhouse gas audit which shows us areas and departments for where we can improve,” said senior Ari Frink, one of Whitman’s two Sustainability Coordinators, in an e-mail.

According to Sean Gehrke, Chair of the Sustainability Advisory Commit-tee, the greenhouse gas audit report revealed that the school has reduced its greenhouse gas emissions by 22 percent since 2008, a statistic that

probably contributed to the increased grade. Gehrke also explained that ef-forts to increase sustainability are getting more recognition because of enhanced CSRC quantitative method-ology, but that efforts have remained as high as they have always been. In other words, the change in grade is a more accurate picture of environ-mental practices here, rather than a significant change at Whitman.

“The surveys that our grade was based upon were completed months ago, so despite its recent release, our current report card is more like last semester’s grades,” said senior Nat Clarke, the other Sustainability Coor-dinator, in an e-mail. “While I don’t think it’s valuable to dwell on an out-side assessment to judge our progress, it’s encouraging that our grade has been increasing steadily every year from a C- in 2008 to our current B.”

Frink and Clarke emphasized that Whitman can do more. Frink men-tioned in particular that President George Bridges has not yet signed

the President’s Climate Commitment, a public pledge colleges can make to combat climate change.

According to Clarke, several stu-dent initiatives have been proposed which are designed to make improve-ments in waste reduction, energy effi-ciency, sustainable purchasing, trans-portation and sustainability policy. These proposed initiatives include increased composting, the creation of a carpool website and the estab-lishment of a full-time sustainability coordinator.

“I would say that there is always more that we can accomplish, but the impetus for improvement will come from a desire to simply make our-selves greener, not because we want to improve our grade on the CSRC,” said Gehrke. “While we are honored that our grade improved and value the CSRC for allowing us to be evalu-ated, it is energizing to know that the campus community is supportive of our pursuit of these practices simply because it is the right thing to do.”

Nathaniel Frank, the author of “Un-friendly Fire: How the Gay Ban Un-dermines the Military and Weakens America,” came to Whitman College on Monday, Nov. 1 to share his expertise on the U.S. military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy. The lecture was the eighth install-ment of the Matthew Shepard lecture series, a series started by an anonymous donor to increase awareness of GLBTQ issues.

The lecture consisted of an interview between Frank and Janet Mallen, assis-tant registrar for institutional records, co-advisor of Whitman GLBTQ and for-merly a sergeant in the Marines. A ques-tion and answer session with the audi-ence followed.

Delbert Hutchinson, associate profes-sor of biology, introduced the pair and explained that he has a problem with “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” because it is a policy that “actively discriminates against people in our name.”

Following that, Mallen shared some of

her experiences in the military pre-“Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” a time that GLBTQ indi-viduals were banned from military ser-vice completely. She managed to leave the military with a clean record by keeping her sexual orientation a secret. However, it wasn’t easy.

“It was crushing me every single day,” she said.

Despite hiding much of her life from her colleagues, she was harassed. She remembers coming back to a ransacked room, picking bugs off her phone and even getting beaten.

Mallen described a time in which GLBTQ individuals in the military faced severe punishments for being of non-heterosexual orientation. Suspected in-dividuals were interrogated and, if found guilty, could be fined, placed in prison or stripped of pay and the ability to vote.

She asked Frank what has changed since the switch from this atmosphere to that of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” He explained that number of discharges and witch hunts within the military in-creased.

“In some ways, things got worse,” he

said. “You can be a patriot and sacrifice your life; but you have to lie about who you are.”

Frank explained three main reasons he supports abolishing the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy: it’s unnecessary, unjust and unaffordable. To illustrate its lack of necessity, Frank used Britain and Canada as examples.

“Before gay bans were lifted in these countries, there were all sorts of predic-tions of doom and gloom, just like there are here. But nothing bad actually hap-pened.”

Twenty-five other countries have had successful militaries without implement-

ing or after lifting gay bans, he said.“We’re talking about diverse countries

and peoples. Even macho Israel doesn’t have a gay ban. These are not all the Netherlands,” he said jokingly.

Frank also said that in one survey, al-most 80 percent of U.S. citizens support doing away with this policy.

He also discussed how the military is able to take a group of different religions, races and backgrounds and make them into a cohesive, efficient fighting force. He believes that having members of dif-ferent sexual orientations will not jeopar-dize this cohesion.

“And it’s the butt of jokes among younger members of the military. Some-one will ask: what did you do last night? And you’ll say: don’t ask, don’t tell,” said Frank.

Some members of the audience were curious why, if “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” is so unpopular, there isn’t more being done to get rid of it.

Frank laughed.“As they say on Facebook, it’s compli-

cated,” he said.He explained that the president is

worried that the issue is too politically problematic, so he has made it a low pri-ority on his agenda. He also pointed out that though “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” was deemed unconstitutional in one level of the court system, it still has several levels to go.

Frank ended the lecture by encourag-ing people to go out and speak about the issue.

“Talk to everyone,” he said. “You might know someone who can push the issue.”

First-year Nick Davies said that the lecture was an informative and positive experience.

“I learned a lot about how illogical this policy is,” he said. “[Frank] gave good counterarguments to the ideas radical conservatives often present in support of ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.’ Now I have con-crete evidence to support my personal beliefs.”

“It’s an issue that’s on a lot of people’s minds,” said Liam Mina, co-president of both GLBTQ and Coalition Against Ho-mophobia. “Most are familiar with the issue, but it’s nice to have an expert per-spective on it.”

influential in the decision to switch back to an 18-credit cap with space for activ-ity credits.

Loranger said ASWC is happy to see the change after predicting that there would be problems--a prediction that was vali-dated by students’ concerns in survey re-sponses about the switch to a 3-2 schedule and a 16-credit cap.

“We anticipated last year that there would be problems with a 16-credit cap, and we’re thrilled to see the change back to the 18-credit cap,” he said.

Loranger believes that keeping classes open to first-year students is important, but he doesn’t think a cap is the best way to accomplish this.

“Instead, we need to get the word out to all students that it is important to talk to professors before registering in order to find out whether students really want the classes they’re registering for.”

He explained that the Registrar and ASWC were definitely in agreement about

switching back for Spring 2011.“We didn’t have to push them. They re-

alized the 16-credit cap wasn’t working.”Giusti explained that she isn’t worried

about enrollment pressure being an issue during the spring semester pre-registra-tion.

“We can use this fall’s numbers to pre-dict what the schedule can support,” she said. “We’re happy and excited to go back to an 18-credit cap in the spring.”

Pre-registration for the Spring 2011 se-mester begins on Friday, Nov. 5.

You can be a patriot and sacrifice your life; but you have to lie about who you are.

-Nathaniel Frank, Lecturer

Pre-registration: ASWC pleased with 18-credit capfrom page 1

by KARAH KEMMERLYStaff Reporter

Whitman gets ‘B’ in sustainability report card

Shepard lecture examines why “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” remains

need: Reduced economic diversity Whitman students’ home states reflect midterm trends

ADVERTISEMENT

by WILLIAM WITWER Staff Reporter

KLAG

Last Saturday, Oct. 30, Senator Patty Murray-D made a surprise visit to Walla Walla in an attempt to garner last minute support in Washington state’s highly contested senatorial race. Over 200 Murray supporters rallied at Walla Walla Community College where Mur-ray discussed her experience in the Senate. She also outlined the direct results she has brought to Walla Walla County, including state-funded improvements to Highway 12 and increased funding for Walla Walla’s Jonathan M. Wainwright Memorial VA Medical Center.APPLETON

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CORRECTIONS TO ISSUES 6-7

In Issue 6, “Students emphasize reality of human trafficking for Slavery Awareness Week” incorrectly named Walla Walla University’s newspaper as The Chronicle. The newspaper is named The Collegian.

In Issue 7, “Alpha Phi selected to be fourth sorority” stated that Alpha Phi had been at Whitman until the 1980s. The sorority left Whitman in 1979.

The PioneerIssue 8

Nov 4, 2010

Page 4 A&EHarper Joy Theatre’s production of “Kid

Simple: A Radio Play Made Flesh”, which will open on Wednesday, Nov. 10, is the story of a young inventor named Moll who creates the “Third Ear” for hearing sounds that cannot be normally regis-tered. The play pays homage to radio dra-mas with two unusual elements: A “Foley artist” who plays sound effects from a booth, and a narrator stationed above the set who struggles to keep the sound and story of the production under control.

“The play is difficult to categorize,” said Assistant Professor of Theatre Chris Petit, the show’s director. “It’s sort of a science fiction/action adventure/coming-of-age story.”

The theft of this machine, and Moll’s quest to get it back, drives the plot for-ward. After joining forces with a virginal boy, played by sophomore Nik Hagen, both fight a shape-shifting mercenary. Al-though the play is heavily indebted to ra-dio drama—a form of storytelling that was more popular in the 1940s—the dialogue and humor are snappy and contemporary.

“Sound effects, both acoustic and com-puterized, make Kid Simple a different sort of experience than most of the plays I’ve seen or been a part of,” says assistant stage manager freshman Melanie Medina. “Most plays don’t have sound effects that are so essential to the script.”

In “Kid Simple,” however, sound is a central element. The plot is focused around sound. The action onstage is con-stantly complemented by sound effects.

“Sound . . . functions like a character in the play,” said Petit. “The play is driven by what you hear as much as by what you see.”

For the first half of the play, these sounds act as normal sound effects do—enhancing and accenting the action play-ing out on the stage. During the second half, however, they take on a life of their own and become analogous to the human characters.

The Third Ear serves as both a catchy element that drives the plot and a physi-cal locus for these sounds. On the stage, it’s represented by a booth decorated with mechanical junk and covered with a cur-tain.

“It’s set up in a way that he’s sort of at the back of everything,” said Hagen.

At times different characters will step back and interact with the machine. At other times, the Third Ear merely acts as an onstage reminder of how important sound is to “Kid Simple.”

When the curtain is opened, the Foley artist is visible inside the Third Ear.

“He sits at a table and he has a bunch of like, sound effects,” said Hagen. “He’s basically the machine. He’ll play all these noises and stuff . . . it’s not so much a big prop as it is a table with gadgets and things

that has somebody behind it.”Played by first-year Nick Budak, the

Foley artist has a wide array of broken in-struments and miscellaneous noisemak-ers. He plucks, strikes and plays his props in as events unfold on stage.

The Foley artist dictates what can be heard. The narrator, played by junior Lau-ren Moscovis, dictates what can be seen. She tracks the events as they unfold on stage. The plot, however, is not so easy to keep down.

“As the play goes on, it starts to lose its typical structure,” said Hagen. “The sounds start mutinying . . . the narrator starts not knowing what’s going on, and she has to say things on the fly, and she goes through a period of self doubt. “

In a traditional radio play, the narrator is important in relaying complex events to an audience who must visualize for them-selves what’s happening onstage. In “Kid Simple,” however, the play slips away from the narrator’s control, and she is directly tied rather than distanced from the events of the play.

“She has a hard time when the order of the play starts jumping the tracks and fol-lowing its own course,” says Budak. “She struggles with the feeling of obsolescence.”

“Kid Simple” will be on the Freimann Stage of Harper Joy from Wednesday, Nov. 10 through Sunday, Nov. 14. Tickets are eight dollars for students and twelve dol-lars for adults.

by SEAN MCNULTYstaff Reporter

Quirky ‘Kid Simple’ brings fresh sound to Harper Joy Theatre

Trevor Cushman ‘11 and Madeleine Hale ‘13 play protagonist Moll’s parents as well as several other characters in ‘Kid simple,’ Harper Joy’s second show of the season.

On November 13 at 6:30 p.m. in the Reid Ballroom, Whitman students will enjoy the unusual combination of pan-cakes and dance crews, partaking in an entertaining evening that will also make a difference for children in need. Kappa Alpha Theta’s annual fundrais-er, Cakes for C.A.S.A: Whitman’s Best Dance Crew, strives to raise money for children in the foster care system who need help paying for legal services.

“Theta’s national philanthropy is C.A.S.A., or Court Appointed Special Advocates, an organization that helps children in the court system find safe and permanent foster homes,” said se-nior Tegan Klein, who served as Theta’s organizer for the event.

“Basically C.A.S.A hires adults to help foster children navigate the legal system and keep an eye out for them,” said Theta member junior Rhya Milici, who will also be contributing to the event as a member of one of the dance crews.

This coming C.A.S.A event will mark the sixth year the Thetas have held this fundraiser. After purchasing tickets beforehand for a price of five dollars or at the door, for eight dollars, students will be able to enjoy a night of customizable pancakes and a dance competition, modeled after the form of the popular television show “America’s Best Dance Crew.”

“It is an all-you-can-eat pancake feast and dance crew competition where people come and eat delicious

pancakes and a wide variety of top-pings, with everything from peanut butter to chocolate chips,” said Klein. “[Students] watch dance crews from around campus compete for the glo-ry of being the next Whitman’s Best Dance Crew.”

This year there will be between nine and ten dance crews competing, any students interested are allowed to form crews.

“For the two crews I’m in, the first thing we did was pick what style of dance we wanted to do and then pick music,” said Milici.

“Generally, crew routines are any-where from one to four minutes in length.”

Students watching the dancers will also be able to consume pancakes with even more toping variety than years past.

“We’ve gotten a little creative this year, [students] can look forward to some Dairy Queen toppings for [their] pancakes,” said Theta sophomore Katie Haaheim, who is in charge of all things food related for the event.

However, with more toppings and more dance crews comes more pan-cakes, increasing Theta’s workload necessary to prepare for the evening.

“Many people are unaware just how many pancakes we have to make-- lit-erally, thousands. We start the pro-cess at about 2 p.m. at several of our off-campus houses that day and go constantly until the event is over,” said Haaheim.

While not changing the general purpose of the fundraiser, Theta will

make a few physical changes to the set up of the event to ensure that is runs smoothly and efficiently, contributing to the overall experience of observers and performers.

“It’s still going to be in Reid ball-room, but instead of taking up lots of valuable space with a giant circular table, we’re just going [to use] chairs,” said Milici.

This change is designed to solve the space problem that occurred in years past.

“Last year the back of the room was crammed with about 200 people still waiting in line for pancakes, craning their necks to try to see the dancers, said Milici. “So we’ve been smart this year about better coordinating the traf-fic flow since so many people come out to the event.”

However, according to Milici despite the change of venue, Reid ballroom can still be a problem when planning dance routines.

“[Members of my dance crew] and I are trying to figure out what kinds of leaps we can do, since our rehearsal space is the Boyer dance studio, which is much larger than the stage we will be performing on,” said Milici.

Theta is looking forward to another successful night of charity, pancakes and dancing.

“Basically, people love to eat and watch other people wiggle. Cakes for CASA: Whitman’s Best Dance Crew offers both a feast of epic proportions and an engaging performance that highlight how amazingly talented our campus really is,” said Haaheim.

by MCCAULAY SINGER-MILNESstaff Reporter

Theta’s Cakes for C.A.S.A features Whitman Dance CrewKappa Alpha Theta’s annual philanthropic event enters its sixth year with home-made pancakes and dance performances for a smart price and a good cause.

Cakes for C.A.s.A. dancers rehearse in the Boyer Dance studio. The dance groups must adapt their performance to the Reid Young Ballroom, which is much smaller than the practice studio, despite event organizer’s attempts to make more room.

MOVIE REVIEW

‘The Class’ portrays student strugglesby MCCAULAY SINGER-MILNESstaff Reporter

THRIFTY WHITTIES

How to make perfect rice

Until I came to college, I was unaware that such a thing as instant rice existed. When I first tried it, I was pleasantly surprised. It is hard to mess up, quick and perfectly ac-ceptable as far as rice goes. However, I am passionate about rice, and when it comes to texture and consistency, instant rice is just not up to par with the real thing. Each grain of well-cooked rice is glossy and plump, and as a whole there should be just enough starchiness that the indi-vidual grains clump together, but not so much that they resemble dining hall gluey rice blobs. When I am cooking a dish that features rice, I begin preparing my rice a few hours early.

The first step to making delicious rice is to wash it thoroughly. Measure as much rice as you wish to cook into a bowl and add cold water. Use clean hands to agitate the rice, rubbing the grains between your hands. Once the water is opaque, tip the bowl over the sink to drain the water. Be careful not to lose any rice; some people use their hand or a pot lid to keep the rice in the bowl as they drain. Replace it with fresh water and scrub the rice again. I usu-ally subject the rice to three rinses, but the best way to tell when the rice is clean is by the translucency of the water. The wa-ter does not need to be completely clear on your last rinse, but it should be pretty clear. If you are familiar with coconut wa-ter, it should look like that. What this pro-cess does is wash the starch off of the rice. When making risotto you do not wash the rice because the added starch will help to achieve a thick consistency.

Preparing the rice can make all the dif-ference, so if you have the time and fore-sight, try following these instructions. If not, skip to the next paragraph. Now that it is clean, set it aside to dry in a strainer.

Make sure the holes in your strainer are smaller than rice grains and spread the rice into a bowl shape in the strainer to al-low it to dry more quickly. It should take approximately an hour to dry. An easy way to check to see if the rice is dry is to run your fingers through the grains. If they all move easily you should be ready to cook.

If you are using a rice maker, this is easy. F0r each cup 0f rice, add water to the rice maker up to the corresponding line on the inside. Place the lid on top and press the start button. If you have a rice maker that more than ten years old, when the rice maker is finished, allow the rice five to 10 more minutes to steam before actually removing the lid. My rice maker is older than I am with only one button, but it has loyally served me for as long as I can remember and it still makes delicious rice. So you don’t need to buy a new rice maker with fancy options to get delicious rice. However, the new machines do have options to keep your rice moist, fresh, and warm for days.

If you do not have the luxury of a rice maker, you can still make delicious rice. Place your rice and water in a medium or large flat-bottomed pot. I have tried sev-eral different measurements and found the best to be a ratio of two cups of rice with three cups of water. Turn the burner on to a medium-high heat and bring the water to a boil. Once it is boiling, turn the heat down to low and cover the pot with a tight lid, one that will not allow the steam to escape. Whatever you do, resist the urge to check on the rice. Once 10 to 15 min-utes have gone by, remove the pot from the heat, but leave the lid on for another five to ten minutes.

Stay tuned to Thrifty Whitties, and I will teach you how to make sushi rice! Until then, enjoy the fluffy perfection of well-cooked rice.

by OLIVIA JONESColumnist

ADVERTISEMENT

AXTeLL

HoNG

November 4, 2010 A&E 5

PIO PICKSEach Thursday, The Pioneer highlights several events happening on campus or in Walla Walla over the weekend. Here

are this week’s picks:

Jazz students seize new musical opportunitiesby CJ WISLERA&E Editor

MOVIE REVIEW

‘The Class’ portrays student struggles

Life inside and outside of the class-room in a poverty-stricken Parisian neighborhood is tough, with teachers and students transcending the defini-tions of “good” and “bad” as they at-tempt to navigate their way through an inherently flawed educational sys-tem. This is the story of “The Class”, directed by Laurent Cantent, a film that feels so real I found myself check-ing to make sure that Netflix had not incorrectly labeled this as a drama in-stead of a documentary while watch-ing.

The movie follows teacher Francois Marin and several of his students and colleagues throughout the daily dif-ficulties of the classroom. The char-acter of Marin is based on the life of the actor who plays him, Francios Begaudeau, a novelist and former teacher himself. Marin struggles with his teaching philosophy, often finding himself having to choose between the styles of punishment or positive rein-forcement in order to procure better results from his students.

The actors playing the students are uniquely effective because they were cast after a lengthy search that was de-signed to find students who could im-provise during the situations in class. The exchanges between Marin and the students are realistically raw, high-lighting the constant problems pres-ent in the inner-city classroom. Given these components, in addition to the three-camera filming style, the film truly manages to occupy a role larger than the genre of “drama,” giving the audience an original and highly per-sonal view into these semi-fictitious lives.

The film begins with the welcom-ing of the new staff. As new teachers view their class rosters, old teachers

quickly begin to sort the lists into those of “nice students” and “not nice students,” sharing tips of who “to look out for” with the new additions. This, while strikingly judgmental, seems to be a coping mechanism at a school where teachers are often at a loss with what to do with the so-called “prob-lem students.” Teachers are frustrated as they strive to impart knowledge that often lands on uninterested or ill-equipped ears.

The students are a mix of those who truly want to do well, those who are simply disinterested and those who fall somewhere in between. Problems often arise between the students due to social and racial tensions, but they bond together when taking on “the bourgeois,” often times the teachers, with whom they associate this discon-nected way of life.

The film does a great job of illustrat-ing the tension constantly present in an educational system where finding the root of disciplinary and academic problems is ignored for the easier so-lution of expulsion. There is no “bad guy” in the story, but rather a flawed system that contributes to a cyclical reaction of unfortunate actions and reactions. Students are living difficult lives at home, so they are often disrup-tive or unsuccessful in school, which leads to teachers frequently being out of ideas of how to help. This constant battle leads to mutual anger that ends in situations that are ultimately harm-ful to all involved.

Though this movie is in French, it appeals to all nations and cultures, and is easily related to by anyone who has gone to a school where the necessary resources are not always available. In creating the documentary-style dra-ma, Cantent is particularly effective in conveying her message of social change, and it is easy to see why this was nominated for an Oscar in 2009.

by MCCAULAY SINGER-MILNESStaff Reporter

Credit-based music classes Jazz En-sembles I and II have provided students with unique, musical class courses for decades. Professor David Glenn, who came to Whitman in the fall of 1989, helped bring about major changes to the bands and give students better artistic opportunities.

“There was only a six to seven piece group when I arrived,” said Glenn. “The band was [also] more of a combination of students and people in town, and stu-dents didn’t really have any ownership of the band.”

Eventually Glenn was able to limit the group to Whitman students only. As interest and enrollment grew, Jazz En-semble II was added. Jazz Ensemble, the premiere Whitman jazz band, contains 16-20 instrumentalists who perform sev-eral times a year. This year, Glenn teach-es a Jazz Workshop, a non-performance based class that gives students even more musical and educational options.

Students in the premiere band, Jazz Ensemble, audition every year.

“It’s competitive,” said Glenn. “Every-one, even old members, audition every year. It gives stu- d e n t s a chance to de-fend their spots. Sometimes old members get beat-

en out [because of] new student talent.”Students in Jazz Ensemble come

from a variety of musical backgrounds. Senior Brian Barton, who came from the Tri-City area, started learning alto saxophone and jazz music in the seventh grade and continued throughout high school. Senior Ross Eustis, who plays trumpet, came from Seattle’s Roosevelt High School, well known for its jazz pro-gram.

While talent and a background in mu-sic matters, Glenn listed other equally important qualities amongst auditioning students.

“Reliability… and flexibility, and the ability to work in a team frame work, especially in a big band [are important] – we can’t have any big egos,” said Glenn. “Being able to dedicate time to the band can sometimes put members in when old ones can’t dedicate time anymore.”

While the auditioning process is rig-orous, Eustis and Barton value the laid-back atmosphere of musical camarade-rie that comes afterwards in the general rehearsal process.

“We’re all there to make music,” said E u s t i s . “Even with all the differ-e n t levels, there’s a mu-

tual respect for one another.

Ego goes out the door [at rehearsal].”“We definitely learn from each oth-

er… there’s no competition in the room,” said Barton.

Sophomore Jonas Myers, the one of two pianists in the ensemble this year, also emphasized that the peer mentor-ship in the band allows for more artistic freedom within the group.

“There’s a great musical dynamic within the group,” said Myers. “Dave [Glenn] leads the charge [as a director], but lets the band take direction creatively speaking.”

“There’s a tradition of self-policing within the ensemble,” said Glenn. “This year and last year there has been espe-cially good leadership from the upper classmen.”

Since he plans on retiring this year, Glenn decided to make Jazz II into a workshop-based class than a perfor-mance-based one.

“It’s something I’ve always wanted to do,” said Glenn. “I wanted to focus on teaching jazz, rather than preparing for performance. With the Jazz Workshop, students learn to develop skills to impro-vise.”

Jazz Workshop offers students of varying musical abilities and back-

grounds a chance to learn about various jazz techniques and instru-

ments. Some s t u d e n t s from the Jazz

Wo r k -

shop gain skills to successfully audition for Jazz Ensemble, and some Ensemble students take the workshop in order to develop new skills.

Because of this new set-up, Glenn was able to supply music to better suit partic-ular musical levels and band techniques and approaches.

“Ensemble gets a lot of brand new music as well as classic pieces… both Ellington Big Band pieces and composi-tions by [University of Kansas Director of Jazz Studies and Professor of Music] Dan Gailey,” said Glenn. “The ensemble is so big that there has been more and more material the big band hasn’t been able to cover. [In addition] Workshop students get music focusing on Jazz The-ory and applying it to improvisational situations.”

While uncertain whether or not these changes will stick, Glenn’s new programs allow for the tradition of jazz, and stu-dents passionate about jazz, the chance to flourish and develop within and out-side of academia. Eustis and Barton hope that the professor taking Glenn’s place will be able to step up the challenge.

“Hopefully we’ll get some young tal-ent with a lot of energy and enthusiasm, someone good at helping teach improv,” said Barton.

“We have potential here with musi-cians in the program,” said Eustis. “We’ve g o t the players – now we need a

director to fill [Glenn’s] shoes and hopefully bring energy to the pro-

gram.”The Jazz Workshop’s

achievements were cel-ebrated at their fall concert last night,

Wednesday November 3. The Fall Concert for Jazz Ensemble occurs tomor-row, Friday November 5 in

Chism Music Hall at 7:30 p.m.

Capella Romana Lecture-Demon-stration: The music and history de-partments present internationally-re-nowned Byzantine choir group Capella Romana. The lecture and performance will engage with multicultural and in-terdisciplinary topics that fuse history, anthropology and music. For those in-terested in Eastern Orthodox practices and music, come to Chism Recital Hall on Friday, Nov. 5 from 12-1 p.m.

WEB Weeks of Wizardry: Quidditch and OWLS: WEB presents Weeks of Wizardry in celebration of the upcom-ing release of part one of the final Harry Potter film. This upcoming Sunday, Nov. 7 from 1-4 p.m., teams will compete in the Quidditch World Cup on Harper Joy Field. For a dose of brainy wizardry, Ordinary Wizarding Levels (OWLS), a quiz testing knowledge of the HP series, will be held in Kimball Auditorium on Wednesday, Nov. 10 from 7-9 p.m.

Diwali Festival of Lights: The South Asian Student Association and ASWC invite you to celebrate Diwali, the tra-ditional five-day celebration which cul-minates on the third day with the Hindu Festival of Lights. SAS and ASWC wel-come you to learn more about this holi-day and enjoy an array of South Asian desserts, music, henna and more. Satur-day, Nov. 6 at 7 p.m.

‘Reflections on Privilege’: On Monday, Nov. 8, Dr. Dick Adams will present his experiences working for the Zimbabwe Arts Project, a colloborative group that assists in providing economic security for working artists in rural eastern Zim-babwe. Featured art will be on display and for sale for the rest of the semester at reasonable prices. The event will oc-cur in the Glover Alston Center at 7 p.m.

THRIFTY WHITTIES

How to make perfect riceMake sure the holes in your strainer are smaller than rice grains and spread the rice into a bowl shape in the strainer to al-low it to dry more quickly. It should take approximately an hour to dry. An easy way to check to see if the rice is dry is to run your fingers through the grains. If they all move easily you should be ready to cook.

If you are using a rice maker, this is easy. F0r each cup 0f rice, add water to the rice maker up to the corresponding line on the inside. Place the lid on top and press the start button. If you have a rice maker that more than ten years old, when the rice maker is finished, allow the rice five to 10 more minutes to steam before actually removing the lid. My rice maker is older than I am with only one button, but it has loyally served me for as long as I can remember and it still makes delicious rice. So you don’t need to buy a new rice maker with fancy options to get delicious rice. However, the new machines do have options to keep your rice moist, fresh, and warm for days.

If you do not have the luxury of a rice maker, you can still make delicious rice. Place your rice and water in a medium or large flat-bottomed pot. I have tried sev-eral different measurements and found the best to be a ratio of two cups of rice with three cups of water. Turn the burner on to a medium-high heat and bring the water to a boil. Once it is boiling, turn the heat down to low and cover the pot with a tight lid, one that will not allow the steam to escape. Whatever you do, resist the urge to check on the rice. Once 10 to 15 min-utes have gone by, remove the pot from the heat, but leave the lid on for another five to ten minutes.

Stay tuned to Thrifty Whitties, and I will teach you how to make sushi rice! Until then, enjoy the fluffy perfection of well-cooked rice.

BOOK REVIEW

Kira Henehan’s debut novel intrigues, pleases

Finley--redheaded, yellow-eyed and snake toting (no, really, she carries a snake named Lavendar with her everywhere)--is an Investigator with a mysterious past and even more mysterious skills. She is adept at deflection but is “ter-ribly covetous.” She is completely unable to keep her narrative going in a straight line. Thus, when her boss, Binelli, assigns to her an Investigation into the mystery of Professor Uppal and his Puppets, Finley’s narrative has none of the markers of a traditional mystery plot: there are no “clues,” no “smoking guns,” and really, no mystery. It is an Investi-gation with no discernible purpose that Finley can see. But then, she’s not the best of Binelli’s Investigators--only the Third Most Hated.

“Orion You Came And You Took All My Marbles” is a meandering, hilarious, beautifully crafted piece of fiction. Finley is a completely unreliable narrator, prone to digressions and mixing up words:

“Tiki Ty greeted us in a riot of black hair and pale green scrubbish garb and shuffling holey mules made of balsa or seagrass or salsa.

No.This last is incorrect.However.”She continues to describe the Tiki Barn

and the exciting prospect of Tiki Ty’s mar-

velous shrimp cocktail, only to interrupt her own description with the phrase “Raf-fia” two paragraphs later. It’s the literary equivalent of an aphasia-stricken conver-sation.

Finley writes everything down; that is, when she’s not distracted by someone’s hair (often her own, for it is so very red, although not particularly flattering), or by something she’s remembered to be embarrassed about, or by a plate of par-ticularly delicious shrimps, or by a man “of pleasing visage.” These are all very dis-tracting things for Finley – especially the shrimps and the men.

Finley’s fellow Investigators--Murphy

and The Lamb--have mysterious pasts of their own. Finley is particularly obsessed by The Lamb’s, and has many theories concerning The Lamb’s “freakish intel-ligence.” Her own mysterious past is hinted at but rarely discussed; she re-members nothing before becoming an Investigator and acquiring Lavendar, her pale snake. The Investigation into Professor Uppal and Up All Puppets!, as well as meeting a host of intriguing secondary characters, raises questions about her mysterious origins; questions

which may or may not be answered by the end of the novel.

Finley, as a heroine, is incongruous and startling--she’s not very good at what she does, she misses obvious cues, and she hurls streams of “furious invective” when upset (rather like her snake, who squeezes people when distressed). Being inside her head is a trip; there is none of the narrative coherency that one usually associates with novels. This isn’t a bad thing; “Orion” is experimental fiction. This book will ap-peal to fans of Mark Z. Danielewski and Ben Marcus; “Orion” is more accessible than either of these, with a core of whimsy that both of these authors lack. Henehan’s wordplay is clever and whimsical with-out being self-conscious or cute. This is a novel that requires more than one reading to get all the humor, and more than two readings to understand the entirety of the “plot,” but it only becomes more enjoyable the more it is read.

by ELLIE GOLDBook Reviewer

COMIC STRIP

Rampant with plot quirks, whimsical wordplay and a maddening narrator, “Orion You Came And You Took All My Marbles” still presents a pleasant, readable challenge.

DJ Boss, MC Birddogg, DJ Pieces and Curcuitbreaker put mainstream rap aside and focus mostly on classic hip-hop, both old and new. The trio’s show contains a variety of artists, on-air chat and jokes about rap lyrics and egos. The DJs also engage in discussions about the messages and musical roots of rap, such as beat ori-

gin and lyrical references. In essence, “Beats, Rymes and Life” features “raw beats, sick rhymes and the good life” with no auto-tune or other tasteless so-called hip-hop trends.

Listen to “Beats, Rhymes and Life” every Monday night at 10 p.m. on KWCW 90.5 FM or www.kwcw.net

Members of the Jazz Ensemble rehearse in preparation for Friday’s concert which will showcase material covered thus far in the course.

KWCW Show of the Week

Beats, Rhymes and Life

BOWMAN

CANEPA

SportsThe PioneerIssue 8

Nov 4, 2010

Page 6 SportsSCOREBOARDVolleyball

Linfield 10/29 W, 3-2

Pacific 10/30 W, 3-2

Lewis-Clark State 11/3 L, 3-1

Women’s soccerLinfield 10/30

L, 3-2Willamette 10/31

W, 1-0

Men’s soccerLinfield 10/30

W, 3-1Willamette 10/31

W, 2-0

Women’s cross countryNWC Cross Country Championships 10/30

1 Lewis & Clark 432 Whitworth 733 Willamette 944 Whitman 1005 Linfield 1136 Pacific Lutheran 1377 Puget Sound 1948 Pacific 2169 George Fox 224

Men’s cross countryNWC Cross Country Championships 10/30

1 Whitworth 332 Willamette 363 Lewis & Clark 664 Linfield 1165 George Fox 1626 Whitman 1627 Pacific 1858 Puget Sound 2029 Pacific Lutheran 240

Volleyball11/5 Lewis-Clark State (Away)11/6 Willamette (Away)

Women’s soccer11/5 Lewis-Clark State (Away)

Men’s soccer11/5 Whitworth (Home, 2:30 p.m.)

Men’s basketball11/6 San Jose State (Away)

UPCOMING EVENTS

Cross country enters home stretch

While cross country skiing is just getting on its feet after becoming a club sport two years ago, the established Whitman cycling team continues to develop its suc-cessful program. Despite the challenges of maintaining student-run programs, both teams have found unique value in being club sports at Whitman.

After Whitman skiing went from be-ing varsity to club two years ago, mem-bers of the cross country ski team have experienced firsthand the differences be-tween club and varsity athletics.

“[Getting cut from varsity athletics] was really really hard for us. But I believe that the team has moved past it, and is now excited and busy with making what we can out of this new opportunity and situation,” said senior and lifelong skier Paige Devlin, who was a sophomore when the program was cut and has since stepped up as one of the principal orga-nizers and leaders.

The team, which now has about fifteen members, continues to practice and com-pete together during the off-season and in the winter.

“There’s a lot less expertise in the gen-eral race aspects of the sport, which is one drawback,” said sophomore Elliot Broze, one of the men on the team.

With no coach, the skiers now struc-ture and design their own workouts, which can be rewarding, but has required some adjustment on the part of the ath-letes.

“It’s hard if you don’t have a coach there with you to keep the intensity up,” observed Devlin.

However, Devlin already sees being a club team as a good thing in the long term.

“The club team definitely offers things that a varsity team doesn’t. We are able to organize things how we choose and run the team the way we want to,” she said.

The team’s spring and fall off-season

workouts are varied and intense. “We do a lot of running, roller-skiing, weight training,” said Broze.

Winter practices are an hour away from campus, a significant travel expense which team members cover with the help of the team money they received from Whitman after the varsity program was cut.

Both skiing and cycling encourage beginners to try out for their teams, il-lustrating another feature of club sports: the ability for athletes of all levels to par-ticipate.

“The experience is as intense as you want to make it,” said Devlin. “We ski be-cause we love it.”

Chelsea Momany, a senior and avid cyclist, reiterated Devlin’s point. With a such a large team--between 30 and 40 members, by Momany’s estimation--there is a wide range of expertise and commitment.

“That’s one reason I like the club sport setup--you can choose how much time you can spend on it.”

The cycling team’s main season in the spring begins after months of off-season preparation. Training rides in the fall are generally longer and easier, whereas spring rides tend to be shorter and more intense.

“In the winter we train with a com-bination of stationary biking and cross-training: weights, core, swimming, run-ning and cross country skiing--which is great cross-training for cycling,” said Momany.

The cycling team has a long history of excellence as a club sport, having more than a few national championships under their belts.

“We like it as a club,” said junior Rachel Hoar, the team’s publicist. “And we’ve proven that we can be hugely successful as a club.”

Without a coach to assist new mem-bers, more experienced cyclists collec-tively take on the role, reaching out to help out those with less experience.

“All of the returning members do a re-ally good job of teaching the new riders how to dress, how to train, how to re-cover, how to ride,” said Momany. “I love cycling, and I love teaching people about it. I love getting people excited about it.”

As a sophomore, now-senior Simon Pendleton remembers the team’s spirit of enthusiasm and love for the sport as the things that drew him to start cycling.

“I had done cross country running, soccer, track and Ultimate before, but I started riding and got to know this team. I was hooked instantly,” he said.

Now in his final year, he is heavily

involved with the inner workings of the team.

“We’ve been working nonstop on bud-gets, sponsors, fundraising and getting equipment in order since getting back for the fall. But we love it, as much hassle as it is,” said Pendleton.

Being a club allows members of both cross country skiing and cycling to take an active role in shaping their own ath-letic experience.

“All the work we put into the team binds us to our teammates and our sport,” said Hoar. “I can’t imagine my life without it.”

Club athletes shape own experience by LIBBY ARNOSTIStaff Reporter

Whitman cyclists Chelsea Momany ‘11, Alli Risa ‘14, Luke Ogden ‘14, Simon Pendle-ton ‘11 and Tom Vogt ‘13 head out for a team ride as part of their off-season training.

ROSENBERG

Women’s soccer players Taylor Thomas ‘14, Jaclyn Rudd ‘13, Julianne Masser ‘13, Hallie Swan ‘14 and Kristin Innes ‘11 (left to right) showed off their pink game shirts at their Oct. 31 match against Willamette. The team was participating in SAAC’s THINK PINK breast cancer aware-ness campaign. Every sport’s team will have one event per season in which athletes wear pink and fundraise for SAAC in an effort to raise money and awareness for breast cancer research.

from page 1

communication between the coaches and players.

“I think, or at least like to think, that I understand what it takes for my players to be student-athletes at Whitman be-cause I too once had to carefully balance athletic and academic performances at Whitman,” said assistant women’s tennis coach Katie Oost.

Oost, a 2009 graduate and four-year varsity tennis player, was twice the recip-ient of the ITA Scholar-Athlete Award and was voted to the All-NWC Second Team as a junior. She has been working with the program since graduating in May 2009. Immediately after graduat-ing, Oost volunteered to be an assistant coach while applying to graduate school.

“My favorite coaching memory was watching my team make it to the finals of the NWC tournament [last] spring,” said Oost.

By continuing to work with the ath-letic programs as assistant coaches, Whitman alumni find themselves able to stay connected with their teams and to build on their own collegiate success to foster success for the next generation

of Whitties.The alums are thus able to set an ex-

ample for the current student-athletes about how to conduct themselves and be a positive contribution to the Whitman athletic programs by representing Whit-man on and off the field.

“I think [having alums as assistants] ultimately leads to better practices and better training,” said Kennedy, “which leads to better performance and compe-tition.”

This echoes Athletic Director Dean Snider’s goal of fostering excellence throughout the athletic department for all its student-athletes in all areas of life at Whitman.

The men’s and women’s swim teams have already competed at the Northwest Conference Sprint Pentathlon and Relay Invitational, and next travel to Lewis and Clark College for a NWC dual meet on Friday, Nov. 12.

The men’s and women’s tennis teams begin NWC team season in early Feb-ruary 2011 following the successful fall competition for both teams at the ITA Pacific Northwest Tournaments and USTA/ITA National Small College Championships.

Whitman College’s men’s and women’s cross country teams placed sixth and fourth respectively in last weekend’s Northwest Conference Championships. The tournament saw all nine NWC teams travel to Tacoma, Wash. to vie for the championship title. Both teams will be sending their top seven runners, along with an alternate, to compete in the West Regional tournament in Salem, Ore.

Both squads entered the season facing the prospect of replacing a large senior class, a task sophomore Cory Rand says was no small feat.

“We lost three out of our top five run-ners, so it was definitely a rebuilding year, but we did pretty well, I think,” he said.

The Whitman men’s sixth place finish paled in comparison to their fourth place showing a year ago. Rand, who spearhead-ed the Whitman men at last year’s confer-ence championships finishing ninth over-all, finished 64th this year. Rand is nursing a lingering leg injury, which will sideline him from his usual place in Whitman’s top seven men and out of the regional tourna-ment.

While the Whitman women’s team suf-fered similar losses of graduating seniors,

they experienced a much less detrimental transition, a result junior Hayley Falk says is indicative of good things to come.

“We got fourth in conference, even though five of our top seven runners grad-uated last year, so we were all thinking, ‘I don’t know how the season’s going to go,’” she said. “But the freshmen and sopho-mores have really stepped it up. I’m really proud, and I think it’s been great.”

Behind the scenes, the 2010 cross coun-try season was also defined by a critical change in personnel, as former women’s soccer coach Scott Shields took over the reins of a young Whitman squad.

First-year Robert Dalton had nothing but praise for Shields’ coaching style.

“I’ve really liked Scott, compared to coaches I’ve experienced,” Dalton said. “He’s been great; he’s been really positive. People who know him as the ‘new coach’ in town have been saying really good things about him.”

Rand is especially impressed by the new approaches Shields brings to coaching.

“He’s really attentive, really good at breaking things down on an individual level and figuring out what a runner needs individually instead of the team as a whole. He made us do a lot of new things, like keep journals about nutrition and how we felt during workouts. I really liked that, be-

cause in my case, when I wasn’t running as well as I usually do, I was able to look out over my previous logs and see that maybe I was running too many miles, and maybe I was eating too many Pop Tarts for break-fast,” Rand said.

Falk, a relative veteran on a team filled with underclassmen, also lauded Shields’ ability to respect what worked before he took over as coach.

“He’s trying to learn, he wants to do well and he’s supportive of of our old traditions, and that’s a really good thing,” she said.

Following the regional champion-ships, the top-placing individuals and teams from the tournament will be given a chance to compete at the Division III National Championships. Whitman se-nior Kristen Ballinger, who finished eighth at the conference, and sophomore Emilie Gilbert, who finished tenth, hope to earn a chance to compete with the nation’s best.

“We weren’t necessarily thrilled with how we did at conference, but that wasn’t Scott’s fault,” Rand said. “We’re a pretty young team.”

Although this rebuilding year didn’t end on a particularly high note for much of the Whitman cross country team, hopes remain for strong performances in the re-gional tournament and faith in the future of the program under Shields runs high.

JACOBSON

COACHING: Alumni offer teams experience, support

Whitman athletes THINK PINK

by BAILEY ARANGOStaff ReporterADVERTISEMENT

The PioneerIssue 8Nov 4, 2010

Page 7OpinionThe public’s as-sessment of the accuracy of news stories hit a two decade low in 2009 according to Pew Center research. A meager 29 per-cent of Americans think that news organizations gen-erally get the facts straight, while 63 percent think that

stories are often inaccurate. While the Pew Center data suggests that Americans perceive that something is wrong with the media, the problem actually lies with the public’s expectations of the media.

Just like any other business, the news media must make a profit. To make a profit, the media appeals to the public’s desires. Events not issue-focused cover-age, sound bites, and sensationalism are all attempts by media outlets to please consumers. Low rates of newspaper read-ership and high rates of television news viewership demonstrate Americans’ reli-ance on surface-level reporting. Despite frequent criticism of this kind of coverage, Americans still choose superficial report-ing at astonishingly high rates.

It is time we stop aimlessly critiquing the media and point our critical eye at ourselves.

Instead of fruitlessly waiting for the media to change, we, as consumers, should consciously choose alternative sources and demand better reporting. If our preferences change, the media will change to meet them.

The first step to accomplishing this is to realize the oddities in our behav-ior. Seventy-three percent of Americans have a favorable view of television news. Comparatively, 65 percent of Americans view the daily newspaper they are most familiar with favorably. The greater favor-

ability of television coverage astounds me considering that the average TV report on a news event is less than one minute and consists of sound bites of an average of seven seconds. Nonetheless, 71 percent of Americans get most of their national news coverage from television.

The irony gets better though. Although fewer and fewer Americans read news-papers, 72 percent of Americans believe that the loss of daily newspapers would be “important.” This statistic leads me to believe that many Americans who do not read the newspaper still believe that los-ing newspapers would damage society. To prevent this “important” loss, these peo-ple should start reading the paper. While turning off TVs and picking up newspa-pers appears to be a solution, it is actually far too simple and Americans are far too attached to TV news.

Shallow television news is at the heart of the problem, but all news sources fre-quently highlight events of one-time sig-nificance instead of focusing on substan-tive long-range issues. We can change this.

Altering our selections of news cover-age would most greatly benefit consumers and the media. Opportunities to change news sources can be divided into two categories: switching type of source and choosing a different source of the same medium.

Reading the news, either in a paper, magazine or online, offers more detailed coverage than television or most radio programming (PBS and NPR as notable exceptions). The benefits of newspapers extend beyond the substantive reporting. Newspapers and magazines, both in print and online, offer better routes for feed-back than TV or radio. Writing a letter to the editor is perhaps the best way to voice one’s opinions about issues or a news sto-ry itself. Not only do the publishers read your views, but other readers have access to your opinions. Online, readers can comment on new stories, allowing them

to quickly share their views on the report-ing, event and, most importantly, the is-sues. Responding to the news encourages quality, issue-focused reporting.

As I acknowledged earlier, not many people will readily switch from TV to newspapers as their main source of news. Americans do not need to give up TV en-tirely. Television itself is not the problem. Some television news programs offer de-tailed reporting on pertinent issues. PBS’s “Newshour” and ABC’s “Nightline” buck the trend of one-minute per news event coverage. When people decide they have grown tired of news shows that feel like a choppy action movie, watching these two shows would provide relief.

Since TV news is clearly a business, boycotting trivial programming would effect change. While a grass roots move-ment like this may seem ineffectual against gigantic multimedia conglomer-ates, the fact is that news rel ies on adver-tising dollars determined by the number of viewers. Without viewers, television channels would be forced to either change their programming or face closure. (This same principal could be applied to a newspaper since newspapers depend on advertising dollars as well.) Our choice to watch or not watch is far more powerful than we think.

Ultimately, by changing our consump-tion we can change the media. Perhaps more so than in any other industry, con-sumers have the greatest power to alter the news media. Since the media must please its consumers to stay alive, express-ing our disapproval not through com-plaints but through changing suppliers or specifically critiquing coverage are the best ways to increase the accuracy and quality of reporting.

While we cannot make the news, we can decide how we consume it. Our choices send clear signals to news compa-nies, giving us the power to at least frame news coverage.

Consumers must demand informative media

New program reveals our passwords

Reform energy grid to fight climate change

ALLISONBOLGIANO

Columnist

I want to take a moment to talk to all of you about Russian male e n h a n c e m e n t . That’s right, with the power of the motherland, you too can extend your manhood! At least that’s what my email told all the people in my

address book several months ago. My Facebook account was phished, and I in-advertently gave my email and password to a cracker (one who breaks security on a system, from the Jargon File.). That same cracker used the email/password combination to access my email account, and then sent out a massive barrage of advertisements to my friends, family and former teachers.

Of course, that was preventable. Not just in the sense that I shouldn’t have giv-en my Facebook email and password to a phisher, but also, it was pretty dumb for me to use the same password for Face-book and my email. According to Mike Osterman, WCTS IT Security Officer, I got off easy.

“One person had their [online broker-age] account broken into, and they actu-ally had their account emptied out.” So, when it comes to password security, the stakes are pretty high.

Phishing remains the greatest threat to your security, but a new threat has cropped up recently. Firesheep is a new extension for Mozilla’s Firefox browser that uses a security flaw inherent in many popular websites, including Face-book and Twitter, to allow an attacker to determine someone’s password based upon cookies transmitted over an open wireless network (It is a gross violation of Whitman’s Acceptable Use Policy to use Firesheep or other tools like it to sniff out other people’s passwords. If you do that, you are liable to get your network

access revoked. So don’t.). Firesheep uses a technique called “sidejacking,” which intercepts browser activity containing unencrypted login credentials.

Of course, with these security threats, it’s important to protect yourself. First and foremost, I highly recommend that you pick up the HTTPS Everywhere ex-tension for Firefox. It forces the sites that Firesheep targets to use Secure Sock-ets Layer (SSL) encryption at all times, which will foil potential sidejacking at-tacks. Second, get a password storage utility. These utilities store an encrypted file on your hard drive that you can fill with all of the passwords for the websites you use, and lock with a single mas-ter password. In other words, tools like KeePass and 1Password allow you to use different passwords for any given site, but store them in one convenient location.

Of course, HTTPS Everywhere is nice, but it’s really only a patch. According to Osterman, “The real fix for this is for ser-vices like Facebook to actually change the way they engineer their sites.” I agree wholeheartedly. The fundamental prob-lem here is that social networks need to stop playing fast and loose with users’ se-curity. I asked Osterman what’s stopping Facebook and sites like it from using SSL everywhere. The short answer: money.

“It generally adds a lot of processing overhead, because it has to encrypt and decrypt the traffic . . . Given the amount of data that Facebook serves per day, that could add a significant amount [of mon-ey] to their hosting bill.” Unfortunately, the cost-cutting measures Facebook and other sites are using are costing us our security.

So here’s the bottom line, in easy to follow bullet points:

-Use a password manager, and don’t use the same password in different plac-es.

-Use HTTPS Everywhere to help pro-tect you from sidejacking attacks.

-Ask Facebook, Twitter, and other so-cial networks to start using HTTPS.

Like many Whit-man students, I sometimes find climate change to be a very abstract problem. We dis-cuss it in class and plan programs to reduce our carbon footprint on cam-pus, but it’s hard to visualize car-bon emissions or

see tangible results of ocean acidification in our day-to-day lives. However, after looking at the smokestacks of the Navajo Generating Station (NGS), climate change seems frighteningly real and imminent. NGS is one of the largest coal-fired power plants in the country, and is single-hand-edly responsible for a quarter of Arizona’s carbon emissions. The clouds of smoke overshadowing the desert surrounding it and the train-fulls of coal waiting to be burned make NGS a seemingly perfect candidate for closure as America slowly moves towards a clean energy future.

Unfortunately, the NGS is also located on the Navajo Nation, where it provides over 600 jobs to a community with a 55% unemployment rate. It illustrates perfectly the economy vs. environment trade-off that many opponents of action on climate change use to oppose a transition to clean energy. The jobs argument is an important

one because even with imminent global catastrophe, Congress will never pass a climate bill which might cause thousands of constituents to lose jobs.

Fortunately, clean energy has great potential to create jobs. The wind farms surrounding Walla Walla might make passing drivers think of electricity, but they also signify good jobs. Walla Walla Community College is developing a pro-gram devoted to wind energy technology because people with the skills to build and maintain wind farms are in such high de-mand. These jobs are great for Walla Wal-la and the surrounding area, and could be used to sell legislation mandating a re-newable energy portfolio or the phase-out of coals plants.

However, wind jobs in Walla Walla mean nothing to the workers who will lose their jobs if NGS closes its doors. Simply creating new jobs with renewable energy is not enough; jobs must be creat-ed in the communities which will be most directly affected by a shift away from fossil fuels as a source of energy.

By creating new jobs for workers who mine coal, drill for gas or run dirty power plants, environmentalists will gain new allies in the fight against climate change. Most people recognize that coal and oil aren’t perfect, even if they don’t believe that climate change is happening. In Ver-nal, Utah, I spoke with George Burnett, the founder of ILoveDrilling.com. George

sells a variety of merchandise embossed with his slogan and spends a large amount of time standing on the side of the road with a Honk If You Love Drilling sign waving at passing cars (at least three-quarters of them honk). He spoke about a recent decision by the Secretary of the Interior, Ken Salazar, to close some drill-ing operations in the area. In spite of the fact that he doesn’t accept climate change, George said he is not opposed to develop-ing wind and solar power, but he doesn’t want to see jobs lost because of the harm it causes communities like his. Find a way to provide those displaced workers jobs making homes more energy-efficient or installing solar panels, and even George might support your environmental proj-ect.

The bottom line is that combating cli-mate change requires nothing less than redesigning our entire energy grid. A lot of people stand to lose jobs if we transition away from fossil fuels, and ignoring this reality when making energy policy will isolate those workers from the larger goal. Many Navajos understand that the United States is moving away from coal power, and efforts are underway in some chap-ters of the nation to develop solar projects which train Navajos to install, maintain and repair panels. Efforts like this which help people stay employed will make re-newable both ecologically and economi-cally sustainable.

BLAIRFRANK

Columnist

Facebook can impact job prospects all around world

Men in bras at birthday parties with their names tagged, girls dress-ing up as frivo-lously as they can, bottles of wine lying around the crowd under the dim party light—these are all sce-narios found in Facebook photos.

Social networking websites such as Facebook profit from targeted advertise-ments, as I have learned from my first journalism class back in China. This education strengthens my disapproval of Facebook, despite the constant upgrading of its privacy settings. Even though I can limit others from entering my personal information, I can’t help if Facebook sells my personal information to its potential advertisers.

My friend, sophomore Srija Srija, uses Facebook as a method of picture storing and sharing.

“Facebook is convenient,” she said, ex-plaining her nearly 500 pictures on Face-book. Flash drives can be lost at any sec-ond and computers can run really slow carrying so many pictures, but organizing photos into albums on Facebook is an easy way to keep track of memories and share them with others.

The convenience of having such easy ac-cessibility to her photos is one of the things that makes Facebook so appealing to Srija, as it does to many other users. However, she still has concerns about her privacy.

“I will die if someone else has my Face-book account!” she said.

Maybe you think that leaking private information to general strangers is not a big deal. But if your potential employer

discovers through Facebook that you are an alcoholic or a party animal, he or she may give a second thought towards your employment, which is a very big deal.

In fact, approximately 30 percent of employers are using Facebook to screen potential employees and 45 percent are checking new hires’ social media profiles, according to a new survey data from Ca-reerBuilder, the leader in job search Web sites. As many as 2,600 hiring managers participated in the CareerBuilder poll in June 2010. Publishing inappropriate pictures has become the first among six career-killing Facebook mistakes, as re-ported by Investopedia.com.

I used to think that members of the Chinese Facebook, Renren.com, were more discreet than users in western coun-tries in terms of publishing their personal life experiences. But it turns out that Ren-ren.com is encouraging Chinese users to expose their personal lives as much as possible by displaying the click rate of pic-tures, the amount of visitors and the most popular Renren.com users in the user’s community.

Renren.com opened to companies for recruitment in 2010. Users can build their resumes through this social networking site and companies can examine almost every detail of the applicants. However, pictures of men wearing dresses or women drunk at parties are not foreign in the Chi-nese Facebook.

Facebook and other social network-ing sites allow us, the tell-all generation, to enjoy others’ constant attention and to live out loud through posting every drop of our life stories. We try to convince ourselves that publishing the creepiest of pictures brings ourselves and our friends much much closer. But do the pictures have to go public, even if it’s at the price of losing a job opportunity?

RACHELALEXANDER

Columnist

ALFoRD

DouGLAs

DINGLI

Columnist

POLITIC AL C ARTOON

The PioneerIssue 8

Nov 4, 2010

Page 8 BackpageThis page is full of jokes!

PringlesAfter realizing that people don’t want to buy

any new chip flavors, Pringles executives, frus-trated with low sales this year, have decided to reach

out to new demographics through the coolest new packaging. Look for these great snacks in your grocery store!

9 p.m.Thesis: All major decisions in “Othello” can be ex-plained by the characters’ desire to keep up social appearances. Within the play there are three major decisions: Iago’s decision to bring down Othello as well as many other characters, Othello’s decision to kill Desdemona and Othello’s decision to kill himself. The outcomes of these decisions are what determine the fate of the characters.

12 a.m.The main reason Othello kills Desdemona, his wife, is because of his insecurities. Like how he is considered not good enough for his wife who is all rich and beautiful, which he is not, and so he is insecure. Because he is insecure, he kills his wife. This is how we know that insecurities can be detrimental to one’s relationships with themselves and others, like wives or girlfriends who are hon-est and really cute.

2 a.m.OTHELLO IS AN IDIOT BECAUSE HE CAN’T JUST SEE THAT HE IS BEING TRICKED AND THAT HIS WIFE REALLY DOES LOVE HIM, THERE WAS JUST THE HANDKERCHIEF AND THAT MESSED HIM UP. LIKE WHEN YOU LISTEN TO GOSSIP AND DON’T ACTUALLY ASK THE PERSON ABOUT WHAT IS TRUE AND THEN BREAK UP WITH HER, OR KILL HER, AND RUIN THEIR WHOLE LIFE IN ONE NIGHT . . . BILLY GO DIE LIKE OTHELLO!

3 a.m.Okay, so let’s say Othello is the hottest of the guys in “She’s the Man” and Desdemona is kind of like Amanda Bynes, but if Amanda Bynes wasn’t aware that she was pretending to be a guy and deceiving the man she loves, but in the end of “She’s the Man” where everything turns out okay, that part never happens and Channing Tatum just murders Amanda. Did you know that “She’s the Man” is actually based on a Shakespeare play? Woah, so hip Will! But seriously, that movie would suck if Tatum killed Amanda. Murderers aren’t hot. Neither are people who break up with me.

6 a.m.In conclusion, Othello and Iago and like everyone in the book Othello shouldn’t be so insecurity all the time because that juust gets you in trouble like when you kill your wife over a kleenax, or a ru-mor that they hooked up with that guy in their geo class but they didn’t, but now probably will.

Works Cited:

William Shakespeare who wrote “Othello.” A long time ago. London?

“She’s the Man” starring Amanda Bynes

Real Facts From My LIFE. 2010. Whitman Col-lege: Walla Walla, WA.

Pulling an all-nighter

Looks like Gossip Girl has put in a trans-fer for the West Coast. It didn’t take too long for her to catch up on all the hot gossip and juicy sightings on the Whit-man campus. Here are some of her lat-est posts - you know you love them. XOXO, The Backpage.

Spotted: The hottest couple south of Boyer may be on the rocks. Better watch your man “V”, looks like a hot-to-trot freshman is moving in for the kill. The two were seen grabbing a room in the library, where rumor has it they were studying “anatomy.”

Spotted: Looks like new freshman Queen Bee was flirting hardcore with a new man last night only to realize that he was a prospie. Can her ego handle such an embarrassing blow? What will frenemy “M” do with this new information?

Spotted: A certain sophomore boy was in for a sur-prise when he tried to buy Taste of Mexico, only to find that he was out of Flex dollars. Looks like we won’t see “J” south of the border anytime soon!

Spotted: Junior boy awkwardly waiting for one of his friends to make eye contact with him so he can be swiped into the dining hall.

Spotted: A couple of friends rock climbing together at the gym.

Spotted: Strange-looking duck being ignored by the other ducks.

Spotted: People playing Ultimate on Ankeny.

Spotted: Wheat fields. Everywhere.

Spotted: I have to get out of this place.

whitmancollege

gossipgirl

Well, here we are. All alone in the wil-derness. Too bad about the firewood, by the way, I totally didn’t mean to douse it with my water bottle. What a crazy accident! I’ll bet you’re glad I’m a certified Wilderness First Respond-er! I know exactly what to do in these situations. The first thing we need to do is get totally naked. Ha ha! I know, I’m way ahead of you. Now, in order to avoid hypothermia, it’s absolutely imperative that you climb into this sleeping bag with me. What? No! I’m not just trying to “get with you,” that’s absolutely ridiculous. It’s called sav-ing lives, Clair, and I’m a professional. No, don’t bother reaching for the signal flares. What? No, of course I didn’t pack the flares, I didn’t think we’d get lost out here, duh! Jeez. No, you can’t “just get in your own sleeping bag.” Why? Um, no reason. No, you don’t need to look for it; it’ll turn up eventually. Look, we don’t have time for this - now get naked and get in here! Besides, I left your--you seem to have left your own sleeping bag--so it’s not like you have any choice. Now come over here and get your snuggle on!

A selection of excerpts from an all-nighter paper on “Othello”:

We could die out here if you don’t take my advice and get into this sleeping bag naked.

Take this fun quiz!

In your Facebook profile picture are you _______?:

a. Smilingb. Laughingc. Clutching your head in your hands, wondering where it all went wrong.

Which quote is most represen-tative of your “quotes” page?

a. “Mama always said you’ve got to put the past behind you before you can move on.” – Forrest Gumpb. “If God wanted us to be naked, why did he invent sexy lingerie?” – Shannon Dohertyc. “Some people seem born to suffer.” – August Strindberg

A friend “tags” you in a picture from a party. You have a beer in

your hand. You’re friends with your mom and your great aunt Mildred.

What do you do?a. Untag yourself and ask your friend not to tag you in “party pics.”b. Leave it! Mildred has to find out sooner or later!c. At this point drinking yourself into a coward’s death may be the only option.

When you first wake up on Sunday morning, are you most

likely to ______?:a. Check your Facebook and upload all those fun pics from last night!b. Check your Facebook and see what pictures people uploaded of you.c. Research how much it would cost to hire an assassin to kill you.

While browsing Facebook you see that your ex has changed

his/her relationship status to “In a relationship.” Do you _______?:a. “Like” the status as a show of good-will and no hard feelings.

b. Ignore it.c. Close your laptop for the last time.

Do your regret spending so much time on Facebook?

a. No! I need to keep in touch with all my friends and find out about cool new events!b. I probably spend a little bit too much time on “the book” but it’s so much fun!c. It’s too late for regrets. Only 25 more feet to the ledge.

You meet someone at a party. You really hit it off, but forget

to get their phone number. The next day, do you _______?:a.b.c. I read an article that said more women attempt suicide, but more men successfully kill themselves. Am I not a real man?

What your Facebook says about Jesus Christ I just can't do this anymore

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QUIZ!

Travel blog is back!!!Once again, we check in with former Backpage writer, Brooke, who is studying abroad in Barcelona! We now bring you her Halloween coverage! Spooky stuff! We miss you so much, Brooke!!!!!!!!!!!!! Come home soon!!!!!!!!

October 29 4:32 PM- Sorry it's been so long, everybody!!!! I have been SO busy lately, just living la vida loca in beautiful Barcelona! I haven't really been speaking much Spanish, but I think that study abroad is about more than that. It's about life experi-ences, really. I have really been taking advantage of what Spain has to offer: tapas, wine, and pretty much all of the things from the culture. I love it here so much! Plus, I have put together an AWESOME Lady Gaga costume for Halloween this weekend!! Halloween is literally my FAVORITE holiday! I can't wait to dress up and see every-one else's costumes! I wonder if people here have the same cool costumes that we have back home, like sexy cats and The Joker? I'll let you guys know!!!

November 1 12:58 PM- UGGGHHHHH YOU GUYS LAST NIGHT WAS THE WORRRSTTT. Spanish Hal-loween is the biggest disappointment yet. Pretty much NO ONE dressed up!! I saw a couple of people dressed up like hobos, but it didn't even seem like they were trying. And everyone was so rude to me!! The guys here are hot, but they were almost TOO gross last night. People were staring a lot, shouting and jeering and me, and just being generally very rude. Normally Spanish people are so civilized! Apparently, Halloween for them means act-ing crazy and disgusting, and not dressing up. Men of all ages kept approaching me for sex, asking how much it would cost for me to get in their car. I don't know what is wrong with these people. I was wearing this awesome red leotard and reaaaaally sexy tights and LACE ON MY FACE=obviously Lady Gaga!!! And I had such awesome, crazy makeup on, and like, really EXTREME perfume. Lady Gaga isn't even known for that, that was just me im-provising! I bet she smells really good, and really strong. I have seen some pictures on facebook of some Whitman girls who went as Lady Gaga, and I think I pulled it off waaaaayyyyy better than they did. Anyway, there is no way that Spanishes don't know who she is because she is an international superstar and so I thought that for sure they would know who I was dressed as, but NO. People here don't know anything!!!! GOD, I want to come HOME!!! I am just so bummed out about this, you guys. Uggghhh, at least there is still Thanksgiving this month, hopefully they can at least get THAT right.love you guys!!

e. JoHNsoN

Pringles VeRTikalSo intense, they had to be stacked!Standing on edge!

Pringles HorizontalTake a rest.

Pringles EdenDON’T EAT THESE CHIPS!

PringlessThe healthy choice! Now with zero grams trans fat and zero chips!

Pringles SinglesOnce you pop, you have to stop.There is only one.

Pringles HipsterI’m over it.

Pringles BieberEat the Bieb!

Pringles BagIt’s so vintage!

by CHUCK GRAVENCertified WFR