Month: May 2008

Brandeis’s website is trumpeting a new set of college rankings released by the Center for College Affordability and Productivity (CCAP) that has our little ol’ school rated No. 21 among national universities in the United States. And while I typically look at these ranking systems with a skeptical eye, this one is designed to give much more weight to academic results and student satisfaction — in short, the things that actually matter.

The most widely used and well-known college rankings are put out by U.S. News and World Report. Despite their popularity, the rankings serve more as measures of prestige than as actual indicators of academic quality. They heavily weigh criteria like alumni giving and financial resources, categories that are not necessarily correlated to overall academic performance (though they can be indicative) and that put relatively young schools like Brandeis at a disadvane. They also tend to put great value on the quality of incoming classes with metrics like applicant acceptance rate and percene of freshmen graduating in the top 10% of their high school class. While these are indicative of a more accomplished incoming student body, they say nothing about the college’s actual performance. High performances in all of these categories make a university look elite, thus guaranteeing it even more donations and wider pools of applicants. Thus, the highest ranked schools reap the benefits of a cycle that makes it very difficult for lower ranked schools to rise.

How does the non-profit CCAP try to avoid these problems? Its director, Richard Vedder, explains the methodology in Forbes magazine:

Our measures begin with student evaluations posted on Ratemyprofessors.com, a nine-year-old site with 6.8 million student-generated evaluations. We look at college graduation rates (as does U.S. News). We also calculate the percent of students winning awards like Rhodes Scholarships and undergraduate Fulbright travel grants. For vocational success we turn to Who’s Who in America. Though imperfect, it is the only comprehensive listing of professional achievement that includes undergraduate affiliations.

Their criteria are geared towards measuring actual results. The inclusion of Rate My Professors data introduces statistical uncertainty through potential sampling bias, but it also gives actual students a hand in determining how well their college performs. Overall, their model comes much closer to measuring what students searching for a school really want to know.

Does that mean that CCAP has created the definitive guide to judging colleges? Of course not. I think most students are interested in more than just a number when it comes to choosing which school to attend; I know that Brandeis’s combination of location, sensitivity to social issues, a different cultural environment, and a strong academic reputation made it the school for me regardless of whether it’s number 21, 31 (its U.S. News and World Report ranking), or anywhere else. For students who are interested in such rankings, they’ll probably turn to the more famous News and World Report numbers, and if they really want to attend a school with an “elite” reputation, that guide will serve them better anyway. Vedder himself admits that his system is imperfect, so I think it mostly shows that making a definite ranking system is an exercise in futility. That being said, CCAP’s heart is in the right place, and overall, they do a pretty good job. I would recommend CCAP’s rankings as one of many tools for anyone going through the applications process, though the reasons for a college’s position are more helpful than the school’s actual net rating. As for Brandeis’s performance, twenty-first is a very strong showing, and I think the administration is justified in doing a little bragging about it.

Or would you rather have them keep going on about imitation butter?

The distinguished senior Senator from Massachusetts, Senator Edward “Ted” Kennedy, was diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor today.

This is bad:

“High-grade glio-malignancies” such as Senator Kennedy has “are unfortunately the most common kind of brain tumor in this age group, and they have a poor prognosis for long-term survival,” he said.

They can also be very debilitating during treatment, Madsen said, and Kennedy’s tumor is in an area where it may well eventually affect his speech.

This makes me sad.

Robert Byrd just burst out sobbing on the senate floor and had to call for an absence of a quorum to compose himself. Now he is railing against the war.

The only member of congress with more seniority in the Senate than Sen. Kennedy is Senator Robert Byrd.

I sent my best wishes to the Senator through his official Senate Site. You might want to do the same.

We’ve just gotten a hold of the unanimous decision by the Union Judiciary to rule in the favor of Noam Shouster and Nelson Rutrick in the Brooks case. There was one concurring opinion by Justice Judah Marans.
Here’s the relevant graf –

Therefore, on all counts the members undersigned of the Union Judiciary find for the Elections Commission, and hereby lift the injunction against Noam Shouster. We request that the Secretary certify as official all results from the Second Round of the Spring 2008 Elections and that the President of the Union swear Noam Shouster in as Senator-at-Large at the next regularly convened meeting of the Senate.

Summary of the opinion follows

Continue reading “UJ rules on Brooks vs Shouster, Rutrick”

According to Ken Mollins (a good friend of Brandeis Students Against the Judge Rotenberg Center) and an anonymous source who works for the state, Massachusetts state police raided the Judge Rotenberg Center and left carrying boxes of evidence.

This is the beginning of the end for the Judge Rotenberg Center. More information to follow as we know more.

In case anyone missed it, today the California Supreme Court ruled that a statute limiting marriage to a man and a woman was unconstitutional, legalizing same-sex marriages in the state. Previously, only Massachusetts allowed gay marriage, and today’s action will hopefully represent a key turning point in the battle to eliminate institutionalized discrimination based on sexual orientation.

I strongly encourage everyone to learn what the status of same-sex couples in their home state is (this map, courtesy of Wikipedia, comes in handy). Aside from California and Massachusetts, seven states and the District of Columbia recognize some form of civil unions or domestic partnerships, a good step forward but still uncomfortably reminiscent of the “separate but equal” legislation that darkened race relations until the Civil Rights Act. The Defense of Marriage Act mandates that the federal government does not recognize any same-sex marriages, even those in MA or CA, thus denying all federal benefits of marriage from any gay couples.

TAPPED, the award-winning blog of one of my favorite magazines, The American Prospect, just wrote about an online effort, led by Brandeis’ own Mike Kerns and Jamie Ansorge, to have a national gas/carbon tax. Here’s what they had to say:

Having college kids argue on the Internet in favor of a $1/1 gallon of gas tax is probably not the best way to convince folks that higher prices at the pump won’t unduly hurt the rural poor. But that’s what a new Facebook group is all about:

Amazingly-and counter-intuitively-a tax on gas consumption will not hurt consumers, but rather will be a definitive stroke of government policy that causes America to lead the world into the cost-efficient, environment-friendly, democratizing era of alternative energy. And amazingly still, this is, via probability, as plain as fact!

Simply enough, there will be less of a market for gas, meaning less consumption and less pollution, while there will simultaneously be a new, direct form of funding for alternative energies, which will be demanded more highly relative to gas with the price increase. And, Voila!

And with the communicative power of technology, here it is possible. If 1,000,000 people simply click “join,” we can literally change the world, and, in a deafeningly defining way.

The enthusiastic group was founded by Brandeis student Michael Kerns. He links approvingly to the idea that revenues from a gas tax should be contributed to the Social Security Trust Fund, which would then allow for cuts in payroll taxes. The problem with that, though, is that if the gas tax truly succeeded in decreasing demand for oil, eventually there’d be a shortfall on Social Security contributions.

This as been the latest episode of Brandeis kids do the darndest things.
Facebook Group here, by the way.

Hi everyone, I hope you’re all looking forward to a great summer, and thank you so much for reading Innermost Parts and making us more successful in our first full semester than any of us thought possible.  Over the past few days, I’ve been talking to Sahar about what our summer posting schedule should look like.  I’m perfectly willing to keep posting new content at a regular rate over the summer, but we question whether anyone will be as interested.  So I’m posing the question to you, our readers.  What directions do you think Innermost Parts should move in over the summer, and will you keep reading?  Any ideas or suggestion would be great; I’ve got a few ideas myself that I think could turn out to be intriguing.

Once again, have a great vacation everyone, and I’ll see you all in August!

This is not a joke… really.

Brandeis Students At Odds Over Israel

Yes, that’s right, our tiny little campus scandal has turned into a major scandal! Soon CNN analysts will be discussing how the UJ will rule, and how the result will affect the world.

I find it pretty silly that the Globe is touching this. It’s such a silly problem here at Brandeis, it’s even less of an issue for the rest of the Boston area.

Either way, Innermostparts.org has now been mentioned in a major media publication. Awesome.

Whenever I order cage-free eggs at Usdan, they force me to use styrofoam trays.
Why? Because in order to make sure I pay the extra 20 cents, cafeteria workers have to write ‘cage-free’ on my food, and marker doesn’t take well on ceramic plates.

Isn’t that something? A victory for animal rights is negated by increased environmental damage. Buying local often precludes buying union-made. Buying used makes it much harder to order sweatshop-free. Even buying political television advertising feeds millions into the mega-corporations that control the airwaves.

Life doesn’t have to work this way.

Continue reading “The Campus Movement”

Please welcome Nelson Rutrick, who is the newest member of the Innermost Parts team. He starts off his tenure here with a special report. ~ Sahar

As a former member of the Student Union Executive Board, as the only EBoard to attend nearly all Senate meetings although it was not mandatory (besides the VP and Executive Senator), and as the only student who attended Senate meetings regularly who didn’t “have” to be there – I, sadly, have a lot of experience with the procedures of the Brandeis University Student Union. Sure, maybe attending all of these meetings makes me a loser in some sense, but it also gives me the ability to speak knowledgeably about what goes on in our Student Union.

I am working on finals right now, but I am a bit bored writing about the morality of political assassination and instead would prefer to clue in the non-insiders of the Student Union as to what really goes on there on this relatively new blog which often deals with the Student Union.

Continue reading “The Student Union’s Transparency Problem”

So I spent my Saturday affirming four separate times that I did not, in fact, call someone a dinosaur. Yeah, it was one of those days…
Continue reading “Reflections on the Trial”

For those unfamiliar with the commenting policy of innermostparts.org, please see this post here

Essentially. You must use a real name and you must use a real email.

Innermostparts is not a place to be a douchebag simply because you can be anonymous. That’s what The Justice Online is for.

The writers of this blog are often douchebags, but at least all of you know who we are.

Yesterday, Sahar, Loki and I sat through seven hours of ridiculous, and live-blogged the whole thing. We were mean, obnoxious, petty, and all-around assholes. But we did it for a reason.

If you were to tell anyone outside of the small group of people very involved in Brandeis Student Union politics (especially people who don’t go to this school) that there was a major, seven-hour long trial over the results of an election, they’d laugh. They’d think it hilarious. The Student Union might be important to the lives of students at the school, but really, its not that important. It’s not critical too much beyond egos. The trial yesterday was an orgy of absurdity. The live-blog was written the way it was because we wanted to reflect how silly the process was, as very few other people in the room seemed to really get it.

The trial is just another example of my problems with the Student Union. Shreeya’s final words of advice to the Senate, as President, were “Don’t take yourself too seriously.” The Union has a lot of influence over the University and it can be used for good and important things, but only if we don’t get bogged down in silly procedures and ego-motivated seriousness.

With that said, the liveblog was pretty ridiculous. I’ll apologize to anyone who took personal offense to anything said, but try to have a sense of humor about it. The trial was pretty funny, but only if you were looking for the comedic value in it and not taking yourself too damn seriously.

NOTE: We reserve the right to say thing blatantly offensive and opinionated against those who make a fool of themselves. We are the final arbiters of who is a fool. This post is in no way balanced, nor does it present an unbiased view on anything. With that said, read on!

For a briefer synopsis, read the executive summaries of the closing statements at the end.

Some quotes of the night:

8:00: Taylor Shiells, representing Andrew Brooks: “My client should have run un-opposed, but a series of events eventually caused him to lose.” You mean, the series of events called Democracy?

2:47: Brian: “Objection: why?” The best kind of objection.

5:00: Court: “Would you like to call a witness?”
Taylor (lawyer for brooks):”no!”
Brooks: “yes!”

7:23: Noam, on being sworn in to give testimony: “Finally I get sweared into something!” Oh snap.

7:28: Q: Noam, did you put up any flyers or anything supporting your campaign?
A: No, I don’t like wasting paper.
Continue reading “ze livebloggin’: Brooks v. Shuster & Rutrick”

There will be an ‘Awesome Raging Celebration’ tonight, hosted by the Activist Resource Center. Essentially an excuse for Activists to kick back a little together before the end of the year.

I don’t want to publish the address of the house online, but here’s a link to the facebook group:

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=12634667621

Looks like fun.

Contact Ari Fertig for more information.

Last week Jordan Rothman promised us a “return to controversy”. Well, he kept good on that promise:

Social justice is stupid. There, I said it, and it feels good. Surrounded by the legions of deluded Brandeisians, using this term almost as much as they speak Hebrew or complain about Sherman, I am now finally happy to write about the imbecilic nature of this concept. This ideal is talked about frequently at our university, and is even one of the four pillars of our institution. Many try (most in vain) to classify all manners of activity as promoting “social justice,” while others self-righteously point out that they are defenders of this “noble” ideal. What is actually quite comical is that none of these “guardians” are fully aware of what the term actually means. The concept is ambiguous at best, and many are content to blindly pursue the tenets of this nearly nonexistent ideal.

I am, of course, completely opposed to almost all that Jordan said in that article, and I think his concept of Social Justice as “slavery” is dangerously whack. That said, I do applaud his bold move to stand for his beliefs, because I know and he knows he’s going to take some flak for this. “I may not agree with what you have to say, but I applaud your right to say it” and all that.

I actually agree with Jordan that Social Justice is a pretty ambiguous term. Then again, so is “conservatism” or “love”. Personally, I find it enlightening that the Hebrew word for Charity, tzedakah, has the same root letters as the word for Justice, tzedek. Then again, Charity is a mistranslation:

the nature of tzedakah is very different from the idea of charity. The word “charity” suggests benevolence and generosity, a magnanimous act by the wealthy and powerful for the benefit of the poor and needy.
[snip]
In Judaism, giving to the poor is not viewed as a generous, magnanimous act; it is simply an act of justice and righteousness, the performance of a duty, giving the poor their due.

To me, Social Justice is realizing that “the system” doesn’t always treat everyone in society fairly. We as individuals and as a society have an obligation to give a hand up to those hurt by the economic structure we have set up. Social Justice is about realizing that we are all brothers and sisters, descendants of Noah.

I am my brother’s keeper. That is what Social Justice is all about.

This last semester I’ve been working on a class project for my Sociology class to plan a Hip-Hop concert for Social Justice in Somerville. The class, Community Structures, Youth Subcultures, is a community engaged learning class that asked students to check out subcultures in Boston, Waltham and at Brandeis

My group, the Boston group, worked with an organization in Somerville called Centro Presente, a Massachusetts-based immigrants rights center. The concert we were planning was to be used to raise money for their after-school program, Pintamos Neustros Mundo (We Paint Our World). It was also to be used as a location for Centro Presente to unveil its newest campaign POLI.C.E, which was meant to raise awareness about the link between the local police forces and the I.C.E. (Immigration and Customs Enforcement).

The event, scheduled for tomorrow evening, has been canceled by the Somerville police, twice. On Monday, Blake Hyatt, one of the people in charge of planning the event, announced that the Somerville Police deemed the concert a security risk and were thus announcing that it cannot be held at its original venue at Somerville High School.

Tonight, Blake sent out this Facebook message to concert attendees:

Hi All,

As you all know, this past Monday we had to switch venues due to pressure from the Somerville Police department over what they referred to as permitting issues. We moved it to Cambridge, into a different venue and a different district. Today, we received a phone call informing us that the Somerville Police department had pursued the issue, pressuring the Cambridge Police to cancel the event. Despite the fact that we had the support of the Cambridge Police, Somerville eventually pressured enough officials, and the Cambridge Police caved. We’ve spent the day since trying to find a way around it, but there’s no way out.

There is very little information as to why the Somerville Police might have gone so far out of their way to do this, and at this point their motives seem very questionable. We will continue posting updates as the case goes on.

We’re very sorry for this turn of events, and send our sincerest apologies for any inconvenience it may have caused. Thank all of you for your support.

Best,
Blake Hyatt ’08
Hip-Hop for Justice Co-Coordinator
bhyatt@brandeis.edu

Quite sketchy if you ask me. This was a totally harmless concert planned by a bunch of students at Brandeis and a few cool kids from Somerville. Hardly a security risk. Not only did Somerville Police run the concert out of their town, but they also ran the concert out of existence. Was it really a security concern? Or was it that they don’t want the POLI.C.E. campaign to get noticed? Sketchy business. A semesters worth of work (and money) wasted.

All commenters must now provide valid email addresses (will not be publicly displayed), as well as a poster name that is either a.) a real name or b.) not something silly. This precludes names like “truth”, “ollie”, “brandeis”, etc. Who determines whether a name is silly, you ask? Sahar and I do.

This is to prevent the declining quality of discussion we have witnessed recently… maybe if people cannot hide behind the cloak of anonymity they will form more reasoned thoughts.

update: Sahar here. I suggest you guys register an account, using “dashboard” link. The reasoning here goes along the lines of “If you have something to say, be confident enough in what you have to say to put your name alongside it”

::::::UPDATE 2::::::

After much deliberation with the Student Union E-Board, I have been convinced that a run-off cannot happen. Apparently, at the top of the first ballot it explicitly stated that no run-off would be held and that the first would be the final vote. To change policy now would set a dangerous precedent for after-the-election rule changes.

For this reason and THIS REASON ALONE, I do not think we can call for a run-off any longer. However, the fact that so many students voted for the solar panels is great. This means we can show the administration that this is something many students care about and would spend even their own student activities money on.

::::::ORIGINAL POST::::::

So the votes have been recorded from yesterday’s election, and the weight room proposal has won by 0.7%. The results are posted below.

Special Funding Request:
– New Weight Room in Gosman Athletic Center: 496 (37.43%)
– Solar Panels for a Brandeis Building: 474 (36.77%)
– Renovation of Chums: 139 (10.49%)
– Brandeis 10-Member Delegation to Rwanda: 91 (6.87%)
– Sexually Transmitted Infection (STI) Free Testing: 46 (3.47%)
– Radio Transmitter for WBRS: 34 (2.57%)
– Peace and Social Justice Week: 26 (1.96%)
– One-Day Carnival: 19 (1.43%)

It disturbs me to see that more Brandeis students voted to build a new weight room than for such proposals as solar panel construction, a delegation to Rwanda or free STI testing. In large part, I think this can be attributed to the athletic community’s get-out-the-vote effort (who would’ve thought!).

Also, the weight room had no other proposals competing for its target audience. The socially-minded community, meanwhile, had 4 proposals to deal with, which certainly split the vote away from solar panels, the second-place finisher.

This is why we need a run-off election between the top two proposals. This would ensure that the winning proposal expresses the will of as much of the student body as possible. Unfortunately, there is almost no time left to hold such an election, and it seems unlikely that any will be held. So we need your help. We’re organizing a coalition and petition to push for a run-off, but we don’t have any time.

Join the facebook group. More to come.

When I heard that despite all the efforts to spend the money from the SAF this semester, we still had $100,000 more in rollover than we did at the beginning of the semester, I saw a great opportunity.   That rollover told me that after all of the great events on campus, all of which were free this semester, we still had more money than we needed.  I hoped that we could recognize the very comfortable material conditions we enjoy on this campus and use the money towards a cause more important than ourselves.  My initial proposal was that we could use the funds to sponsor one African per undergraduate student for a whole year.  We could do so through the UN Millennium Village project.

The Millennium Villages seek to end extreme poverty by working with the poorest of the poor, village by village throughout Africa, in partnership with governments and other committed stakeholders, providing affordable and science-based solutions to help people lift themselves out of extreme poverty.

I’m not a member of Positive Foundations, the group on campus working towards the cause of achieving the Millennium Development Goals, but I emailed their group leaders with my idea.  They liked it, but said that they were focusing on getting funding for a trip to Rwanda.  A noble idea as well, I believe, but the trip would only benefit 10 Brandeis students and the trip’s impact on either Rwandans or Brandeis students would be limited, in my belief.  In the end, I decided not to submit my proposal because I wanted to respect the plans of Positive Foundations.

A few days ago I heard that SEA had drafted a plan to provide solar power to the campus.  They went through the work to consult campus administrators to come up with a realistic proposal and advertised it over Facebook.  While such a plan would mostly help Brandeis lower its energy bill, it would also teach students the importance of renewable energy, tell the greater community that Brandeis values sustainability, and help to (however small) alleviate the problems of climate change.  I backed the proposal wholeheartedly.

It’s now been voted upon, and Brandeis students have chosen to refurbish the weight room.  Last time we choose to build a game room in Usdan.  I would say that our record is pretty poor–Brandeis students care very little about making change in the world and care way too much about themselves.

Today is May 1, the real labor day, a.k.a. International Workers’ Day

The middle class exists due to the organized labor movement. We owe organized labor our gratitude and support. Just as unions work to better the lives of all workers, not just unionized ones, we too salute every hard-working man and woman in America and abroad.

If anyone from BLC has something to say we’re interested in your take.

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Continue reading “May Day”

I just talked with Union Judiciary member Jordan Rothman, and he tells me that Andrew Brooks’s appeal is going to be heard on Saturday at 1:30pm.  The hearing will be open to the public, so I encourage anyone interested in the outcome of the election to attend and hear the arguments both sides make in their most complete form.  Updates with info on location or anything else will come as they’re released.