Category: Uncategorized

As the title says, there’s less than one hour left to vote in the Student Union Vice President Special Election.

I have to admit, I was skeptical at first of Adam’s run for VP.  I suppose I didn’t really know him that well.  All I knew was that he was Sahar’s friend and he was a big blog junkie.  Lately I’ve come to know Adam in a much different light.  When speaking with him in person, I notice his strong eagerness to serve the student body and continue where the great Mike Kerns left off.   He really cares about making Brandeis a more progressive place.  He’s got the right positions on the top issues: campus sustainability, gun control, and equal housing.   The Vice President of the Union (quite literally) sets the debate by governing parliamentary procedure during Senate meetings.   From what I’ve learned about Adam, he knows in which direction he wants to take this University.   Adam Hughes is the progressive choice.  Adam Hughes is my choice for Student Union Vice President.

You may recall that last year there was considerable talk about a bicycle program for Brandeis students. We would all pay a small fee, and would then get access to bikes, so that we could ride all over town and annoy the Waltham traffic. So what happened? As far as I can tell, there isn’t any bike program. If there was, I’d be riding one right now, instead of sitting on my fat lazy ass in front of the computer.

Maybe this thing was never proposed. Maybe I’m imagining it. But I’m fairly sure it was promised, and yet seems to have somehow sunk to the bottom of the sea. I think it might have been the baby of Michael Kerns, actually, which may be why it never came to fruition. Seems like nothing ever gets done around here without Kerns.

Whatever the explanation, there is no reason why this great program shouldn’t go forward. Hell, this thing has been talked about for years. An editorial in The Hoot back in 2005 proposed turning us all into bike-riding communists:
Continue reading “Bicycles, perhaps?”

Nathan is a new writer for us. Please welcome him to the blog. -Sahar

      Last year, each morning I went up to the Information Booth in the Shapiro Campus Center and obtained a crisp copy of the day’s New York Times. These were free, as part of some sort of program-thingy that Brandeis runs to give newspapers to the masses. They also gave out The Boston Globe and The Financial Times. Nobody wanted those, though, because the Globe is a watery version of the NY Times, and the Financial Times is printed on paper the color of salmon, and salmon is no color for a newspaper. Fish and news should be kept in separate spheres.

      Anyway, this year, the papers are gone. Disappeared! No longer is there a fresh stack of papers lurking in the info-booth. We used to have a sort of secret little club for those who knew how to properly sidle up to the booth, give a knowing look, and flash their ID. That has vanished without notice. The little info-people in the red shirts have all offered me contradictory and unsatisfactory explanations for this mystery.

       “Where have the papers gone?” I ask them. Many do not know. Others offer lies and conjecture.

      “They will be here when the time is right,” one tells me. “They have gone,” another says. Others tell me the Times will return within the week, though some say it could take a matter of months. None have a reason for the phenomenon.

      Meanwhile, I am news-less. My morning coffee-and-paper routine has been halfway destroyed. I am forced to get my news from those damned wretched untrustworthy “blog” things, or from empty-headed cable-news people. I have to substitute Wolf Blitzer for Bob Herbert (and despite having the coolest name on the entire planet, Wolf Blitzer is supremely useless as a source of information).

      So my question for Brandeis is this: WTF? Where did the papers go? Why can’t I grab a Times in the morning? How are we supposed to keep ourselves informed on The Issues Of The Day? By reading The Hoot? Surely not! Perhaps Innermost Parts can equip us with our basic knowledge, but surely the New York Times is a good way to supplement the wisdom of Sahar and the gang.

If you read Innermost Parts, you already know that voting between Adam Hughes and Andrew Brooks for Student Union veep runs from now until 11:59 tonight. Vote now, if you haven’t already.

Checked that box? Submitted your vote? Great. Now spread the word. Though I unabashedly support Adam Hughes as much as the next writer here at Innermost Parts, I don’t care whether you support him or Andrew Brooks: guilt your friends. Notify your hall mates. Yell things at strangers. Go dorm storming if you can spare half an hour.

If you’re not good at guilting or yelling, then just bring it up in casual conversation. A lot of people on campus feel they had little time to choose between candidates they know close to nothing about. A lot of people today might forget about the final runoff. Gently remind those people that they have the opportunity to influence decision-making on campus in a matter of minutes. Tell them what you think of Brooks and Hughes, and point them in the right direction.

608 people voting is a lot, but we can get more. 195 people voting for Adam Hughes isn’t enough, but we should get more. Spread the word this very instant.

This is a bit off our normal beat, but worth marveling at.

With the DOW off over 500 points yesterday, Lehman in bankruptcy, the Fed rescuing A.I.G. tonight, the viability of WaMu and others institutions in doubt, Fannie and Freddie placed in conservatorship, a major money market fund halting redemptions, it might seem like the credit crisis is spiraling out of control.

And there are definitely more problems to come.

So it seems that we just nationalized ourselves some banks by accident. Socialism!

First impression – so the US Government now owns a big chunk of the financial industry, eh? This can only increase the power Chris Dodd. All glory to the Dodd!

Seriously, though. Can anyone more informed than me help explain? This would be a good time for, say, a Brandeis Econ Professor to drop by and teach us what the hell is going on.

This is exciting. Remember when Etta King sent out an email telling everyone about her efforts to create a physical location for the Activist Resource Center?

Remember this?

I have proposed to Jason Gray (Student Union President) the establishment of a physical space tentatively called the Activist Resource Center to serve and support the activist community.

If you are interested in discussing this possibility, if you want to have a say in what a place such as the one proposed would look like or do, OR if you think this is an unecessary effort and would like to discuss why, you are invited to a meeting with Jason and I and anyone else who shows up to begin this process. I have been in countless conversations over the last few years about how to better support the activist community, and I think this is a very possible solution towards building better connections between our groups

It’s going down today.
7pm. Shapiro. Union Office.

(You’d have known this already, by the way, by seeing this event on the “Upcoming Events” widget located on the sidebar to the right of this post)

This is it. The final push. Don’t forget to vote. For Adam..

It’s a runoff. Hughes vs Brooks.

update- The numbers:

1 Andrew Brooks 266 43.75
2 Adam T. Hughes 195 32.07
3 Gustavo Pardo 85 13.98
4 Christina Khemraj 37 6.09
5 ABSTAIN 14 2.30
6 Anthony Rios 2 0.33
6 Alex Trott 2 0.33
8 Nate Porteshawver 1 0.16
8 Frank The Tank 1 0.16
8 Jordan Suchow 1 0.16
8 Roy Rotstein 1 0.16
8 Jordan Rothman 1 0.16
8 William Sipzner 1 0.16
8 Alex Braver 1 0.16
15 Alexander Reed Braver 0 0.00
15 Suahd Iddrissu 0 0.00
15 Chaely T. Marrow 0 0.00

According to my back-of-envelope calculations, Adam needs about 4/5 of the Gustavo/Khemraj vote to win, assuming that all who abstained in the first round continue to do so and everyone else votes the same way as they did before (either for Hughes or Brooks or not voting at all).
Winning 80% of those votes is a pretty tall order.

Mike Kerns, outgoing VP of the Brandeis University Student Union, just made a powerful endorsement of Adam Hughes for the same position. Read it for yourself:

VOTE ADAM!...

I wholeheartedly endorse Adam Hughes to succeed me as Vice President. He is a candidate who can truly represent the ‘deis student body and help to guide our Student Union in progressive, truly constructive directions. I have come to know Adam as a selfless individual who has within him all that a true leader requires. While we often find the work of the Student Union to be distant from us, there are a great many impactful issues that need be addressed, and we need Adam to stand for student rights, we need Adam to stand up to the administration when students are barred from campus unduly with their academic careers on the line…we need Adam. There is no question in my mind that he is up to the job, and I respectfully urge you to VOTE NOW (http://union.brandeis.edu/elections/FA08-3/vp#) for Adam. He is simply the candidate I trust to carry on as guardian of our values, our interests, and our community’s priorities as Brandeis’ next Student Union Vice President!

If you’re looking for the candidate whose platform represents who he truly is and what he truly stands for, Adam Hughes is your only choice. He is the activist who actually does more than pay lip service to our community’s concerns at election time. He portrays himself as the individual he actually is as opposed to the candidate painting himself over and pandering at election time. Adam is the candidate who has actually worked hard on the issues touted now by his primary opponent at election time.

I know because I pioneered many of these issues through the Union last year, including gender-neutral housing, tolerance for individual identity, an environmentally friendly campus-wide initiative, a resolution calling for endowment transparency, etc. And I have experienced our candidates in action. Adam is the one for us.

Respectfully, there is a reason Andrew Brooks was voted out of his senate seat last spring, and there is a reason he was so unsuccessful in his previous bid for VP.

That’s how it’s done y’all.

One and a half hours left before the polls close.

All night I’ve been trying to go to http://union.brandeis.edu/elections and vote for Adam Hughes.

All night the server has been crashed. It’s 2:30 at the time of this writing and things don’t seem to have gotten better. Last year we also had problems on election night. Let’s hope that the results will be announced sooner this semester, at least.

As for the mysterious Justin Sulsky email – he pulled the same sort of thing last election. I don’t know where Justin gets access to all students’ emails so quickly. I doubt he painstakingly copied them out from the brandeis people directory. Shady.

Anyways, there are problems with the election website, we here at IP have endorsed a scrappy candidate who happens to be running in the same race as Andrew Brooks, while Justin Sulsky has access to everyone’s email address. It’s April 2008 all over again!

Very rarely am I ever as upset as I presently am. Just a few minutes ago, I received an introductory e-mail from Senator-At-Large Justin Sulsky. This e-mail was written to all the first-years on campus. After giving a two sentence introduction providing the reader with minimal information, he segways into reminding all first years to vote in the Vice Presidential election. Directly following the link to vote, Sulsky moves into a full endorsement – with bolded text! – of Andrew Brooks.

Anyone with common sense can see that this endorsement was intended to abuse the naivete of first years who are less than familiar with Brooks’ schemes for Senate seats. My favorite line of all:

I support Andrew because he will bring a badly needed fresh perspective to the Student Union.

Apart from being utterly false, the above quote has poor sentence structure. Go below the fold for the entire contents of the e-mail.

Continue reading “Another Senate Seat Scheme”

Half an hour before the primary election, and possibly swayed by my ringing endorsement, Mike Kerns has announced his endorsement of Adam Hughes for Student Union Vice President.

More info as this situation develops…

There’s been a lively debate in the comments over the upcoming Vice-Presidential Special Election, but through the lens of analyzing one candidate, Andrew Brooks. This is the case for Adam Hughes, the insurgent candidate for the post (and a fellow here at IP).

What is the character of Brandeis? Is it found in our entreprenurial and innovative spirit? The way that we find people different than us kickass? (We reserve our tolerance for people like Jordan Rothman.) Is it our crusading spirit to heal the world?

Only one man in the running represents all these facets of our beloved school. Only one man can truly represent all these underlying ideals of this community. That man is Adam Hughes.

Continue reading “The Case for Adam Hughes”

Please welcome Emily, another new writer of ours

EDIT: Please read the recent Justice article on this event, which I found very enlightening, particularly the sophomore that was interviewed who was profoundly personally affected by the September 11th attacks. There is a particular reason for my- and other attendees at this discussion- ignorance to his experience, and I wish he was available to speak earlier in the discussion. I find that this new piece of information, along with my own shift of opinion, gives the forum ground to speak of a tragedy as a tragedy, and not a means for analysis and social productivity. However, I am greatly disappointed that there wasn’t, to my knowledge, any other forum on those latter issues that Thursday, and my argument still stands… just not for this particular forum. Thanks again to McElhaney, Grey, and Father Cuenin; new thanks to Michelle Liberman of the Justice.

Student Union President Jason Grey and Director of Community Development Ryan McElhaney held a sparsely attended open commemorative forum for 9/11 Thursday in order to “commemorate, reflect, and remember the lives lost” seven years ago in New York City. Grey and McElhaney invited Father Walter Cuenin, Catholic chaplain at Brandeis, to moderate the discussion. We attendees sat in a small circle of chairs in the Shapiro art gallery, and many of those chairs were empty. Out of the seventeen people who were there at some point or another, four of us were press.

The lonely space and prolonged silences caused the forum to spend a good deal of time on its own importance. That people should be there. That 9/11 was significant. We talked about the way the attacks changed our perception of the world and the United States’ place in it. We talked about the emotional impact the sudden loss of life can have. We talked about how the attacks brought people together and wondered why the public had decided to stop remembering this year.

My thoughts after the cut. Continue reading “Largely Unattended 9/11 Forum Stifled Productive Discussion”

As a new writer to Innermost Parts and a new student to the Brandeis campus, I see the value in reading through previous posts published on this blog. Granted, I only grasp a quick glimpse into the many dilemmas of the previous year, there is still so much perspective and insight from my fellow writers that I greatly value.

Take a look at the April 18th, 2008 post by Lev. My favorite quote of all:

We need to ensure that candidates who want to take action and transcend petty politics fill these seats.

In my case, I demand a candidate to take action, not just “want to take action.” I demand an activist, not someone who wishes to bring back “an activist spirit.” I demand passion, not politics. I am forced to question the validity of a man’s words when this man disregarded activism in one election and then made it one of his main platform components in another.

I am clearly a Brooks skepticist. But then again, who am I to question the motives of this man?

I am a voter, and that’s my responsibility.

The Brennan Center for Justice (great org run out of NYU) just came out with a “guide to explain the rights of student voters”. Their website is here. Their press release:

ith thousands of young and new voters expected to participate in the 2008 election, today the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law launched an online legal guide to student voting. Students across the country will face unique challenges when they register to vote and cast ballots this November, and the interactive
Legal Guide to Student Voting provides an easy-to-use state-by-state analysis of voting laws tailored specifically to college students.

The Brennan Center Guide also dispels common myths about the registration process that can impede student voters—particularly students attending college away from home—as recently described in the New York Times.

With a thorough synthesis of the voting regulations in 50 states and the District of Columbia, the Guide features a clickable map of the United States with concise guidelines about the often complicated registration, residency, voter ID, and absentee laws that vary in each state. By scrolling over a given state, the Guide allows students to
quickly determine how to cast a ballot whether they are voting in their home state or out of state.

There are so many resources for youth voting this year, it’s ridiculously easy to vote / register to vote. And kudos to Brennan. This goes beyond “how to register to vote” and instead attacks people’s legal questions and the FUD (fear, uncertainty and doubt) surrounding Student Voting head-on.

This post is about the power of electoral activism. As the readers of this blog are well aware, Innermostparts.org campaigned pretty heavily against Andrew Brooks last spring in his campaign for Senator at Large (as well as Vice President). We charged he was right-wing, opposed to social justice, we even called him a ‘dinosaur’ and a few other mean and nasty things. Ultimately, whether due to us or to Brooks’ lack of popularity amongst the student body, we won. Noam Shuster, the write-in candidate, succeeded in receiving more votes than both Brooks and Sulsky. It was a clear mandate by the Student Body that we wanted a Student Union that advocated for Social Justice, both here at Brandeis and around the world.

A few moments ago I received an invitation to the Facebook group ANDREW BROOKS FOR VICE PRESIDENT, where Brooks outlines his platform and his experience in his current campaign to fill the seat vacated by progressive activist and former DFA member Mike Kearns. He writes, ” Andrew Brooks has spent most of his time at Brandeis working to change our campus for the better. As an activist leader on campus, Andrew has worked to stimulate interest in a variety of activist issues in order to change the world around us.” Of the six bullet points he includes, three of them relate to his social justice work:

*Sponsoring and passing legislation to expand the Union’s nondiscrimination law to include preventing discrimination on the basis of “color, gender identity and expression, national or ethnic origin, and disability”

*Pushing for gender-neutral housing on the Residence Life Advisory Committee

*Signing onto and successfully supporting legislation to make the Student Union more environmentally friendly

His first of three platform points is entitled “ACTIVISM” and it reads: “Andrew wishes to bring an activist spirit back into how the Union does its business. He will work to make sure the Union is involved in issues that not only effect our campus, but the world around us. Andrew supporters the “Brandeis Votes” initiative and has helped collect donations to provide assistance to hurricane victims in the Gulf Coast.”

Continue reading “Andrew Brooks the Activist!”

Message for you:

Drinking liberally tonight.
Chums, 11pm.
We’ll have a chums challenge competition, if enough people come.

Before drinking liberally, you might want to …
a: go to chums open mic night at 9pm
b: do the SEA bonfire (show up at shapiro atrium at eihter 8pm or 9pm)

See you TONIGHT

Did you know we had a Kiva.org group set up for Brandeis University? You can join here.

Kiva.org is an easy online way to give out international, no-interest microloans. Here’s an excerpt from their about page:

We Let You Loan to the Working Poor

Kiva’s mission is to connect people through lending for the sake of alleviating poverty.

Kiva is the world’s first person-to-person micro-lending website, empowering individuals to lend directly to unique entrepreneurs in the developing world.

The people you see on Kiva’s site are real individuals in need of funding – not marketing material. When you browse entrepreneurs’ profiles on the site, choose someone to lend to, and then make a loan, you are helping a real person make great strides towards economic independence and improve life for themselves, their family, and their community. Throughout the course of the loan (usually 6-12 months), you can receive email journal updates and track repayments. Then, when you get your loan money back, you can relend to someone else in need.

Good news, everyone:

Hello Everyone!

Whereas many people within the activist community at Brandeis have expressed frustration and discomfort with the lack of collaboration, organization and cooperation between activist groups on campus

Whereas activism can only grow to be more effective and inclusive in an environment that fosters the sharing of skills and resources

Whereas many activist efforts could use a place to store, share and meet in a constructive manner

I have proposed to Jason Gray (Student Union President) the establishment of a physical space tentatively called the Activist Resource Center to serve and support the activist community.

If you are interested in discussing this possibility, if you want to have a say in what a place such as the one proposed would look like or do, OR if you think this is an unecessary effort and would like to discuss why, you are invited to a meeting with Jason and I and anyone else who shows up to begin this process. I have been in countless conversations over the last few years about how to better support the activist community, and I think this is a very possible solution towards building better connections between our groups. I am not aware of other efforts to create a similar space, so I apologize if I am stepping on anyone’s toes. Please reply to this email and let me know which meeting time (Wednesday September 17th at 7pm or Thursday September 18th at 7pm) is better for you. Whichever date gets the most replies will be the time of the meeting and I will send out another email.

PLEASE forward this to anyone you think should be involved because I did not send this to every club! Thank you so much.

Peace.

Etta King

Etta can be reached this way.

Did anyone catch Ariel Wittenberg‘s article in the Hoot (the August 2008 issue). It’s called “God Bless You”: A personal story and it’s about what she did over the summer. Damn it’s good. Read it. It’ll make your day. It sure made mine.

Here’s a brief excerpt:

His mom had shown me his picture. In it he was all dressed up in his army fatigues with his helmet and riffle. Derek wanted to be a police officer when he got back from the war.

His face was young. He was my age, but being 19 and working behind a desk for the summer made 19 too young to dress like a GI-Joe and to be shipped off to a foreign desert to risk your life for your country.

I’m a patriot. And for me, that means speaking up against a war you disagree with.

But for this kid, who was a patriot too, it meant paying back a country that lets you speak out whenever you want with his body, maybe his life.

You can tell that Ariel wrote this from the heart, and not as a quick hack job to beat a deadline. This work was honest. A Brandeis Virtue.

Got an email from Jason Gray today; I’m sure you did too. Looks like the Student Union EBoard is trying to do its bit to help out the victims of Gustav.

What their effort boils down to is this: Tabling for donations, backing a student volunteer group, and persuading International Club to donate some funds from Pachanga.

Well, that’s good I guess. Way to use the bully pulpit for some good. I remember in High School, after the Southeast Asian Monsoons, a kid named Adam Sax raised 10,000 from students for charity. So this donation drive definitely has promise. I don’t know why, it just feels…underwhelming.

Maybe the students who join the National Collegiate Volunteers could do some video interviews with some residents and bring back their stories? How about we get the University to invest some of its endowment in no/low-interest micro-loan programs for hurricane survivors. Or maybe we as a student body could raise a ruckus about the failed conservative policies that got us into this mess…again?

I dunno. This isn’t meant to be a criticism of the Student Union. They’re just people on a busy schedule doing what they think is right. I just think there is a capacity at Brandeis for so much more. Those are just some quick ideas I had. This is a good first step, but imagine the possibilities of all else we could do.

You can read the email under the flip:
Continue reading “Student Union vs Hurricane Gustav”

Maybe it’s because localities put so many barriers in front of students registering to vote?

Late last month, as a voter-registration drive by supporters of Senator Barack Obama was signing up thousands of students at Virginia Tech, the local registrar of elections issued two releases incorrectly suggesting a range of dire possibilities for students who registered to vote at their college.

The releases warned that such students could no longer be claimed as dependents on their parents’ tax returns, a statement the Internal Revenue Service says is incorrect, and could lose scholarships or coverage under their parents’ car and health insurance.

[snip]

Last fall, in Statesboro, Ga., in a hotly contested city council race, there were challenges to the registration of about 1,000 Georgia Southern University students who had used dormitory addresses. “We threatened suit, but the issue went away when they figured out that the challenges weren’t going to affect the results of the election,” Mr. Greenbaum said.

In 2003, in Waller County, Tex., the district attorney wrote a column in a local newspaper threatening to prosecute students at Prairie View A&M, a historically black university, for illegal voting. The project sued, and the district attorney backed down

This happens all across the country. In many places, students have to change their voter reg information every time they switch dorms. Oftentimes, towns don’t want students from other states to mess with their local elections, so they pull shit like this to make it hard for students to vote. On one hand, you don’t want large Universities overpowering the small towns they’re adjacent to. On the other hand, you don’t want to disenfranchise anyone. It’s a problem.

Applications to join the Steering Committee of the Brandeis Pluralism Alliance (which basically means giving out grants and so forth for deserving clubs, etc) are due at midnight tonight.

Here’s what I wrote for my application:

Q: How would you describe the issues and challenges related to pluralism and unity at Brandeis?

A: Brandeis, as I’ve said before, has a very fractured social scene. The glut of clubs serves to divide, rather than unite, many students on campus.

For instance, the members of Students for Environmental Action and the members of the Brandeis Democrats may have much in common and benefit from working together, but the clubs meet at around the same time and one can’t be in *all* the activist clubs on campus.

Similarly, the “identity clubs” (mixed-heritage, ahora, etc) have little contact with clubs which are not under the ICC umbrella. This is a problem which should change.

Beyond these structural problems, there are simmering tensions below the surface of calm. Voluntary segregation is still an issue. Anything to do with the Middle East is sure to raise hackles. Affirmative action is like religion and politics – not spoken about in polite company. There are only 7 Black professors on campus, and goodness knows how many Latin@s, etc.

Pluralism, Diversity, Tolerance. These things are stressed during Orientation (and the Mosaic pre-orientation program) and hardly ever spoken of again. As Ben Brandzel put it, this University was created to tear down the walls between members of humankind. We were explicitly created to challenge unjust admittance quotas in other colleges. I don’t believe that we’re institutionally living up to that legacy.

So that’s what I think? What about you?

As you probably know by now if you read your email and received your free water bottle, Jehuda has decided to ask Aramark to “discontinue the use of bottled water at catered events on campus”. In addition there is going to be a committee to investigate the advantages and disadvantages of having bottled water on campus. I think Jehuda’s decision is a good one, and it represents the strength of SEA, who has been lobbying the administration for a ban of bottled water on campus since at least last semester. Although SEA hasn’t yet achieved its full goal, I think this is a good start and probably the best they could hope for as a first step from the administration.

Hopefully the committee will do a good job, unlike the committee to investigate whether or not BranPo officers should have guns. That committee made a terrible recommendation to the administration and they unfortunately, but predictably, took it. Personally, I am very suspicious of the quality of the research that committee did, although I have hope for this committee because the question they are confronting doesn’t seem as complicated. At least to me.
Continue reading “The Legacy of Our Generation”

Over the last year or so, I’ve been getting this amazing email newsletter from the International Center for Ethics, Justice & Public Life (notice how everything at Brandeis is some sort of center or another? Seriously. Even Volen is the “Volen National Center for Complex Systems”).

Anyways, it kicks ass. As does the Ethics Center website.

Point is, the listserv rocks. But it’s a bitch to be added to. Here’s how you do it:

Send your name, email, and mailing address to

Sample email from the listerv under the fold…
Continue reading “A Cool Brandeis Publication”

Announcing the newest, hottest, rawest, most swashbuckling club on campus.

That’s right. Drinking Liberally.

Long Story short?
Every Thursday. 11pm. Chums. Chill with other liberals.
Also, sign up here to get announcements for parties, movie screenings, and other events we might put on.
Continue reading “Drinking Liberally”

[Sahar here. Please welcome Jessica, our even-newest contributor].

I had quite the experience this summer, thanks to funding from the Peace Awards here at Brandeis.

In short, I went to India for two months and taught English and World Religions to underprivileged Buddhist nuns in the Himalayas.  I went through the Jamyang Foundation, which has many projects in remote Himalayan regions dedicated to providing education for ordained Buddhist women.  This education spans a wide variety of subjects, from Buddhist philosophy to hygiene to English and more.

Before I continue, let me just say that there is no way in hell I will ever be able to completely convey this entire experience to you.  Writing this gives me the same feeling I had when taking pictures of the Himalayas: knowing the picture you take will never be able to capture the tremendous beauty and majesty of those mountains, or the feeling you get when you’re surrounded by them.  So, if I ever sound frustrated in my writing of this, or if this ends up being ridiculously long in an attempt to fit everything in, please understand my dilemma.
Continue reading “Some summer revelations, and an opportunity to help!”

I just happened upon this using my handy dandy google news-about-brandeis generator:

the Brandeis International Business School is rolling out a new MBA program centered around social and environmental responsibility in business.

The program is built on principles espoused by Justice Louis Brandeis a century ago. Brandeis advocated that businesses address broader social purposes beyond profits. The new MBA in Socially Responsible Business allows students to incorporate into their business study issues such as economic and social development, corporate governance, and environmental policy. They will do this in a uniquely global setting, with fellow students from over 60 countries and a curriculum rooted in international economics, finance, and business. Continue reading “Cool green program at IBS”

A personal message from Ingrid Schorr, Program Administrator of the Office of the Arts

The Office of the Arts and Student Activities is hosting an all-arts barbecue on the afternoon of September 11. We would like to acknowledge that this is also the anniversary of the 2001 attacks on the United States. Those events affected our community in many different ways; some students were 11 years old at the time; some did not live in the United States. Others lost family members in the attacks, were displaced from their homes, jobs, or schools, or experienced trauma in other ways.

As artists, how might we mark the day at this gathering? I don’t mean to say that the barbecue itself will be a memorial. I would like to find an appropriate and meaningful way to acknowledge the date. We might have a period of silence; a prayer book or other place to write a response; a collaborative gesture such as a song or building a cairn. What do you all think? I welcome your suggestions and leadership.

Student Union University Committee applications are due tomorrow at noon.
(Read our previous coverage about them here)

Being on a committee means you have a real position to act and change campus for the better. Better fill out your application quick.

Brandeis Pluralism Alliance Steering Committee applications are due Sunday at Midnight. Don’t forget those either.

Technical Support Help Desk Analyst at GE Healthcare.  Sounds thrilling and rewarding, doesn’t it?  Forced into working for “the man” out of financial necessity, that was my title this summer at my job back in Western Mass.  I admit that I needed a break from politics and working for my values after many months of hard-fought campaigns at Brandeis, but something was missing.  It was hard to live without living my values daily, so I took the opportunity this summer to look inward to reform my own habits and lifestyle choices.  Looking back at all of my accomplishments, I feel pretty confident that I made my lifestyle significantly greener.  Interested in how I did it?  Follow the jump.

Continue reading “How I Greened My Lifestyle–and How You Can Too!”

You! Yeah you!

Do you like money?

Do you like giving it away? What if it’s someone else’s money? What if you could give it to kickass people and clubs that you like?

Sounds good, eh? Why don’t you apply to join the Brandeis Pluralism Alliance Steering Committee?

Confused? Here’s what’s going down:

The Brandeis Pluralism Alliance (BPA) invites applications for new members to join the Steering Committee, which is responsible for advising all of the initiative’s community-building activities and for
selecting student and faculty grant recipients for projects addressing issues of identity, pluralism and unity at Brandeis. Applications are due Sunday, September 7, 2008 at midnight, and are available online at www.brandeis.edu/das/programs/bpa.

I’m listening to a DFA NIght School Session right now and they’re talking to a Yale Law professor about Voter Turnout.

Here’s some info:

Follow-up calls to those that have expressed interest work beautifully.
Here’s a refrain we’re hearing a lot this year – the more personal, the more local, the better.

Social Networks, in other words, are key.
“Many local, low-budget campaigns operate as if they were headquartered in a far-away city and parachuted into this local race. Use your friends, your community members, your social networks” they are great social networks!

So the 50 cent version of this two-hour session: “Stay local! Use personal connections! Distant methods like robocalls and lit drops are bleh.”
Continue reading “Voter Turnout – What works and what doesn’t”

It’s weird, isn’t it? The more local an election, the lower the turnout rate. Yet the more local the office, the greater an impact it will have on the lives of electors. The Executive of Monroe County had much more power to advance or retard my fame, my fortunes, and my family than Governor Paterson ever will.

Same goes for Brandeis. Sometimes, the elections and appointments with the lowest buzz are the most important. This is one of those times.

The Student Union is accepting applications for University Committees. This is actually pretty important. Being on a committee may not be as sexy as being Vice President, or Senator at Large, but if passionate people control those commitees, we can push good policy through to the University. I plan on applying, and I hope all readers of Innermost Parts do too.

Confused?
Continue reading “You can haz the power”

Please extend a warm welcome to Carrie, our newest contributor here on Innermost Parts. – Sahar

As a first year here at Brandeis, I was overwhelmed by the turn-out this past Thursday night in the Shapiro Atrium as Barack Obama gave his acceptance speech for the Democratic Party’s nomination for president. While I am fully aware that this is a fairly liberal campus of individuals, there was something very reassuring about such a large group. While I suppose that it is entirely possible some were simply passing through for a trip to Einstein’s, there is no doubt that so many went out of their way to be there.

And as I sat there, in awe of our future president’s words, I thought: What if everyone in this room made an effort to help elect this man? What if, apart from their own vote, they helped to get out the vote of others, both on and beyond this campus?

Sure, we all have things that need to get done – things that perhaps rank above helping to elect the future leader of this nation – but what else is stopping you? Are you afraid of being labled a “crazy liberal?” Are you afraid of reaching outside of your comfort zone? Are you afraid of putting yourself out there? Well, my friend, some fears rank secondary to the fear of four more years of a failed war, four more years of the same failed policies.

So I urge you to break free! If you cared enough to take in Obama’s words that night, care enough to pass the message. Care enough to help change the country because if you won’t, who will?

The very first DFA meeting of the year is occurring this Tuesday at 9 pm, in Pearlman 201 202. For those of you who don’t know, DFA is the sweetest activist group on campus among many sweet activist groups (and yes, I may be slightly biased).

Our very own Sahar made a short, kickass intro video highlighting our work last year and showing new people what’s up.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OogT5m31po0[/youtube]

The saga is over. Congratulations to the now official Senator at Large! Now all she needs to do is learn the fast-talking Senator lingo.

I don’t quite get it either.