Thursday, April 10, 2003

by Ken Patton
Gazette News Reporter

In an informal talk last night, Vice President of Administration Larry
Schall spoke on the “The Meaning of Swarthmore” and the evolving mission of
the college. Schall presented information from the beginning of Swarthmore
up until the present day and discussed how the purpose of Swarthmore has
been changing since its founding. The talk was based upon the dissertation
and research done by Schall over the past few years.

Schall began by discussing the Quaker roots of Swarthmore. According to
Schall, Swarthmore was designed to provide an “education for Quakers, by
Quakers.” In addition, he discussed the concept of a “guarded education,”
and how the turning point in Swarthmore’s history was in 1902, when
Swarthmore began to diverge from this “guarded education” in favor of new
goals such as excellence in education. Schall claimed that at this time,
with the selection of Joseph Swain as President of the college, “Swarthmore
became Swarthmore.”

 From this point forward, Schall discussed the successful leadership of
several of the other famous Presidents of the college. In addition, he
talked about how the power structure has changed over the decades, with a
shift in power from the Board of Managers to the President beginning in
Swain’s presidency, and another shift in the 1960’s from the President to
the Faculty with the formation of committees. According to Schall, the
power in the college today lies mainly with the Board of Managers, the
President, and the faculty, with a small influence from alumni and students.

by Evelyn Khoo
Living and Arts Editor

A small fire was discovered in Paces yesterday evening sometime between
6:15 and 6:30 p.m. Staff members at Essie Mae’s were preparing for dinner
when they smelled smoke coming out from Paces. Public Safety was called,
and there were three to four fire engines at the scene.

According to one of the firefighters, the fire had been caused by a rag
placed on the glass topped stove. “It seems like someone had just turned
off the stove and the thing about a glass topped stove is that it is still
hot for a few minutes after you’ve turned it off. So when a rag and a cake
were placed on the stove, the rag caught fire.”

The fire was put out in around 45 minutes.

However, it is not known who had been using the Paces kitchen. Vice
President of Administration Larry Schall, who arrived at the scene, said
that he will be talking to the Paces directors to do further
investigations.

Despite the disruption and the smell of smoke that lingered in the air,
Essie Mae’s stayed open throughout the proceedings and continued to serve
dinner.

by Roxanne Yaghoubi
Gazette News Reporter

Wednesday night saw the beginnings of a new student group on campus. In a
Kohlberg classroom, five or six students gathered to talk about how they
could improve the situation of special needs students at Swarthmore. To be
considered as having “special needs,” such students could have any type of
disability at any level of severity. The group especially wants to
emphasize that the students’ disabilities do not have to be previously
documented; in fact, one of the group’s main goals is to ensure that
students who think they might have a disability can get the testing done
that is necessary to become documented.

Ryan Budish ’04 started off the meeting by introducing himself and
describing the work of the Disability Taskforce, to which he is a student
representative along with Dannie Silverman ’04. This taskforce has just
finished preparing a report which makes recommendations to the college on
how to improve its services for disabled students. Primarily, the taskforce
thinks it is important for the college to evaluate its academic support
programs, such as the WA and SAM programs, through internal examination and
by outside experts.

The meeting then moved on to asking whether any students present had
questions about which professors and departments were the most accomodating
towards certain disabilities. Though no one present had any questions about
that, most of the students present agreed that they thought it was
important to give such information to incoming freshmen. The group hopes to
reach out to these freshman through mailings before they even reach campus,
or a student/faculty panel on disabilities and support services that would
be held during the first few weeks of classes. Other ideas included
bathroom signs that would give the names of students and faculty to whom
students could go to for support and advice regarding their disabilities,
especially if the students were still undiagnosed.

The new group will continue to work on planning these activities. If any
other students are interested in working on these issues, or have concerns
about their disabilties and support needs, they should contact Budish or
Silverman, or Myrt Westphal, the coordinator for the special needs student
group.

On April 4 at about 11:00, a fire was reported in an apartment building in
the 100 block of Park Avenue. When the police arrived, flames and heavy
smoke were observed in a first floor apartment facing Park Avenue. Officers
evacuated the other residents, forced the apartment door open, and attacked
the flames with a fire extinguisher, but were driven back by the heavy
smoke. The Swarthmore Fire Department arrived and extinguished the flames.
No injuries were reported, and the cause of the fire is under investigation.

Between the mornings of April 5 and April 6, a cherry picker was moved from
its parked position at the construction site at Swarthmore-Rutledge School
and driven into a side of the school building. A new window in the building
was broken and part of the surrounding wall damaged. The amount of damage
is unknown at this time.

*****

* Iraqi civilians celebrated in Baghdad on Wednesday as coalition forces
moved freely through the city after top Iraqi officials fled only hours
before. People all over the world watched video footage of Iraqis and US
Marines tearing down a statue of Saddam Hussein in Firdos Square near the
center of the capital. Information Minister Mohammed Saeed al-Sahaf was
notably absent from the capital, failing to give his daily denunciation of
what he called American propaganda regarding the movement of coalition
forces. Marines also entered the home of Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz
to find evidence that he had left only a short time before, although he had
done so in a manner suggesting he planned to return. However, the success
was tempered somewhat by widespread looting and an announcement by the
International Red Cross that one of its Canadian workers had been killed
and that it would be temporarily halting work in Baghdad because it was too
dangerous. US administration officials cautioned that the war was not over
yet, noting that Iraqi forces appeared to be regrouping near Tikrit.
Defense Secretary Rumsfeld identified a number of goals that still needed
to be accomplished: capturing or accounting for Saddam and other members of
the Iraqi leadership, finding US POWs, locating and securing weapons of
mass destruction and finding and breaking up all terrorist organizations
operating in Iraq.

* Republicans in the US House and Senate could not come to an agreement on
the size of the tax cut to be enacted as part of the 2004 budget, and have
decided to put off the decision until a future date. House Republicans have
decreased the size of the tax cut to $550 billion, but moderate Republican
senators, including Olympia Snowe of Maine, have refused to increase the
size of the cut from the plan the senate passed, which called for $350
billion in cuts. Said Snowe, “Clearly the understanding is explicit that
the package remain at 350. Our voices have clearly been heard at every level.”

*****

Upward Bound Tutoring
Sponsored by Upward Bound
Kohlberg 202, 4:00 p.m.

Genevive Lee Lecture
Sponsored by the Department of History
Kirby Lecture Hall, 4:15 p.m.

“Global Islams” Lecture Series
Sponsored by the Department of Sociology and Anthropology
Kohlberg: Scheuer Room, 4:30 p.m.

Biology 2 Study Sessions
Sponsored by the Department of Biology
Martin 213, 6:00 p.m.

Physics and Astronomy Clinic
Sponsored by the Department of Physics and Astronomy
Bond 133, 7:00 p.m.

Asian Film Festival: “Jin Roh” (1998, Japan by Hiroyuki Okiura)
Sponsored by the Department of Modern Languages and Literatures
LPAC Cinema, 7:00 p.m.

Astronomy Lab
Sponsored by the Department of Physics and Astronomy
Sproul 300, 7:00 p.m.

Watson Informational Meeting for Juniors
Sponsored by the Dean’s Office
Parrish Parlor-East, 7:00 p.m.

Latin American and Spanish Film Festival
Sponsored by the Department of Modern Languages and Literatures
Kohlberg 115, 7:30 p.m.

Lecture: “The Future of Swarthmore”
A talk by President Al Bloom
Sponsored by Student Council and the Vice President’s Office
Kohlberg Commons, 8:00 p.m.

Empty the Shelters Film: “Poverty Outlaw”
Intercultural Center, 8:00 p.m.

Muhlenberg was off to a strong 2-0 lead in the first quarter, but the
Garnet rejoined with seven straight goals, thus leading Muhlenberg 7-2
heading into the fourth quarter. The Mules struck back in the fourth
quarter, scoring four goals and shutting out the Garnet for the rest of
play. It wasn’t enough to stop the Garnet however, as Swarthmore ultimately
triumphed with a final score of 7-6. John Murphy ’03 scored a game-high
three goals, and Ryan Croken ’05 recorded strong play in the net with 12
saves.

*****

Today:
Baseball hosts Ursinus, 4:00 p.m.
Women’s Tennis at Bryn Mawr, 4:00 p.m.
Women’s Lacrosse hosts Bryn Mawr, 5:30 p.m. (venue change)
Softball hosts Baptist Bible (DH), 3:00 p.m.

Tomorrow:
Baseball at Ursinus, 4:00 p.m.
Golf at Holy Family, 1:00 p.m.

*****

QUOTE OF THE DAY

“Things are only impossible until they’re not.”
–Jean-Luc Picard, “Star Trek: The Next Generation”

*****
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