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Brandeis University's Community Newspaper — Waltham, Mass.

Archive for February 17th, 2012

The Hoot predicts the Oscars

Published February 17, 2012 in Arts, Etc. by Sean Fabery

Best Picture
Will win: “The Artist”
Could win: “The Descendants”
There’s little chance “The Artist” won’t win, as it has swept almost all the awards for which it has been nominated. It will ...

View from the Top: Yael Katzwer

Published February 17, 2012 in Features by Yael Katzwer
When I look back at my past three and a half years at Brandeis, a lot of things stand out. One thing that truly stands out to me is the ...

Student misconduct rarely brings consequences

Published February 17, 2012 in Front Page, News by Nathan Koskella
Official crime reporting at Brandeis highlights only a trace amount of severe misconduct in recent years, which the university routinely deals with internally, rarely referring incidents to outside law enforcement. “We’re ...

Brandeis singled out in new MBTA Advisory Board plan

Published February 17, 2012 in Front Page by Alex Schneider
Under a new “third” plan released Wednesday to bridge the MBTA’s budget gap and prevent service cuts, Brandeis students could be forced to dish out an annual $10 commuter rail ...

Posse program supports student achievement

Published February 17, 2012 in Features by Marisa Budlong
This academic year marks the 14th year that Brandeis University has worked with the Posse Foundation, which works with public high school students in urban areas that have great potential ...

Pests infest dorms, to students’ ire

Published February 17, 2012 in Features by Zach Reid
In many residence halls across the campus, students have found themselves at odds with all manner of pests. They include but are by no means limited to spiders, flies, mice, ...

Editorial: Applaud new MBTA proposal

Published February 17, 2012 in Front Page by The Brandeis Hoot
Under mounting pressure for seeking large cuts in transport service, the MBTA has released a subsequent proposal with a range of alternatives to make up the budget shortfall. We applaud ...

Coping with tragedy, one year later

Published February 17, 2012 in Front Page, News by Jon Ostrowsky
One year after a student suicide rattled the Brandeis community, Feb. 15 holds a new meaning for Manny Zahonet ’14. On his birthday last year, Zahonet returned to his first-year residence ...

Clayborne Carson accepts Gittler Prize

Published February 17, 2012 in Featured, Front Page, News by Rachel Hirschhaut
Professor Clayborne Carson of the African-American Studies Department at Stanford University came to Brandeis on Tuesday to receive the Joseph B. and Toby Gittler Prize. The award, named in honor ...

Housing policy puts Brandeis in small group

Published February 17, 2012 in News by Aly Schuman
Gender-neutral housing is a recent addition to Brandeis but one that makes it rather unique among colleges, allowing for any students, regardless of gender, to share a dorm room on ...

Brandeis ranked among best-value colleges

Published February 17, 2012 in News by Connor Novy
Princeton Review has once again listed Brandeis as one of the “Best Value” colleges in America. The average student, the survey claimed, graduated Brandeis with $21,000 in debt. Nearly 70 ...

Students weary about fallout from transit cuts

Published February 17, 2012 in News by Zachary Romano
In preparation for a March 1 Waltham hearing on MBTA cuts, Student Union President Herbie Rosen ’12 and Vice President Gloria Park ’13 organized a Town Hall Forum on Monday ...

Brandeis graduate convicted in terror plot, appeals case

Published February 17, 2012 in News by Connor Novy
Lawyers for Brandeis graduate Aafia Siddiqui PhD ’01 have appealed her conviction, saying that the testimony the 39-year-old woman gave during her trial was involuntary because she was not mentally ...

Midyear senator elected, Charles River still vacant

Published February 17, 2012 in News by Connor Novy
Derek Komar became the first midyear senator after the election Monday night with 37 percent of the vote. He is intent on effecting change in both the student body’s perception ...

Gates Foundation gives $500,000

Published February 17, 2012 in News by Morgan Gross
Donald Shepard, a professor at the Schneider Institutes for Health Policy at the Heller School, has been awarded a grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to pursue research ...

AMST’s Whitfield on ‘Jews, Racial Justice, and Democracy’

Published February 17, 2012 in News by Rachel Hirschhaut
Professor Stephen Whitfield (AMST) gave a lecture Sunday titled “Jews, Racial Justice, and Democracy,” speaking at Temple Shalom in Medford, Mass. The event, open to the public, emphasized the “role ...

Two students found tech start-up, showcase newly-made app

Published February 17, 2012 in News by Connor Novy
Brandeisians are the type of people who color-code their closets and keep files in extremely complex subfolder systems. It’s little wonder then that two of them have invented a mobile ...

Oh Megan puts the ‘Oh’ in orgasm

Published February 17, 2012 in Arts, Etc. by Dana Trismen
For the second time this year, the Brandeis Vagina Club brought back “Oh Megan!” to impart her knowledge about the female orgasm. Held in Lown Auditorium, the workshop quickly became ...

Romantic movies, please; hold the schmaltz!

Published February 17, 2012 in Arts, Etc. by Yael Katzwer
Just because Valentine’s Day has come and gone—as it is wont to do—does not mean that the romance needs to end. But let’s save the fancy dinners and expensive jewelry ...

‘Soul Calibur V’: Have the swords rusted?

Published February 17, 2012 in Arts, Etc. by Gordy Stillman
“Soul Calibur V” is the latest game in Namco Bandai’s “Soul” series, which tells the tale of two semi-sentient legendary swords. There’s the cursed sword, Soul Edge, and the blessed ...

Men’s basketball drops a pair falls to fourth in the UAA

Published February 17, 2012 in Sports by Brian Tabakin
The Brandeis men’s basketball team suffered a major setback this weekend in their quest for a berth into the NCAA Division III tournament. This past Friday the ...

Women’s basketball’s cold shooting forces loses skid to four

Published February 17, 2012 in Sports by Brian Tabakin
The Brandeis women’s basketball team has further fallen down the UAA standings after dropping both games this past weekend, a 53-48 loss to Emory and a 53-37 ...

Fencing impresses at Duke Invitational and the Beanpot

Published February 17, 2012 in Sports by Brian Tabakin
This past Saturday the men’s fencing team went 2-3 at the Duke Invitational, finishing in a tie for third place. The Judges defeated Johns Hopkins for the second week in ...

Women’s fencing continues to struggle in competition

Published February 17, 2012 in Sports by Brian Tabakin
This past weekend at the Duke Invitational the Brandeis women’s fencing team struggled, going 1-4 with three of their four losses against nationally ranked teams. The Judges’ only victory was ...

Cold shooting dooms Judges as their losing skid grows to four

Published February 17, 2012 in Sports by Brian Tabakin
The Brandeis women’s basketball team has further fallen down the UAA standings after dropping both games this past weekend, a 53-48 loss to Emory and a 53-37 loss to 11th-ranked ...

Brown and Warwick lead men and women’s track and field

Published February 17, 2012 in Sports by Justin Burack
Brandeis track and field athletes turned in exceptional showings at the 2012 Boston University Valentine’s Day Invitational during the past weekend. Distance runner Kate Warwick ’12 placed 10th in the 5,000-meter ...

Midyear mess: Housing headaches

Published February 17, 2012 in Impressions by Zoe Kronovet
You may be surprised to hear that I am not unhappy being a midyear. I know that it has been discussed many times, but as a receiver of the midyear ...

No need to mind your own business, intelligence is intelligence

Published February 17, 2012 in Impressions by Abby Vigderman
A recent conversation with a friend got me thinking about intelligence. We were discussing neuroscience when she told me that she’s not very good at it. This confused me. I know ...

Still Writing: How a game of “Chicken” could teach us about compromise

Published February 17, 2012 in Impressions by Gordy Stillman
Chicken is a game between two parties in which both take positions and attempt to make the other yield, with the worst possible situation being neither party yielding. A simple ...

‘The Vow’ offers typical romantic heartbreak

Published February 17, 2012 in Arts, Etc. by Betty Revah
With Valentine’s Day around the corner, a movie like “The Vow”—with its tragic, life-changing, world-shaking romance—was more than expected. The movie, directed by Michael Sucsy, is doomed to predictability from ...

Engrossing: Internet blurs the boundary between fact and falsehood

Published February 17, 2012 in Impressions by Morgan Gross
As an editor of The Hoot, I have an obvious interest in the way news is produced and consumed in our country. Many people have predicted the downfall of the newspaper ...

What You Get For a B.A.

Published February 17, 2012 in Impressions by Adam Cohen
Conventional wisdom tells us that we’ll forget 90 percent of everything we learn in college. When we say this as a joke, laugh and complain about how unfortunate it is ...

Call Me, Tweet Me: Let’s talk about domestic violence, baby

Published February 17, 2012 in Impressions by Leah Finkelman
Remember when Chris Brown hit his then-girlfriend, Rihanna? I do. It was the eve of the 2009 Grammys, and Brown and Rihanna were both scheduled to perform the next day. According ...

Sound Off: Discussing mental health at Brandeis

Published February 17, 2012 in (Audio/Video), Featured by Tali Singer
Listen here: Sound Off: Discussing mental health at Brandeis Almost exactly a year ago, the Brandeis community was sent into shock when Kat Sommers, a freshman, committed suicide. Her death not ...

Sexcapades: The ins and outs of sex in a galaxy far, far away

Published February 17, 2012 in Impressions, Top Stories by Yael Katzwer
SSIS does a great job of educating Brandeis students about sex, but there are just some things that SSIS has never bothered telling us. We had to learn these things ...

The Katzwer’s Out of the Bag: It is not such a bad thing to fight for gay marriage

Published February 17, 2012 in Impressions, Top Stories by Yael Katzwer
The past couple of weeks have seen amazing headway in the advance of legalizing gay marriage in the United States. Washington Gov. Christine Gregoire signed into law on Feb. 13 a ...

Who’s annoyed with ‘Ordinary’ Virginia Woolf?

Published February 17, 2012 in Arts, Etc. by Candice Bautista
To be fair, I have read about two pages of Virginia Woolf’s work, specifically two pages of “Mrs. Dalloway.” From those two pages, I gathered that party planning was a ...

Vagina love for ‘The Vagina Monologues’

Published February 17, 2012 in Arts, Etc. by Alex Patch
“The Vagina Monologues,” performed on-campus last weekend, was a beautiful show. “Monologues,” presented this year by 30 young women, is an annual tradition at Brandeis, as well as at many ...