Jono Gruber

Number of articles: 45
First article: September 27, 2013
Latest article: February 17, 2017

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Home for how long? Bowdoin students feel impact of immigration policies

On Saturday, January 29, Bowdoin students joined 4,000 Mainers at Portland International Jetport (PWM) to protest President Donald Trump’s immigration ban. While no one was being held at PWM, the protest was carried out to stand in solidarity with people trapped both at U.S. airports and around the world as a result of Trump’s executive order.
While many individuals who attend political protests may not feel immediate fear, some Bowdoin students do. We spoke to four students who have been directly impacted by our president’s actions: Mohamed Nur ’19, Giselle Hernandez ’19, Anu Asaolu ’19 and Hayat Fulli ’19.
Nur is the son of Somali immigrants. His parents fled the Somali civil war in the 90s and arrived in Portland in 1993. While there are now thousands of Somali people living in Portland, Nur’s parents were some of the first to come to Maine.
“We’ve been trying to get my mom’s side of the family, our grandfather, some of our uncles, to come to the US for years, and now that’s no longer going to be an option anymore [now that Somalia is on the list of banned countries],” said Nur.
Many of Nur’s friends from home in Portland have had similar experiences.
“[The order] was absolutely insane, because there are so many people that I know in Portland who are from Somalia, who are from Iraq, Iran, Syria. All my friends are from those countries, and every time I call home or text friends from home, something new has happened,” said Nur.
“Whether parents are stuck in Iraq, or their sick grandma who’s been trying to come to the U.S. for decades can’t come here anymore and now she has to stay wherever she is and continue to be sick, it’s just really devastating and difficult to hear.”
Asaolu immigrated to Minnesota from Nigeria in 2001 and while Nigeria is not one of the seven countries on the ban, she is nervous about the possible expansion of the order.
“Nigeria is not on the list, [but] Somalia and Libya, other African countries, are on the list and Muslim territories and if you don’t know, the northern part of Nigeria is Muslim, [and includes] Boko Haram terrorists,” said Asaolu.
While she would like to take some sort of action, Asaolu has also felt the need to monitor herself.
“I shared [a petition] on Facebook, then that night my mom called me she said, ‘Why are you doing this—you don’t want to draw more attention to yourself than you need to,’” Asaolu continued. “There’s a lot of fear because I want to be active, but at the same time she is right. I can’t put myself in the open.”
Hernandez is more personally concerned about Trump’s Mexican immigration policy and his proposed wall. Her mother immigrated illegally from Mexico and she knows people will not stop attempting to enter the country.
“A wall will just make it more dangerous for people trying to pass.” said Hernandez. “Hundreds of people, hundreds, have died in the past decade coming into the U.S. And [the wall] is just going to increase those numbers. It’s not going to keep people out, it’s just going to make it more dangerous for people to come.”
As Hernandez noted, coming to the United States legally is not a realistic possibility for some immigrants.
“People say, ‘You just have to do it right, you have to [immigrate] legally,’” Hernandez continued. “Sometimes, that’s not an option … If my mom had been waiting, it would have taken her 26 years, [like it did for my aunt] to become a legal resident.”
Instead, Hernandez’s mom crossed the border to the United States illegally in 1990. She became a legal resident 23 years later in 2013, not because her paperwork was finally processed but because her eldest daughter turned 21.
Like Nur, Fulli was born and raised in Portland. Her parents are from Ethiopia and, while she too worries about the extension of the immigration ban, its immediate and unexpected arrival has left her disoriented.
“I don’t know, I think it’s hard just because I feel like I haven’t even processed it. So sometimes especially with the conversations at Bowdoin I’m fearful it will be expected that I have all these answers and kind of have all these experiences that I’m just supposed to share when in reality I just don’t really know what it means for me,” said Fulli. “I have these certain emotions but I don’t really know what that looks like, and [what] actions [to take], or what that means.”
The escape Bowdoin offers Fulli can be relieving, but the lack of any casual conversation about the ban on campus has also been worrying.
“I think there’s this false security that I feel at Bowdoin that sometimes I lean on but at the same time makes me feel a little incomplete, because at home, 40 minutes away, it’s just a different environment.”
Hernandez has found strength in Bowdoin’s tightly-knit community.
“The people that I associate with, the people that I’m friends with, generally have all expressed the same thing: ‘No ban, no wall.’ That’s really reassuring,” she said.
Nur, though, has also noticed a difference in tone between how his Portland community has reacted compared to Bowdoin, and is frustrated by Bowdoin’s lack of daily dialogue on the subject.
“My high school that I went to, they’ve been protesting left and right … It’s really inspiring to see high schoolers getting out there, protesting, marching and knowing that they’ll stand up for their friends … I wish, at least here at Bowdoin … we were more vocal or just as vocal as them because if they can do it why aren’t we.”
Asaolu also believes the student body can do more.
“How much people are not talking about [the ban] really freaks me out. There are select target populations of people speaking about it … but there are so many people who claim to be liberals on campus who don’t view this as something to be discussed,” she said.
Nur agreed, noting, “I want more people to talk about it. Because there are definitely people on this campus who are being directly impacted by [Trump’s actions]. I want people to be able to attach a face to a name, to humanize this issue.”
Squash teams gear up for NESCAC tourney

Both the men’s and women’s squash teams are seeded seventh and will play Hamilton College in the opening rounds of their respective NESCAC tournaments tonight, both of which will be played at Amherst.
The men’s team enters the Championship with a 3-10 record after losing its last three matches. However, the team played fairly well in January—including an 8-1 win over Hamilton. After starting the season with five straight losses—four of which were 9-0 shutouts—the men’s team picked up its play and won three of its next four matches.
The midseason progress can in part be attributed to the team staying healthy.
“Improved roster health has been a huge factor for the team’s success,” said Head Coach Tomas Fortson. “Our goal [for the championship is] to compete well while applying some of the improvements each player is working on. Hopefully we’ll win all of our competitive matches.”
The women’s team fared slightly better the men’s this season, finishing 4-8 on the year. The team won three matches in a row, including one over its NESCAC tournament opponent Hamilton, before getting outplayed last weekend by Brown University and the University of Virginia—two teams with much larger programs.
Having an injury-free team is especially important for the women as there are only 11 athletes on the roster, compared to the men’s 13. Nine players must compete in a match.
The women’s team plays at 4:30 p.m. today while the men’s team will kick off its tournament run at 6:30 p.m.
Faculty affirms College's values after election

Statement issued to student body met with mixed opinions among professors

At Monday’s faculty meeting, faculty members voted 49-31 to release a statement to the student body in the wake of the presidential election that “reaffirm[s] that we stand together in support of each other as individuals and as a community.” The letter acknowledges the spectrum of political views on campus and asks students to “join with us in creating an environment on campus in which acts of hatred and violence of any kind are resolutely rejected.”
The statement was first drafted in mid-November by a small group of professors. It originally contained language more explicitly addressing students who are upset by the election’s results, but was modified after feedback from faculty. While some faculty felt the statement was unnecessary or counterproductive, others defended its importance.
“I have seen [from the] students involved that they do not feel safe. And not only students but staff members and faculty members are being affected by this singling out and targeting of particular groups in the country,” said Associate Professor of Romance Languages and Literatures Nadia Celis.
Celis helped pen the original draft and is a member of the joint student and faculty campus group Intersections: People, Planet and Power (IP3).
“The original letter, the one that was first circulated among faculty, had a statement basically in solidarity with those particular members of the community that were particularly attacked,” Celis said.
That original letter was given to the Committee on Governance and Faculty Affairs (GFA) which drafted its own version of the statement and then sent that statement out to all faculty for comment. After hearing comments, the committee revised the letter and brought it to the faculty meeting for a vote.
Eighty faculty members were present and voted at the meeting. According to the College’s common data set from last academic year, Bowdoin has 240 faculty members.
Although there was talk of circulating the original letter to all faculty members who could individually choose to sign the letter or not, the professors who drafted the original version and the GFA decided to hold a faculty vote.
“As a committee we were concerned about just having to sign their names and would there be pressure on one another and we didn’t want to put any of our colleagues in that kind of position,” said Bion R. Cram Professor of Economics and chair of the GFA Rachel Connelly.
“We decided to go with the route of having a vote at the faculty meeting and then if it passed with a majority then the statement reads as it does, passed by a majority of the faculty, or the majority of the people present at the faculty meeting and that way it has a sense that it’s coming from everybody, or at least from a big group of people.”
As the 49-31 vote suggests, not all faculty members favored the statement. Professor of Government Paul Franco thought the statement was divisive and not necessary. At Monday’s faculty meeting, he proposed an amendment to the letter which was passed and diluted some of its language. Franco still voted against the statement.
“My objections were basically that the statement had a certain political bias built into [that] seemed to almost assume everyone voted one way and was disappointed,” said Franco. “Another dimension of my disagreement is I find that these statements, which are designed to bring people together, often become a source of division.”
Franco also believed the original tone of the letter was too therapeutic.
“There [was] a lot of sympathy or sentiments to the effect that we support and empathize with our students—sentiments I certainty do not disagree with—but I thought it was kind of unnecessary to articulate them,” he said. “I think that’s kind of goes so much to the core of who we are that to kind of recite these things suggests we weren’t honoring these [sentiments] in the past.”
“In some ways that isn’t the relationship,” he added. “We’re here to think about it, reflect about it, dispassionately analyze it, but not necessarily to therapeutically council.”
Celis, who could not attend the meeting due to a personal conflict, wished she could have been at the meeting to share the expressions and stories she has heard from students and faculty. Despite the changes to the statement, she is still happy that it was circulated.
“The letter is not sufficient from my perspective but I think it’s something that we can give to our students, and it’s important that we do it,” Celis said. “I still think this is a time for action and that this sort of non-engagement and being a good person kind of personal politics is not going to enough.”
Celis and other members of IP3 are considering writing another letter next semester that more closely resembles this statement’s original draft.
Panel and photoshoot reveal everyday prejudices

A group of students of color held a panel at Quinby House to discuss their experiences with racially based confrontations at Bowdoin and beyond in a program entitled “Shit White People Say to POC”—people of color—on Tuesday.
The event was organized by the Asian Student Association (ASA) and the South Asian Student Association (SASA). The two groups also collaborated on a photo exhibit in David Saul Smith Union that went up on Tuesday night highlighting microaggressions against Asians and Asian Americans. Both the event and the exhibit were a part of No Hate November, a month of programming coordinated by Bowdoin Student Government (BSG) that aims to build a more inclusive campus community.
The program, moderated by ASA President Mitsuki Nishimoto ’17, asked seven panelists how they respond to leading questions about their identities—such as, “Where are you from?” and, “If you hate it here, why don’t you go back?”—and led discussion on how their social and academic experiences have been shaped by instances of stereotyping.
Raquel Santizo ’19 raised her qualms with the segregated party scene at Bowdoin. Alexis Espinal ’17 spoke about being both white and Honduran and being marginalized by both groups because of her identities. Olivia Bean ’17 told of being consistently mistaken for a different black student by a professor in a seminar.
Although planning for the event started months ago, and the election of Donald Trump and the subsequent racial attacks across the country have shocked many on campus, the event went on as planned.
“[The event] was [originally] intended to be a small thing like … ‘What Kind of Asian Are You?’ because Asian Americans, we experience different microaggressions,” said Arah Kang ’19, an organizer of the event. “And then we were like, ‘why don’t we expand this?’ Because a lot of POCs feel these microaggressions.”
“We had heavy discussion: do we push this back or go as planned? Especially right after the elections because a lot of things got shut down and things were being pushed back, and I was like ‘No, this is what we needed the most.’”
At the event, seats were scarce, and many students were left standing. Afterwards, students expressed gratitude that the conversation had taken place.
“I was very happy that a lot of non-POCs were here to listen to the talk,” said Bethany Berhanu ’20. “Because I was honestly expecting mostly people of color just listening to the things we were going to go through. So it was really nice that a lot of people came here to be informed about these things that we all go through.”
Xin Jiang ’20 thought the event was very accurate.
“I’m very grateful that they did this,” she said. “As a first year, the other event that they did that touched on race was during Orientation and I felt like that one was more meant as an educational program, while this event was more revealing the actual truths that people of color are going through every day.”
Although the panel discussion evolved to include the voices of different students of color, the photo exhibit is designed to highlight stereotyping of Asians and Asian Americans. Inspired by #thisis2016, a hashtag and story series that exposes aggressions against Asian Americans that are not often discussed, ASA attempted to take a more Bowdoin specific angle and include a more diverse set of Asian voices.
“We really wanted to do a photoshoot that kind of addressed stereotypes that Asians and Asian Americans might face and some microaggressions that we’ve experienced or heard from other people,” Nishimoto said.
“I can’t say that I know what the black students or the Latinx students were going through last year, even though we all are students of color, but we did feel that Asian Americans are often left out of conversations, not only at Bowdoin, but also in general in this country.”
ASA hopes to continue its programming by inviting Ben Chin to campus in December. Chin is a Bates graduate who was met with racist attack ads during his campaign for mayor of Lewiston.
“ASA has been pretty dormant over the last few years,” said Kang. “We haven’t had any bad incidents, so we thought this would be a good time to do something.”
“What I loved about ASA was that it created this really awesome community of students who identify as Asian or Asian American on campus,” said Nishimoto. “But something I felt was lacking was kind of like campus activism, if you will, or just kind of making ourselves more present on campus as a community.”
Editor's note, November 27, 4:45 p.m.: This article has been updated to clarify that the panel and photo exhibit were a part of No Hate Novemeber.
Volleyball seniors rule record books

The women’s volleyball team’s season ended on Saturday with a 3-1 loss to the No. 1 seed in the NESCAC tournament Tufts (10-0 NESCAC, 24-3 overall). The Polar Bears came out strong, winning the opening set 25-21, but the Jumbos, led by a strong service game, were able to pull away. Caroline Flaharty ’20 led the team with 11 kills in the match and Katie Doherty ’17 had a characteristically impressive defensive game with 26 digs.
This year’s team was never able to put together a sustained stretch of victories even though they dominated across the board, leading the league in kills, digs, assists and hitting percentage.
“It wasn’t our best win-loss record and in ways that was hard for us but I think we learned so much from every loss we had,” said captain Erika Sklaver ’17. “I’ve never seen a team improve every single week the way our team improved every week.”
Despite the early exit from postseason play, some Polar Bears received individual accolades for their standout play throughout the season. Captain Quincy Leech ’17 and Doherty were named to the First Team All-NESCAC and Flaharty was named NESCAC Rookie of the Year and earned a spot on the Second Team. Doherty also claimed her third NESCAC Defensive Player of the Year award, making her the first athlete in league history to earn the title three times.
Leech and Doherty are part of one of the most impressive senior classes in the program’s history. Comprised of Leech, Doherty, Sklaver and Clare Geyer ’17, the Class of 2017’s impact on Bowdoin volleyball has been apparent over the course of their four years here and will last in the record books for years to come.
Leech ranks second in all-time career assists and finishes her career only 9 away from the record of 3215 set in 2007. She also ranks fourth all-time for most assists in a single season after her impressive campaign last fall.
Sklaver ranks third in career blocks and holds the record for most blocks in a single season, which she earned her sophomore year.
Doherty became the first Bowdoin player to break 2000 career digs. Also, her single season dig totals in the last three seasons rank as the best three in program history and she ranks third for career service aces.
Geyer has been an integral member of the team’s front line, making her presence as a middle blocker known from her first year when she earned .9 blocks per set over the course of the season.
Although this season may be over, the team’s recent success has helped build up the program and Head Coach Erin Cady will have a new recruiting class coming in next season.
“I have no doubt that this program will be so successful in the future. We already have a lot of recruits that are really going to help the program,” said Sklaver.
Sklaver expects this class of graduating seniors to continue the legacy of aggressively supporting the team for years to come even though they won’t be suiting up.
“It’s a really cool tradition that has been started the last few years,” said Sklaver. “I mean [cheering may not be] as fun as playing, but the next best thing is cheering the way our alumni cheer—they look like they have a lot of fun.”
B.E.A.R.S. survey shows 11 percent of sexual assaults officially reported

On Wednesday, President Clayton Rose released the results of the Bowdoin Experiences and Attitudes about Relationships and Sex (B.E.A.R.S) survey in a campus-wide email. The survey asked Bowdoin students over the age of 18 about their “experiences with relationships, sexual misconduct, and sexual assault” and their opinions about how the College handles these situations.
The College did not release raw data from the survey, instead issuing a summary of the results. According to the summary, 78 percent of students agree that Bowdoin would support the person making a report, but 14 percent feel the College would not ensure a fair process for the person accused of sexual assault. Slightly over nine percent of respondents (14.5 percent of women and 3.2 percent of men) reported sexual assault “involving completed or attempted penetration of the vagina or anus or oral sex involving physical force or threats of physical force; or the inability to consent because of being passed out, asleep, or incapacitated due to alcohol or drugs.” Four percent of respondents believe that sexual assault or misconduct doesn’t occur at all at Bowdoin.
81 percent of enrolled students completed the survey. Although it is important to note that the survey is specific to Bowdoin, response rates of similar surveys—specifically the Association of American Universities Climate Survey on Sexual Assault and Sexual Misconduct—administered at other schools are consistently lower.
The survey highlighted that the majority of sexual assaults occur during student’s first two years at Bowdoin. 50 percent reported that the assault took place during their first year at Bowdoin and 87 percent reported that it happened during their first or second year.
The survey was created last year in a collaborative effort between the Office of Institutional Research, Analytics & Consulting, and Director of Gender Violence Prevention and Education Benje Douglas and others, along with student consultation from Ali Ragan ’16, Emma Patterson ’16, Marina Affo ’17, Amanda Spiller ’17 and Kendall Schutzer ’18.
The survey drew upon previous surveys offered at other schools that have sought to gauge the campus climate of sexual violence, but was made to be specific for Bowdoin.
“We pulled from the AAU [Association of American Universities] survey’s ideas, we pulled from the HEDS [Higher Education Data Sharing Consortium] survey’s ideas, which was a lot of smaller colleges, to come up with a very Bowdoin specific survey, but with concrete ideas that already had practice behind them,” said Spiller.
The B.E.A.R.S survey also showed students’ hesitation to seek formal or trained help. While 97 percent of students who reported an incident told a friend, only 21 percent told someone at the Counseling Center and 16 percent told a member of Safe Space. Douglas and Associate Director of Gender Violence Prevention and Education & Director of Accommodations Lisa Peterson stressed their desire to close this gap. They are instituting new programs and education initiatives while emphasizing existing ones to train students if they are sought after by a friend.
The report also highlighted a fairly consistent disconnect between students’ belief of how to handle a sexual experience and students’ actual experiences: 96 percent of respondents agree that it is important to get consent before all sexual activity, but 14 percent of respondents believe that it is extremely or very likely that they will experience sexual assault or sexual misconduct while at Bowdoin.
“In my world almost 100 percent of the students that I see are sexually assaulted so that is my world. So no matter what numbers we saw, [it] would’ve been difficult to surprise me,” said Douglas. “That said, I think the things that I see that hearten me the most. I think our students really get consent on paper. I’d love to see that actualized a little bit more directly, but people are at least saying the right things in such a large number that that leads me to believe that people really do believe that it’s the right thing to say.”
The report of the survey identified sexual assault education and awareness among first years and sophomores in particular as a focus of programming going forward.
The Office of Gender Violence Prevention and Education has paired with the Athletic Department this year to invite first year athletes to small group breakfasts to talk about issues of sexual assault and consent. Douglas hopes to expand this initiative to all first years over the course of the year.
“We want it to be a healthy four years and I think one of the ways we can do that is focusing really intently on the first and second year,” said Douglas.
Douglas also noted that the statistics regarding first years and sophomores will help his office gauge the efficacy of its initiatives.
“More first year and second year focus is going to give us a better sense of what we’ve actually changed with our programming versus what just happens with other outside characteristics,” he said.
“I’m continuing to hold smaller workshops that are ninety minutes for students that want to start to build their skills in supporting friends who might have experienced gender violence,” said Peterson.
“I think when we’re training people it is with the thought that they are a bridge to resources, so understanding that someone who is responding to someone who has disclosed experiencing violence … it’s not their role to be acting in a therapeutic capacity but its their role to know the best way to respond initially and to know the right resources to direct students to on campus.”
As of this year, members of Safe Space will meet with students on their assigned first-year floors for at least two hours each month to help connections with underclassmen.
While much of the new programming has already taken effect, B.E.A.R.S highlighted a need to focus efforts to promote healthy relationships. Eighty-one percent of respondents said they are or had been in a romantic or sexual relationship at Bowdoin and of that group, 32 percent said they had stayed in a relationship because it was too hard to end.
“I think where the survey will continue to be useful in helping us inform our programming,” said Peterson. “I think the survey called attention to relationship violence that is occurring on campus and that we don’t currently have a lot of programming around, and so that can help us to direct efforts and make sure we’re addressing that.”
Although the survey helped shape curriculum, Douglas does not imagine B.E.A.R.S being offered every year.
“I think we need to figure out the best practices for campuses of our size to get the best possible data. We don’t want to go from an 81 percent response rate to a 42 percent,” said Douglas. “I think part of the reason why that could happen is if we do this yearly I think people will start to miss some of the importance of it.”
BCA seeks to gauge student support with new petition for divestment

On Tuesday, Bowdoin Climate Action (BCA) renewed its divestment efforts and began collecting signatures on a petition that asks the College “to permanently divest its endowment from the top 200 publicly traded fossil fuel companies over the next five years” with the hopes of submitting it to Bowdoin Student Government (BSG) for a referendum.
If the petition, accessible through Blink, receives signatures from at least 20 percent of the student body (around 360 students), BCA can submit it to BSG. Then, after a three week period, the referendum would open to the campus for voting. If more than one third of the student body votes in the referendum and two-thirds of the voting population votes in favor, BSG will submit the referendum to the Board of Trustees on behalf of the student body. As of press time, the petition has 70 signatures.
According to BCA member Jonah Watt ’18, the group has long focused on divestment as the main method of climate activism on campus.“Divestment has always been our tactic, with climate justice being our larger goal,” said Watt.
This is not the first time that BCA has petitioned for divestment. In 2013 and 2014 BCA collected signatures from students, and instead of delivering the petition to BSG, BCA submitted the signatures to former President Barry Mills, which resulted in the group presenting a proposal for divestment to the Board of Trustees.
Due to the relatively informal nature of the previous petition, there was a discrepancy between the number of signatures that BCA claimed it had when it was submitted to Mills and the actual number of valid signatures. Research into the petition revealed that there were a number of duplicate signatures, lowering the stated count of 1,000 to Mills to 825 valid signatures.
“Last time we petitioned, we petitioned across semesters and we petitioned students that had graduated, we petitioned across five class years. This time it’s only for students who are enrolled this semester,” said Watt.
This new petition gives BCA a chance to gauge on-campus student support for divestment.
“I think the referendum is a way for us to re-engage and re-educate and then get a very clear sense of where the student body stands and so that way we can have a greater sense of how we can leverage that support and who we need to be reaching out to and what education we need to be doing going forward,” Watt said.
BCA has been planning the petition for a referendum since the end of the summer. Watt cited this year’s negative returns on Bowdoin’s endowment—mentioned by President Rose in a recent email to the college—and Senior Vice President for Investments Paula Volent’s attribution of these negative returns to falling oil prices as affirmations of the petition’s timeliness.
Watt indicated that in addition to divestment symbolizing the moral urgency of confronting climate change, BCA also feels that divestment is a financially responsible course of action, citing the “plummeting” value of oil.
BCA hopes that submitting the petition for a referendum through BSG will bring awareness of divestment to current first years and sophomores, who may not be as exposed to the issue as upperclassmen.
According to Watt, BCA hopes that both the petition and referendum will draw the consideration of the Board of Trustees, which has historically been dismissive of the possibility of divestment.
“I don’t really expect an answer from the Board because we’ve never gotten an answer from them. We’ve met with them, we’ve presented to them, we’ve delivered petitions to them, we’ve held a sit-in and we’ve never gotten an answer,” said Watt.
“I think that the referendum could be a way to finally elicit a response from the Board, and hopefully a response that listens to the student body.”
Watt also hopes that the Board to Trustees will be more transparent about how Bowdoin invests its endowment. As of 2013, 1.4 percent of the College’s endowment was invested in fossil fuels. Watt believes that the number is likely lower now.
“Part of what we’ve been demanding for four years is greater transparency, greater conversation both with our Board of Trustees and with our fund managers,” said Watt.
There is no clear timeline for the petition itself at this point, as it can be left open until 20 percent of the student body signs it and BCA can wait to submit it for referendum indefinitely.
Poet Denice Frohman opens up through spoken word

For Latinx Heritage Month and Beyond’s penultimate program, poet Denice Frohman performed her brand of witty and biting cultural narratives in spoken word Wednesday night at Jack Magee’s Pub & Grill.
The event began with four performances from members of Bowdoin’s Slam Poet Society before Frohman took the stage.
Frohman, a queer Latina woman who grew up in New York City, tackles issues of identity, race and privilege in her work.
Her first poem of the night, “Accents”, celebrates her Puerto Rican mother, who makes “play-doh out of concrete English.” Later, she spoke about two gay men she saw at a Puerto Rican Day festival who beautifully and unapologetically conquered the space around them on the dance floor.
Almost all of the poems she performed trace a personal narrative or dilemma. Even “The Hour Dylan Roof Sat in the Church”, a poem Frohman wrote as she dealt with grief in the wake of Roof’s shooting of nine African-Americans at an historically black church in Charleston, South Carolina, was in part inspired by a conversation with her hairdresser.
“You have to think about the spaces in which you operate with privilege and how you talk to people moving along the spectrum [of racist actions],” said Frohman. “How often am I who I say I am?”
For Frohman, it is this personal connection to her work that got her into performing.
“I hated writing when I was in high school,” said Frohman. “Generally speaking, I wasn’t exposed to a lot of writers of color, so when I got to college my freshman year, I was exposed to spoken word. That really exposed me to a lot of writers of color and this idea that you could sound like yourself and you didn’t have to change who you were.”
The performance drew a packed crowd to the pub, and inspired many of the audience members to begin or continue to write their own work
“It was really refreshing because she is familiar with putting her culture into her work,” said Esther Nunoo ’17, one of the night’s opening performers. “She has an accent, you hear her accent, she owns her accent and I love that. I think that’s dope, and she makes me want to work.”
“Things like this are fantastic,” said Maddie Lemal-Brown ’18, another slam poet performer. “It’s expressed in a way that you can’t do in any other place. I think it should be mandatory for every Bowdoin student to come and see amazing performers like Denice.”
The final event for Latinx Heritage Month and Beyond will take place Thursday, November 3, when Pulitzer Prize-winning author Junot Díaz speaks at Kresge auditorium.
Soccer seasons off to strong starts

The women’s and men’s soccer teams both won their season openers 3-0 against Babson College and the University of New England (UNE), respectively, on Wednesday. The two teams will start their NESCAC seasons with home games against Amherst—whose men’s team is ranked No. 1 and women’s team is ranked No. 19 nationally—on Saturday at noon.
While the two teams are coming off impressive 2015 campaigns, they are also facing similar obstacles replacing key seniors from last year’s teams. The women’s team, which made the NESCAC championship game and won its first round game in the NCAA tournament last year, lost three of its top four goal scorers as well as All-American goalie and captain Bridget McCarthy ’16. The men’s team, which has won back-to-back NESCAC championships the last two years, graduated its top three goal scorers in addition to defensive captain and NESCAC Player of the Year Nabil Odulate ’16.
With the losses in personnel, the two teams are looking to their upperclassmen players to avoid any transitional difficulties.
“The good news is we have a lot of players back that have also been through those fires and can build on and grow from those experiences,” said men’s Head Coach Scott Wiercinski.
“We’re pretty confident in the returners and their ability to take advantage of the opportunities they’ve been given [the past couple of seasons] and see what we’ve got out there,” said women’s Head Coach Brianne Weaver.
For the women’s team, however, a lot of its early season success will rely on contributions from new players. The team has 10 first years on the roster and four of them—Morgen Gallagher ’20, Sophia Lemmer ’20, Emma Beane ’20 and Lizzie Sands ’20—started in the opener against Babson.
“We tend to use our depth and if we have depth coming out of the first year class, that’s always helpful and bodes well for the future,” said Weaver. “If someone is ready to play as a first year we want to get them on the field.”
In the Babson College game, the team got off to a quick start when Nikki Wilson ’18 intercepted a Babson pass near midfield, dribbled the ball up the field and scored just inside the 18 yard box. Julia Patterson ’19 added a goal seven minutes later off an assist from Evan Fencik ’17. The goals combined with Rachel Stout’s ’18 dominance in goal led to the 3-0 shutout win.
The Polar Bears will have to change their strategy for the Amherst game. The Purple and White’s possession-oriented attack is a big change of pace from Babson’s attack, which utilizes speed as it looks to send the ball over the top to create quick scoring opportunities.
“Amherst is always a good challenge. It’s almost a little rough playing them in our first [NESCAC] game because you kind of just get thrown in,” said Taylor Haist ’17. “Their coach focuses a lot on their technical skills—they’re possession oriented.”
“I think for a long time there was a fear of Amherst in our program,” said Weaver. “But we’ve worked on making sure and understanding that we’re right there [with them]. We have matched up well against them the past few seasons when we’ve come out to play.”
The Amherst men’s squad poses a different set of challenges as they will attempt to overpower the Polar Bears. The team is known to play a hyperphysical attacking style that bullies opposing teams in the box. Despite their position as the defending NESCAC champions, the Polar Bears are underdogs this weekend as Amherst is ranked No. 1 in the NSCAA Coaches Preseason Poll.
Although Bowdoin lost last year’s regular season contest, the Polar Bears, who pride themselves on maintaining their defensive order, were able to outlast Amherst two years ago in the NESCAC championship game and hope to do the same this weekend.
“Our defense has carried us the last couple of seasons, so every year I think our ability to defend is what really carries us forward,” said Wiercinski. “[Amherst] requires a defense to be super organized and super disciplined and we certainly hope we’re going to be that when we play on Saturday.”
As for completing a NESCAC three-peat, captain Cedric Charlier ’17 is looking to last year’s mindset for inspiration.
“I think it’s similar to last year when we won the year before that. We don’t dwell on the past. This is a new season, it’s a new team and our goal is to win a NESCAC championship as this team.”
Approval ratings: Spring 2016 approval ratings survey results

This week the Orient sent out its biannual approval ratings survey, which asks students about their opinions on various institutions on campus. 518 students responded to this semester’s edition of the survey, and while many of the institutions received similar scores as they did last Spring and this Fall, a few results stood out. The percentage of students who strongly approve of Bowdoin dropped by 10 percentage points in the last five months, and the percentage of students who disapprove and strongly disapprove of Residential Life also increased fairly dramatically. A slightly smaller percentage of students approve or strongly approve of President Rose compared to approval of President Mills last spring, and while there was a 10 percent bump in students that strongly approve of the town of Brunswick compared to this fall, it is still 10 percentage points lower than last Spring’s ratings. Also, over two percent of respondents have no opinion on Bowdoin’s faculty.
Freeport teens arrested after campus harassments

On Tuesday night between 11:30 p.m. and midnight, four female students were allegedly assaulted by two teenage males on bicycles between Studzinski Recital Hall and Coles Tower.
Both of the two teenagers were apprehended and identified by the four students that night and have been charged with class D misdemeanors for unlawful sexual touching. One of the suspects was also in possession of hashish oil and charged with a drug crime. Since the two are juveniles, their names will not be publicly released.
Both suspects were issued criminal trespass orders, banning them from campus.The Office of Safety and Security quickly responded after receiving a call from a student who had her books knocked out of her hands by the two on the bicycles. Security received three other calls within minutes of the first one.
“We learned later on that there was some inappropriate touching involved [in the first incident],” said Director of Safety and Security Randy Nichols. “[The three] other calls were coming in [as we were responding to the first one] and reporting that people had come up to them on bicycles and smacked them on the buttocks, which is a form of assault of course, so we responded as security officers and immediately notified the Brunswick Police Department (BPD).”
The two males then ran away, and Security found one of them attempting to conceal himself behind a rock near Quinby House.
The other biker found his way to Brunswick Apartments where he convinced a group of Bowdoin students who had not yet been notified of the alleged assaults to drive him back to his family’s home in Freeport.
“They thought he was a poor lost teenager that needed help,” said Nichols. “It was only when the students were driving back to campus after having dropped the [teenager] off [that] they had read the security alert that had come out, and later on they notified security, [saying], ‘We think we might have helped the guy escape.’”
By this time, Security and BPD had already learned the identity of the alleged assaulter who had found his way to Freeport from the individual they had apprehended. Freeport Police then brought the male back to campus so that the four victims could identify him.
Nichols stressed the importance of a quick response from the students.
“The prompt reporting was critical but also the very effective response by Security and law enforcement was critical because these two could have easily gotten away,” he said. “The fact that we were able to quickly wrap this up I think kept the anxiety level on campus down to almost nothing as opposed to had they been unidentified [because] then students, rightfully, become a little more anxious.”
The two males have been released to their parents and are set to go to juvenile court on June 15. According to Nichols, they could receive up to one year of jail time.
Men’s tennis uses dynamic approach to deal Amherst worst loss in a decade

The undefeated men’s tennis team put on a show for the Polar Bears in attendance last weekend as it dismantled Hamilton (4-8 overall, 0-3 NESCAC) and powerhouse No. 14 Amherst (12-5 overall, 3-2 NESCAC) in its home openers. The team swept both matches 9-0, did not lose a set in either and is now ranked second nationally with three weeks left in the regular season. The Polar Bears will hope to continue their stellar play this weekend when they take on No. 23 Brandeis today at 3 p.m and No. 4 Middlebury on Sunday. Both of this weekend’s matches are away.
While the victory against a Hamilton team that has yet to win a set in NESCAC play this season was expected, the results against Amherst, who has won two national championships in the past five years, were more up in the air. Still, the win against the Continentals was paramount for the Polar Bears as it helped get them in the right mindset for the next day’s match.“I knew we were going to have a good result [against Amherst], or at least play our best, because of our match the day before against Hamilton,” said senior captain Chase Savage.
“Hamilton is the bottom of our conference. They’re by no means a team that should beat us, and I feel pretty confident saying that,” Savage continued. “But what guys did in that match was be really focused, really disciplined, take nothing for granted and just go out there and do their job. And that has been why we’ve been successful this year.”
In the contest against Amherst, the Polar Bears stayed disciplined early on in the match as Luke Tercek ’18 and senior captain Luke Trinka jumped out of the gate to an 8-2 win in first doubles. Kyle Wolfe ’18 and Jerry Jiang ’19 quickly followed suit with an 8-4 win of their own, as Savage and Gil Roddy ’18 wrapped up the doubles in a hard-fought 9-8 victory in third doubles. Things weren’t as dramatic in the singles matches with all 12 sets going Bowdoin’s way.
While the Polar Bears were impressed with themselves after the shutout win, they are most excited looking forward, as they believe their potential has yet to be reached.
“I don’t think anyone on our team expected it to be 9-0. We know how good we are, but we also know we’re playing a top-10 team,” said Savage.
“The scary thing about the group is that after some of these really great wins, there are specific things that we can all do to get better. So in many ways, it’s a group that still has a lot of room for improvement,” added Trinka.
This year’s team is also a fairly young one—captains Savage and Trinka are the only two upperclassmen on the team—which makes the win against Amherst, who only lost three seniors from last year’s Elite Eight team, even more impressive. Although they are still developing, the Polar Bears credit most of their success to the focus and preparation they are putting into their matches.
“Guys have been very intentional in their preparation in ways that differ from seasons past,” said Trinka. “People were really thinking out loud about their matchups for the coming weekend. [They are] very deliberate about strategizing within practices against teammates just to try to replicate what we would be up against on Sunday.”
Sunday’s match against Middlebury carries extra weight as Bowdoin hopes to avenge last season’s losses to the Panthers both in the NESCAC tournament and in the Sweet Sixteen of the NCAA tournament. The team has not beaten both Amherst and Middlebury in a single regular season in 15 years, and playing on the Panthers’ home court adds an extra obstacle to the matchup.
“To be honest, Middlebury is one of the toughest places to play, and it has as much to do with their fans on the side of the court as it does the players on the court,” said Savage. “They like to make it an intimate atmosphere—their fans like to get in your face a little bit, which is something unusual for a tennis match, and so they try to take you out of their game. In years past, we’ve had guys who’ve gotten taken out of their game, and I feel like with this year’s team, that’s not going to be the case.”
The team will hope to stay undefeated against the Judges and the Panthers.“I think [our court conduct] has slowly started to change to a team that’s got a little bit more of an edge to it than before,” Savage said. “We walk a very smart line with it...there’s a bit of a different competitive fire that we bring to some of these matches than we have in years prior.”
After inconsistent performance in Florida, softball prepares for key Tufts series

After spending Spring Break playing 16 games to open up its season in the Florida heat, the softball team now stands at 9-6-1 as it heads into NESCAC play. This weekend, the Polar Bears have three contests at three-time defending national champions Tufts (7-6).
The Polar Bears won their first two games of the season against Plymouth State and McDaniel College but then lost three of their next four over the next two days. Emily Griffin ’17, Samantha Roy ’19 and Julia Geaumont ’16 all pitched well during the four-game stint—the only game in which one of the pitchers gave up more than four runs was in an 11-5 blowout win against Western New England University—but the team was having trouble putting runs on the board.
Back-to-back wins against Salve Regina and Benedictine the next day helped the Polar Bears turn their play around for the remainder of the Florida trip. Against Benedictine, the team got off to a slow start, giving up five runs in the second inning, but their bats eventually came alive, scoring six runs in the bottom half of that inning. Jordan Gowdy ’18 knocked in Samantha Valdivia ’19 for an insurance run in the third, enough for Griffin to finish out the game on the mound for a 7-6 win.
According to Head Coach Ryan Sullivan, the team’s mediocre start was in part due to the delay the Maine winter imposed on the team’s season.
“We go down midweek, and other teams are already six or eight games into the season,” said Sullivan. “You’re kind of getting the kinks out, and they’ve already gotten those out, but we were able to rebound from that and play much better at the back of the trip.”
“[The Benedictine game] was a nice tipping point. It was about midway through the trip. It was kind of a place where we could say, ‘Yes, we are a good team. We can do this.’ Because we started off slowly, there’s a little bit of indecision there and unknown, but we were able to rally together and pull that one out,” he added.
The team finished out the trip 4-3-1 after the Benedictine game. Although its record may not be where the team would like it to be, improved play against tougher competition at the end of the trip has the Polar Bears feeling hopeful looking forward.
“It’s not the best we have done in Florida. Typically we get to at least 10 wins, but this is probably the hardest competition that we have had so far, at least in my four years,” said captain Katie Gately ’16.
As the Polar Bears head into NESCAC play, they will have to improve their defense, which at times let down the impressive pitching performances from Griffin and Geaumont. Fourteen of the 25 runs Griffin gave up in Florida were unearned.
“As you get into conference play, it’s a whole different animal in and of itself too, and you know the other pitchers, and they know you,” said Sullivan. “For us, it’s just keeping ourselves emotionally stable and consistent in our play and making sure that we’re really focused on us and not the other teams that we play.”
This weekend’s games against Tufts will likely be especially tough. Although the Jumbos no longer have Allyson Fournier ’15, a four-time All-American pitcher who graduated last spring, they are still the defending national champions and the team to beat.
Still, Sullivan is confident that the team can compete with anyone.
“I really like where we are leaving Florida. I think we’re in a position where we can confidently go play anybody and feel pretty good about our chances to win that game,” he said.
Stereotyping at ‘tequila’ party causes backlash

For the third time in just over a year, an incident of ethnic stereotyping by Bowdoin students at a party has ignited campus-wide tensions, frustrations and pain, and prompted an institutional investigation in response.
In the latest incident—a “tequila”-themed birthday party in Stowe Hall last Saturday night—some students wore sombreros, according to a student who attended.
A screenshot taken from the email invitation showed the event being referred to as a “tequila” party and read, “we’re not saying it’s a fiesta, but we’re also not not saying that :) (we’re not saying that).”
Several Mexican and Mexican-American students expressed exhaustion and frustration at the public comment time at Wednesday night’s Bowdoin Student Government (BSG) meeting. “As a senior who has seen multiple racist incidents at this college, I’m at the point now where I’m really, really tired,” said BSG Vice President for Student Government Affairs Michelle Kruk ’16.
“What happened last weekend completely distorted what I stand for, what I embody and what I fight for. That was wrong, especially in light of what happened last semester,” said Bill De La Rosa ’16.
Last semester, the sailing team’s “gangster” party, where students wore costumes of stereotypical African-American apparel and accessories, prompted a wave of conversation and protest about issues of race on campus. In fall 2014, the lacrosse team’s “Cracksgiving” party, where students wore Native American costumes, resulted in the discipline of several individual students.
On Wednesday night, BSG followed a precedent set after the “gangster” party last fall by urging the student body to attend its public comment time during its weekly meeting to discuss the incident and passed a statement of solidarity offering support for those affected.
The statement passed by the BSG, in addition to condemning the incident, offered several recommendations, including that the administration address bias incidents and the hurt caused by them more quickly and that the College develop a standardized process for punishing students involved in these incidents.
Two major additional recommendations were added to the draft after public comment time. The first encouraged the College to acknowledge the time pressures on students of color tasked with responding to such incidents. The second recommendation, inspired by a new course on Black Lives Matter at Fairfield University, recommended that the Office of Academic Affairs play a role in punitive measures for offending students by mandating academic work in certain subject areas.
At the public comment time, De La Rosa voiced frustration that a BSG member allegedly attended the party.
“That is disgraceful. That is shameful. Especially because you’re elected by the student body, not to represent a certain group, but the student body,” said De La Rosa. “I encourage the BSG to do something about this—to put a bylaw starting whenever, next year, that you are all elected to represent the student body, and that there should be some sanctions, some consequences, for those that partake in behavior like this.”
“We have asked over and over and over, and the thing we’re asking for is just basic respect,” said Catalina Gallagher ’16.
“I have spent at least five hours talking about this. That’s so much of my time,” said Raquel Santizo ’19, who is on the board of the Latin American Student Organization (LASO). “I’m a first year, I should be doing first-year things."
BSG concluded the meeting by setting up an ad-hoc committee to draft an amendment to either the BSG’s bylaws or its constitution to address situations when members of the assembly break the social code.
Of the students who spoke at the meeting, none defended the party’s theme or said that they had attended.
Several members of LASO discussed meetings that they had held with administrators. A student who attended the party confirmed to the Orient that many of those present at the party had been involved in meetings with the Office of Student Affairs as well.
The administration has not yet announced how or if it will respond to the incident.
An email to campus from Dean of Student Affairs Tim Foster on Monday night announced that his office was “in the process of investigating what we have learned from students and from posts on social media.” Foster asked students with information about the event to contact him or Leana Amaez, associate dean of students for diversity and inclusion.
In an email to campus Wednesday night, President Clayton Rose did not refer to the specifics of last weekend’s incident, but wrote broadly that further work needs to be done to make students of color welcome on campus and condemned insensitive posts on the anonymous social media platform Yik Yak.
Foster declined to comment on the incident to the Orient, pending the results of the investigation. Amaez did not respond to requests for comment.
Administrators have largely moved away from the language of “cultural appropriation,” which was used in official emails after the Cracksgiving incident and has still been a common topic of debate on Yik Yak. Foster’s email referred to “ethnic stereotyping,” while Rose’s referenced an “act of bias.”
Editor's note (2/26/16 at 11:30 a.m.): It was originally reported in this story's second paragraph that students wore "stereotypical Mexican garb including sombreros." That paragraph has been updated to clarify that sombreros were the only stereotypical attire reported by the student who attended the party.
Men’s track claims Maine State Meet

This past Saturday, the Bowdoin men’s track and field team won the Indoor Maine State Meet for the first time since 2012. The Polar Bears tallied 175 points to top University of Southern Maine (USM) (148), Bates (147), Colby (81) and St. Joseph’s (1). The week before, the team rolled over Colby and New England College (NEC) in their final indoor invitational of the season.
The team’s success has been largely the result of smart training techniques and strong leadership.
“This is the time of year when we put a high premium on simulating competition in our training,” Head Coach Peter Slovenski said.
The emphasis on simulating competition is in stark contrast to the team’s training regimen earlier in the season.
According to Slovenski, “cross-training, slower training with greater volume, and other activities such as swimming” dominate the early-season training. This not only builds endurance, but also helps the athletes stay healthy. Staying healthy is often a real challenge for distance runners, many of whom are in season year-round.
“We emphasize cross-training a lot to keep the three season runners mentally and physically fresh,” Slovenski said.
The pre-season extended workouts have so far payed extreme dividends for the team. The Polar Bears have won three of the four meets they have competed in this winter season. The one week it did not come out on top, the team finished second in a field of eight to powerhouse Massachussettes Institute of Technology. Last year, the Polar Bears did not win a second meet until the second week of April.
Among the individual standouts for Bowdoin were Matt Jacobson ’17 and Brian Greenberg ’18. Jacobson, who won the 3000m run by more than two seconds, was named the Track Performer of the Meet, and Greenberg, who won the Long Jump and the Triple Jump, was honored with the Field Performer of the Meet award.
Although most of the events are competed in individually, the camaraderie and depth of this year’s team helped it defeat three-time defending champions of the Maine State Meet, Bates.
“When everyone is getting excited and pumping me up and cheering me on and I feel like the whole team is coming together and supporting each other and it’s been really exciting,” said Jacobson.”
“The state meet rewards teams that have a lot of depth. We have a lot of depth and maybe as many as 30 athletes will score in the state meet,” said Slovenski.
The Polar Bears will compete in the Dave Hemery Invitational tomorrow before starting their postseason play the following weekend at the New England Division III’s. While a great team performance catipulted the team last weekend, it will have to rely more on its individual talent if it hopes to continue its recent winning tradition in the weeks to come.
“The New Englands rewards teams that have more of the all-star caliber athletes so the people that are getting first or second in the state meet, they have to step up and be ready to place at the New England Division III meet. That’s what it takes,” said Slovenski.
Taking off the shades: Taylor finds confidence filming ‘Tangerine’

Student Activities welcomed Mya Taylor, the star of last year’s low-budget Sundance Film Festival hit “Tangerine,” to campus yesterday to present the film and discuss her life and struggles as a transgender woman.
The film opens at Donut Time, where Sin-Dee (Kitana Kiki Rodriguez) spends one of her two remaining dollars on a doughnut to split with Alexandra (Taylor). After Alexandra lets it slip that Sin-Dee’s boyfriend Chester, who doubles as a pimp, cheated on Sin-Dee with one of his prostitutes during her 28-day stint in jail, the two transgender women scour the streets of West Hollywood looking to take revenge of Chester and the “fish” (a slang term for a cisgender woman) he slept with.
The two go on to break up a motel room brothel, bargain with a police officer to force a client to pay up and promote a show Alexandra is performing in, all on Christmas Eve.
Taylor, a trans woman of color who moved to Los Angeles after her grandparents kicked her out of their house at 18 for being transgender, was herself not unfamiliar with LA’s unofficial red light district. The film, and Taylor’s acting success, likely would not have come to be if Sean Baker, the writer and director of “Tangerine,” had not come across Taylor.
“I was at Santa Monica in Macaron talking with some friends—at that time they were friends—and Sean says that he saw me 30 feet across the room and he just said I have that star quality,” said Taylor. “He came and he talked with me and said ‘I don’t know anything about this area but it looks interesting, there’s a lot of stuff that goes on, I’d like to turn it into a movie.’”
Before she met Baker, though, Taylor was anything but close to a big break. She had applied for 186 jobs in one month and interviewed for 26 positions. Without the cash to change her name and gender on her ID, Taylor could not escape discrimination.
“There was a job on Craigslist, it was a telemarketing job. The man [hiring] liked me and he said he wanted to have the company call me to test my voice over the phone because it was telemarketing,” said Taylor. “He took my information down, which is what revealed my ID at that time, which did not say Mya Taylor—it said my other name and it showed that I was transgender.”
The man said he would get back to Taylor the following day, but no call came. After three days on edge, Taylor decided to call out her potential employer. She called the company back but was told that, unfortunately, it was having a hiring freeze. So she applied under a fake name.“I sent them a message saying oh, this is Jessica Miller, I’m so interested in this job and everything and here are my skills,” said Taylor.
“The lady said well, come in tomorrow at 10:20 a.m. for an interview. I was there at 10:20 and I walked in as Mya Taylor. [I told the receptionist] that they told me they weren’t hiring anymore...She was like, well, that’s a lie.”
Tangerine was shot on an iPhone 5s, and the hyper-realness of the footage makes the characters’ ever-present struggle just to get by eerily authentic. But the daylong extravaganza of absurdities still feels comedic because of the light Taylor and Rodriguez bring to their situations.
“I wanted it to have comedy [because] the story is so depressing. Whenever I was down, low in my life, I would bring it back up with comedy,” said Taylor. “When you’re down that low, you’re prostituting, you’re selling your body to try to make money, to try to live to get by, it’s not fun, but you gotta make fun of it.”
Despite “Tangerine” being her first real role—she is credited as an unnamed zombie in one episode of “Hollywood Wasteland”—Taylor played the role with a confidence that both animated Alexandra’s comfort in her West Hollywood neighborhood and also helped Taylor through her own transition.
“I had started taking hormones two months before [shooting the movie]. In real life, I was always in shades, big shades, like Hollywood shades because I was insecure about what I looked like,” said Taylor.
“I would wear shades because shades cover up a lot of your face, but it also keeps you in your own zone, it keeps everyone away. That’s how I felt in shades. Doing the movie I came out of the shades and I said look, this is something I have to do, this is something I’m doing for my career, you never know how this movie could turn out. I don’t know, somewhere I build up all the confidence.”
Now, Taylor is in a much better place. She is starring in two upcoming short films, is working on a television show and has fallen in love and moved with her fiancé to North Dakota.But she’ll be the first to say her fame hasn’t changed her.
“Sometimes I want to go to Taco Bell and [my friends] want to eat out at these really expensive restaurants where the food is nasty as shit and I’m like, ‘Bitch, I’m not used to eating that...that meat is pink on the inside, I don’t eat that, bitch.’ They sit there and they eat that really expensive food and I go right to Taco Bell and still have my coins in my purse.”
Men’s hockey heating up before crucial stretch

Thanks to game-winning goals in back-to-back games from Cody Todesco ’19 last weekend, the men’s hockey team (8-7-3 overall, 4-5-3 NESCAC) now stands at sixth in the NESCAC. After another win against the University of Southern Maine on Tuesday, the team is on a four-game win streak heading into a final stretch of six conference games to end the season.
Some of the team’s recent success can be attributed to a formation change Head Coach Terry Meagher implemented the weekend before the win-streak began. Typically filling the ice with three forwards and two defensemen, Meagher has brought a forward back to defense. The “three-back” lineup has freed up the Polar Bear wings and allows for more fluid play between the forwards and defensemen.
While Meagher has implemented the nontraditional formation in previous years, he brought out this year’s version to confuse the opposition, somewhat compensating for the team’s lack of experience.
“It has turned into a pretty traditional league as far as playing structure is concerned, so that makes it easier for teams to defend when you’re doing the same thing. [After that], it comes down purely to those that can make hockey plays,” said Meagher.
“If you look at us, a young team, and where we are on the learning curve, that process was going slower than I anticipated,” added Meagher. “[The new formation] makes it challenging for our opposition and gets them out of their comfort zone.”
“This could be, by age and by class, the youngest team I’ve had here in an era where it’s an older league [because most hockey players take gap years],” Meagher emphasized.
Aside from simply giving the opponent something new to defend, the three-back formation has helped jump start the Polar Bears offense by allowing for more movement between positions, thus loosening the team up.
“You have more responsibilities, but you have more freedom [as well],” said Todesco. “More guys can jump up in the play. Defense can play offense. It doesn’t really matter.”
Prior to last weekend’s games, the Polar Bears had gone four contests without a win. However, once comfortable with the new formation, the team kicked off its win streak by avenging losses to the University of New England (UNE) and Williams, as well as an early season tie to Middlebury. Todesco’s game-winning goals clinched the latter two.
“Getting that win against UNE was big for our confidence,” said Matt Sullivan ’17. “We lost 8-3 to them earlier in the year, and we knew that wasn’t the type of team that we were. We knew we had a lot of better players in our room, and we expected a lot more out of ourselves.”
Three days after the UNE win, the Polar Bears welcomed Williams, who currently sits at second place in the NESCAC. Goalie Peter Cronin ’18 earned his third clean sheet of the season in a 1-0 upset win. The next day against Middlebury, Cronin put up another gem, allowing just one goal in the 2-1 win.
Cronin played in 11 games last season, but with the departure of goalkeeper Max Fenkell ’15, he has begun to come into his own as starting goalkeeper. Recently, he has played especially well, allowing no more than one goal in the team’s last three contests.
“I think he is the backbone of the team. He’s given our team a lot of confidence lately,” said Todesco.
With just six conference games left before the end of the regular season and the Polar Bears currently sitting at sixth in the NESCAC, the team will need to finish strong to solidify a spot in the postseason.
In the final season of Meagher’s 33-year tenure, the Polar Bears will need to continue to get great play—both on and off the ice—from senior captain Matt Rubinoff to reach their goals. His performance will be a key factor in not only locking down a playoff spot but possibly rising to the fourth seed in the NESCAC and earning a home playoff game.
“We’re getting timely saves. We’re getting strong, good, game leadership from [Rubinoff], who’s basically said, ‘I’m the leader. I’m the captain. Get on my back.’ That’s inspiring to a team,” said Meagher. “All we need are more timely goals.”
Van Zant records his second shutout of season for baseball

The baseball team (9-14 overall, 2-3 NESCAC East) needs a strong showing in its three-game series this weekend against the Trinity Bantams (10-11 overall, 2-4 NESCAC East) to climb up in the NESCAC East standings after a physically taxing week of out-of-conference games.
The team opened last weekend with a Saturday doubleheader at Wesleyan (15-5 overall, 3-0 NESCAC West). In the first game of the day, captain Henry Van Zant ’15 continued his impressive season, winning a pitchers duel against the Cardinals’ Gavin Pittore 1-0. The shutout earned him the NESCAC Pitcher of the Week award, improved his record to 4-1 and lowered his ERA to a team-leading 1.32.
Pittore was pitching a no-hitter going into the seventh and final inning until captain Aaron Rosen ’15 hit a leadoff single. Three batters later, Peter Cimini ’16 knocked Rosen in on a single to center field for what turned out to be the game-winning run.
While Van Zant has been one of the few bright spots for the pitching staff, Harry Ridge ’16 pitched well in the second leg of the double header, striking out four in five innings of work. Neither the impressive pitching nor the Polar Bears’ seventh-inning rally, which produced one run and forced a pitching change, were enough to tie Wesleyan’s three runs.
After just one day off, the team headed to St. Joesph’s College in Standish for what turned out to be a four-hour marathon of a game that the Polar Bears eventually lost 13-12.
St Joseph’s started the game with a five-run first inning, but the Polar Bears bounced back quickly with a six-run rally in the fourth fueled by doubles by Chad Martin ’16 and Buddy Shea ’15, for a 9-7 lead.
The lead was short lived though, as the Monks scored six runs over the next two innings. St. Josephs took a three-run lead into the eighth inning when, with two outs, Cimini knocked in Nicholas Sadler ’18 and Sean Mullaney ’17. After a pitching change, captain Erik Jacobsen ’15 grounded out to end the rally.
Bowdoin split the next day’s doubleheader at Husson University. The first leg of the seven-inning game was scoreless through eight and a half innings, when Bowdoin walked three straight batters in the bottom of the ninth before Brandon Grendreau hit a walk-off single for Husson.
Bowdoin’s batters came alive in Tuesday’s second game, scoring three runs in the first two innings, four in the fourth and one more in the sixth to take the 11-5 win.
Bowdoin welcomes Trinity at 3:30 p.m. today at its home-opener for the first game of the weekend series. The Polar Bears hope to take advantage of the NESCAC East last place Bantams to improve in the standings.
Erin Cady announced as next volleyball coach

Yesterday, Bowdoin named Erin Cady as the school’s next women’s volleyball coach. The position was left vacant after Karen Corey stepped down immediately following the end of the team’s 2014 season.
For the past four seasons, Cady served as the head coach of the College of Holy Cross volleyball team. Before her time at Holy Cross, she played D-I volleyball at the University of New Hampshire and then professionally for the SWE-Volley team in Erfurt, Germany.
Cady will be the Polar Bears’ fourth coach in the 29 years of the volleyball program. After having only four winning seasons in its first 20 years, the team thrived under Corey’s leadership.
In her nine seasons as Head Coach, the team never had a sub-.500 record, and from 2007-2012 the team boasted a home win streak of 40 matches. She led the Polar Bears to a NESCAC championship in 2011 and three appearances in the D-III NCAA tournament—including two trips to the regional finals.
Cady inherited a Holy Cross team that had eight total Patriot League wins in the four years before her arrival. In her first year as coach of the Crusaders, she tied the program’s single-season conference win total with six, but only earned three, seven and seven total wins in her last three years at the helm, respectively.
Despite Cady’s relative lack of success, the team and school are encouraged by the hire. “[Holy Cross’ record] was definitely something that we thought about,” said captain and one of the members of the search committee, Hailey Wahl ’16. “But there are a lot of factors that go into having a winning season and often times it doesn’t necessarily speak to your qualities as a coach. Holy Cross is a lot more focused on other sports and does not pay as much attention to volleyball as they may to say hockey.”
“We are excited to welcome Erin to the Bowdoin community as the leader of our volleyball program,” said Ashmead White Director of Athletics Tim Ryan in yesterday’s official press release. “It is evident that she cares deeply for the student-athlete experience and her track record of developing athletes on the court, supporting them in their academic endeavors and leading them in the community make her the ideal person to lead our volleyball program.”
While her record as a head coach may not have been her strongest attribute as a candidate, Cady’s passion for the sport and her commitment to her team’s players helped separate her from her competing applicants.
“We clicked very easily with her,” said Wahl. “She was very willing to be honest with us about her techniques and theories as a coach and it fit a lot with some of the qualities we wanted—open mindedness and a lot of emphasis on playing, as opposed to talking about things, [which is] different in a way [from Corey].”
Although the coach may be changing, the rest of the program should be in familiar hands. Next year’s team expects to return all 12 members of this year’s squad that made it to the NCAA regional finals—three wins away from the national championship game.
“We’re excited for her to work with and analyze the skills we already have and help support us in a lot of the things we are already successful with,” said Wahl.
“Any change is really helpful because we are all working with the same basic skills and a new energy would be helpful.”
“Hopefully the respect that I’ve gained last year [as captain] will be helpful if there are certain challenges we face,” she added.
Snapshot: What a difference a day makes in Smith Union

On Monday afternoon, Smith Union was packed with students, faculty, staff and community members to welcome President-elect Clayton Rose to campus. Today, Smith Union was quiet as much of campus was closed and some classes were cancelled because of winter storm "Juno."
Photos by Hy Khong (Jan. 26) and Jono Gruber (Jan. 27)
Women’s hockey dominates early in the season

The women’s ice hockey team is off to its best start since 2002, staying undefeated at 3-0-2 after beating Nichols College on Wednesday.
In their season opener, the Polar Bears handily defeated Colby (2-4-0) in Waterville, winning 6-1. First-year Miranda Bell stepped up for the team that had two of its top six scorers from last season graduate, scoring a hat trick in her first game as a Polar Bear.
Bell scored once, unassisted, in each of the first two periods, giving the Polar Bears a 2-0 lead going into the final 20 minutes of play. Colby scored early in the third off of a power play, but fellow first-year Julie Dachille answered a minute later to re-establish Bowdoin‘s two-goal lead. The floodgates opened seven minutes later as the Polar Bears scored three goals in three minutes to put the game away.
The next day, the team welcomed the Mules to Brunswick. Although it failed to find the back of the net as easily as it had the day before, the team was able to shut out Colby and earn a 1-0 victory.
The game stayed scoreless through the first two periods as Lan Crofton ’17 racked up 19 of her eventual 30 saves and Colby’s Angelica Crites held her own at her end of the rink.
The only goal of the game was not until halfway through the final period when, on a power play, Marne Gallant ’17 fed the puck across the ice to Schuyler Nardelli ’15, who found Maryanne Iodice ’18, who fired the puck just inside the left post.
Two days before Thanksgiving, the team needed a third period goal to tie The University of Massachusetts Boston (5-2-3). Five minutes into the game, Dachille fired a shot that was deflected by the UMass goalie, but Maureen Greason ’18 knocked in the rebound and gave Bowdoin a 1-0 advantage.
The Polar Bears held the lead until midway through the second period, when the Beacons scored twice in two minutes against Beth Findley ’16 who was making her first start in the net this season. Ariana Bourque ’16 came up big for the Polar Bears three minutes into the third period, equalizing the score at 2-2.
Four days later, the Polar Bears struggled through a defensive battle against Holy Cross (7-2-1), with both teams failing to score in the 0-0 tie. While Crofton had to save 15 more shots than her Holy Cross counterpart, the Polar Bears had multiple opportunities to take the lead, including chances from Greason and Dachille.
The team hopes to continue to receive an impressive contribution from its first years when they host Saint Anselm College tomorrow and Norwich University Sunday before taking a month off.
Volleyball Head Coach Karen Corey resigns

A day after the volleyball team’s season ended in the NCAA regional finals, Karen Corey announced her resignation from the College after nine years as head coach of the program.Corey and her family will be moving to Germany to allow her husband to accept a promotion.In her time at Bowdoin, Corey transformed a struggling program into a perennial national contender. Prior to her arrival the team had had only four winning seasons in its 20-year history.
During Corey’s tenure the team never had a sub .500 record, and from 2007-2012 the team boasted a home win streak of 40 matches. She led the Polar Bears to a NESCAC championship in 2011 and three appearances to the D-III NCAA tournament, including two trips to the regional finals. The impressive 2011 campaign earned Corey NESCAC and American Volleyball Coaches Association regional coach of the year honors.
“It is tremendously hard to leave something that I’ve really invested myself in—making the program so strong and investing in the players and the recruiting process and trying to make the program better each year,” said Corey. “But, at the end of the day we have a really cool opportunity for my husband’s work and we’re going to pursue those opportunities right now.”“Karen’s an incredibly talented coach and teacher and brought a level of expertise to Bowdoin that led to an incredible amount of success,” said Ashmead White Director of Athletics Tim Ryan.
While her on-court success singled her out, Corey’s commitment to the College and involvement in the greater Brunswick community also highlighted her time at Bowdoin.“She was incredibly involved [at Bowdoin]—she was an organizer in Girls and Women in Sports Day, she’s been involved with the town rec department,” said Ryan. “She’s just an incredibly involved person in our community and we’re certainly going to miss her.”
Although the announcement seemed somewhat sudden, coming immediately after the Polar Bears were eliminated from the NCAA D-III tournament, Corey and her family had been planning the move for some time. Corey only waited until the end of the season to tell her team and the Bowdoin community of her retirement so her team could maintain its focus on the season.
“[The team] deserved to have no drama and [to not have] something to distract them away form our program,” said Corey. “So I did choose to wait until the end of the season so we could have a focus in season on what we were doing and do it together.”
Corey’s decision to postpone her announcement, while designed to keep the team focused, came two days after early decision deadlines were due.
When Head Football Coach Dave Caputi announced his plans to step down earlier in year, he did so in middle of the season with potential recruits in mind.
In reaction to Caputi’s decision Ryan said the announcement was made early “to make sure that the students who we are in the recruiting process with are able to make informed decisions about the composition of our coaching staff.”
However, the college does not expect Corey’s volleyball recruits to have an adverse reaction to the announcement.
“All of our coaches when they talk to recruits, the most important decision for them to make is the decision about attending Bowdoin,” said Ryan. “A lot of things can change after you decide to attend a particular institution, but the most important thing is you’re excited about the academic experience you’re going to have at Bowdoin.”
“I’ve been speaking to [the recruits] and they’re all still interested and have applied early decision one and I think the program is going to be in a really healthy and strong place,” said Corey.
This year’s team had no seniors and hopes to use the rare continuity it will have next season to fill the void in leadership left by Corey’s absence.
As for Corey’s replacement, Bowdoin hopes to hire a new coach by January.“It would be great to have someone here just to support the current members of our program,” said Ryan.
Men’s basketball wins tournament crown

After losing three starting seniors from last year’s squad the men’s basketball team opened its season on a strong note by claiming the Rick Martin Holiday Inn Express Tip-Off Tournament last weekend.
In the tournament’s opening match, the team beat Elms College handily 77-57. The Polar Bears stormed out of the gate to gain a 15 point halftime lead. Although their defense let up a little in the second half, Bowdoin was able to keep its double digit lead for the last 30 minutes of the game.
The Polar Bears’ starting five controlled the game with their balanced attack, with each starter scoring in double digits. John Swords ’15 continued where he left off last season, anchoring the team with 16 points and eight rebounds. But it was Lucas Hausman ’16, last year’s sixth man, who led the team in scoring with 22 points.
In the tournament’s final against Westfield State University, the team went down late in the first half after Swords had to go to the bench with early foul trouble. The Polar Bears were able to cut down the Owls’ lead and take a two point lead of their own into halftime.
The Polar Bears opened up the second half with an early 8-0 run and never gave up the lead after that, ultimately beating the Owls 68-56.
Despite his extended time on the bench due to the early foul trouble, Swords finished the game with a 20-point, 16-rebound performance, helping him earn tournament MVP honors. While the starters continued their impressive play, the bench contributed only four points to the team’s total.
The Polar Bears hope to continue their perfect start to the season when they travel to Saint Joseph’s College tomorrow.
Volleyball plays into mixed results in weekend tournament

The volleyball team saw its six-match win streak end last weekend when it lost 3-1 to Springfield College on Saturday. The team won both of its other two games in the Hall of Fame Tournament hosted by Amherst against Wheaton College and Wellesley College to improve its record to 19-6.
The Polar Bears coasted to victory their opening match of the tournament against Wheaton. Quincy Leech ’17 and Clare McInerney ’18 served well for the team, setting up points for Christy Jewett ’16 and Clare Geyer ’17, who finished with 16 and eight kills, respectively.
After winning the opening set against Springfield the following day, the Spirit took the next three to end the Polar Bears’ win streak. Although some individuals did show some impressive play, including a 33 dig performance from Katie Doherty ’17, errors were what led to the Polar Bears’ loss. The team had over twice as many mistakes in the third and fourth set as it did in the opening set that it won.
Hours later the team rebounded and beat Wellesley in straight sets in its final game of the tournament. Leech led the serving charge again, recording 14 aces, and Geyer once again dominated the net with eight kills.
It was Jewett’s all-around performance, however, that led the Polar Bears throughout the weekend. Her 16 kills in both the Wheaton and Springfield games earned her All Tournament Honors.
The Polar Bears end their regular season this weekend with games tonight at 8 p.m. at Amherst and tomorrow at Williams. The team is currently ranked fourth in the NESCAC standings and if it is able to maintain or better its standing, it will host a NESCAC tournament game next week.
Women’s tennis swings past competition in home tourney

The women’s tennis team took to the courts this Homecoming weekend as hosts of the Bowdoin Invitational, the team’s final event of its fall season. Bowdoin went a combined 24-12 in its matches over the weekend against athletes from Wellesley, Tufts and Bates.
After claiming All American status with their fourth place finish at the ITA Small College Nationals in South Carolina two weeks ago the doubles pair of Emma Chow ’15 and Tess Trinka ’18 split up, each playing with other team members as the squad tries to get its best rotation together for the spring season.
The two may have missed the connection they created over the fall season as Trinka, paired with Pilar Giffenig ’17, went 2-2 in their doubles matches and Chow went 2-1 with her new partner Cory Alini ’18. In singles the two were much more successful—Chow won all four of her matches while Trinka played an even 2-2 in hers.
Sam Stalder ’17 and Kyra Silitch ’17 played well for the Polar Bears, with Stalder wining both of her two singles matches, and Silitch going 2-1 in her three matches.
The team will inaugurate its spring season during March break when it travels to California to play top D-III competition on the West Coast. Co-captain Tiffany Cheng ’16 will return from a semester abroad to help the Polar Bears build off of their elite eight finish in last year’s D-III national championships.
Sailing team sets course for return to nationals

In the wake of its first-ever trip to the national championship last season, the sailing team opened up its fall season last weekend with an impressive series of finishes in five different meets.
At the Harry Anderson Trophy at Yale—the top-tier coed sailing event of the weekend—the boat sailed by Jack McGuire ’17 and Charlotte Williamson ’15 teamed up with Michael Croteau ’15 and Paige Speight ’16 to finish fourth out of 18 teams, the best result Bowdoin has ever achieved in the event.
At the Toni Deutsch Regatta, held at MIT, the women’s team placed fifth out of 14 teams. Courtney Koos ’16, Frances Jimenez ’16, Mimi Paz ’17, and Julia Rew ’17 had to battle through tough wind conditions but still navigated their way to a top-five result.
The team continued to show off its depth at the FJ Invitational at Harvard. Phil Koch ’15, Jade Willey ’17, Louis Frumer ’18, and Emily Salitan ’16 dominated the event, taking first place with ease.
The Polar Bears had their worst result of the weekend at Maine Maritime in the Philip Harman Cup. Although they placed second to last in the eight-team field, Bowdoin’s team was only a few points behind the six steams to whom they lost to, and even managed to win the last race of the regatta. Two different boats also competed at Maine Maritime in the Penobscot Bay Open, finishing sixth out of 18 competing schools.
The team hopes to continue to build on last season’s historic finish in meets at Dartmouth, MIT, Boston College, and the University of Vermont tomorrow.
Women’s rugby shuts out Amherst

Last Saturday, the women’s rugby team kicked off its season in dominating fashion at Amherst, shutting out the Lord Jeffs 92-0.
The opening performance came as a good sign for the team, which last season won the New England Collegiate Rugby Conference championship and made it to the quarterfinal round of the Division II National Championship.
The outcome was never in question for the Polar Bears—who earned two quick tries from Charlotte Kleiman ’15 in the opening minutes. Randi London ’15, Samantha Hoegle ’17, Anna Piotti ’16, Pamela Zabala ’17 and Emily Athanas-Linden ’15 piled on the points, each adding early tries of their own, adding to the Polar Bear lead.
Even the few Polar Bears—Emily King ’16 and Paige Pfannenstiel ’17—who were playing in their first game in new positions had little trouble assimilating into their new roles during the match.
The Polar Bears hope to post another dominant performance when they face-off against Tufts in their home opener tomorrow.
Men’s golf struggles as tournament host

Doubling as competitor and host, the men’s golf team placed ninth out of 12 schools in its opening tournament, the Bowdoin Invitational, which took place last weekend.
Thomas Spagnola ’17 led the Polar Bears with a weekend score of 160, with Dustin Biron ’15 right behind him at 164. Although he led the Polar Bears this weekend, Spagnola’s 160 slotted him into 23rd place—16 strokes behind the individual champion, Providence’s Jamie Ferullo.
Bowdoin, and even Providence, were no match for Middlebury, the Invitational’s champion. The Panthers placed three players in the top five, leading to a team score of 601—five strokes ahead of the second and third place teams and 34 strokes better than fourth place Bates.
Kevin Zmozynski ’16, Martin Bernard ’17, and Jay Vaidya ’16 rounded out the Polar Bears’ five-man team that posted a score of 661.
The Polar Bears will be back on the course tomorrow for the Maine State Tournament at the Bangor Municipal Golf Course.
Wrapped up: athletic trainers dedicate time to varsity teams

Along with laundry loops and team gear, athletic trainers are one of the perks of being a Bowdoin athlete.
According to the athletics website, they are only intended to treat varsity athletes. With only five full-time employees, the trainers have their hands full working with the approximately one-third of Bowdoin students on varsity teams.
On game days, the trainers are usually on campus four hours before game time, according to Director of Athletic Training Dan Davies.
“Depending on the sport, visiting schools may not send a trainer with the team so we have to get that team ready on top of ourselves—we call it organized chaos,” he said.
Rehabbing injured athletes makes up a significant part of what the trainers do. Most of their mornings and early afternoons are spent helping injured students who are navigating around work and class schedules. During practice hours the trainers on the various practice fields rehab the athletes who are sidelined due to injuries.
Their remaining training duties revolve around preventative measures. Most athletes will come to the training room to get taped up or stretched out before practice or a game, then have their muscles iced or heated after practice.
Each of the five trainers is assigned a specific team, and for the trainers paired with more physical sports, the season can be extremely strenuous.
“When football starts,” said Davies, “it’s 13 weeks and I don’t get a day off. We have early morning practices so I’m here at four in the morning and I don’t leave until five or six at night.”Some student interns aid the trainers—Davies said he has one from both the University of New England and the University of Southern Maine—but delivering care can still be a daunting task.
“We’re trying [to get another trainer]; I put in for it,” said Davies. “The school’s been good to me though. I started here and we only had three [full-time trainers], now we have five, so they have given me resources.
“There are other schools in our conference that have more than us...but we’re in the middle as to staffing,” he added.
The Divide
While club athletes who have daily team practices are entitled to some services offered by the trainers, non-varsity athletes by and large do not receive equal access to trainers.
“We have 600-plus varsity athletes in 31 sports with five trainers. You do the math. It’s just not possible [to give equal attention to club athletes],” he said.
While the training staff does not purposefully neglect club athletes, it is beyond their power to do as much for them, according to Davies.
For club sports like Frisbee and crew, the trainers “do the initial evaluation to see if immediate attention is needed—first responder type of thing—then we’ll refer them to the Health Center or doctor,” said Davies. “They’ll get that first evaluation so they know what to do or not to do so they won’t hurt themselves more.”
“On the field, if an ultimate Frisbee player goes down screaming, we’re not going to turn our back on them,” added Davies. “They’re still a student of the College, and we’re going to take care of that person and that immediate need.”
Although it is a club sport, men’s rugby—because of its physical nature—is treated as a varsity sport and receives full access to the trainers.
“Overall, I’m pleased. I’d give the training staff an A,” said Cole Duncan ’14, an ex-football player who is now on the rugby team.
According to Duncan, the football and rugby teams receive equal access to trainers. Assistant Athletic Trainer Gretchen Appleby traveled with the rugby team to most of their away matches, including the team’s trip to the New England Regional and National tournaments.
“Whenever you need [Appleby], you go in, you call her. There’s no real difference,” said Duncan.While Duncan is extremely satisfied with the care his club team receives, some varsity athletes say their sports are unfairly placed lower on the trainer totem pole.
“Some people on the team will get frustrated when the trainer we have for indoor [meets] then goes and joins lacrosse,” said track captain Sam Copeland ’14. “I understand maybe in a sport like track you are less likely to injure yourself in the middle of a race, but our team is so much bigger than most teams on campus so it makes sense that we would have a trainer too.”
The track team does not have a trainer at all of its practices and a Bowdoin trainer does not go to the team’s meets, although host teams do provide one for each meet.
“We definitely get adequate attention,” added Copeland. “I just think there [are] definitely differences between teams and unfortunately track is normally at the bottom.
“I don’t want to say we don’t have anything good going for us because if we go to the trainers they’ll help us if we ask,” she added. “They’re not bad or anything at all, it’s just they do their job and their job is to help certain teams more than others.”
Softball silences Colby but falls to mighty Jumbos

The softball team went 3-2 this past weekend, sweeping Colby (1-4 NESCAC, 5-12 overall) in a three-game series, but then fell in a double header the following day against defending D-III national champion Tufts (5-0 NESCAC, 21-3 overall).
Although the team relied mostly on the strength of its bats early in the season, the team’s pitching has been earning it wins recently. After giving up six runs in her opening start of the season back in March, Melissa DellaTorre ’14 threw her second shutout of the year in the Polar Bears’ 2-0 win over Colby on Saturday—and allowed just one hit.
Although the Polar Bears’ offense got off to a slow start, junior Adriane Krul’s single batted in Siena Mitman ’15 for what would be the winning run in the fifth. Casey Correa ’14, who went 2-3 that afternoon, added an insurance run for DellaTorre with a solo homerun in the seventh inning.
“We’ve kind of had two different seasons. One early in the year where we hit really well and our pitching was slow to come along,” said Head Coach Ryan Sullivan. “And then the last six or seven games, our hitting has leveled off a little bit and our pitching has come up strong.”
Sullivan is somewhat surprised to see the pitching surge come this late in the season.
“Softball pitchers can go and go and go, but what you find is over the course of a season they start to wear down,” Sullivan said. “So I think that we’re fortunate with four quality pitchers we’re able to mix and match a little bit.”
The following day the Polar Bears opened up their double header with a win in what turned out to be a pitchers’ duel against Colby. Emily Griffin ’17 emerged victorious—pitching a 1-0 shutout—but the winning run did not come until Correa hit a walk-off single in the bottom of the seventh.
The team’s bats started to pick up in the third leg of the double header in a 4-2 win. Colby got on the scoreboard first, but a double from Dimitria Spathakis ’16 and another Correa home run in the third helped settle Julia Geaumont ’16 down, who finished the complete game.
On Sunday, the team travelled to Medford to play its third day in a row—this time a double header against Tufts. In the first game, Tufts’ Allyson Fournier, who is a perfect 10-0 this season, was too much for the Polar Bears. Although Griffin found her rhythm late in the game, the team could not battle back from a Tufts three-run homer in the first, ultimately losing 4-0.
Errors killed the Polar Bears in their last game of the weekend, as DellaTorre only gave up one earned run in a 3-1 loss. The errant play may have been partially due to the fatigue built up over the weekend.
“It’s hard. It’s physically demanding…but the mental part is really the key though,” said Sullivan. “It doesn’t require as much physical stamina as other parts, but mentally you have to be engaged the whole time, and it can be really mentally draining.”
The Polar Bears travel out of conference this weekend with double headers at Husson today and one at home against Brandeis on Saturday.
“We’ve had a nice rivalry with both of those programs over the last six or seven years,” said Sullivan. “They’re quality programs so my message going into this weekend is ‘let’s treat this like a conference weekend because they are quality teams.’”
Men’s tennis opens season against nation’s best in California

While only one top-five seed made it to the quarterfinals earlier in March at what is widely considered the fifth slam, the PNB Paribas Open in Indian Wells, Calif., the men’s tennis team failed to catch the SoCal upset fever during its time in Claremont over Spring Break. They finished their trip with a 4-4 (1-0 NESCAC) record against top D-III competition.
Unlike Bowdoin, many opponents had already started their seasons before spring break and had been able to practice outside for a couple months, if not year-round.
Regardless, after two invitational tournaments, the Polar Bears opened up their spring season with a 7-2 win over Skidmore. The team won two of the three doubles matches to open the contest, and the only singles loss was Sam King ’14, who had to retire early due to injury.
The very next day though, with its doubles starting to unravel, the team fell to then-No. 11 Carnegie Mellon, 6-3. With King still sidelined, Head Coach Conor Smith had to push the singles in positions 3-6 to each play one spot up. Luke Trinka ’16 and Chris Lord ’14 were able to win their matches, but with only one doubles win, the effort was not enough.
On their third consecutive day of matches, the Polar Bears fell to top-ranked Washington University 7-2. Nearly all the singles matches went deep into the third set and all three doubles matches ended in tight pro-sets, but the Polar Bears were only able to eke out two of the close matches—both of which happened to involve King in his first day back after his trip to the ER.
“It ended up being fine, but it was pretty scary,” said King of the heat issues that led to his hospital visit. “I had to sit out the match before, which I think lit a fire in my belly to want to put the team in a position to beat Wash U, which was at the time ranked.”
“Early in that match I was losing a lot of close games, but I made some adjustments to play more aggressively and was fortunate enough to pull the match out.”
While the team finally had a couple days’ rest to prepare for and beat Pomona-Pitzer 5-3, that afternoon it faced No. 3 Claremont-Mudd-Scripps and was shut out 9-0 without a single match even making it to a third set.
“Claremont’s just good,” admitted Smith. “I’m not making excuses but it’s just a reality. We were pretty beat up physically and mentally after we had a tough match that morning.”
The team had another tough loss against No. 7 Emory the next day. But after three days of rest, the Polar Bears got back on track, defeating both Trinity and Denison on back-to-back days to earn their first NESCAC victory—and bring themselves back to a .500 record.
Despite failing to upset any of the top teams they faced, the Polar Bears know their season is not determined by the success of their play in March.
“It feels good beating Trinity, but I’d be lying to say a win against them is really going to be a hallmark to where we want to be,” said Smith. “But I’m not going to go out and schedule a bunch of cupcakes. We’d rather push ourselves and see what we’re made of—even though we’re literally finding out what we’re made of on the spot.”
The team has room for improvement, especially in doubles, but its play in California is anything but a setback for the season.
“Our expectation for our team is always a developmental one with a long-term goal in sight,” said Smith. “We want to peak in May and continue to develop ourselves and get better so we can play our best tennis the NCAA’s and in tourney time.”
“We’re trying to win a championship this year and that starts with pinning yourself against the best competition out there,” added King.
Men’s hoops stunned by Trinity in triple-OT thriller

Unless the men’s basketball team receives an unlikely at-large bid to the NCAA tournament on Monday, its season ended with an incredible and controversial 71-66 triple overtime loss to Trinity (15-10 overall, 5-5 NESCAC) in the NESCAC quarterfinals last Saturday. It was the longest game ever in NESCAC championship history.
The match-up was much more action-packed than the regular season game against Trinity, which Bowdoin won 46-39.
Saturday’s game seemed like it was going to follow a similar script when the Bantams took a 25-19 lead into halftime. But, while the Polar Bears continued to struggle in the opening minutes of the second half, the scoring picked up for Trinity as they took a 14-point lead with just over 14 minutes to play.
With help from John Swords ’15—who was in early foul trouble—Lucas Hausman ’16, and Bryan Hurley ’15, the team went on a 19-3 run to take their first lead since the opening minutes of the game. The teams went back and forth for the final few possessions when, with a 52-50 lead, Trinity missed a free throw and the Polar Bears threw a quick outlet to Hausman, who elected to push the ball up the court rather than set up the offense. Hausman tied the game with a lay-up to send the teams into their first overtime period.
Madlinger opened up the second overtime period with another three, but several attempted threes early in the shot clock allowed Trinity to go up by three with under 10 seconds remaining. Then, on what was potentially the Polar Bears’ last possession of the season, Hurley brought the ball up the court, dumped it off to Hausman who, off a poor rotation by Trinity, was able to get the ball back to Hurley just in time for him to launch a buzzer-beating three to force a third overtime.
“In the huddle [before the play] I was thinking ‘Crap, we kind of screwed ourselves with this situation,’” said Hurley of the timeout before his buzzer beater. “I thought the shot was good [coming off my hands] but the guy on me said he got a piece of it so I wasn’t sure if he actually tipped it and it was going to be short. But when it went in I was like ‘We have to win this game—this is our game.’”
But, after getting off to a quick lead in that third overtime, it seemed like the game would again be extended at least another five minutes. Down by two with half a minute remaining, a Swords lay up came out of the basket on what looked like an uncalled goaltending violation by Trinity.
“I found out about that later. I just thought I missed,” said Swords. “I don’t know whether or not certain events that transpired were malicious but I wouldn’t put that on [Trinity’s Papadeas] because he is a good guy.”
“If they don’t call it, they don’t call it,” said Head Coach Tim Gilbride. “There’s no way you can go back and say, ‘Hey, let me send the film to you.’ I mean the kid does stick his hand in through the net, not much question that he did that. But that’s like any situation. If they don’t make the call they don’t make the call.”
Bowdoin was forced to foul immediately after the controversial missed lay-up and the Bantams were able to seal the victory from the free throw line.
After starting off the season on a record 12-game win streak and having been ranked in the top 20 nationally, the team faltered late in the season, ending the season 2-4. But none of those losses were decided by more than four points.
“It’s a tribute to the guys on our team and a tribute to our seniors,” said Gilbride. “Matt Mathias, Andrew Madlinger and Grant White ’14 were unbelievable. They really got everybody on board with everything.”
“I really pretty deeply enjoyed this season, more so than I ever have enjoyed a sports season,” added Swords. “Never felt more like I was on a team than with these guys.”
There’s still hope that the team could make the NCAA tournament when the bracket is announced Monday. Because of the abrupt end to their season, the Polar Bears need other D-III conference favorites to win their respective tournaments. If a potentially less-deserving team steals one of those trophies, it would force one of the prospective conference winners into one of the coveted at-large bids that Bowdoin is hoping for.
“Now we’re just waiting to see what our status is,” said Gilbride. “I think we’re qualified and do I think we’ve had a good enough year, yes, but how it shakes out? Who knows.”
Men's hoops will play Trinity tomorrow at home in NESCAC quarterfinal

After splitting last weekend’s games at Bates and Tufts, the men’s basketball team completed its regular season with a 6-4 NESCAC record (19-4 overall), good enough for the No. 4 seed in the NESCAC tournament. The men will host their quarterfinal matchup against Trinity tomorrow in Morrell Gymnasium.
In the Friday game against Bates (11-12 overall, 1-8 NESCAC), the Polar Bears happily took advantage of a nearly absent crowd due to Bates’ winter break. After bracing themselves for one of the NESCAC’s toughest gyms, the Polar Bears heard few jeers as they coasted to a 75-49 win.
“Oh, that made my day,” said John Swords ’15. “I have a buddy who goes there who has been looking forward to screaming horrible, horrible things at me all fall and winter and then I got a text from him earlier in the day [telling me he was away on break].”
Errant timeout costs men’s hoops at Middlebury

Chris Webber’s infamous timeout in 1993 cost his Michigan Wolverines a chance at becoming National Champions. While the timeout the Bowdoin men’s basketball team called in their 69-66 loss on Sunday to Middlebury (5-3 NESCAC, 15-7 overall) did not cost the Polar Bears a title, the sentiment the loss left to a team shaping up to make a run in postseason play was similar in its anger and gloom.
The Panthers took a five-point lead heading into halftime and, while they never had more than an eight-point lead, were able to prevent the Polar Bears from making a big run early in the second half. Bowdoin finally cut the lead down to two with 11:27 left in the game and the score remained close as both teams exchanged baskets for the remainder of the half.
With eight seconds remaining, Jack Roberts of Middlebury hit a free throw to put the Panthers up by three. The Polar Bears called their last time out to draw up a play and hopefully send the game into overtime. And, with 2.2 seconds remaining, Grant White ’14 hit a game tying three from the left corner.
Men's basketball 14-1 after 12-0 start

The men’s basketball team continued its great play over break, entering the new semester with a 14-1 record (3-1 NESCAC). This past Friday, Bowdoin’s 12-game win streak—the best start in the team’s history—ended when it traveled to Williams, where the Ephs (13-2 overall, 3-1 NESCAC, ranked 10th nationally) ended the perfect start in a 69-64 game.
The Polar Bears held their own in the opening half but entered the intermission down by three. This marked just the second time this season when the team was behind going into halftime this season, and that lack of experience may have hurt the Polar Bears who allowed the Ephs to a 10-0 run early in the second half. The team rallied in the second half and cut the Ephs’ lead to one with just over a minute remaining.
After a defensive stop the Polar Bears had a chance to take the lead but a three-pointer attempt by Grant White ’14 went in-and-out and an Eph grabbed the rebound and was able to ice the game on the free throw line.
Women’s basketball stays in win column

The women’s basketball team is off to a 6-0 start after beating the University of Southern Maine (USM) on Tuesday, the best beginning to a season since Bowdoin won 10 straight games to start the 2009-10 season.
The team narrowly edged out USM with a 62-56 win. It was another balanced attack for the Polar Bears with Brady, Phelps, and Prue all scoring in double digits. Marle Curle ’17 added a team-high four assists and initiated an 11-5 Polar Bear run to close out the game.
“They’re always a very strong program. They’re very similar to us in that they have a very strong inside-out game,” said Head Coach Adrienne Shibles. “Offensively we worked a lot on execution this week [in preparation for Southern Maine] really trying to move forward and learn from the UNE game.”
Men’s basketball handily wins Regis Tip-Off

The men’s basketball team opened its season by winning the Regis Tip-Off Tournament this past weekend. In its opening-round match the Polar Bears defeated Western Connecticut State University by a final score of 80-55 before beating Regis 74-61 in the championship game.
In the first game, Grant White ’14 led Bowdoin with a career-high 20 points and nine rebounds. Five other players had at least nine points. After leading by 10 at halftime, Bowdoin outscored the Colonials by 15 in the second half.
In the tournament’s championship game, Bowdoin defeated Regis 74-61. An opening 3-pointer by Regis was the only lead the Pride had in the game. Despite trading baskets for much of the first half, the Polar Bears entered halftime with a six-point lead. After sitting out much of the first half due to foul trouble, John Swords ’15 led the charge in the second half, leading the Polar Bears 13-5 run to end the game.
Men's soccer nearly upends No. 1 Amherst

The fifth-seeded men’s soccer team ended its season last Saturday by losing in a double-overtime match to top-seeded Amherst in the NESCAC semifinals. Bowdoin’s 8-4-4 record was not strong enough to earn the team an at-large bid into the NCAA D-III tournament.
Despite ending their season with a loss, the Polar Bears fared well against the undefeated Lord Jeffs, who have been ranked No. 1 nationally for most of the season. After giving up a goal off a corner kick, the Polar Bears struck back when Matt Dias Costas ’17 capitalized on a rebound in the 56th minute.
Bowdoin was able to match the aggressiveness of the notoriously physical Jeffs and even had a couple opportunities to end the 1-1 draw in overtime. But Amherst secured the win when Justin Aoyama put the ball in the back of the Bowdoin net from roughly 30 yards out with only three minutes remaining before a penalty shootout would have decided the game.
Men's soccer advances to NESCAC semifinals after thrilling PK victory

The men’s soccer team avenged a regular-season loss last Saturday by beating Tufts (8-5-2, 6-4-0 NESCAC) on penalty kicks on the road in the quarterfinals of the NESCAC Championship. The win means Bowdoin will meet top-seeded Amherst in the semifinals tomorrow.
After a scoreless first half, Bowdoin put in the first goal of Saturday’s game after a miscommunication in the Jumbos’ back line gave Cedric Charlier ’17 an open net. Matt Dias Costa ’17 added to the Bowdoin lead in the 80th minute after captain Zach Danssaert ’14 intercepted a Tufts pass and crossed the ball into the box, where Austin Downing ’17 headed it to Dias Costa for the goal.
Unfortunately for the Polar Bears, Tufts mounted a furious rally to score two goals in the final five minutes of regulation—one with only 37 seconds remaining—to force overtime. Despite having allowed these potentially demoralizing goals, Bowdoin kept its composure in the two subsequent overtimes and gave itself the opportunity to keep its season alive by forcing penalty kicks.
Jumbos cool men’s soccer’s hot streak before playoffs

The men’s soccer team honored its senior players last Saturday in its final home game of the regular season with a 4-1 victory over Colby (5-2-2 NESCAC, 8-2-3 overall). The Polar Bears then fell to Tufts in a 1-0 match on Tuesday, and will face the Jumbos in the first round of the NESCAC Championship tomorrow at Tufts.
Thirteen minutes into the game against Colby, Hunter Miller ’16 put a corner kick into the box where captain Ben Brewster ’14 got a foot on it and scored his first goal of the season.
The Mules tied the game later in the first half, but the Polar Bears took control after the intermission, scoring three unanswered goals. Captain Zach Danssaert ’14 played a key role in all three of these second half goals. He assisted Matt Dias Costa ’17 in the 55th minute, and 20 minutes later, he almost scored but was blocked by the Colby goalie. Danssaert controlled the subsequent rebound and fed the ball to nearby Sam White ’15, who capitalized on the open net. Danssaert finally got a goal of his own from outside the 18-yard box on a breakaway later in the half.
Men's soccer pushes winning streak to five

Coming off two Homecoming Weekend wins, the Bowdoin men’s soccer team traveled to Connecticut College last Saturday to beat the Camels (7-3-2 overall, 3-3-3 NESCAC) 2-1. After starting their season 0-2-2 in conference play, the Polar Bears have now won four straight conference games and eight straight total matches.
The victory moved the team into fourth place in the NESCAC standings. The match started off with a scoreless first half, and although both teams had opportunities, Bowdoin got on the scoreboard first when Andrew Jones ’16 scored in the 52nd minute off a cross by Hunter Miller ’16.
But the game stayed close. Just six minutes later the Camel’s Zach Punt ripped in a lower 90 goal. The Camels kept pressure on Bowdoin’s defense throughout the half, but Bowdoin found an opportunity when Connor Keefe ’16 crossed a ball to the back post and Cedric Charlier ’17 knocked in the winning goal in the 71st minute. This marked Charlier’s second game-winner in as many matches.
Men’s soccer on the rise; now 3-2-2 in conference

The men’s soccer team has turned its season around after a 0-2-1 NESCAC start with three wins and a tie in their past four conference games.
They started their stretch with a tie at Trinity last weekend. After a scoreless first half, the Bears got on the scoreboard first with a goal from Zach Danssaert ’14 in the 50th minute. Although Trinity controlled the ball for more time, Bowdoin was able to prevent them from scoring until a poorly-cleared corner kick led to a Trinity goal in the 80th minute.
Both teams had solid scoring opportunities in the two overtime periods, but stout goalkeeping by Will Wise ’14 and Trinity’s Domenic Quade ensured the game ended in a 1-1 tie.
After disappointing tie, men’s soccer obliterates UMF 10-0

The Bowdoin men’s soccer team came out of its match last Friday night with a scoreless tie against Thomas University (4-3-1). The game was the second in a row in which the Polar Bears played two overtimes. Despite the extra time and empty scoreboard, goalie Will Wise ’14, who played the entire 110 minutes, only recorded two saves. The Polar Bears controlled possession most of the game, frequently getting into Thomas’ half of the field, but the team was unable to capitalize on any of its 24 shot attempts, 11 of which were on goal.
“I think everyone’s a little frustrated. We had possession of the ball a lot of the time but didn’t really finish them that well,” said Wise. “Once we missed a couple we got pretty anxious and tight and missed a few shots we probably would’ve made otherwise. I think we shot ourselves in the foot a little.”
Coach Scott Wiercinski added, “I think one of my frustrations Friday night was the lack of urgency and lack of professionalism in terms of on the field stuff, getting the right things done.”
Field hockey beats Middlebury, Bates by 12-2 combined score

The field hockey team upset fourth-ranked Middlebury (2-1 NESCAC, 3-1 overall) 4-2 at home this past Saturday. Bowdoin got on the scoreboard first, when Rachel Kennedy ’16 scored with nine minutes left in the first half. The Polar Bears refused to give up the lead for the rest of the game.
After Kennedy’s goal, the Panthers responded with a goal of their before the end of the half. But Bowdoin started the second half strong. Colleen Finnerty ’16 capitalized on a penalty stroke seven minutes in. Middlebury tied the score two minutes after Finnerty’s goal, but the Polar Bears responded immediately with Kimmie Ganong ’17 tapping in a shot near the left post. Kennedy added an insurance goal with 4:26 remaining. Captain Katie Riley ’14 assisted on three goals.
“Scoring first was pretty important because it set the pace for the game,” said Finnerty. “In field hockey one goal can decide the game. So it’s important to get that first goal and show the other team how you’re going to play.”

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