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Boston bans tobacco sales on college campuses
February 22Boston students who are interested in buying tobacco products may not find it so easy to do anymore. As of Feb. 9, college campus stores and pharmacies have been ordered to remove tobacco products from their shelves — a move the Boston Public Health Commission approved last year. The commission also made adjustments to Boston's 2002 workplace smoking ban by prohibiting smoking in nearby outdoor areas, banning new smoking bars such as hookah and cigar bars and giving current smoking bars 10 years to remain open. "The Boston Public Health Commission has the feeling that places that are supposed to be protecting our health, as in pharmacies with over-the-counter products — places that you should reasonably rely on to make you healthier — should not also be selling tobacco products," Edith Balbach, a community health senior lecturer, said. The commission hopes that the new ban will prevent many college students from smoking, because tobacco products will not be as readily available. "For the most part, if people are going to start smoking they start before they're 19 years old, so one of the key times of smoking uptake is the first year out of high school," Balback said. "For [about] 25 percent of the population that is their first year in college, so the thought was to put one more barrier in front of smoking uptake for 19-year-olds. If you have to actually physically leave campus to go find cigarettes, that is one additional barrier in the environment to try to get people to stop smoking — or even better, to just not start." While the potential positive health effects of the ban are encouraging, some feel that the strategy of banning certain things from students is not appropriate and will not be effective. "I think anything that prevents students from smoking is a good thing, but on the other hand, students should be allowed to buy what they want," freshman Adam Shepro said. Balbach agrees that restricting students could be risky. "The U.S. has a very libertarian philosophy — anything I want to do to my body I get to do to my body," she said. "Not allowing alcohol consumption by people under 21 has not been effective in preventing the use of alcohol in college dorms. We all have this basic libertarian instinct to want something badly that we can't have. So I always worry a little bit about specifically restricting certain things." One different and potentially more effective way of approaching the tobacco problem, according to Balbach, might be to try to persuade students that they don't want tobacco, by doing such things as broadcasting its negative health effects. "In public health, there are supply-side strategies and demand-side strategies," Balbach explained. "Supply-side means you try to interrupt the product from getting to the person, and demand-side strategies stop the person from wanting the product. I'm a real believer in demand-side strategies. If you handed me a pack of cigarettes right now, I would not take them. It's not the supply of cigarettes that makes the difference in my case; I have no demand for them. "I think the strongest policies we have in public health area are … the ones that convince people that they don't want the product," Balbach continued. "The strategies that try to stop the product from getting to the people I tend to think are much less effective. Those haven't worked all that well with cocaine, marijuana or any of those drugs. It's a much harder thing to do because if you have willing providers and consumers, you tend to have people getting the products." Demand-side tobacco prevention strategies are no stranger to the Bay State. "Massachusetts used to have one of the best tobacco control programs in the country, until the legislature gutted it," Balbach said. "It had a very effective media campaign, and even on TV now you see some of that truth campaign, so media campaigns are very effective." Another venue the government can pursue to reduce tobacco sales is a tax. "Tobacco tax increases are also very effective, because they make the product so expensive that you don't want it," Balbach said. "Also, making dorms and offices smoke-free, those are the things that are effective, because you create an environment for the product in which people can't use it. Those are all considered demand-side strategies." Balbach does feel, however, that the recent tobacco ban will be effective on campuses in preventing a lot of the positive tobacco advertising that is often ubiquitous in convenience stores and markets. "I think that not having sales on college campuses is probably a really good idea because as soon as convenience stores start selling cigarettes, they blast students with tobacco ads on all sides," she said. "Pro-advertising companies for cigarette sales are problematic, so from that standpoint I think it's useful not to have tobacco on college campuses." Although many students will inevitably be angry about the ban, the effects on Tufts will likely be minimal, especially since the on-campus convenience store, Jumbo Express, stopped selling cigarettes long prior to the recent policy changes. On a whole, smoking is also not as popular on college campuses as it used to be, according to Balbach. "Smoking follows an educational and social class gradient. College students are not a population that smokes a lot, so it's not a big deal to them. I think they are more aware of the health effects, and I think that there's probably more stigma associated with being a smoker," she said. "I think it's perceived as a negative behavior. When I was in high school … smoking still had that cool cache, but I don't think among this generation smoking is perceived as cool. The idea that smoking is the rebel behavior is long past … you guys have different ideas of what rebel behavior is."
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Clinton appoints Fletcher dean
February 22Dean Stephen Bosworth of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy will oversee the United States' North Korea policy in a newly created position, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced on Friday in Seoul during a four-nation tour of East Asia. Bosworth, who was U.S. ambassador to South Korea from 1997 to 2001, will help coordinate U.S. involvement in the six-party talks on North Korean denuclearization and will also focus on human rights and humanitarian issues. He will remain in his role as dean despite the new position. The appointment, which media reports last week said was in the works, comes at a time of increasingly aggressive rhetoric on the part of North Korean officials. The reclusive Communist nation said on Thursday that it was "ready for an all-out confrontation" with South Korea, the official KCNA news agency reported. North Korea recently announced a termination of diplomatic relations with South Korea, and it is reportedly preparing to test a long-range ballistic missile. Clinton last week issued a warning to North Korea on the potential missile launch, which North Korean officials deny, but indicated the United States would reciprocate any actions by the North to verifiably shut down its nuclear program. In his new role, Bosworth will consult with senior State Department official Sung Kim on the six-party talks, which include the United States, North and South Korea, China, Japan and Russia. Kim worked closely with previous chief U.S. negotiator Christopher Hill and will serve as U.S. envoy to the six-party talks. A 2007 deal promised North Korea the equivalent of 1 million tons of fuel oil if it agreed to close its Yongbyon nuclear facility, in addition to other nuclear weapons-related concessions. The talks fell apart in December, though, after the North failed to agree to a verification process for the dismantlement of its nuclear program. A State Department official told the Daily yesterday that he was unsure whether Bosworth would attend the six-party talks. Kim will "probably" attend, he said, as well as lead day-to-day efforts and coordinate with other nations participating in the negotiations. Bosworth traveled to Pyongyang earlier this month on a five-day private visit during which he did not represent the U.S. government. While he was in the North Korean capital, he met with officials involved with foreign affairs, defense and the economy, he told reporters afterward, the Associated Press (AP) reported. Bosworth also told reporters that North Korea expressed a readiness to speak with U.S. officials about resuming the talks. "We can continue to work towards eventual denuclearization of Korean peninsula," Bosworth told reporters in Beijing, according to the AP. By creating a higher-ranking position to deal with North Korea than that previously held by Hill — one similar to the roles held by other new special envoys to hotspots around the world — the United States has shown it is likely to give more attention to the issue, according to Sung-Yoon Lee, an adjunct assistant professor of international politics at the Fletcher School. "I think it sends the message that the new Obama administration is very serious about dealing with North Korea," Lee said. "I think it's a positive message." Bosworth brings a familiarity with the region to the newly created State Department position, experts on North Korea told the Daily. "Dean Bosworth has had a long history of working on Korean affairs at a high level" and commands respect among officials in the United States and in the region, Lee said. "He has the age, rank, experience and gravitas necessary to negotiate with the North Koreans." Under a 1994 agreement, North Korea agreed to halt its nuclear weapons program in exchange for a promise to build two light-water reactors, an effort which has since collapsed. The North Koreans "have made the completion of these reactors a condition for the dismantlement of the plutonium-producing reactor at Yongbyon," Selig Harrison, director of the Asia Program at the Center for International Policy, said. Bosworth served as executive director of the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization — a consortium created to oversee the construction of these reactors — from 1995 to 1997. "He became intimately familiar with this project," Harrison said. "That is very important." "Beyond the official negotiators, like Chris Hill, he's probably had more contact with the North Koreans than anyone else in the United States," said Daniel Drezner, associate professor of international politics at the Fletcher School. "He's eminently qualified for this." Bosworth also served as ambassador to the Philippines from 1984 to 1987, and to Tunisia from 1979 to 1981. University President Lawrence Bacow praised the appointment. "I have promised Steve that we will do whatever we can to support his mission," Bacow told the Daily.
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Symposium tackles global cities
February 22The annual Norris and Margery Bendetson Education for Public Inquiry and International Citizenship (EPIIC) symposium concluded yesterday after five days of panels on topics ranging from finance to terrorism. Entitled "Cities: Forging an Urban Future," the symposium brought together experts from around the globe. Institute for Global Leadership (IGL) Director Sherman Teichman called the programming a "slam-dunk victory." "The content has been just galvanizing," he told the Daily. "The interactions have been extraordinary." In the symposium's first lecture, Columbia University Professor of Sociology Saskia Sassen spoke about the state of the world's cities in a time of financial crisis and evolving power structures. In her talk on Wednesday night entitled "Global Cities/Global Slums," Sassen termed the global city as "one of these grand strategic places" where powerless, informal political actors have the chance to execute their projects. "The global city is a frontier space, which means that two actors from different worlds encounter each other, but there are no rules for engagement," she said. "Then the work begins." Turning to the global financial downturn, she talked about the destructive power of financial investors and their role in causing the subprime mortgage crisis. Above all, though, she encouraged those in attendance to continue their inquiries about global urban politics. "I have questions. I want to understand the making of power, the making of politics, the making of powerlessness," Sassen said. "Where does this become complete and critical?" In a Friday panel, "Targeted Cities: Terror in the 21st Century," speakers discussed terrorism and counterterrorism in the context of urban areas. Specifically, panelists focused on why terrorists target specific places and on how attacks influence the evolution of cities. Before the panel began, senior Saumini Shah and junior Nethra Madurai showed "Tribute to Mumbai," a narrated slideshow accompanied by a vocal performance. Following the slideshow, Gwyn Prins, the director of the London School of Economics' Mackinder Programme for the Study of Long Wave Events, talked about his experiences with terrorism in cities. Prins addressed the distinction between conditional and unconditional terrorists. Unconditional terrorists, he said, have no interest in negotiation; they can only be preempted or surrendered to. Conditional terrorists, meanwhile, have demands and can be deterred. As an example of unconditional terrorists, he referred to the planners of the Mumbai attacks. He also argued that, paradoxically, Barack Obama's international standing, not India's financial markets, was the principal target of the attacks. Like other panelists, Prins warned of future attacks. "The next 9/11, when it comes — and we haven't had it yet — … will have the added components," he said. "It will include dirty bombs, it will include chemical weapons." Panelist Yona Yahav, the mayor of Haifa, Israel, focused his presentation on the 2006 Israel-Lebanon War. Yahav argued that Haifa should serve as a model for the rest of Israel. The city, Israel's third-largest, has a mix of Muslim, Christian and Jewish citizens who coexist in relative peace. He noted that years before the war, he had fought for Israeli withdrawal from southern Lebanon. As a result, he questioned why Hezbollah chose to attack his city. "The whole war was, for me, a personal slap in my face," he said, highlighting the efforts he took to save lives and maintain stability during the fighting. The third panelist, retired Marine Major John Williams, discussed the military side of counterterrorism and counterinsurgency efforts in urban areas. According to Williams, who is currently the deputy director at the U.S. Naval Academy's Center for Middle East and Islamic Studies, these campaigns are difficult and should used sparingly. "I'd like to state early and clearly and emphatically … that employing military forces in a town or city is to be avoided at all costs, absolutely," he said. Still, he conceded that these tactics are occasionally necessary to secure certain ends, like neutralizing enemies or providing security and stability in a city. The main focus of such operations is "winning the hearts and minds" of populations in terrorist strongholds, Williams said. He spoke at length about collateral damage and about the need to secure the trust of local citizens during counterinsurgency campaigns. A 1,000-pound bomb, for example, can eliminate enemy forces, but it can also create new enemies as a result of collateral damage, he noted. Throughout the symposium, organizers aimed to integrate arts and humanities into the programming. Specifically, the symposium featured poetry and vocal performances. According to Teichman, EPIIC alumni were struck by this focus, which differentiated this symposium from prior ones. Teichman also praised the efforts of current EPIIC students. "Those students performed wonderfully," he said. "You know you've done it when your students are regarded as highly as they are by professionals in the field."
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Somerville looks to benefit from stimulus funds
February 19With billions in federal funds on the horizon, Somerville has joined the statewide fray to secure a portion of the newly minted stimulus package.
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The Instinct Diet' offers a biological base to fight food cravings
February 19With the quick swipe of a student ID and a plastic brown tray in hand, Megan Kono is left standing in the Dewick-MacPhie Dining Hall faced with a serious dilemma. As she moves from station to station, she must fight the ever-present temptation to grab a slice of fresh tomato pizza or dish out a serving of macaroni and cheese. She must walk quickly past the tub of French fries and the trays of cookies that Dewick offers on a daily basis.
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Correction
February 19A Feb. 18 article, "School of Medicine professors push to reform to medical education ethics," misspelled the name of Jerome Kassirer, a professor at the Tufts School of Medicine.
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GDAE explores deforestation in Amazon
February 19A Tufts research institute earlier this month introduced a program to examine agricultural-induced deforestation in the Amazon Basin.
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Long-distance couples face tough decisions about relationships
February 19As college freshmen pack up their belongings and make their way to college, those who are involved in romantic relationships must inevitably face an age-old, difficult decision: break up or stay together?
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Theta Chi fraternity brothers sell pins, shave heads to benefit American Heart Association
February 18Theta Chi hopes to raise awareness and funds for heart disease research this month by selling pins, continuing an annual philanthropy project that started five years ago after a brother lost his father to heart disease. The proceeds from the red dress pins sold by fraternity brothers will go to Theta Chi's national charity organization, the American Heart Association (AHA). The men began selling pins for $5 a piece this week. The Tufts Theta Chi chapter began raising money for the AHA in 2004, after brother lost his father to heart disease. "He brought the AHA to the house, and every year we've sold pins to raise money," said David Friedman, one of Theta Chi's philanthropy chairs and a former chapter president. The brother, Ben Rubinstein (LA '05), told the Daily in 2006 that it seemed only natural to suggest supporting the AHA. "My father was a cardiologist who was very active raising money and promoting advocacy for the AHA," he said. "He passed away my freshman year at Tufts, and I took on a fundraising role afterwards, trying to fill at least some of that gap." The money the brothers raise this year will go specifically to the AHA's national "Go Red For Women," which aims to increase awareness of heart disease in women. Heart disease is the leading killer of women in the United States. The drive is part of a larger push to raise money during for AHA that the brothers participate in annually. "Last year, we hosted a red party where we accepted donations and gave out food and asked people to wear red, and depending on how much we raised some of the brothers shaved their heads," Theta Chi Social Chair Danny Wittels, a sophomore, said. Theta Chi brothers went through dorms on campus last night, selling the pins to residents. They raised $300, and were planning on going back to dorms last night and tonight, Friedman, a senior, said yesterday. The fraternity will continue to sell the pins at Dewick-MacPhie and Carmichael Dining Halls next week, and brothers will set up a booth in the Mayer Campus Center later this month, Friedman said. "We're going to set up a booth … and for every increment of $100 another brother will shave his head," he added. The group hopes the shaved heads will raise both awareness and cash, as they have in the past. Last year, the fraternity collected about $2,000. Theta Chi President Brendan Blaney, a sophomore, said the group set a goal of $3,000 for this year. Since 2005, Theta Chi has raised nearly $8,000 for the AHA, according to Friedman. The AHA campaign will be Theta Chi's second philanthropy project this year; the fraternity held a "Toys for Tots" drive in December. For that project, the brothers worked with the U.S. Marine Toys for Tots Foundation, which aims to distribute toys to needy children. That campaign was not very successful, though, according to brothers, due to the last-minute nature by which it was set up. "It wasn't as well-publicized as we would've hoped," Theta Chi's Public Relations Chair Ed Chao, a sophomore, said. "Next time, we're going to have more publicity, we're going to get the word out a little bit more." The fraternity is also planning a charity dodgeball tournament and Boston Red Sox ticket raffle for later this spring. Ben Gittleson contributed reporting to this article.
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Wind turbine at Medford school saves money, educates students
February 18Students passing by the Gantcher Center can now catch a glimpse of a 121-foot-tall wind turbine recently constructed by the City of Medford to provide renewable energy for McGlynn Elementary and Middle School. The turbine became operational on Feb. 5, after it was dedicated at a ribbon-cutting ceremony late last month. It will provide for 10 percent of the school's yearly energy costs, which translates to estimated annual savings of $25,000. The project has focused on energy education at the middle school, and was funded in part by Tufts. McGlynn is located on Mystic Valley Parkway (Route 16). "The students are really the long-term sustainable goal of the project," Patricia Barry, the director of the City of Medford's Energy and the Environment Office told the Daily. Students will hopefully become enthralled with the idea of studying renewable energy or go into fields like meteorology, she added. The students at McGlynn, who "absolutely love" the project, will have access to information about the turbine, like the amount of power it generates and wind velocity, with the help of a computer program, Barry said. "It is our hope that through this project, we will provide a means for students and citizens to become involved in more sustainable measures, practices and thinking so that we will all be able to work together to create a cleaner, greener more sustainable Medford for our generation and those to follow," she said. Tufts' involvement began when Barry met recently with Tufts Community Union President Duncan Pickard and Associate Treasurer Lauren Levine, a sophomore. The City of Medford did not have sufficient funding for the full educational program, Barry said. Tufts, he said, has helped establish the program. According to Pickard, a junior, Levine had been working on looking for an organization that focuses on environmental sustainability as a target for funds raised by the upcoming Tufts Dance Marathon when Medford city officials told her about the turbine project. Money raised for the Dance Marathon will go toward a patio located near the turbine. That patio will feature various learning materials that teachers can utilize in teaching their students about energy conservation and environmental sustainability. "I think it's wonderful," Pickard said. "I'm really happy that we're going to be raising money for this. Of course environmental sustainability is something that is very important to Tufts … I think that this is right in line with the work that some student organizations are doing." Barry praised the focus on teaching. "We are leading by example and then educating the children and we're actually thinking about sustainable measures now," Barry said. "It will pass from generation to generation." The turbine's three blades measure 33 feet long and spin around, generating 100 kilowatts of electricity at any given time from wind speeds ranging from 7.8 to 56 miles per hour. The average wind speed was determined to be 11 mph in that area of Medford, according to Maureen McCracken, director of marketing for Vermont-based Northern Power, the company that built the turbine. Though the turbine is larger than that used to power small residential buildings, she said, it is still much smaller than those used for commercial or industrial purposes -- for which turbines are commonly used in the Midwest. During the planning stage of the project, a city committee conducted investigations all over Medford looking for windy areas that would ideal for a wind turbine, according to Barry. Planners settled on McGlynn. From there, Barry successfully secured major grants that made the project possible, including funds from the Massachusetts Renewable Energy Trust and the Massachusetts Energy Consumers Alliance. These funds constituted $400,000 of the total $644,000 cost of the project. The remaining funding will come from the school's yearly energy savings and the selling of renewable energy credits. The installation of the turbine occurred late in 2008 through the combined efforts of Northern Power and Massachusetts-based Cullen Electrical Contractors.
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Highest college costs for the 2008-2009 academic year
February 18Highest tuitions: 1. Bates College: $43,950 2. Middlebury College: $42,910 3. Colby College: $42,730 4. Union College: $40,953 5. Connecticut College: $40,900 *23. Tufts University: $37,952
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Miller residents, BEAT Bias team up to turn vandalism into art
February 18Students met Tuesday night in Miller Hall to discuss ideas for a mural to be painted in the dorm's central stairwell, in order to combat inappropriate graffiti that tarnished the dorm earlier this semester. Miller Hall residents noticed last month offensive vandalism after a drunken student wrote in permanent marker on walls, columns and other surfaces. Some messages took a homophobic or sexual theme, while others were inoffensive in their messages. One particular message attacked Miller custodians, and comments on a second-floor stairwell that displayed homophobic comments particularly irked residents. The vandalism in that stairwell stayed up for about a week and a half before it was finally covered up, but some markings remain visible. A student from another dorm has since admitted fault. After the dorm was defaced, two members of the Bias Education and Awareness Team (BEAT Bias) who live in Miller came up with the idea of creating a "safe space" in the dorm. BEAT Bias, an on-campus student group that promotes issues of dialogue and tolerance and trains residential advisors, teamed up with Miller's residential advisory team and decided to create a mural over the stairwell graffiti. Samantha Frank, one of the BEAT Bias members, described the vandalism as "off-putting." "We need to address it in a way that can strengthen the community," Frank, a sophomore, said. At last night's meeting, a number of students spoke about creative ways to convey positive messages in the new mural. One main point the group stressed was to turn the offensive graffiti into graffiti art, taking the negative connotation that graffiti holds and turning it into something positive. Other key themes were incorporating words as well as symbols and portraying the Tufts community in relation to the rest of the world. Ideas for this approach included painting empowering words such as "knowledge," "strength" and "respect" in the style of graffiti. The students agreed to leave certain bricks open for personalized space in which people can mark symbols or words that are important to them. Symbols would include traditional Tufts-related images, as well as universal icons and certain words painted in different languages. An elephant with its legs and trunk spelling "Miller" may serve as the mural's centerpiece. "We want to send the message that this is our safe space," said freshman Kathryn Salwen, the other BEAT Bias member who lives in Miller and who is involved with the mural project. "We can change this in a positive way." "The most important part of the mural is the act of people taking responsibility for their hall," another BEAT Bias member who does not live in Miller, Christine Kim, said. "They want to accomplish something to fight the graffiti -- something of theirs to claim in the community," Kim, a junior, said. The students, who feel confident in the power of the potential painting, have little concern about future defacement of their mural. "It's not necessarily that people think about their actions and try to attack the community," Salwen said. "I think people just do stupid things. They wouldn't be as aggressive to ruin something beautiful that students did." Once the students draw up a mock design, administrators in the Office of Residential Life and Learning must give their approval. The group hopes to begin work in the next few weeks.
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Famous man-cries throughout history | Big boys do cry
February 17While it may be difficult to watch our heroes lose their composure, sometimes it's nice to see their softer sides. Here's a look at some memorable male breakdowns:
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Middle East groups continue to collaborate after conflict ends
February 17A fledgling consortium of six Middle Eastern-related student groups sponsored two events last month in the wake of the conflict in Gaza and southern Israel, but participants' efforts to create a civil forum for dialogue did not stop even as the heat from that war died down on campus.
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School of Medicine professors push to reform to medical education ethics
February 17Ahead of the American Psychiatric Association's (APA) annual meeting in May, some professors at the Tufts School of Medicine have said the current format of symposia are ripe for potential conflicts of interest.
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EPIIC to kick off annual symposium tonight
February 17The 24th annual Education for Public Inquiry and International Citizenship (EPIIC) symposium begins tonight and will focus on the theme of global cities and the future of urbanization. The five-day annual event, entitled "Cities: Forging an Urban Future," will open with a presentation by sociologist Saskia Sassen and will include about a dozen panels and events involving leading international experts.
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New research questions benefits of crying
February 17Students looking for an easy way to let off steam after a Valentine's Day heartbreak may have to search a bit harder than they thought. The process of shedding tears, long touted as a traditional cure for tragedy, might not be the best way to cheer up. According to recent research, for some, crying could be more harmful than helpful.
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Alumni donate despite economic hardships
February 16The university remains on track to finish its $1.2 billion capital campaign by 2011, despite the recession, in large part due to widespread alumni donations toward scholarships and financial aid.
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MAB creates new position; public editor to critique Tufts publications
February 16The Media Advocacy Board (MAB) announced earlier this month the creation of an ombudsman position tasked with critiquing all undergraduate student publications. Senior Jeremy White recently took up the position, officially making Tufts the first university in the country to have an ombudsman at the undergraduate level, according to the MAB.
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