Four students at the University of Rhode Island will have the possibility of studying abroad during the summer as a result of being selected for the 2013 Benjamin A. Gilman Scholarship Program.

The program selects students to give awards to twice a year and select undergraduate students in order to help reduce the cost of studying abroad during the summer. The program was established by the International Academic Opportunity Act of 2000, according to its website. To be considered for the scholarship, students are required to be receiving the Federal Pell Grant at a “two-year or four-year college or university to participate in study abroad programs worldwide.” The program aims to “diversity the kinds of students who study abroad and the countries and regions where they go” by providing funding to those who would, in other cases, not study abroad due to not being able to finance the trip.

The winners of the scholarship, from URI, are Aine Lehane, Pitu Sim, Rachael Adams and Nermeen El-Araby. Each winner chose a country that they’d like study abroad in. Two of the recipients, Sim and Adams, chose countries in Asia while the other two recipients, Lehane and El-Araby, decided on an African and European country, respectively.

As a sophomore health studies major – with a concentration in global health – taking pre-med courses, Lehane selected Botswana as her destination of choice.

“I applied for the scholarship because without [the scholarship] it would not have been financially feasible for me to study abroad,” Lehane said in an email. “I am very thankful I got it.”

Lehane said she wanted to get more of an international experience, especially one that focused on health so she looked for a program that had something related to her interests. “I also love traveling so I thought studying abroad would be a great way to do this,” she said.

Wanting to learn more about HIV/AIDS, Lehane decided that she wanted to travel to a sub-Saharan country in Africa. Because there is a high rate of HIV/AIDS in Botswana, she decided to choose that country – but not for that reason alone. “The program offered in Botswana is focused on public health, and it also includes an internship so I will have the opportunity to intern at a local health clinic and hopefully learn a great deal about Botswana’s healthcare system,” she said. She added that in addition to learning about their healthcare, she would have the opportunity of a firsthand experience in the country both in and outside of the classroom.

One of the classes she plans on taking while there is one of the local language, Setswana. She said learning the language will hopefully help her better interact with the locals. Other classes she will be taking will focus on Botswana’s healthcare system and for the last week of the program, she is traveling to a rural village to work in a care clinic. “I think this will give me great insight into what it is like to provide healthcare in a developing nation, which is something that I hope to make [into] a career one day,” Lehane said.

Lehane hopes to gain an understanding of life in a developing nation and what it’s like to live in one. She said since the country has such a high prevalence of HIV/AIDS she hopes to also understand the local healthcare system.

“Overall, I hope to experience everything the country has to offer and I can’t wait for the unknown that awaits me,” Lehane said.

For junior economics and political science double major Pitu Sim, winning a Gilman Summer 2013 Scholarship means more than the relief of the financial burden of studying abroad.

With this scholarship, Sim is being given an opportunity to return to his native country Cambodia, a place he has not seen since his immigration to the United States when he was in kindergarten.

“I’m originally from Cambodia and [I’m] trying to revisit my culture, my language, and see Cambodia,” Sim said.  “Being in America I’m not exposed to that kind of history just because the only person who usually talks to me about Cambodia is my mother.”

While in Cambodia, Sim would be taking an intermediate Cambodian language course and a history course.  Though his course load would be rigorous, Sim hopes to be able to make time to see his grandmother who still lives in Cambodia.

“The only relatives I have are my mother and my aunt, my grandmother’s only children, so to be able to see my grandma would be a really great surprise for me,” Sim said.  “My mom is just really excited that I’m thinking about going.  I told her it cost too much, but since I got this scholarship she’s been really excited.”

In an effort to reduce student stress and raise money for a local organization, the University of Rhode Island Student Senate’s Cultural Committee hosted Rhody Paws on the quad yesterday from 11 a.m. to 3p.m.

For this event a Rhode Island therapy dog organization, Pet Partners, brought five trained therapy dogs, one dog in training and two puppies to interact with students.  Donations were accepted at the event and all proceeds will be donated to Pet Partners.

Kathleen Uy, a member of the Cultural Committee was in charge of all advertising for this event.

“It's a trend at different college campuses and we thought it would be a good idea because of end of the semester stress,” Uy said. “Because of the recent events on campus, therapy dogs would be a good stress reliever.”

Rhody Paws is not the first time therapy dogs have been used on campus.  Earlier this month, Weldin Hall hosted therapy dogs to interact with residents. Dogs that were on the Quadrangle included a corgi, chocolate lab and German shepherd, among others.

“We thought this would be a good event because a good amount of people on campus love dogs,” Uy said. “Students [can] take a little bit of time from their day to play with the dogs, and most importantly it [brings] the campus and student body together.”

As a result of this year’s extremely positive turnout, Uy and the Cultural Committee hopes to make this event annual.

“We definitely want this to be a yearly event because of the positive responses we’ve received from the student body,” Uy said.

This article will be running as a special two-part series, divided between two issues of the Cigar.

Sandy Hook. Virginia Tech. Columbine. These are three names of schools in the United States. To most Americans, they are more than just places of learning. These are the locations of three of the worst school shootings in American history. They are names associated with death, tragedy and horrific mass gun violence that have sharply increased in recent years.

University of Rhode Island students, faculty and staff all know these names. Two weeks ago, a gun scare in Chafee Hall had some thinking that URI would be the next on this list. Fortunately, it was a false alarm. But the thoughts of “what could have been” linger in the air, and with them, the ongoing debate about whether campus police should be armed has resurfaced.

In their more than 30–year existence, the campus police have never been allowed to carry guns. Police officers have long voiced their strong belief in the need to be armed, petitioning the state legislature and the recently formed Rhode Island Board of Education – the only groups with the power to change the policy—multiple times. Faculty members, particularly those on the URI Faculty Senate, have opposed this idea with equal strength. Until now, the deciding powers have kept the status quo.  With the memory of the Chafee incident still fresh, they may reevaluate.

“URI is like its own town,” Officer Michael Flanagan, who has been with the campus police force for a little more than a year, said. He previously served 20 years with the Coventry Police Department as a lieutenant.

“Same as any other town, there are large numbers of people attending and visiting the campus, both students and not. There’s no way to control who’s on campus, so we deal with the same people as local police officers,” he said.

Unlike local police officers, campus police officers, who attend the same training through the state police academy, are allowed nothing beyond pepper spray and a baton.

“[A gun] is a tool of the trade,” officer Mark Chearino, who has served 15 years with the campus police said.“You don’t give a carpenter a rock to build a house; you give him a hammer. Without our tools, we can’t adequately protect people.”

Guns are necessary not only to protect the campus community from harm, but also for officers to protect themselves.

“Without guns, we become a liability,” captain and 35-year campus police veteran John Carey said.

Flanagan explained that this can be especially dangerous in an active shooter situation.

“The first officers that get there deal with the situation,” he said. “If you’re not armed, you become another potential victim.”

In almost all campus situations requiring a police response, it is the URI police who are the first responders, according to Chearino, who recalled a shooting incident in 1997 near Bressler Hall in which he was one of the first on the scene but had no weapon.

. . .

Read the next Cigar for more.

Everyone has seen at least one inspirational sports movie in their lifetime. I mean, this entire last generation practically has “Remember the Titans” engrained in their heads from the numerous times they’ve seen it on TV (additionally in my case for all three years my middle school played it in the auditorium).

Sometimes with these movies, there is also a theme of racial prejudice that serves as the backbone of the story, such as “Glory Road” and the aforementioned “Titans.” With that in mind, it’s odd that it took this long for a biopic about Jackie Robinson, one of baseball’s most famous and important players, to come along, but it’s here at last with “42.”

Rather than take the birth-to-death route that many biopics do, “42” instead zeroes in on the start of Robinson’s career with the Brooklyn Dodgers thanks to executive Branch Rickey’s insistence on breaking the barrier for non-white baseball players in the MLB.

Being the first African-American to play in the major leagues excites Robinson, even to the point of proposing to his girlfriend once he signs the contract, although the road to being accepted isn’t without its obstacles. Even without taking into account the opposing teams trying to rile up his short temper during games, Robinson has to deal with prejudice from his own teammates despite his skills on the diamond.

Truth be told, “42” doesn’t break any new ground in regards to the sports movie genre, yet the movie has just the right amount of earnest sentimentality and intense drama to make it work. There are certainly times where it threatens to overstep itself in the emotional manipulation, such as randomly switching a few times to the perspectives of young boys who look up to Robinson, but don’t have any bearing on the plot itself.

In a similar vain, sportswriter Wendell Smith, who seemed as though he would be used as a framing device as he follows Robinson on this journey, is mostly window dressing in the grand scheme of things and isn’t developed beyond sidekick tag-along. He felt like a part that writer/director Brian Helgeland saw more as a historical checkbox than an integral part of the story being told aside from his initial actions that get it all started.

With that said, it’s hard not to be swept up in the events that categorized this year in Robinson’s life. When Philadelphia Phillies manager Ben Chapmen (played against type by the usually affable Alan Tudyk) berates him nonstop during a game, we really feel the anger and frustration bubbling within Robinson. When he goes back into the dugout and releases it all in a fit of bat-breaking rage, it’s an emotionally powerful moment to witness, all the more impressive given this is Chadwick Boseman’s first major acting role. An episode of “Law and Order” and “ C.S.I.” isn’t exactly the calling card for undertaking a part as daunting as Jackie Robinson, but the decision paid off greatly as Boseman steals the movie from his more experienced costars with inner turmoil and charisma to spare.

It can understandably take a few minutes to get used to Harrison Ford’s heightened performance as Branch Rickey. With the rest of the movie and actors being played with earnest seriousness, he might seem like a caricature. As time goes on and the relationship between Rickey and Robinson is given some screen time, the character settles into a groove and shows some of Ford’s more inspired acting after recent years of phoning it in for a paycheck.

Big star Ford aside, Helgeland was wise to fill out the rest of the roles with recognizable character actors. While he isn’t in the movie for too long, Christopher Meloni gets one of the more memorable parts as trainer Leo Durocher, who satisfying puts the rest of the team in its place when they create a petition to stop playing as long as Robinson is there. John C. McGinley gets an amusing bit as broadcaster Red Barber and Lucas Black has a nice part as Pee Wee Reese, one of the few team players who openly sticks up for Robinson. One of the neat and more fulfilling things about the movie is that although Robinson is certainly the central focus, the supporting characters get enough dimension and definition to make them stand out and the movie feel more complete.

That’s why “42” works as well as it does. On the outside, it looks and unfolds like many other inspirational sports movies, hitting the right audience pleasing notes of rousing excitement without really taking risks with the material. If this can be overlooked, the movie yields very gratifying results and the breakout performance from Boseman will most likely win you over, even if the rest of the movie doesn’t. In this age of darkly cynical movies, having one come along that is unabashedly feel-good and made so well is quite refreshing.

It was 2:15 on Monday afternoon. I was in my apartment enjoying a late lunch and watching Mike Napoli send Fenway Park into a tizzy with a walk-off hit to win the Red Sox game.

It was Patriots’ Day. The Sun was up. The Marathon was in full swing. The Sox had won. This is how the best Monday of the year is supposed to be.

Less than an hour later the cheers were replaced with tears. The joy and euphoria of the best Monday of the year had been swallowed and regurgitated as the confusion and hysteria of the cruelest of nightmares. This isn’t supposed to happen. Not in this town. Not on this day.

As a native Bay Stater, it’s hard to describe how much the state anticipates Patriots’ Day. Try combining Christmas, Hanukkah, Super Bowl Sunday, and the first day of summer vacation: that’s Marathon Monday. Schools are closed, families are together and the Red Sox are on at 11 a.m. As a kid there was no better Monday, and as an adult there still isn’t.

Patriots’ Day is Massachusetts’ day. The race snakes through eight towns and usually brings out hundreds of thousands of fans and volunteers. It’s a 26.2-mile party. New Orleans has Mardi Gras; Boston has Patriots’ Day.

Then Monday happened. Three days later it still hasn’t sunk in. That a corps of miscreants could, or would, ever cause this type of chaos on a day as joyous as Patriots Day doesn’t seem real.

I cried. I screamed. I panicked when I couldn’t get through to friends in town (I did later in the day). There were no words.

The pain will linger, but Boston will survive. The degenerates responsible will be brought to justice, the town will dust itself off, and it will remain strong.

A day later the Sun rose. Boston was there. Two days later the Sun rose. Boston was there.

Patriots’ Day was Boston’s day. Patriots’ Day is Boston’s day. Patriots’ Day will always be Boston’s day. No one can, or will, ever take that away from us.

URI ‘shooting’ shows how far behind we still are as journalists, students say

URI ‘shooting’ shows how far behind we still are as journalists

What we’ve come to hear on numerous occasions and contexts of our education at the University of Rhode Island is that our society is considerably troubled and cannot be bothered with vital information – chalk it up to elitism or blissful ignorance, or even a perfect hybrid of both.  When complacency replaces proactivity, and the value of being an informed American is neither recognized nor reinforced, it’s no wonder such troubling neurosis persists in our society.  

As if we are aroused and consumed by mediocrity, we endorse and reinforce the news media to perpetuate this metaphorical condition by simply watching and rarely questioning. This is perhaps part of what WPRO host Matt Allen calls “the putrid Rhode Island gene” – a germ that flourishes in our unique petri dish, incubated by unsophisticated and softball news investigation, shoddy or lazy research and careless rehashing of unverifiable accounts, all coalescing to create a news culture that prove as substantial to the needs of Rhode Islanders as daily drips from TMZ and the National Inquirer, or the blog posts of a melancholy house cat named “Tardar Sauce.”

Of course public interest in the “shooting” has waned:  the story staled as an inevitable consequence of insubstantial reporting.  Naturally, it had to be piggy-backed on the issue of arming the campus police, a dead-horse controversy, given the fact that the most common form of violent crime on the Kingston campus is burglary, followed by rape, according to crime statistics released by the URI Police in 2011. 

The events on Thursday, April 4 showed us, as ever-skeptical journalists, is that we must take an objective look at what our industry is devolving into, and determine the grounds on what disciplined steps must be taken to reverse it. An objective account this is not—it is, however, highly critical.

On the afternoon of April 4 and into the weekend, our fears of a mass attack by unknown gun-people were compounded by concerns with journalistic integrity, and through the weekend we discovered that our industry was unable to fulfill the needs of vital public discourse.  

Less of a discovery than a revelation looking us dead in the eye is the fact that we’ve only just pinpointed an inherent disconnection that our news media exhibit, far-flung from the priorities of truth-seeking and verification, of being right before being first, of loyalty to our citizens, and consideration of the reputable harm on innocent parties that develops as a result of reckless reporting.  

On April 4, it seemed as if the television news stations had pursued the dead-in-the-water “possible active shooter” story with inhuman, insatiable vigilance, stalking professors and calling over any eager student to speak on what happened in the auditorium at the Chafee Social Science Center when hundreds stampeded in a panic to get away from an alleged gunman. 

Very few stories contained a semblance of actual proof that any of these students’ accounts could be positively cross-referenced with the exact classroom and exact time of the incident. Not until a comprehensive reunion of the students and the professor of the class is realized, those who actually heard the man screaming, can any analysis or conclusions be drawn as to what actually happened?  But on April 4 and through the weekend, we heard plenty of reported accounts that bypassed this simple rule. 

The University of Rhode Island baseball team (19-17) pushed its win streak to four in a row Tuesday afternoon as the Rams defeated Boston College 2-1 in extra innings.

“Coming off the sweep at Fordham [last weekend] it was huge to keep the momentum going with another win.” Senior Kevin Stenhouse said.

In the first inning Tim Caputo singled and then stole second to put himself in scoring position. Senior Mike LeBel then singled to left field that scored Caputo to give the Rams a 1-0 lead. LeBel went 2-4 with a double and one RBI in the win; the senior has now gone 5-13 with six RBI in his last three games.

With Junior Milan Mantleon the mound the bottom of the first started off a bit rough. A throwing error from LeBel allowed BC’s lead off batter to reach second base. Mantle then hit the next batter, and threw a wild pitch to the following batter. Matt Paré tied the game for BC with a single, junior John Hennessy then grounded into a double play that drove in a run to give BC a 2-1 advantage.

After reaching on a fielders choice in the top of the second inning junior Joe Landi scored from second on a two-out single off the bat of junior Jeff Roy to tie the game 2-2.

“When you let up a lead you always want to get it back as soon as you can.” Head coach Jim Foster said. “We’ve done a good job lately making sure we get runs and get the lead back when we need to.”

Mantle pitched until the fifth inning, he then handed the ball over to senior Rob Curran. Curran went on to pitch four scoreless frames that helped the Rams force extra innings.

In the top of the tenth inning senior Kevin Stenhouse singled to right field to put the go-ahead run on base for Rhody. A sacrifice bunt from LeBel allowed Stenhouse to move into scoring position. Freshman Connor Foreman then singled which moved Stenhouse to third base. Stenhouse would then score on a past ball to give the Rams the 3-2 lead going into the bottom of the tenth.

The Rams closer Bobby Dean had a 1-2-3 inning with two strikeouts to pick up his seventh save of the year.

Everything seem to come together nicely in the Rhody win as the Rams out-hit the Eagles 12-4 and the three Rams pitchers allowed no earned runs and struck out nine BC batters.

“It was nice for our guys to rack up a bunch of hits and our pitchers to keep throwing as well as they’ve had most of the year.” Stenhouse said.

This weekend the Rams host Temple University for a three game series in hopes to continue their run to the top of the Atlantic 10 baseball standings. Game one will be Friday at 3 p.m., game two will start Saturday at 1 p.m. and the series will conclude on Sunday at noon.

The University of Rhode Island Student Senate recognized five new groups on campus during their meeting Wednesday night.

The Rotaract Club is an official partner of Rotary International, an organization that aims to provide numerous types of service worldwide.  Rotaract will also promote leadership and professional development and have already planned a clean-up for next week. The group has 20 active members and encouraged all interested students to join.

The Sojourn Collegiate Ministry is a Christian organization that aims to create a community for religious and non-religious students to do service and charity work.  Sojourn is also a forum in which any members can speak freely and ask questions on any topic they desire. Sojourn has already participated in a Polar Plunge fundraiser and would like to travel to San Diego, Calif. next year to help with Habitat for Humanity work.

“We’re about creating relationships, doing events and creating a space for students who are non-religious or religious to come together,” sophomore president Sarah Bonneson said.

The Environmental and Natural Resource Economics Student Association (ENRESA) is designed to promote environmental sustainability and have worked closely with the Environmental and Natural Resources Department.  ENRESA had those interested sign pledges for Earth Day to reduce their resource usage, such as taking shorter showers or riding the bus in exchange for items such as lettuce seeds.

Secular URI is an organization during provide a forum in which any interested students can meet to discuss culture, education, politics, science and other topics. The group, which currently has 10 members, will pursue URI professors to speak at their future meetings.

The final group recognized on the night was the Cultural Connections Club. The club pledged to promote diversity and encourage international students to come together and work on group events, such as the recent Brazilian Block Party. The organization has 14 members and any interested students can join.

“We feel as though there any many people who can contribute to the growing cultural society here at the University of Rhode Island,” junior president Anthony Russello said.

The sixth group scheduled for recognition, the Longboard Club, did not have a representative present at the meeting.

IN OTHER NEWS –

•            Senate will vote next week on a programming contingency grant of $2,250 for the Scuba Club.  The funding would cover the cost of SCUBA certification for the club’s members.

•            Senate will vote next week on a capital improvements contingency grant of $911 for the URI Martial Arts:  Capoeira group.  The grant would supplement the cost of musical instruments the club wishes to purchase.

•            Senate held an internal election to determine their Elections Committee. Adam Schumter, Sarah Patterson, Emily Schaffert, Martin Lannan and Rebecca Allamey filled the five seats.

Award-winning reporter Charles M. Sennott delivered the sixth annual Christiane Amanpour Lecture at the University of Rhode Island’s pharmacy building auditorium last Thursday.

In the aftermath of the Boston Marathon bombings, Sennott, the co-founder, vice president and executive editor of the world-news site GlobalPost, changed his talk from covering international reporting in order to address both the terrorist bombings he has covered in his 25 years as a foreign correspondent and the Boston bombings. 

“This week in Boston we had a news event of specific enormity,” Sennott said.  “I have covered a minimum-I stopped counting at 20 bombings in 20 cities.  This bombing was in my hometown and that’s different.”

Sennott, a resident of Boston, was unable to attend a day he describes as his favorite day of the year, this years Boston Marathon, as a result of his recent knee surgery.  At home with his wife, four sons and new golden lab puppies, he heard the news of the explosions from a neighbor.

“[It is] the choreography of some terrible tragedy, some play I never want to see again, but this time the theatre is in my hometown,” Sennott said.  “Suddenly, Boston has an event that is the type of event I’ve covered all over the world.” 

Sennott’s experience covering bombings in areas of conflict such as Colombia, Belfast and Afghanistan gave him insight into these attacks that the average citizen does not have.

“The actual perpetrators may be domestic, but the event is global,” Sennott said.  “It’s always someone’s hometown and we need to cover these events like that.” 

Despite the three-person death count of this incident, Sennott did not compare this event to a large-scale act of terror.

“I think it’s nowhere close to a 9/11 event, I think it’s a shocking gut punch to a city on a beautiful day,” Sennott said.  “Three people were killed and that’s horrific enough, but you need to draw perspective that it’s not 3,000.” 

One of the large issues surrounding the Boston bombings was the fast spreading of information through social media and incorrect reporting. 

“[One of the issues was] reporters scrambling for facts and making mistakes because they’re going too fast,” Sennott said.  “I think you’re a journalist if you’re a story teller and I think this week Boston has a story that needs to be told.” 

Before addressing his topics of presentation, Sennott spoke words of praise for the nationally known journalist and URI graduate whose donation to the university has made the Amanpour lecture series possible.

“There are givers and there are takers,” Sennott said.  “And Christiane [Amanpour] is very much a giver.”

John Pantalone, the URI journalism department chair, introduced Sennott’s presentation. 

“Tonight we hit the jackpot,” Pantalone said in reference to Sennott’s many accolades.

The University of Rhode Island baseball team (22-17), for the second straight weekend, swept an Atlantic-10 opponent.

The Rams’ three wins against Temple University pushed its win streak to seven and elevated Rhody to second place in the conference with a record of 9-3.  

“It’s good to get three more conference wins under the belt,” head coach Jim Foster said. “The team is playing good right now on both sides of the field, we just need to keep it going.”

The Rams pitching staff was pivotal in the weekend sweep as senior Mike Bradstreet (6-3) set the tone for the weekend. Bradstreet struck out a career-high 11 batters through 7.2 innings of work on Friday in the Rams 3-0 victory.

Rhody struggled to score until junior Jeff Roy drove in senior Chris Famiglietti to score the first run of the game. Senior Mike LeBel then struck a double to left-center field that drove in Roy and sophomore Tim Caputo.

Jeff Roy went 4-4 with two stolen bases and accounted for all three runs in the Rams 3-1 victory over the Owls on Saturday. Senior Sean Furney (5-3) pitched five innings in the win where he allowed seven hits and one run. Freshman Brad Applin threw four shutout innings to pick up the first save of his Rhody career.

On Sunday, the Rams went on to complete the sweep with a 6-2 win. The Rams took the lead in the first inning when Caputo scored on a sacrifice fly off the bat of junior Pat Quinn, but quickly gave the lead back in the second inning.

The Owls would score their only two runs in the top of the second due to sloppy fielding by the Rams. Despite giving up the lead, freshman Steve Moyers settled down on the mound for the Rams. Moyer pitched seven innings where he didn’t give up any earned runs and had eight strikeouts.

Freshman Connor Foreman singled up the middle to score Roy in the third inning to tie the game 2-2.

The Rhody bats were silenced until the bottom of the eighth inning where the Rams put four runs on the board. A singles from senior Kevin Stenhouse broke the tie game before an RBI single from Joe Landi and a two-run double from Tim Caputo helped provide some insurance for the bullpen.

Bobby Dean ended the game as he struck out the side to end what was a terrific pitching week for the Rams. 

“Our goal is to win the A-10 championship and to do that we want to put ourselves in the best position possible to win the conference,” Famiglietti said.

Inside the numbers:

The Rams pitching staff went 4-0 this week, holding opponents to a .176 batting average. The Rams and had an ERA of .24 in 37 innings of work. 

“The pitching has been big for us lately,” Foster said. “We know in order to win we need some good pitching, and we’re getting good pitching. That’s why were winning.”

After struggling for the first half of the season, Roy went 6-11 with four stolen bases and five runs during the weekend series.

“Getting him going is important for us to put up runs.” Famiglietti said. “When he gets on he gets in the pitcher’s head and it makes it easier for the middle of the order to get quality at-bats.”

This week the Rams have a busy week as they play five games – all on the road. Rhody plays Brown University today at 3:30 p.m. in Providence and Hartford University at 3 p.m. tomorrow before going on the road to face conference opponent Xavier University.

Multiple law enforcement agencies responded to a report of a possible gunman on the University of Rhode Island campus last Thursday that turned out to be, after some investigation, a false alarm.

At approximately 11:20 a.m. on April 4, the University of Rhode Island and South Kingstown police departments responded to a call of a possible gunman in the Chafee Social Science Center, according to Charlestown Police Lt. Patrick McMahon who was acting public information officer for a short time.

One of the many responding to the call was URI police officer Frank Pascale. Pascale said the URI police “[couldn’t] engage” until the South Kingstown police arrived at the scene. URI police were unable to enter Chafee because they are not armed. “This has been a constant battle for police men on campus to get firearms,” URI police officer Mark Chearino said. Chearino said that since the Virginia Tech massacre, every state except Rhode Island has armed their campus police officers with guns. Currently, the URI police carry pepper spray and batons.

Through all of the commotion, as police tried to figure out what happened, witnesses recounted different versions of what happened.

The location of the incident was confirmed to have been in Barbara Van Sciver’s, who is listed as a lecturer on the College of the Environment and Life Sciences webpage, human physiology class, according to junior Kayla Gilmore and other students.

“We were just sitting there and [I] heard somebody pounding on the door saying he had a gun,” Gilmore said. “He was just screaming ‘let me in I have a gun.’”

Gilmore said she and others hid under their desks and about “10 seconds later” was when Van Sciver said to the class, “everybody run.”

Gilmore said she didn’t see the man, but she heard him. Gilmore said the scene resembled that of a stampede in that “everyone was trampling over each other.

“I was going down the stairs head first,” Gilmore, who sustained minor bumps and bruises on her legs, said.

Another student in the class, Shawn Volpe was recording the lecture on his phone and was able to capture audio from within the class.

He said it was a normal lecture when someone got up and yelled. From his recording a male voice is heard yelling, “I’m a nice guy. I’m a nice guy,” followed by a female voice yelling, “Oh my god.” Following those two, all that could be heard was yelling by students in the class in addition to the sounds of desks.

Volpe said he didn’t see the person who said, “I’m a nice guy.”

Van Sciver said she didn’t hear exactly what was said but “it just sounded angry to me.”  She said students then got up and started to run.  She said she stood by the door telling everyone to “go out, everybody out.”

Sophomore Brian Myette, another student in the classroom, said he also heard someone say, “I’m a nice guy, I’m a nice guy,” and said he heard a woman yell, “he has a gun,” after which everyone started to run.  Another student present in the classroom said he believed it was a man who said, “he has a gun.”

After students were evacuated, Chafee was cleared room-by-room by the Rhode Island State Police according to a message sent via the alert system at URI.

A notification was sent out by the university at approximately 11:50 a.m. notified students, faculty and staff of a “possible active shooter on campus.” A follow-up to that notification came at approximately 12:06 p.m. with more details of the location of the incident and instructions to stay indoors. Classes were canceled at approximately 12:48 p.m. for precautionary reasons and by 2:30 p.m. the campus-wide lockdown was lifted.

Rhode Island State Police Capt. Frank B. Castellone replaced McMahon in addressing the media. He said, during the press conference that “at no time was there a gun or an active shooter on the campus.”

The university, by way of the alert messaging system to students also wrote “the investigation has revealed that at no time was there a gun or an active shooter on the campus.”

What the police did find was a Nerf gun in the backpack of a student in the class, but URI Police Department Major Stephen Baker said he did not know if the Humans vs. Zombies game is connected to the incident. URI President David M. Dooley said there has never been a problem with the Human vs. Zombies organization in the past. Castellone said it’s possible that it was a misinterpretation but all possibilities are open.

When asked if this brings up the case of arming on campus police officers, Dooley said he supports the move to arm campus police officers.

When asked if she thought the incident was real or not, Gilmore said “I don’t know why anyone would joke about that.

This past Thursday, April 4, famous film critic and journalist Roger Ebert passed away after enduring a long decade with thyroid cancer.

Despite the many difficulties he fought through, including having to leave his film criticism television show “At the Movies” due to surgeries, Ebert continued his film work up to the very end on his personal website. Through his dedication and love for movies, Ebert has been one of my main influences in becoming a writer; in particular an aspiring film critic and his passing hit me – and the rest of the Internet – pretty hard when the news broke.

Throughout almost the whole weekend, Ebert continued to be trending strong – notably on Twitter – because of the amount of respect he has garnered from other aspiring writers, fellow critics and many filmmakers who admired his work. Most famous for having the rating system of a thumbs up/down with his “At the Movies” costar Gene Siskel, his appreciation of movies as an art form went beyond simple hand gestures and statements boiled down to three minute segments.

Ebert was one of the first film critics to champion smaller B-movies, particularly horror movies, and showed that they have merit and entertainment value of their own that doesn’t have to be appreciated as high art. In fact, during the start of his career, he co-wrote the screenplays for many films of his director friend Russ Meyer. Meyer was an unabashed exploitation filmmaker, and the Ebert-scripted “Beyond the Valley of the Dolls” has withstood time as a cult classic of fun schlock.

That was the thing about Ebert’s writing: he would be honest about liking a movie that could be considered “trash cinema” and about disliking a movie that had been receiving a lot of praise and success. Great films, at least to most of us, such as “Blue Velvet” and “The Usual Suspects” were given the negative treatment by him, but I learned something from these outside-the-majority reviews of his. It does not matter whether everyone disagrees with you or your opinion seems crazy at first. From Ebert’s writing, I learned that any viewpoint could be expressed as long as you back it up with reasoning and an engaging writing style. As the man said about the movies themselves one time, “It’s not what a movie is about, it’s how it is about it.”

Reading through his film reviews, it becomes clear that his profession wasn’t merely a job to him, but a passion. No two of his reviews are ever the same, and never fall into a mechanical structure. Every review made that movie feel special, even if it was a bad one, because his write-up was tuned into that movie in the moment. Often times, he would focus on one aspect and how that made the film stand out rather than breezing through the review “essentials” like acting, visuals, special effects and the like. In the case of evocative art films such as “The Tree of Life,” which defy typical description, Ebert would show how his love of the film was brought about by certain feelings it invoked in him, rather than a cold appreciation of its technical achievements. Films were alive to him.

He was also able to make criticism fun, and often funny. The arguments he would often get into with Siskel on “At the Movies” provided much entertainment value, and his writing displayed this too. It was a particular treat when he found a movie he could pan with such fervor. On the Ashton Kutcher rom-com “A Lot Like Love,” he said, “To call ‘A Lot Like Love’ dead in the water is an insult to water.” In his recent review of “Battle: Los Angeles” he said, “Here’s a science-fiction film that’s an insult to the words ‘science’ and ‘fiction,’ and the hyphen in between them.”

A favorite of mine is his takedown of “The Human Centipede:” “I am required to award stars to movies I review. This time, I refuse to do it. The star rating system is unsuited to this film. Is the movie good? Is it bad? Does it matter? It is what it is and occupies a world where the stars don’t shine.”

Ebert made it feel like sitting through every movie, even the bad ones, was unique, and that the bad ones could inspire a reaction as inspired and fiery as the great ones, rather than one of mere discontent. I admired him for the passion he showed in his work, for his embrace of new technology (especially towards Twitter and online criticism), for his honest and singular viewpoints, and for the impact he made in raising the stature and prominence of film criticism outside of cinema circles. He will be greatly missed, but his mark will always remain there as a role model to the many that looked up to him, including myself. I’m still waiting on an explanation for how “Anaconda” and “Cop and a Half” got higher ratings than “A Clockwork Orange” and “Raising Arizona” though.

Investigations by the ESPN program "Outside the Lines" has brought to light information regarding the charitable foundation of a former University of Rhode Island basketball star, the Providence Journal reports.

Lamar Odom's charitable foundation Cathy's Kids was founded in 2004 "to honor his mother who died from stomach cancer when he was a 12-year-old growing up in Queens, N.Y.," the Providence Journal reports.

During an ESPN review of eight years of tax records, it was discovered that Cathy's Kids had never given any grant money to cancer-related causes. "Of the $2.2 million raised by the charity, $1.3 million went to salaries and to finance two elite youth basketball travel teams," the Providence Journal reports. ESPN writes that the mission of Cathy's Kids was to raise funds for cancer-related causes, though no money has been given for it.

Cathy's Kids only has one paid executive in Jerry DeGregorio, Odom's high school coach and best man at his wedding DeGregorio is now an assistant coach for the Golden State Warriors. The Providence Journal writes that as a

secretary for the foundation, DeGregorio made, from 2004 through 2011, a "median annual salary of about $72,000. The 2011 tax returns show the charity was $256,000 in debt."

 ESPN reports the $256,000 debt comes from "a loan Odom made to the charity, according to his business manager Lester Knispel, also the charity's treasurer." Though the loan wasn't illegal, ESPN reports, it is "they type of action that nonprofit groups consider a red flag because it could indicate the charity was in poor financial health and such a loan could create a conflict of interest."

After multiple confrontations with Odom, neither ESPN nor his agent was able to get an answer as to why his charity was considered dormant.

Odom's celebrity wife Khloe Kardashian took to her Celebuzz blog in order to address the ESPN report, according to the Huffington Post. "On her blog, Kardashian insisted Odom has personally donated millions and no money ever 'went to help Lamar personally or any member of his family,'" the Huffington Post writes.

In her blog post, Kardashian lists some of the purposes of the organization as "[benefiting] underprivileged youth and cancer research." She makes mention of the AAU basketball teams the foundation has funded, but not of any money going toward cancer research.

The University of Rhode Island Student Senate unanimously voted to uphold the decision of the Finance Committee to unfreeze the budgets of the Pan-Hellenic Council (Panhel) during their meeting last night.

    The Senate made their choice after new evidence revealed that no female delegates were implicated in the incident that occurred at a conference for the National Greek Leadership Association in Hartford, Conn., which both Panhel and the Inter-Fraternity Council (IFC) attended. Some of the members of the URI delegation were found with alcoholic beverages in their possession, something that is strictly prohibited by those who run the event. 

    “In this instance, I think that everyone should be in favor of the decision that Finance [Committee] made and that you vote to uphold the decision and unfreeze the budget of the Panhellenic Council,” finance chairwoman Kristen Stewart said.

Panhel and IFC were asked to leave the conference after committing the infraction and being insubordinate with NGLA officials.  Both groups were warned that if the incident were to happen again, they would be permanently banned from the conference. Former Student Senate president Stephanie Segal reported the findings at a meeting last month from a letter sent to Vice President of Student Affairs Thomas R. Dougan.  

The original punishment was reconsidered after the Rules and Ethics Committee voted last week to return the decision to the Finance Committee for further deliberation. 

The Senate voted earlier to uphold the freezing of the IFC budgets until next semester. The organization also will not be eligible for travel contingencies until the fall semester of 2014.

IN OTHER NEWS –

•            President Matthew Kilduff announced his appointees for certain positions during Wednesday night’s meeting:  Sydney Kempler (Director of Communications), Kyle St. Jean (Chief Information Officer), Ansley Stuart (Secretary) and Pitu Sim (Treasurer).

•            The Senate approved a programming contingency grant of $3,857 for Uhuru Sasa to host their annual Fashion Show, for which they are expecting more than 300 attendees.  The funds will go towards staging, props, lighting and promoting the event, which carries a Michael Jackson theme this year. The show will take place on April 26 in the Ram’s Den.

•            The Senate unanimously recognized The Venue during their meeting Wednesday evening.  The Venue is a Christian youth group who has engaged in different types of community work, such as raising money for starving children and holding toy drives. The Venue, which currently has approximately 10 members, meets in the Atrium on Tuesdays and encourages all who are interested to join.

•            The Senate voted to move $20,000 from the Tax Allocation fund to the programming contingency fund. 

•            The Senate will vote next week on a programming contingency grant of $7,010 for the Asian Students Association.  The grant would help the group host their 26th Annual Culture Show.

•            The Senate will vote next week on a general contingency grant of $750 for the newly recognized URI Dressage Team.  The grant would cover the costs of paying the squad’s coaches for the remainder of the semester.

•            The Senate will vote next week on a contingency grant of $1,110 for the Gay-Straight Alliance.  The grant would assist GSA in holding their Day of Silence and Break the Silence Dance.

After Governor Lincoln Chafee signed it into law last June, the decriminalization of marijuana became official this past Monday.

This does not, however, mean that it isn’t still illegal to possess.

As of April 1, possession of an ounce or less of marijuana will now be treated as a civil violation rather than a crime in the state of Rhode Island. Instead of being criminally charged, those found with small amounts will instead receive a $150 fine. However, the Providence Journal writes “three such violations within 18 months would be a misdemeanor with larger fines and/or prison.” Of the fines collected for the violations, half will go to drug-awareness-and-treatment programs for youths.

“As far as the police go, if we encounter someone with marijuana and determine that it’s an ounce or less, those people, at the discretion of the police officer, can receive what amounts to a traffic ticket to appear in traffic court to answer the charge,” University of Rhode Island police Maj. Stephen N. Baker said. “For those [older than] 18, it’s punishable by a fine of up to $150. For those under 18, the penalties are different. The penalties include [drug education classes], but they will also be sent to the same court.”

Baker said that if students are found in possession and given a violation, they will be sent to the Wakefield Traffic Court. “Basically that’s the only change on our end,” Baker said.

Whenever a student is charged with a violation, a report will be forwarded to the Office of Student Life. Even if the individual is not charged and, in the officer’s discretion, they deem it to be unnecessary to write a civil violation, a report will still be forwarded to the Office of Student Life.

Regardless of the location of the violations - on or off campus - students are still reported to the university, according to Katrina Dorsey, coordinator of off-campus living. “Anything that happens off campus, whether it’s the South Kingstown Police, the Narragansett Police - if it happens with someone who is a [URI] student, we get those reports no matter what happens,” she said.

Dorsey said students shouldn’t misunderstand what decriminalization means.

“It only means they don’t go to jail,” Dorsey said. “It doesn’t mean they won’t be held accountable for their actions. They will be held accountable accordingly.”

Another important fact with student drug use on campus, which Dorsey mentioned, was the eligibility for a student to receive financial aid. She said the United States Department of Education requires all students who receive financial aid to sign a no drug use oath in order to receive financial aid. “So that is still in effect no matter what happens,” Dorsey said.

The Federal Student Aid website writes that if a student has been convicted for an offense that happened while the student was receiving financial aid, the aid can be affected. Students who have been convicted are required to fill out a worksheet in order to help determine whether or not the conviction affects the eligibility for federal student aid.

If a student’s federal aid has been suspended due to a conviction, the student can regain eligibility “early by successfully completing an approved drug rehabilitation program or by passing two unannounced drug tests administered by an approved drug rehabilitation program,” according to the site. If a student regains eligibility during the same year they are given an award, they are required to notify their financial aid office so that they can begin to receive the aid they were eligible for.

Students who are convicted of a drug-related offense after submitting their FAFSA can lose eligibility and may “be liable for returning any financial aid received during a period of ineligibility.” 

Rhode Island is one of 14 states that have decriminalized marijuana.

Baker said though it has been decriminalized, it still remains a crime to sell marijuana, even if the amount sold is less than an ounce.

“Whether it’s an ounce or less, it’s still a felony charge,” Baker said. “Most cases it’s a misdemeanor arrest for [possession of] up to 2.2 pounds, other than that it’s a felony for possession of [more than] a kilo. If there’s any evidence of sales, that’s a felony. Our department will investigate all possession issues, even if it’s a civil violation. We’re going to try to determine where the marijuana is coming from because it’s still a violation to have it on campus.”

Marijuana remains a controlled substance on campus. “Students need to be mindful of the use of marijuana...they could lose their financial aid,” Dorsey said. “Students need to pay attention, because records are filed through the court system and those records, if searched, can be found. With their names linking them to possession or consumption of marijuana with a ticket, citation or violation.”

Gov. Lincoln Chafee has proposed a two-step pay raise for 14 of his top directors within his administration.

This news comes after Chafee denounced a previously proposed pay raise for members of the University of Rhode Island faculty union, a year ago, according to the Providence Journal and Boston Globe.

The pay raise, which will total 6 percent - 3 percent in June and 3 percent in December - comes after the governor told the chairman of the Board of Governors for Higher Education that he couldn't support a retroactive 3 percent raise "tentatively negotiated with faculty at [URI] and three other unions at URI, Rhode Island College and the Community College of Rhode Island," according to the Providence Journal.

In April 2012, "the 700-member union and the chairman of the now-defunct Board of Governors for Higher Education, Lorne Adrain, negotiated a two-year agreement last year that would have given the faculty at the three public colleges 3 percent raises," the Providence Journals reports.

The Providence Journal cites that Chafee said, at the time, the raises for state university and college workers were "inappropriate 'at a time when Rhode Islanders are struggling and when other state employees are making a daily sacrifice to help the state remain fiscally healthy.'"

The news of this proposed pay raise to the governor's directors has not yielded a positive reaction from those turned down.

"I guess the governor feels the work of his directors must be more significant than the efforts of the URI faculty to teach America's young people," Frank Annunziato, executive director of URI's American Association of University Professors, told the Providence Journal. "I hope his directors enjoy their raise and I hope the governor’s largesse will now extend to the vastly underpaid URI faculty."

If the proposed raises are approved, each one of Chafee's department heads will be earning more than $100,000 a year. The highest paid of the department heads will be Rosemary Booth Gallogly, a 30-year veteran and head of the department of revenue, whose pay will increase to $166,383 come Dec. 29, if the proposal is approved, according to the Providence Journal.

A state law allows a governor to propose raises for their cabinet members, on one main condition. They are required to propose the raises at a hearing that is open to public comment - which Chafee did - last Friday at 9 a.m.

In a separate report, the Providence Journal noted that an incentive for Rhode Island agency directors is the ability to have a state-issued vehicle. They write that though a vehicle is offered, not all of them choose to take one. Four of the seven who have taken a vehicle use it to commute to and from work, the others "'use them during the days for business travel,'" Ronald Renaud, a department of administration official, told the Providence Journal.

It happened with one swing last February in Nashville.

Then-Rhode Island senior Mike LeBel said that he felt a twinge of pain in his left arm during a game against Vanderbilt University. He stuck out the game, but the next day he couldn’t move his arm.

It was a torn labrum; his season was over. Throughout the next year, LeBel was in a sling with an awkward pad stuck between his wrist and armpit to stabilize his shoulder. He said he had to sleep in a recliner for six weeks after getting surgery.

“Rehab was tough,” LeBel said of getting healthy. “It wasn’t something I think you’d want to wake up and do. It’s not fun, but it’s something you have to take seriously if you want to come back the way you want to.”

LeBel, URI’s all-time home run leader, could have graduated and moved on, but he said he came back for a fifth year for one reason: to win a championship. However; things were different in the URI baseball program when LeBel came back into the fold this season.

Shortstop, the position LeBel had starred at for two years, was being played by sophomore Tim Caputo. LeBel moved over to the hot corner and said he’s comfortable at third.

“Timmy is an outstanding shortstop; he does an outstanding job for us,” LeBel said. “I played third my freshman year so it’s a little blast from the past for me. I’m having a good time over there.”

This season LeBel has returned to the form he showed before the injury. He is the only Ram with a home run this season, and he leads the team with 14 runs batted in. Defensively, LeBel has amassed 50 assists, second only to Caputo’s 71, and a .939 fielding percentage. He is one of four Rams to have started in all 23 games this season.

As one of the oldest players on the team LeBel said that he’s ready to accept the responsibility of being a leader on and off the field.

“I’m definitely ready for it; I was a captain my junior and senior year,” LeBel said. “It’s just about going your business the right way and going out and playing good baseball. We know we have a good team so that’s all it takes.”

With less than three months left of his college career LeBel said that he wants to keep playing if possible but is keeping his options open.

“I’d love to keep playing,” LeBel said. “I’m going to get a degree in finance and that means a lot, I’ve always taken academics seriously. Wherever life takes me that’s where I’m going to go.”

Yesterday it was announced the University of Rhode Island assistant men’s basketball coach Bobby Hurley would be taking over as head coach at the University of Buffalo.

Ouch.

When Bobby’s younger brother, Dan, left Wagner College to come to URI it was expected by many that Bobby would take over the reins of the Seahawks. Instead, he followed Dan to Kingston and helped stabilize a program in desperate need of direction.

In a statement yesterday Dan said he was happy for his brother.

“I am excited for Bobby and the great opportunity he has ahead of him at the University at Buffalo,” Hurley said. “The last few years we have coached together have been special and I know he is ready for this next step.  Buffalo is getting a great coach and an even better person.”

Buffalo’s gain, however, is a big loss for Rhode Island. Bobby, a double national champion with Duke in the early 1990s and the NCAA’s all-time assist leader, brings a brand to go along with his knowledge of the game.

Now what for the Rams?

Jim Carr and Preston Murphy both remain on the staff as assistants. Murphy, a star at URI in the late-90s, has developed a recruiting pipeline out of the state of Michigan that has already brought Jordan Hare into the program as well as top-100 recruit E.C. Matthews, who will arrive in Kingston next fall. Carr has more than 20 years coaching experience and was able to land high-level international recruits during his time at Rutgers University.

A quality, local coach who would fill the void nicely is Franklin Dobbs. Dobbs, who just finished his second season at Bryant University, helped guide the Bulldogs to their first ever postseason appearance and has strong local ties. His career includes stops at Boston College, Cleveland State, and as head coach at Brown University.

During his time at BC and Cleveland State Dobbs was also a recruiting coordinator to go along with his coaching duties. Another strong recruiter, with local ties, would be a plus for the Rams.

Parents and students can breathe a small sigh of relief, as student tuition will not be increased in the fall.

The University of Rhode Island's recent announcement of a tuition freeze for the 2013-14 school year is welcoming news for both new and returning students, although possible financial shortcomings loom for the university.

“It's a little bit of a risk, I will admit,” URI President David M. Dooley said. “We needed to make a decision, even though the state is still making the budget.”

Dooley explained that Rhode Island Governor Lincoln Chafee countered the university's proposal of a $12 million increase in state funding with a $6 million increase along with a guarantee of a tuition freeze.

 “It wasn't as much as necessary, but a good step,” Dooley said.

In the previous three fiscal years, the university had added between $12 and 15 million per year through tuition increases. With the current $260 million figure staying stagnant next year, the $6 million given by the state won't be enough to make up the difference. Dooley said the university is anticipating a $4.9 million gap in the budget.

“We're seeking alternative measures to reduce expenses,” Vice President of Administration and Finance Bob Weygand said. “Are there some things we do now that we don't need next year? What about academic programs...that only have four or five students enrolled?”

Weygand said a decent portion of the gap would be closed through a reduction of employees. Rather than hiring new people to fill vacancies, he said current employees would instead pick up extra hours to reduce overall spending.

In addition to the tuition freeze, the university is expected to give out its highest amount of financial aid ever.

“[College] is more expensive than it should be, I believe,” Dooley said. Since Pell grants no longer provide as much help as they used to, he hopes the $90 million in financial aid will offset the difference for students.

Despite the financial aid, recent tuition hikes have put an increased burden on families who are trying to afford college. Weygand believes that freeze will help retain some students who are currently struggling to afford school and cannot pay any more than they already do. He explained that even small amounts of money can make a huge difference.

“In my senior year I was really struggling, and I got a $250 financial aid grant. That was the difference,” he said. “When the economy is bad, $1,000 makes a big difference.”

Dooley also recognizes the importance of keeping tuition as low as possible. He said that although the cost of attending URI as a on-resident is around $40,000, “It's much cheaper to go here than Providence College or other [private] schools.” He added that he wants URI to remain “a good investment” for those who attend.

The Community College of Rhode Island and Rhode Island College also agreed to freeze tuition in exchange for more state support. Weygand said enrollment is rising rapidly for those schools, and even a small increase in student enrollment at URI would be a big help moving forward.

“Retention rates are very important,” he said. “If we increase enrollment by 100 [in-state students], we will generate another $1.5 million.” He added that retaining just 10 more out-of-state students would add more than $250,000 in revenue.

Of course, the possibility of the freeze backfiring is present. However, Weygand believes that a larger jump in tuition rates for the 2014-15 academic year is unlikely.

“I think the goal is to at least decrease the rate at which tuition increases,” Dooley added. “[We hope state help will] enable us to get on a trajectory of modest increases.”

How much the state will be able and willing to help is unclear. Whereas the state at one point gave approximately $80 million to the University, only $58 million was given for this fiscal year.

“That's a significant drop in a short time,” Dooley said. “[However,] they understand that higher education is getting more expensive.”

He added that with the improving economy, more money may be available within the next few years.

“Assuming there is no tuition increase or only a modest one, we're asking for an increase of $9 million more [from the state next year],” Weygand said.

Weygand acknowledged that many of these figures are not set in stone.

“We're assuming the [budget] proposal will pass legislature,” he said. “[The budget committee] doesn't decide how much to give until the budget is passed.”

Though the school is already sending out financial aid packages to students based on the projected budget, the committee will not decide on the state's final amount of support until the summer. If less money is given to the university than is expected, more cuts will be needed to account for the difference.

“The timing is not advantageous to us,” Weygand said. “We're in uncharted waters until June.”

Despite the multitude of moving parts, he believes it is the proper course of action.

“Freezing tuition is in the best interest of students and their families,” he said.

Dooley said the freeze should benefit the university more than hinder it.

“We think we can manage that increase in revenue...We think it's the right thing to do.”

On Thursday, prominent writer and lesbian Barrie Jean Borich presented a reading of her new memoir, Body Geographic, in the Harge Forum of the Multicultural Center, hosted by the gender and women’s studies department.

Borich’s visit both promoted her new memoir and was the final event of the opening day of the University of Rhode Island’s 19th annual Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Intersex Queer and Questioning (LGBTIQQ) Symposium this year entitled Pioneers of Pride.

The reading was well attended and opened to a Q&A where Borich answered URI students and faculty questions on everything from stylistic choices in her non-linear memoir to what it is to be a lesbian today as opposed to 15 years ago.

Borich’s presentation was a well-chosen one to launch this years LQBTIQQ symposium. Both her novel and her speech offered undertones of both gay activism and pride with comments on what an exciting time it is for gay rights today.

Borich’s novel follows her life geographically, linking her physical location to emotions and events including her relationship with her partner Linnea Stenson. In her novel, Borich addresses issues such as rape, love, and sexuality. At a time when marriage equality is being discussed by the Supreme Court, Borich’s reading and words of wisdom resonated with students at the university.

“I thought Borich’s book reading and talk was very powerful,” freshman Sarah Smith said. “As a heterosexual supporter of marriage equality it was really interesting to gain perspective into the mind of a gay rights activist and lesbian.”

Borich, who holds an MFA from the Rainier Writers Workshop at Pacific Lutheran University is known for other works such as My Lesbian Husband and various essays and poems.

The author currently splits her time between Chicago and Minneapolis and teaches creative writing in the English Department at Chicago’s DePaul University.

This story is part of Softball Stories, a season-long look inside the University of Rhode Island softball program as it looks to improve upon its best season in over seven years. All of the stories are written by current players and will take you on the field, in the dugout, and on the road with the Rams.


The Rhody women’s softball team packed its equipment, positive attitude, and light-hearted spirit and was back on the road again over the weekend.

We have had an intense week, to be sure. This weekend alone, Rhody traveled through Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Georgia, and Ohio. We are becoming very familiar with every airport up and down the east coast, and we have spent more time on the road this month than we have in the Ocean State.  The endless hours we have spent in buses, vans, and planes have not gone unnoticed. It has made us work that much harder. It is a challenge, but we have been able to stick together due to our intense travel schedule.

We started our play this week against Yale University on Friday, splitting the double header with the Ivy Leaguers. After a tough loss in the opening game, the Rams came back fighting. Offensively, we exploded in the second contest. The Rhody Rams came out with intensity in the second game, with a strong pitching performance by junior Samantha Bedore and a tight-knit defense behind her. The bats all through the line up were explosive and strong, scoring 13 runs, including a three-run home run by senior Courtney Prendergast. The Rhody Rams knocked the Bulldogs out of the water with a score of 13-6. It was our biggest scoring outburst of the season, and we used this intensity and momentum to carry us into our Atlantic-10 Conference opener in Dayton, Ohio on Saturday.

After traveling through the night, we arrived in Dayton two flights later ready to take on Flyers. Although we lost the game, our bats stayed hot, which is a good sign. Balls were flying over the fence and off our bats. Freshman Lauren Klepchick had her first career home run as a Rhode Island Ram, and junior Jocelyn Mattison also went yard.

Due to inclement weather and snow in Dayton, our Sunday game was canceled and we only played one game against the Flyers. Our bats left a major mark on them, and we will continue to improve and take charge in our Atlantic 10 competition this Friday.

The University of Rhode Island is presenting a breast cancer awareness and research event tomorrow night at the Boss Ice Arena.

The event, called “Pink the Rink,” will be held from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. and there will be a $5 admission fee that will be used as a donation to go directly to the Gloria Gemma Breast Cancer foundation of Pawtucket, RI. Participants are welcome to bring their own skates, or they may rent a pair for an additional cost.

“All donations go directly to the foundation,” senior and head of the event Julian Emerich said. “The Boss Ice Arena has donated the two hours of ice time.”

The Gloria Gemma Foundation will be present at the event to provide information about breast cancer and early detection. Local DJ Top Nach will also be there playing top-40 hits and raffles with prizes such as gift cards to Subway, UMelt and Burger Shack will be available.

URI has donated the ice rink and hospitality rooms to Emerich free of charge, the senior said in an email.

Emerich is the lead coordinator of the event, working alongside fellow students.

“No projects, no assignments, just my vision and their help,” Emerich said in an email.

The Boss Ice Arena and the Subway located inside the arena are also contributing to donations to the foundation with their sales on the night. Both companies will be donating 10 percent of their sales for the night to the Gloria Gemma Foundation.

The entire event was inspired by “a similar event on the quad this year” that ended up being successful, according to Emerich. “I wanted to hold this event to help differentiate myself before I graduate,” he said.

Further information about “Pink the Rink” can be found on the events calendar on the Boss Ice Arena website.

Earlier this week it was formally announced that Xavier University and Butler University would be leaving the Atlantic-10 Conference and going to the new Big East Conference beginning next season. Compound that with the exit of Temple University to the America-12 conference, and the University of North Carolina-Charlotte heading to Conference-USA, and the Atlantic-10 will look drastically different in terms of geography and competitiveness.

Numerically, a 12-team league will work in terms of scheduling and tournament purposes, but the A-10 can’t replace the prestige that will officially leave in July. The brand-name recognition of Xavier, Butler, and Temple, to go with their strength athletically, is a huge blow to a league that has very little power in the world of realignment.

The league can either opt to stay as a 12-team league and build an identity as a strong eastern league. The lone team west of the Eastern Time zone is St. Louis University and it has been linked to the Big East in the future.

A league built around Virginia, New England and the Mid-Atlantic is the best way to go long-term. For Rhode Island, more than half the league would be a manageable bus ride away and it would make recruiting more centralized. However; with SLU, and potentially the University of Dayton being linked to the Big East, it seems that the A-10 will have to look to add teams into the fold.

The first logical choice is George Mason University. Based in suburban Washington, D.C., Mason is a natural fit as it would be easily able to build rivalries with Virginia Commonwealth University and George Washington.

Beyond that the pickings are slim. Schools that have been thrown about in the Twitterverse are Davidson College and Siena College. Davidson will always be tied to Stephen Curry and the Wildcats’ magical 2008 run to the Elite Eight of the men’s basketball tournament, and it would expand the league’s footprint back into Charlotte market.

However, the school is incredibly small, with only 1,800 undergraduates. It would also be the only Presbyterian school in a league that, in its 12-team configuration, has seven Catholic institutions. From an athletics perspective, and in terms of market expansion, the Wildcats fit, but would Davidson fit “the mold” that the presidents of the league’s schools are interested in? I don’t know.

Siena, a Catholic school, would expand the league into the Buffalo market. The Saints, however, don’t have the selling power of Davidson or George Mason. The Saints had recent success, advancing to the Round of 32 in the men’s basketball tournament in 2008 and 2009 and becoming a national contender in men’s lacrosse.

If SLU and Dayton leave, and I was the commissioner of the Atlantic-10, the first two phone calls I make are to George Mason and Davidson. Athletically they help keep the league where it is in the conference pecking and keeps the league’s geographic footprint intact.

The University of Rhode Island Student Senate approved two contingency grants for the Student Association for the Advancement of Haitian People (SAAHP) during their meeting Wednesday night.

The first grant was a programming contingency of $4,195 for SAAHP to host the Third Annual Musical Gospel Concert on Saturday from 7-10 p.m. in Edwards auditorium.  The goal of the free event is to raise money through donations for the Village of Promise Foundation, which will go towards helping victims of the 2010 earthquake. 

The second grant was a travel contingency of $1,260 for SAAHP to attend Fifteenth Annual Haitian Student Conference in Washington, D.C. The conference, which will take place April 19-20, invites Haitian organizations from around the country to listen to keynote speakers and discuss their groups.

“For the future we’re looking to hold the gospel concert again next year,” SAAHP Vice President and treasurer Lynly Jean-Louis said. “We’re looking to explore different avenues through doing other shows and other conferences and reach out to other organizations and schools.”

IN OTHER NEWS

    The Senate approved a programming contingency grant of $5,200 for the Students for a Sensible Drug Policy (SSDP) to hold their Hempfest.  Students are invited to listen to speakers, listen to music, play games and enjoy food from vendors. The free event will take place on the quadrangle on April 20 from 3-11 p.m.

    The Senate recognized the Costuming Club during their meeting Wednesday night. The Costuming Club hopes to cultivate a positive environment in which all students can create and enjoy costumes.  The group currently has 13 members and invites any interested students to join.

When the Rams got back from Oklahoma the reaction and response from the fans in the Ocean State was overwhelming to say the least, and the ensuing week was chaotic.

Reynolds-Dean – Once we landed, everyone was waiting for us at T.F Green. The support was unreal. The whole community was on the bandwagon after that week. Students would come up with balls and t-shirts and ask you to sign them.

Clay – It was a natural high. It was good to see the support once we got off the airplane. Everyone had the signs and wanted to hear us talk; it was unbelievable feeling all the support.

Harrick – We came back and they were all over the airport waiting for us; it was wild. It was pandemonium all week but that’s what it’s like when you get to the [Sweet] Sixteen and the [Elite] Eight. I think the kids really enjoyed it. It was really special.

Reynolds-Dean – I remember walking around campus and in the dining halls everyone was wearing Rhode Island t-shirts; it was chaotic. The teachers were asking you about the games. It was good and it was overwhelming as well.

Up next for the Rams was a Sweet Sixteen date against one of the great fairy tales of college basketball: Valparaiso. The Crusaders, coached by Homer Drew and led by his son Bryce, were the 13-seed in the region and had upset the University of Mississippi in the opening when the younger Drew hit a now-famous three at the buzzer.

The trip to St. Louis was a family affair for the Harricks as Jim Jr. was an assistant coach under Drew at Valpo.

Wheeler – We knew they were the Cinderella and they had Bryce Drew, who was kind of the golden boy of college basketball at the time.

Harrick – It was a tough game; it was a good game. They came out and with 16 minutes left in the second half they were up six. They come out of the timeout and come over half court to pick us up. Well, I put Preston on the floor and we spread the floor on them so now we have Wheeler, Murphy, and Mobley. They can’t guard any of those guys. We went from six down to 10 up with four minutes to go in the game.

Clay – Once you make it past the first weekend there is no such thing as the big guy or the little guy; everyone has showed they can win. We were picked to win but you can’t underestimate everyone when it comes to playing in the tournament. We just went out there and played the way we normally played and it worked out well.

King – It was a tough game physically because we didn’t know much about them and they were much bigger than we thought they would be.

Murphy – It was definitely a shift. You could feel the shift from us being the underdogs to us being the favorite. It’s a credit to our team because we didn’t do anything different. We went in there and executed.

Reynolds-Dean – That was one of my best games. It was real tight and I got a putback late in the game. Tyson got me the ball in the right spots, and I could finish and create for other teammates. I remember that we knew that Valpo wasn’t going to go away and we knew Bryce Drew was a great player. We didn’t think we had the game won until the final buzzer.

Wheeler – It was a tough game; we were going back and forth. Cuttino was sticking Bryce Drew and doing an excellent job of defending him. We tried to make the other players beat us. We were really rolling as a team. Coach Harrick said he’d never seen his UCLA offense ever run that well.

Reynolds-Dean scored 16 points and grabbed 11 rebounds to lead the Rams to a 74-68 victory and the program’s first appearance in the Elite Eight. Mobley also had 16 points; Clay and Murphy added 14 and 12 respectively.

Waiting for the Rams in the regional final was an old foe: Stanford. The Cardinal, the three seed in the region, defeated Purdue to set up a rematch with the Rams.

Wheeler – After playing in the Cable Car, where we felt we should have won, we came in confident. We matched up well against them. They had big guys, but they were slow; we felt we could expose them in that aspect of the game.

King – Because we knew each other so well nothing really had changed. Both teams were evenly matched. That first half we were just feeling each other out, and when we went into break coach Harrick said we were right where we wanted to be. We played the way we wanted to play.

Harrick – That is one of the toughest games you’ll play in college basketball: the Elite Eight game [with] the pressure to get to the Final Four and everything.

The first half was nip and tuck and the game was tied at 38 at the intermission.

Reynolds-Dean – First half was similar to the game in California. They went on a run and then we went on a run. It was a real close game.

Murphy – I just remember being more intense than any game I’d played until that point. It was a very physical game. They had Mark Madsen and some physically strong players.

King – Beginning of the second half we’re pretty much neck and neck, and as the half wore on we built some momentum and started taking control of the game. We were playing our style, but playing Stanford you’re never really going to get a big lead; they don’t let you do that.

High up in the rafters of the Thomas M. Ryan Center at the University of Rhode Island a series of blue banners hang to commemorate basketball success gone by.

There are banners for NCAA Tournament appearances and even a few for Sweet Sixteen showings, but the most inconspicuous one of all is also the most eye-popping.

1998: Elite Eight.

What? There is no way that a school on a hill in a village in Rhode Island could compete with the likes of college basketball royalty. They didn’t compete with the bluebloods: they beat them.

Fifteen years later the 1998 Rams, and their charismatic coach, continue to loom large in Rhode Island lore.

This is the story of those 12 young men and their coach who electrified a sport and united a state.

The Rams ended the 1996-1997 season with a first-round loss to Purdue in the NCAA Tournament. The Rams returned five of their top six players in 1998, and with the addition of Luther Clay, who ironically had transferred to URI from Purdue, were poised from the start to make another run through March.

The biggest challenge was one of the few unknowns with the team: a new head coach. Former coach Al Skinner, who had recruited the entire team, left to take the reins at Boston College, which left an experienced team in a state of limbo.

Tyson Wheeler (senior point guard) – When coach Skinner was leaving we felt that we were losing a father figure and like a father as a coach because a lot of us came in together; there were 6 or 7 freshman coming in at the same time and we went 7-20 and then we made the tournament [two years later].

Antonio Reynolds-Dean (junior forward) – It’s always tough when you lose a coach that recruited you. I think everyone was kind of surprised and shocked at first, but as a player you had to understand that business is business.

Preston Murphy (junior guard) – It was a little emotional. Obviously Al was the guy that brought me in and you wanted to be there for him. Play for him. On the same token it was a chance to play for a guy who won a national championship and had a big reputation in the college basketball world.

That “guy who won a national championship” was Jim Harrick. Harrick, who had guided UCLA to a title just three years prior, was looking for a program and found one he liked in Kingston.

Jim Harrick (coach) – Well you know it was funny; they called me and I just got intrigued by it because they told me they’d have a top-25 team. It turned out that way and it was good.

Reynolds-Dean – Tyson and myself were fortunate to be on the committee to pick the new coach. Once we saw we could get a coach that won a national title it made our decision a lot easier.

Wheeler – I don’t know why they chose just us two, but we were on the committee and there were a lot of good names for coaches and we had to choose one. Coach Harrick, coming off of a championship at UCLA, was the best choice for us.

Harrick – Coaching is worse than cocaine. It’s a disease that gets in with all of us and I don’t think it ever goes away. Really didn’t know a lot about [Rhode Island], but I did know that Tommy Penders had coached there and did really well. I had an absolute fabulous time there. I met with the faculty members, the president, the booster club, and the team…and that was before I was hired.

Wheeler – [Chemistry] was real good. We had a veteran team so we were all about business. We had a good coach, a well-respected coach around and basically it was like a celebrity coming to Rhode Island.

Reynolds-Dean – All coach had to do was come in and pick up where Coach Skinner had left off. There wasn’t a lot of change because we already knew each other and understood each other. We were already a confident bunch and he made us an even more confident bunch.

The other unknown for the team was the addition of Clay. Clay had been a McDonald’s All-American in high school and gave the team a much-needed athletic big man.

Luther Clay (junior center) – The reason I transferred at the time…I was immature and I got frustrated with [Purdue]. I spoke to my high school coach and he said that if I was serious about leaving that he knew a program that was really good with taking transfers. [Maine Central Institute coach] Max Good really guided me to URI.

Reynolds-Dean – Having a big guy with Luther’s athleticism beside me, once we made that adjustment, things kind of took off from there.

Clay – The first time I played a game I thought the crowd was booing me because they were chanting “LOU!” I wasn’t sure what was going on. It took me a couple of weeks to make that adjustment.

The Rams started the season 1-1, including a loss to Connecticut, before rattling off five wins before Christmas.  The wins included double-digit wins over archrival Providence and UNLV, teams that made the NCAA Tournament that year.

After final exams, the Rams competed in the Cable Car Classic in California. After defeating the University of Pennsylvania in the opening round Rhody matched up with Stanford. The Cardinal featured future NBA players Tim Young, Jarron Collins and Mark Madsen.

Senior shooting guard Cuttino Mobley led all scorers with 30 points, but it wasn’t enough as the Cardinal escaped with a 70-69 win.

University of Rhode Island President David Dooley spent some of his time speaking to the student senate and addressing their questions during last night’s meeting.

“We’ve been working on [the] budget recommendation ever since and we’ve come to the conclusion that through checking and [making] some modifications,” Dooley said. “We are planning right now, minus some really major earthquake … between now and then, when we send out letters to continuing and new students here in the next week or so to say that both resident’s and non-residents’ tuition for next year will be the same levels as this year.”

This came after Dooley announced that Gov. Lincoln Chafee indicated to increase the amount of state funding for higher education by approximately $6 million. In addition to that $6 million, Dooley said another $6 million would be needed in reductions and that would be characterized as meeting him halfway.

“We want to put together a price-checking plan that doesn’t put us in a position –years from now – to have to come back and ask for a large tuition increase,” Dooley said.  The end goal for the school is that there isn’t an increase in tuition. Should there be one, it shouldn’t be a major one.

“I will say that it’s highly unusual for a public university to freeze non-resident’s tuition,” Dooley said.

Dooley said this will help out-of-state students who pay a higher rate in tuition. With this information now known, students are going to be able to determine how much it’s going to cost for them to attend URI next semester.

Another plan for the university is a new nursing facility in Providence.

“The other thing the governor’s budget contains that we’re very happy about is [that] it contained a half a million dollars  … for the design and process [and] plans to build and operate a new nursing facility in Providence,” Dooley said. The plans for the new nursing facility would be so that students from Rhode Island College and URI can share a facility in the city. Dooley said the plans for it would include making it a state-of-the-art nursing facility.

“It will be worth the drive [from Kingston to Providence],” Dooley said. “Those facilities will be, if successful, the most advanced in the country.”

Dooley also spoke about the plans for a new chemistry building on campus. He said the school hopes to break ground before commencement and, if not, by June. The location of the building will be where the Chafee lot currently sits. Dooley said the contract is out for bid at the moment and that they have a small list of people that can bid on the project. The school is looking to make the decision a relatively quick process so that work can begin as soon as possible. The building of the chemistry building will be a $70 million project.

In addition to plans for a new facility in Providence, Dooley said he hopes to be able to have a commuter rail station for the campus in the future along with renovations around campus including, but not limited to, the quadrangle, a new LGBTQ center and an overhaul of Ranger Hall for the Harrington School of Communication.

In response to the shootings in Newtown, Conn. this past January, a University of Rhode Island senior looks to bring awareness and support to people with mental health issues by implementing a National Alliance of Mental Illness club on campus.

Danielle Chasse, a sociology major at URI, has been working collaboratively with Chaz Gross, executive director of the Rhode Island chapter of NAMI. Together they have worked to help achieve her goal of making URI the first college in Rhode Island with a NAMI on Campus club.

“I got inspired to do this after I heard about what happened in Newtown,” Chasse said. “It was really hard for me to not be empathetic to whatever was going on in [the shooter’s, Adam Lanza,] mind to commit something like that. It was a clear cry for help.”

Chasse wanted to raise awareness about mental health and hopefully prevent something like what happened in Newtown from happening here at URI by promoting acceptance. After some research, she found NAMI.

NAMI is a national grassroots organization and has been in Rhode Island for 29 years. It provides support to people who are suffering from mental health issues. Currently NAMI on Campus has groups in 35 states and its goal is to provide support, education and advocacy according to Gross.

“Seventy-five percent of people who go away to college wind up with mental health illnesses,” Gross said. “It’s vital and important that [URI] have [NAMI on Campus].”

Chasse’s connection to NAMI is more than just that of a concerned, caring citizen. Nineteen years ago, at age 8, she was one of the first children to ever be treated for bipolar disorder.

“It has made it very difficult for me to go about my own life as I got older and had to explain to people what I had been through because people were so unaware of mental illness or mental health issues in general,” Chasse said. “They didn’t even look at me as a person.”

Chasse does not want other students to experience the alienation and bullying she felt growing up due to the “misconceptions and stigma” surrounding mental health issues, which is why she feels a NAMI on Campus club would be instrumental in helping college students suffering from similar problems.

“I want to raise awareness, but I also want to promote acceptance,” Chasse said. “I don’t want this to be something for just people who have mental health issues, I want people who don’t have mental health issues to be involved as well.”

Gross also has a personal connection not only to NAMI, but also to the on campus NAMI in particular.

“My motivation is an older brother who dropped out of college half way though and committed suicide; [he] shot himself in the head,” Gross said. “If I can get one person to join the club [at URI] it’s worth it.”

In addition to providing support for and raising awareness about mental illness, URI would be setting an example for other Rhode Island colleges by instituting this club. “I think it would be wonderful for the university to say they’re the first one and they would be an exemplary role model for the rest of the colleges,” Chasse said.

Despite some of the assumptions Chasse and Gross are anticipation, NAMI on Campus will not be an in for pharmaceutical companies to target URI students. “We would rather be small and poor then sell ourselves,” Gross said.

Chasse hopes that getting a NAMI on Campus club instituted will make people with mental illnesses feel more accepted.

“If there’s anything we can do to make people living with mental health issues feel more accepted and educate people on mental health issues, we could be changing the world,” Chasse said. “It’s vital and important that we have this.”

“It takes someone who’s courageous to advocate for this and Danielle’s a hero to me,” Gross said.

In order to get NAMI on campus off the ground, Chasse needs more people who are interested in sharing their experiences, becoming educated about mental illnesses and advocating for those living with mental health issues. “I would love to hear from anyone interested at Danielle_chasse@my.uri.edu,” Chasse said.

Chasse believes that more people will benefit from this club than they expect.

“Mental illness isn’t just the things you hear about on a daily basis like autism, “ Chasse said. “Mental illness can be something like stress or anxiety and college students go through these every day.”

Eight months ago, three University of Rhode Island graduates made the decision to become their own bosses and open a law firm upon graduation from Roger Williams University law school in May 2012.

Jonathan Whaley, Lisa Bowie, and James Bagley started Whaley, Bowie & Bagley Legal, a Providence based legal company, in hopes of jumping the corporate ladder by starting a small business and working for themselves.

“I think a lot of it had to do with the job market,” Bowie said. “We were all near the top of our class in law school, and when we got to the last year and started looking for jobs there wasn’t much around and it got frustrating.”

The original idea for the firm was introduced by Whaley, who was close friends with Bagley from their work on RWU’s mock trial team. Whaley added Bowie to the equation and after a few beers, WBB Legal was born.

“Here we are almost a year later and we’re going strong,” Whaley said. “It’s stressful, challenging and scary, but its rewarding at the same time.”

Despite the unanimous consent in their decision to start a small business, the partners will readily admit that this has been a learning experience.

“Its tough because you’re learning how to be a lawyer and a business person at the same time, and none of us really had any experience with small business,” Whaley said. “We’re learning how to be our own bosses, partners in business, and how to talk to customers and conduct ourselves in a court room at the same time.”

Though WBB Legal is equipped with the skills to deal with many different types of law, the main types of cases they’ve seen so far are family, criminal defense, DUI, and landlord/tenant.

Despite the challenges, the partners at WWB Legal are starting to see the “light at the end of the tunnel,” Whaley said.

In addition to being business associates, Whaley, Bagley, and Bowie all have a deep amount of respect for the work the others are doing.

“We’re all very intelligent in our own way,” Whaley said. “Jim [Bagley] definitely brings a sense of humor and a personality to keep things light even when we go through stressful times. He’s very passionate and a hard worker.”

“John [Whaley] is the workhorse of the group,” Bowie said. “He’s the one who at the beginning, even when we only had one or two cases, came in every day at nine and stayed the whole day.”

“Bowie is one of the smartest people I’ve ever met,” Bagley said. “She has an ability to dissect problems and offer insightful analysis on how to deal with them.”

The trio did not attend URI at the same time, with Bagley graduating in 2005, Bowie in 2008, and Whaley in 2009. However, the partners all feel that they use the skills they got from their undergraduate education on a daily basis.

Bowie and Whaley graduated with degrees in wildlife and conservation biology and business administration, respectively, while Bagley graduated with a degree in theatre.

“I think that my theatre background has definitely helped me with law,” Bagley said. “From the start I was comfortable getting up and talking in front of people, which is something not many of my peers were able to do.”

Despite the versatility their undergraduate majors have given them, law school was not where any of the partners saw themselves heading while at URI. “[If someone had told me while I was at URI that I was going to go to law school] I would have told them they drank too much,” Bowie said.

Whaley has stayed involved with URI since graduation through his spot on Sigma Pi fraternity’s housing corporation. Whaley is a brother of Sigma Pi from his time at URI.

“If anyone considers going to law school and wants to chit-chat and get some dos and don’ts, feel free to give us a call,” Whaley said.

WBB Legal hopes to keep ties with URI and help students with their legal troubles in the future.

“We hope to relate to kids at URI a little more because we’ve been there and anything they can get themselves into, we hope to be able to get them out of it.”

Their information can be found on their website www.wbblegal.com.

In a style that belies the nature of Daryl Dixon, the character he portrays on the critically acclaimed TV series “The Walking Dead,” Norman Reedus stepped onto the stage of Edwards Auditorium at the University of Rhode Island with an impossibly broad smile on his face. The dude was plainly stoked. It is a long way off from the zombie-killing crossbow man that audiences have come to know and love. For almost two decades, Reedus has been slipping into the skin of hardened killers like “Boondock Saint” Murphy MacManus and weapons dealer Scud in “Blade II,” which makes witnessing the actor in such a jovial state a jarring experience to say the least. Within moments of appearing, the actor whipped out his iPhone and gleefully initiated the now-ubiquitous panorama crowd photo.

Reedus began the show by regaling the audience with the dramatic tale of how his acting career began, including the star-crossed endeavor of following a girl to Los Angeles and getting too drunk at a fancy Hollywood

On the subject of “The Walking Dead” itself, Reedus had remarkably insightful answers to all of the questions that ravenous fans hurled at him. On the subject of the possible romance brewing between another character and Daryl, Reedus enigmatically rebuffed,

“If it happened I wouldn’t be mad...but I like the idea that these two damaged individuals sort of gravitate toward each other for reasons other than, you know, that.” By far the most fascinating behind-the-scenes fact that Reedus revealed to the crowd was the seasonal ritual of what he called “The Death Dinner.” “If your character is gonna get killed off, they always tell you first,” he explained, “and we always have a big dinner when someone goes, there’s always a lot of drinking, a lot of crying, a lot of reminiscing.”

The speech invoked a heartwarming image of the “Dead” cast gathered around a grand oak table, providing old friends like Dale or T-Dog with a proper send off. Reedus also talked about the choice to use real film stock as opposed to digital cameras for the filming of “The Walking Dead” and emphasized, “Our camera crew is the best in the business,” despite the antiquity.

Even the television show format in comparison to feature films fell under his critical scrutiny, much to the delight of the true geeks that sprinkled the audience. “With a movie, you have a very small of time to tell a story with a very linear beginning and end. With a TV show, you can drop little seeds of detail in early episodes that later grow into plot point sprouts and then later plot trees and the show keeps going. It’s beautiful, really.”

Sitting in Edwards and hearing the deafening shrieks of all the Daryl-lovers gathered in the tiny hall made it hard to believe that there were even crazier fans out there, but Reedus spun a bizarre super fan yarn that all but convinced me.

“Some lady sent me her breast implant,” said Reedus, still clearly bewildered by the scenario. “Which I now use as a cell phone cradle!” He blurted this out in the midst of uproarious laughter, an unintentional punch line to a real-life joke.

Judging by the wide variety of objects that audience members held aloft (which included a handmade “Walking Dead” lamp, a copy of Daryl’s ear necklace and dozens of zombie dolls) to either give to Reedus or have the actor autograph, some of the craziest fans were present in the URI auditorium on Sunday. The second the hall light came on, a tsunami of overeager nerds surged forth over Edwards’ seats and onto Reedus in a stunningly zombie-esque occurrence. Unlike Daryl, Reedus reacted with thinly visible anxiety as he snatched and scribbled on fliers, took photo after photo, shouted back answers to shouted-out questions and graciously hugged the occasional female fan.

With taxes on small business in Rhode Island rising and customers cautious about spending money in an economic recession, many local restaurants and retail businesses are struggling. But walk into Phil’s Main Street Grille in Wakefield on a Sunday at noon, and you’ll see cracked-leather booths packed with customers, with others eagerly waiting in line for their share of the mounds of golden home fries sizzling on the grill.

“It’s the seasoning, but I can’t tell you what that is,” owner Ken Tetzner said, referring to the famous home fries that are served aplenty with every breakfast plate. They’re even available to go.

“I literally have someone cutting potatoes all day,” Tetzner said. “Families will come in and get them and then go cook breakfast at home. Fishermen will bring them for the guys on the boat.”

Tetzner credited his success with the long-standing traditions that Phil’s represents in southern Rhode Island.

“It’s an institution in town. Grandfathers come here, kids at URI, families, locals in the winter and tourists in the summer. Everybody knows Phil’s and has great memories from here,” he said.

Phil’s was started in the 1940s by Phil Watson, a local resident and volunteer firefighter. Since then, it has gone through good times and bad. When Tetzner, the sixth owner, took over 15 years ago, there was little business success and a lot of updates needed.

In his time as owner, Tetzner said he has “put his heart and soul” into turning the “ugly, crumbling building” into a booming breakfast diner and, now, a dinner restaurant as well. In the process, he tried to preserve as much of the original “diner feel” in the breakfast area as possible.

“People know the name, and I wanted to keep what they associate with that name as true to form as possible.”

When Tetzner first began working at Phil’s, he had never cooked an egg. He worked with one waitress per day and did most of the cooking himself, quickly becoming an expert in eggs. Now, he has a 30-person staff, including a chef for the upstairs breakfast and dinner restaurant that opened last June.

“We literally finished construction and two hours later had the opening of the upstairs,” Tetzner said, explaining that the upstairs dining room has a “more sophisticated” menu and less of a diner feel. “So far it’s a process, and it’s going to take time for it to become as popular as our downstairs breakfast is.”

With a full bar, including specials, and events such as karaoke and guest comedians from Comedy Connection RI in East Providence, Tetzner said he hopes to attract people to the newer dining area and spread the word.

“A lot of people don’t even know it’s there,” he said. “But we’re working on advertising and really using word of mouth to get the word out; I think that’s the best way to get a business going quickly.”

Tetzner also emphasized the importance of using Facebook, coupons and advertisements to help grow the newer section of his business because “people are really looking for a deal right now.”

Word of mouth has certainly helped Phil’s business overall, especially in the downstairs diner, where business has actually increased throughout the past two years according to Tetzner.

“It’s homemade great food at a great price, and breakfast definitely seems more affordable, even in a tough economy,” he said.

Staying open rain or shine also helps business thrive. Phil’s had one of its most profitable days during Hurricane Sandy, according to Tetzner.

“We were actually really busy during the hurricane because we were one of the only businesses open here,” Tetzner said. “People need to eat, and we just kept serving until we started running out of food.”

Tetzner, born and raised in Narragansett, started college at Rhode Island College in Providence before deciding to leave because “college just wasn’t my thing.” At that time, he saw a chance to pursue ownership of a small business at a diner near his hometown, and the rest is home fry history.

Though Tetzner never saw himself with a career running a restaurant, he said he wouldn’t have any idea what else he could be doing at this point in life. Now married and a current resident of Wakefield with two young children, the flexible schedule that running a small business allows combined with his connections to southern Rhode Island make Phil’s his ideal place to work.

“I just love it down here; there’s such a community feel; and I think Phil’s is really a part of that community. I cannot emphasize enough that we’re an institution, and I’m proud to be a part of it.”

Two new student organizations were recognized by the University of Rhode Island Student Senate last night. Collegiate SMILE and Compost URI were both unanimously approved.

Collegiate SMILE (Science and Math Investigative Learning Experiences) will be dedicated to helping underrepresented children in Rhode Island middle and high schools. It is an academic after-school program geared towards pushing children towards college in STEM fields, or science, technology, engineering and math. Collegiate SMILE will branch off of the existing SMILE Program at URI.

“Most [students] that have gone through SMILE have gone to college with a STEM major,” said club president Jimmy Li, a SMILE graduate.

Li said the program helps guide students toward college through mentorship and tutoring in the sciences and math. He said the SMILE Program currently works with schools in Central Falls, North Kingstown, South Kingstown, Pawtucket, West Warwick and Woonsocket.

“Our goal with the program is to hopefully get more schools involved throughout the state,” Li said.

The club plans to assist with a SMILE event this Friday and Saturday held in the Memorial Union Ballroom benefiting middle school students of the program, Li said.

Compost URI was the other group recognized last night. The club currently has about 20 members and plans to advocate for the benefits of composting across campus, as well as compost food scraps from URI Dining Services and other departments on campus.

While the club will be presently focused on advocacy, it hopes to bring enough attention to the practice to begin composting in locations on URI grounds.

…

In other news

    URI President David M. Dooley will be attending the next Student Senate meeting on Wednesday March 3 at 6:30 p.m. in the Senate Chambers of the Memorial Union for an open forum.

The Senate has paid $450 for a co-sponsorship for the Graduate Student Association’s first annual 5k run. The run will be held on Sunday, April 21 at 9 a.m. on campus and the cost of registration is $10. All proceeds from registrations will go directly to the SMILE program.

The SOARC committee will hold its March Presidents’ Meeting on Monday at 7 p.m. in the Memorial Union Ballroom.

Senior speaker applications for spring commencement are due to the Senate office in the Memorial Union by tomorrow at noon.

Declarations for Senate elections are due tomorrow at noon in the Senate office in the Memorial Union.

The Graduate Student Association at the University of Rhode Island has set plans for events in the spring.

The GSA is sponsoring a 5k run and walk that will take place throughout the campus on Sunday, April 21. This event will begin and finish in front of the memorial union and all proceeds will go toward the URI SMILE program. URI SMILE was established in 1994 and is a non-profit pre-college science, technology, engineering and math academic after school program for underrepresented students. According to URI SMILE, the program has a year round schedule of activities designed to provide and integrate university and real world experiences, mentoring, learning activities, and career explorations to support students. The students range from grades four through 12 and are from the Rhode Island community.

The Graduate Student Association is a non-profit government body maintained by and for the graduate students of the University with the purpose of enhancing the academic, intellectual and social opportunities of its members and the community. Officers and members of the GSA Senate distribute GSA funds to graduate students and other qualifying groups, organize social events and serve as graduate student representatives on University wide committees. Vice president of GSA, Kyle Scully, became involved with this organization to give back to the community and stay involved with URI.

“We represent the interest of graduate students on many university committees, and provide support for graduate students in both their academic progression through their program as well as socially by offering events like bowling, trivia and a spring formal,” Scully said. “We also try to remain active in the community frequently holding food drives, campus and beach cleanups and now a charity 5k road race.”

Scully hopes to raise money at the 5k event to support the URI SMILE organization, while also enjoying the outdoors. The association has sponsored other events in the past including costume bowling, learn to surf day, spring formal, ice-skating and campus and beach cleanups. This organization is opened to all graduate students.

“We represent all graduate students, all grad students are welcome at our monthly meetings and social events,” Scully said. “We encourage all programs to nominate senators to represent their program so their needs and concerns are heard.”

The 5k road race will begin at 9 a.m., in front of the memorial union and will conclude with a silent auction and raffle in the memorial union ballroom. Registration prices range from $10 online, $12 in person and $15 on race day. Students are able to register for the event at www.getmeregistered.com/GSACharity5K and can also find more information on the organization’s Facebook page, http://www.facebook.com/events/402594336493219/.

“We always strive to continue to grow the network of graduate students active within the URI Graduate community,” Scully said. “We also strive to further dedicate ourselves to community outreach and involvement.”

An organization at the University of Rhode Island is focused on creating a safe, supportive environment for freshmen women through mentoring. 

The organization, We’re Offering Women Wisdom (W.O.W.W) contributes to URI by providing a comfortable, safe and supportive community for freshmen women.  W.O.W.W was founded in September 2005 by Kristen Motel and Lisa Marie Carroll. Members of W.O.W.W reach out to students during events such as First Night, Open Houses and Welcome Days.

Senior and Gender and Women’s Studies Major, Alyssa Mroz, is a peer advocate and mentor for W.O.W.W.  Mroz joined her freshman year after a fellow classmate introduced her to the group and she has been involved with W.O.W.W ever since.

“We are a group of young women at the University of Rhode Island who strive to establish not only a sense of [a community], but an actual community where upperclassmen peers will be a constant, non-judging community to incoming freshmen women in hopes to mentor them in a way which provides a cycle of organizational transition from mentee to mentor” Mroz said.

Mroz often works through the organization with vice president of the group and senior biotechnology major, Alyssee Quiterio.

“She is amazing, and we find ourselves working side by side with each other’s input and support,” Mroz said. “We also have a hardworking executive board who works hard to create social events, philanthropy events and make sure that all of the women who are mentees are happy and welcomed.”

The group consists of upper-class mentors and freshmen mentees who are able to become future mentors. Although mentees are usually freshmen, any student interested is welcomed to join. When students enter W.O.W.W, each new member becomes a “little” and gets an upperclassman as a “big.” Once the year is over, each “little” makes the transition to becoming a mentor for the upcoming fall semester. Each year, the organization has a ceremony to induct the newest members

“We are much more than a community, though,” Mroz said. “We see ourselves as a family and a lot of the women who are in W.O.W.W say that what made them stay is that they feel so welcomed entering a room full of women who are friendly, non-judging and so eager to meet them.”

Previously this year, W.O.W.W presented the annual date auction with the fraternity Sigma Chi, in honor of Aura Diaz, a high school friend of founder Lisa Marie Carroll and other victims of domestic violence. Other events of the organization include the date auction social and the event in which they cosponsored, 1 Billion Rising.

“As of right now we are preparing for Relay for Life and our second alumni event of the year. We love our alumni and are always excited for them to return to URI with their stories and experiences,” Mroz said. “At the end of this year, we will host our event where all of the women in our group who are mentees become mentors, in preparation of mentoring the new group of incoming students in the fall.”

For the future, W.O.W.W hopes to continue to be a place for freshmen women to come and also hope to maintain the community of women from all different walks of campus life.

“My personal goals are to continue to make W.O.W.W a community that women return to year after year and only grows in the future. I hope to always be in the position to help people in the future,” Mroz said. “I think something that makes W.O.W.W so amazing is how unique our group of women is. We bring something different to the group, and that is what brings us together.”

W.O.W.W meets every Thursday at 6 p.m., in the Women’s Center library.

A young entrepreneur at the University of Rhode Island has recently added to the music brand he has created by launching a clothing line.

Ivan Brooks, a sixth year communications student launched a clothing line last year to add to the music brand the singer/songwriter has been creating for himself throughout his time at URI.

“It [the clothing line] branched off of me,” Brooks said.  “Ivan Brooks Music is a brand and the brand represents chasing dreams.  I’m a dream chaser.” 

Brooks, a Providence-based artist, knew he had to find way to make a mark on the industry other than simply by his music. 

“Music today, people don’t want to buy, they want to download,” Brooks said.  “So I had to think of how to bring money in. I took the skill from my musical brand and put it in fashion.”

The line, which Brooks launched on his birthday, Oct. 25, represents his motto of chasing his dream.  The apparel which includes shirts, hoodies, track suits and beanies represents a large, shield-like crest that Brooks created for himself.

Along with a power symbol shield, the clothing also has Brooks’ logo, IBMC. 

“The ‘IB’ stands from Ivan Brooks,” he said.  “The ‘M’ stands for music, and we’re still working on the ‘C.’  It’s a work in progress.  We don’t know yet if we want it to represent music clothing or music crest.” 

Regardless of what the ‘C’ stands for in his logo, Brooks knows what his line represents. 

“Forever music,” Brooks said.  “My music is about how men forgot how to be men and how we forgot how to treat women, and that’s music you want to listen to forever.” 

In addition to the motto of “Forever Music,” Brooks hopes to use his success to inspire people everywhere. 

“I started with a budget of zero [dollars],” Brooks said.  “Some people are lazy, but when they see you doing it, when they see you chasing your dream, it motivates them.”

Currently, Brooks is working on promoting his brand through social media sites, putting the finishing touches on his website which he plans on launching in March, and getting his clothing into both retail stores and fashion shows. 

“We’re hoping to get in fashion week next year,” Brooks said.  “We have the resources, we just need to make sure sales are good so we can fund it.” 

Brooks has found that the best way to interact with his fans and promote his new line is through social media sites.  He posts pictures on social network sites such as Instagram and Facebook and asks for input ftom his fans.

IBMC does not create clothing directed towards a specific demographic, it creates clothing for “dream chasers.”

“I represent class and elegance,” Brooks said.  “I’m urban, but I can cross over and still be preppy.  And I’m a dream chaser.” 

Though Brooks is unsure of where his future will take him, he plans to keep investing in himself. 

“I hate when people [on social media sites] say they’re bored,” Brooks said.  “How can you be bored if you’re making an opportunity of your life?”

A recent URI alum is making interesting use of her mechanical engineering and Spanish double major as COO of Dear Kate, a lingerie start-up company located in Providence, R.I.

Sharon Ruggieri graduated from URI in 2007 from the International Engineering Program and continued on to receive her MBA from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

In 2011, Ruggieri met Brown University graduate Julie Sygiel who had just launched a line of lingerie in Providence called Sexy Period.

“I was really interested in entrepreneurship,” Ruggeiri said, “and Julie and I had really complementary skills and got along really well.”

In November 2012, Ruggieri and Sygiel launched Dear Kate, a line of functional lingerie for women.

“We make beautiful lingerie for women, mostly bras and panties,” Ruggieri said. “[Our lingerie] has performance fabric so that a women never has to worry whether she’s working out, having a baby, or on her period.”

Dear Kate was created with the same technology Sygiel used when launching her Sexy Period line. “You don’t have to worry about anything getting on our clothes and you can be comfortable and confident [while wearing the lingerie],” she said.

 The name Dear Kate was a collaborative effort.

“We wanted a name that made people comfortable,” Ruggieri said. “People love the name Kate and the concept we used was as if the line would be an advice column or a women’s best friend so we went with Dear Kate.”

Sygiel and Ruggieri work collaboratively each playing into their strengths to help the company grow.

“Julie is the creative genius,” Ruggieri said. “She has a great personality and represents the company beautifully while I do a little more of the production side.”

Besides being a startup functional lingerie company, another thing that makes Dear Kate unique is that it is made and sold only in America. “We try to get as much of our materials from the United States and the lingerie is made in New York,” Ruggieri said.

Currently Dear Kate products are sold in boutiques and maternity stores in Providence, but Ruggieri is hoping that in the future they’ll be able to expand to stores such as Bloomingdales and Saks Fifth Avenue.

Though Ruggieri is not sure what the future holds for her, for the time being she is more than happy at Dear Kate.

“Working for a startup is so exciting,” Ruggieri said. “I will stay with the company as long as my contribution is helping it grow. Hopefully it gets bigger than us!”

Dear Kate is currently offering a promotional discount to all URI students. Enter the code “rhodyrams” at checkout to receive $10 off your purchase.

The new director of enrollment services at the University of Rhode Island is tackling the challenges of the department with a hands-on, holistic approach. 

Carnell Jones was hired as the new director of enrollment services before the start of the 2012-13 school year, and after five months at the university, he has stuck to his goal to “provide the highest level of customer service to the entire URI community.”

As director of enrollment services, the department in charge of all the billing, financial aid and registration for the university, Jones is aware that many people do not know how important the department is. 

“[Students] may not know that enrollment services is more than just a front desk,” Jones said.  “We are truly a one-stop organization.”

Since Jones has been at the university, he has made several changes.  “I have been very proactive in reaching out to students,” Jones said.  Jones’ first step was to send out emails at the beginning of the fall and spring semester welcoming the students back, informing them of important dates and giving them information of who contact for specific issues.

Jones also plans to send out surveys to both students and faculty in the next few months to see how enrollment services is doing. 

“We need to know how we’re doing,” Jones said.  “I want to make sure students feel welcome here.”

Commuting from his house in Swansea, Mass., Jones is usually the first one in Green Hall; where enrollment services is housed and the last one to leave. 

“The good thing about working here is that you can never really predict how your day is going to go,” Jones said.  “That’s the exciting part. . .it keeps you on your toes.”

On a day to day basis, Jones deals with students who owe money to the university, families with concerns and students who “Every time the phone rings [in his office] you know it’s a call that couldn’t be handled somewhere else so you know you’re going to get it.”

Before working at URI, Jones worked as a university registrar at University of Massachusetts Amherst for 7 years and previous to that he worked at Harrisville University and Southeast Missouri State.  Before his career in higher education, he was an auditor at Ford Motor Company. 

Jones graduated from Southeast Missouri State and got his PhD. from the University of Missouri, the school his daughter recently graduated from.  He also has a son who is currently in college.

The director of enrollment services at URI was a perfect fit for Jones’ skill set.

“Though my background was in banking and finance, my career has been in the registrars area,” Jones said.  “The position at URI was an opportunity to oversee all the areas I’ve worked in.”

“I can’t say I’m a pro at the job,” Jones said.  “But when I’m talking to a parent or a student its not a foreign language to me.  I’ve been there done that.” 

Though Jones has directed most of his attention in the last five months to managing the department, he enjoys getting his hands dirty. 

“I’m very hands on, probably more hands on than most people are used to,” Jones said.  “I get in and I’ll do every job until I learn its meaning. I’ll get in and I’ll sit next to someone on the phone, I’ll take phone calls.  I may not know the answer but I’ll always throw my hand up first.  I’m not above doing any of the jobs here.” 

One of the aspects of enrollment services that Jones finds very important is customer service. 

“If one upsets you the phone call before, you need to let that go and not carry that over, they’re people,” Jones said.  “It’s bringing the human element back. Not saying that it wasn’t here before, but since I’ve been here I want to make sure its reinforced.”

Despite the challenges Jones faces on a day-to-day basis, he is more than content with his new position. 

“I look at every day as a labor of love,” Jones said.  “I know it sounds cheesy, but I love getting up every day and coming to work here.”

The University of Rhode Island’s College of Engineering recently received one of the largest planned gifts ever left to the university.

A $2.5 million donation was left to the university from the estate of URI alumni David and John Parker, class of 1934 and 1940, respectively.  The Parker brothers left the money to the university from their reciprocal estate with the intent that it should benefit the College of Engineering. 

Michael Smith, president of the URI Foundation said this particular gift is unique not only in its large amount, but also in its nature.  Unlike most other gifts that are given to the university with a specific donor-intended use, the Parker brother’s gift was given with the main intent of improving the College of Engineering.  “This gift is a truly philanthropic gift because, for a good portion of it, I don’t believe there were any expectations other than to be used for the best use for the college,” Smith said. 

In an official URI Foundation press release, Dean of the College of Engineering Raymond Wright expressed his gratitude for the gift. 

“The Parker brothers’ gifts will have a tremendous impact on the college and its students, providing significant support to a number of college priorities,” the release said.   

Approximately half of the gift will be used as support for the college, with an emphasis on the mechanical engineering department, which was the discipline John taught while a professor at URI.  The remainder of the gift will fund two endowments.  The first endowment is a scholarship in ocean engineering and the second endowment will be named in honor of the brothers and will provide library resources in engineering.

“A bulk of the money came in for the dean to decide the best use in the college,” Smith said.

The money will support the college’s new building future fund, according to Smith. 

The Parker brothers were close and lived together for many years.  They had close ties to the university and John retired as an engineering professor from the university in 1997 after 25 years.  During his time at URI he was not only a respected professor, but was also very involved in the building of Wales Hall. 

John remained close with the university after his retirement and went on to become the treasurer of the URI alumni association.  He received the Ram Award in 1975 for his dedicated campus involvement.

David passed away in 2001 and left his estate to his brother John Parker.  The gift was passed on to the university after John’s death in 2011. The university, however, was aware of the gift before their passing.  “We were made aware of the brothers intent to provide for URI in their estate plans in 1992,” Tracey Manni, director of communications for the URI Foundation said.

“I think it is important to note the tie between their gift and the impact it will have on engineering students,” Smith said.  “The brothers had a true passion for education.”

According to Smith, this gift will have a large impact on the college and university for years to come.  “This is an extremely generous gift and will have a lasting impact on University.”

Students at the University of Rhode Island are attempting to end the war on drugs. Students for a Sensible Drug Policy (SSDP), is an international grassroots network of students who are concerned about the impact drug abuse has on our communities. The organization has over 100 chapters at universities on five different continents. This year, the URI chapter of SSDP was ranked the 9th best SSDP chapter in the country by High Times Magazine.

The mission of the organization is to improve illicit drug regulations on three different level; campus, state and federal.  SSDP aims to make sure that students on-campus are not losing their opportunity for a prosperous future due to a substance problem or wrong decision.

The organization’s state goals include protecting Rhode Island’s medical marijuana program from federal interference and continuing to push for more sensible state laws regarding marijuana and other drugs.  

At the federal level, SSDP is focused on ending the federal government’s fight against medical marijuana programs and bringing attention on the amount of money spent each year on global war on drugs.

SSDP President Eric Casey has personal reasons as to why he is involved with the group.

“I’m involved with this organization because I firmly believe in the values it stands for. The idea of incarcerating someone because they use drugs is so accepted in our society and yet it doesn’t make any sense to me. If someone actually has a drug problem, sticking them in jail with violent offenders and no access to treatment will not solve their problem. There are also plenty of people who use soft drugs like cannabis and are fully functional members of society, and yet the federal government sees cannabis as a Schedule I narcotic, like heroin,” Casey said. “When I saw a group like SSDP was at URI, I knew I had to check it out and I’ve been here since. It’s allowed me to travel to amazing places I otherwise wouldn’t be able to go and network with influential and interesting people.”

According to Casey, the organization believes that while it is clear drug abuse can negatively impact society, the current policies do little to stop drug abuse and actually create an environment where drug dealers are free to profit off the black market, while users are left stigmatized with few treatment options.

“We believe in replacing our current laws with ones that allocate resources better, starting by legalizing and regulating drugs that pose little danger to society, like cannabis, while treating hard drug abuse as a public health problem instead of a criminal justice problem,” Casey said. “ It’s clear to us that after spending 40 years and billions of dollars on the war on drugs, if it was actually going to reduce drug use, it would’ve happened by now. Just like alcohol prohibition, drug prohibition is too simple a solution for a complex problem.”

The goal of the organization is to give the student body a safe place to openly speak their minds about drug use. SSDP seeks to support individuals who have the desire to positively impact their government and community, and to encourage students to be active participants in the democratic process.

“Hopefully, URI’s chapter will continue to enable URI students to play a role in the national movement to legalize cannabis and eventually end the war on drugs. As evident in a recent gallup poll, which showed 50 percent of the country supporting the taxation and regulation of cannabis, it’s clear what direction the country wants to go, and I think that organizations like SSDP will remain at the forefront of the movement,” Casey said.

The organization hosts the annual Hempfest music festival on the URI Quadrangle in April. SSDP also holds events such as movie screenings and guest speakers and as a group, attend conferences. Last year, the organization traveled to Los Angeles for the Drug Policy Alliance International Conference. Casey had the opportunity to travel to New Hampshire for the Republican primary and was able to actually question presidential candidates about drug law reform. SSDP also testified at the statehouse in favor of the marijuana decriminalization bill, which was passed by the legislature and will go into effect in April 2013.

The organization is currently planning a movie screening that will also include a panel with experts in drug policy reform, including former law enforcement officials. SSDP is also looking to collaborate with other organizations as well as businesses to improve Hempfest.

“We are also working this year with a variety of different groups across the state, including the Brown University chapter of SSDP, to attempt to lobby the Rhode Island General Assembly to pass a bill that will legalize, tax and regulate cannabis for personal use in 2013,” Casey said. “There will be a number of distinguished organizations working strategically to accomplish this goal and judging by the popularity of initiatives in several other states, as well as by the margin decriminalization passed in Rhode Island, we feel that this goal is within reach sooner rather than later.”

This article is a continuation of a previous article that ran in last week’s Cigar.

Even dealing with the day-to-day affairs of the campus, which may include domestic issues with roommates or traffic violations, officers are at risk, Flanagan said, posing a hypothetical situation involving pulling over a car for speeding.

“You don’t know who’s in that car,” he said. “If you walk up to the car and the individual is armed and intent on getting away they may use that weapon, and if you’re armed, you’re going to die.”

“I am nobody’s sacrificial lamb,” Chearino said.

When police were notified of the potential shooter situation in Chafee, URI police were there 30 seconds before members of the South Kingstown Police Department, according to Flanagan. This may not seem like a lot, but even those 30 seconds can be crucial.

“That 30-second time advantage can mean going in to locate the shooter and neutralize the situation,” he said. “It means saving more lives.”

Carey added that Rhode Island is one of only two states in the entire country in which the public university’s police forces are unarmed.

The majority of faculty members say this is not reason enough to give campus police guns, or even tasers. On URI’s Faculty Senate web page, an appendix containing meeting notes from February 24, 2009, on the issue stated URI is “different” from these other public universities.

“Arming the police does not prevent crime. It may well be that these other universities have armed their police, where URI has not, precisely because their crime rates are so much higher.”

The appendix added that URI police officers are likely to face the kind of arrests of armed offenders, often associated with late night traffic stops or “responding to an alarm in an unoccupied building in the early hours of the morning.” According to evidence gathered for the report, Rhode Island municipal officers made an average of 13.8 arrests per officer in 2000, compared with 3 per officer for the URI police officers.

Economics professor Art Mead, who was in Chafee when the scare occurred, agreed.

“To me, there’s a difference between being a town police officer and being a university police officer,” he said. “This is an environment populated by young people. It’s just a different situation.”

Mead said that to him, the 30-second lag time between campus police and the SKPD was not of great importance.

“It’s hard for me envision how the campus would have been safer with the campus police having guns versus the South Kingstown police having guns,” he said. “Short of having someone in every room of every building, I don’t see how the difference in response time would ever matter.”

Sociology Department Chair Calvin Peters was also in Chafee when the threat was thought to have happened and everyone was evacuated from the building.

“The argument [to arm campus police] based on school shootings is just bogus,” he said. “By the same logic, school shootings at universities have happened with armed campus police, so we should just disarm all campus police to stop school shootings.”

Peters added that he thinks the resurfacing of this debate is somewhat futile, since there was no actual shooter or gun threat.

“If we look at this in the cold eye of logic, a non-event was turned into something more,” he said. “Had this incident not occurred, no one would even be talking about this.”

Though Peters acknowledged that the URI community’s perceptions of safety might have changed, “the event ultimately does not change reality.”

Peters said he is skeptical if anyone should be armed, even beyond URI police.

“I just don’t see any need or reason,” he said. “There’s a major assumption that having guns increases safety at all. The more guns you have on campus, the more likely you are to get shot.”

Chearino argued that this misperception is one of the main reasons why he thinks campus police have been unsuccessful in winning the argument against the faculty on this issue.

“Cops don’t run around pulling guns out and killing people,” he said. “There’s less cops killing people than [non-law enforcement] people killing people.”

Carey added that there are specific rules and procedures in place that dictate when a police

officer should draw a weapon, which are covered in police training.

Some students and faculty on-campus admit that they may make assumptions about the campus police that inform their opinions on if police should be armed.

Mead said he opposes URI police carrying guns because “when I walk out the door, I want someone with significant training carrying one of those.” When told that URI police go through the same training with firearms as every other police officer in Rhode Island, Mead said it’s not an issue that he has thought a lot about.

“It’s just not an issue, it’s not our issue,” he said.

Many students were also unaware that campus police were unarmed currently, or said they only became unaware from news coverage following the gun scare earlier this month.

Sam Marks, a freshman originally from England, said he also didn’t know campus police went through the same training as other police officers. However, he added that in England, he thinks strict gun control laws are in part responsible for fewer gun-related deaths compared to the United States.

The University of Rhode Island Student Senate discussed potential improvements and additions to the Memorial Union during their meeting last Wednesday night.

John Burse, representatives for the architecture firms assigned to the project, Mackey Mitchell and Lerner, Ladd & Bartels, attended the meeting and spoke during public forum. Burson requested the opinions of Senate concerning what they would like to see added to or improved within the Union.

Burse and his colleagues issued 12 red dots to each of the senators and instructed them to place one or more dots on any combination of images. The images were of rooms and/or areas that could be built into the Union and the dots were used to ascertain the popularity of each. The pictures were placed on posterboards according to category, which included outdoor areas, indoor areas, study areas and dining rooms.

“At the end of the day this is the living room of the campus, this is the students’ building,” Burse said in a separate interview. “Culturally, what is the life of the campus is experience through the students, what are their impressions of the building from the moment they arrive on campus as a visitor to the point upon which they graduate.”

Some of the most popular Senate choices, which obtained between 10 and 12 votes, were a massive television wall on which advertisements and group promotions could be projected and a Rhody Market- style area that could make students feel more comfortable and relaxed in the Union.

Other potential ideas included an immense purple light wall and large-scale water wall, both of which were said to be aesthetically pleasing and could set URI and its Student Union apart from other institutions.

Burse said that, while there is no specific construction date for the project yet, a plan for improvements and additions must be submitted by the end of June.

Public student forums were held last Thursday from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. and from 5:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. in Room 300 of the Union (Student Senate Chambers). Burson said that the contributions and opinions of students in this matter are “absolutely vital.”

IN OTHER NEWS:

-The Senate approved a capital improvements contingency grant of $911 for the URI Martial Arts: Capoeira Club to purchase instruments. The music would improve the Capoeira performances and students can practice with them during meetings and bring them home.

The Senate approved a programming contingency grant of $2,250 for the SCUBA Club to certify 10 more members. A representative for the club said that, since the group has run out of funding and has had an unprecedented amount of members this year, more money has needed to accomplish this task.

The approval of the Longboard Club has been sent back to the Student Organization Advisory and Review Committee (SOARC). This is the second consecutive meeting during which the approval of the club was postponed.

Brian Sit and Kyle Weinrich were officially sworn in as Finance Chairman and SOARC Chairman, respectively.

-The two members of the Summer Senate were elected during Wednesday’s meeting: Director of Marketing Paul Knott and at-large representative Nicholas Hetland.

It’s no surprise that I consider the modern state of rap in a total disarray of fake artists, atrocious lyrics depicting the glamour and riches of being a rapper, or obnoxious fan-bases that seem to dominate the spotlight rather than the actual music itself.

Already going to a few concerts myself at the University of Rhode Island, stretching back from KiD CuDi in my senior year of high school to Lupe Fiasco that rocked out during my freshmen year at URI, I was very skeptical – and I do put this lightly – when renowned rapper Kendrick Lamar was going to perform for URI students and fans alike in the middle of April. I, for one, didn’t know what mix would come from Lamar and the eventual crowd that filled the Ryan Center Sunday night, but what I saw was something more miraculous then I believe anyone could anticipate.

Starting the night off was two young MC’s from URI, though the names quickly escaped me while the night went on. It’s quite a shame because I thought they did a pretty adequate job opening up the crowd that increased as their performance raged on. I especially like their remix of “Molly” (originally performed by Tyga and Wiz Khalifa). While they needed to get the crowd more amped up for the night ahead, they still did a good job and I commended them for their charisma and command for their lyrics.

Earl Sweatshirt on the other hand, I couldn’t have forgotten any faster than anything that occurred throughout the performances on stage. Nothing really stood out to me as creative, fun or memorable rather than to get the anticipation through the roof. I suppose it worked, as everyone seemed to be jumping around like sardines going up a stream, but I didn’t want to get anything away from seeing Lamar from giving it all in front of the small Kingston crowd.

But of course, what did I think of the ever-so-hyped Lamar? I thought he nailed it. Every second of his presence on stage was looked upon by the (estimating here) couple hundred people. It really sent me into complete hype mode when he just casually walked in on stage. No announcement, no light, or any sort of light show. He showed up, said who he was and went right to town. Although he tested the audience on how much they actually knew the “real Kendrick,” as he put it, at no point did his presence come off as snarky or forced.

Everything Lamar rapped felt very real, as if his already huge ego didn’t get in place of the music. In that same sense, I earned a boatload of respect for him in the same regard as I did with Lupe last year. Of course, the whole spiel of having URI “being the loudest tour on his tour” kind of felt a little out of place at points during the show, but at least it gave the floor audience even more of a reason to scream their heads off.

As for the songs themselves, they were nothing short of perfectly performed. Everything from his mixtape “Section.80” to his up-tempo “m.A.A.d city” (off of his album “good kid m.A.A.d city) were all on display and he had no problem turning the attention to the crowd to ensure everyone was on the same page. Although I have to commend the side sections (though oddly out of place throughout the show) for showing their support, it was the crowd that easily rocked the vibe that carried through the Ryan Center that night. I especially loved the renditions of “ADHD,” “B*tch, Don’t Kill My Vibe” and “Money Trees” starting off the night on the right mood.

Going through his well-known songs including “Swimming Pools (Drank),” “Poetic Justice” and a pretty inspiring new take on “Backseat Freestyle,” what I found the most intriguing was just how alive the crowd was. I was really taken back by how many true Kendrick fans showed up to fill up the Ryan Center, and that sent a huge smile coming from my face all through the night. Despite a short run time, which I wanted to go until midnight, everything Kendrick promised through this music was brought to fruition one way or another Sunday night.

I’m personally glad that “Swimming Pools (Drank)” wasn’t the most sung-to song for the night, which again, really took me back. Despite some minor hick-ups with audience troubles, I loved everything that came from Kendrick Lamar and he’s earned a spot to be placed in the top five artists working right now.

On April 11, the Student Alumni Association and the Entrepreneurship Club presented its first Entrepreneurship Panel in the Robert L. Carothers Library’s Galanti lounge.

“The average person has a million dollar idea,” Hungry Rhody creator Devin Sheehan said. Hungry Rhody is a popular website that students who live both on and off campus use to order food from various local restaurants on campus and in South Kingstown. Sheehan was just one of five University of Rhode Island alumni who were selected to be on the panel. The other four panelists were C.J. Bordeleau, founder of Arsenal Social, Kurt Harrington, founder of Something Fishy Inc., Eddie Omar, creator of Power Hour healthy energy shots and Bob Cerio, owner of Ocean State Energy Resources. The members shared words of wisdom with the attendees about their journey into entrepreneurship.            

“If you’re not failing, you’re not trying hard enough,” Harrington said. “Keep knocking on those doors until they say yes.”

The beginning of the creation process is the hardest for many budding entrepreneurs. Hopefuls need to have genuine passion for their idea and not be in it for the salary.

Sheehan warned that one mistake many entrepreneurs make is drawing a salary too soon, rather than putting that back into the business. They all agreed that it is important to find a niche and develop a strength that is other peoples’ weakness. Finding a mentor in the field is an instrumental tool many of the panelists wish they had when they began. For Cerio, it seemed as though it was just yesterday he was walking the URI campus.

“Time flies, so if you have an idea go for it,” Cerio said.

 Sheehan agreed and added, “a lot of people don’t react on the ideas they have.”

Of course, the panelists faced their share of adversity while growing their businesses. “The only thing certain is uncertainty,” Omar said about his struggle to get his company off the ground. He announced he had just completed his Ph.D. in natural product chemistry that day. Naturally, he must have used some of those Power Hour energy shots to get him through his studying.

“I’ll sleep when I’m dead,” Omar said. “I have better things to do now.”

He lamented how there were individuals who kept saying he couldn’t do it, but that is what fueled him.

Sheehan prepared a list of five business killers and five business boosters to share with the attendees. He said making lists was one of the tools that got him to where he is today. Some of his business killers were sitting in front of the television and a lack of organization, while his boosters were having faith and surrounding yourself with successful people.

The night was both engaging and insightful and there is sure to have been more than one person who walked out of the lounge ready to take on a new idea.

“This is what I’m about,” Cerio said. “Exchanging knowledge.”

The University of Rhode Island golf team earned a second place finish at the Century Intercollegiate this past weekend to end its regular season.

Rhode Island finished three strokes behind hosting Yale University for the title. The team has finished in the top two in all four of its events in 2013.

Senior Jeffrey Ray led the Rams with a third place tie, his best finish of his collegiate career. Junior Andrew Fiorenzano also equaled his season-low round on Sunday.

Ray and Fiorenzano were tied for 20th place after shooting a pair of 78s on Saturday.   With team stroke average leader Brandon Chicorka struggling on Sunday, shooting a year-high 80, someone had to step up.  Ray shot a final round of 71, his lowest collegiate round, and Fiorenzano finished with a 73, earning him a tie for sixth place. 

“[Ray] played the best tourney of his career,” head coach Gregg Burke said.  “Knowing we needed to score, he came up big.  He played up to the initial expectation we had for him.”

In his first five events of the year, Fiorenzano’s best finish was a tie for 17th place.  In the last three events, however, the junior’s lowest finish was eighth, including a fifth place finish at the New England Division-I Championship.

“When he puts it all together, he can be one of the best players in the league,” Burke said.

Chicorka ended the tournament tied for 10th place after opening the tournament with a 73 on Saturday, which tied him for third place.  His 10th place finish marked his eighth top 10 finish in nine starts this year.

Junior Jared Adams and freshman Nick Fairweather tied for 17th place in the tournament.  Fairweather fired a season-best 74 on Saturday, which tied him for sixth place heading into the final round.

The Rams will head to the Atlantic-10 Championship on Thursday in Coral Springs, Fla., where they finished fifth last year and haven’t won since 2004.  Fiorenzano tied for fifth place last year, three strokes back from first, and Chicorka finished seven strokes back in a tie for 18th.

Burke said both players have a good chance of winning the tournament.

“The par is king,” he said. “They need to get pars.”

Rhode Island is projected to finish eighth in the league, but, the Rams certainly hope to finish better.  Burke said the three southern schools in the league have different priorities because they’re able to play year round.

“We come in thinking that if we play our best we can win the tourney,” Burke said.  “I just hope it rewards our hard work throughout the season, and obviously we hope to do better than eighth.”

The University of Rhode Island golf team finished second at the New England Division I Championship in Middletown, R.I., this past weekend.

Rhode Island had a two-stroke lead heading into Sunday’s play, shooting a spring-best 295 as a squad. However, The Rams completed the competition with 600 total strokes, which was good for second place over Hartford University by two strokes, but 11 strokes behind first-place University of Connecticut.

“We’re thrilled to have played so well on the first day,” Rhode Island head coach Gregg Burke said. “We’re disappointed we didn’t play so well the second day because we put an awful lot of work into it. It’s a championship we haven’t won since 2005, so we’re disappointed we didn’t do better.”

Junior Andrew Fiorenzano shot the best for the Rams after hitting +3 on the first day and +1 on Sunday, which allowed him to finish tied for fifth-place overall out of 50 golfers on the par-72 course. Fiorenzano’s 73 on the second day of play was his lowest of the spring season. 

Senior Branden Chicorka finished tied with Fiorenzano for fifth place after shooting a +1 on Saturday followed by a +3 on Sunday for a total of 148. Chicorka was able to place in the top eight of all but one tournament in which he has participated this season.

“[Chicorka] came into the tournament with every expectation to win,” Burke said. “I believe he’s the best player in New England. He very much wanted to win it but it just wasn’t his tournament. He’s been playing extremely well but he just didn’t play the way he’s played most recently.”

Junior Jared Adams achieved the second-best finish of his Rhode Island career after ending the competition in a tie for eighth place. Adams shot for par on the first day, the best of any Rams’ golfer. A +5 on Sunday brought Adams to a 149-shot total, which also gave him his best placing on the year.

Freshmen Nick Fayerweather and senior Jeffrey Ray finished 24th and 28th, respectively, at the championship. Fayerweather began the competition +3 on Saturday but shot a +8 on Sunday for a total of 155. Ray shot a +5 on the first day of play, which was good for his second-lowest score on the season.  He finished the tournament two strokes behind Fayerweather at 177.

Rhode Island continues their spring season at the Century Intercollegiate Tournament at the Century Country Club in Purchase, N.Y., this Saturday and Sunday. The Rams took first place at the Century Intercollegiate Tournament last season with a total of 600 shots and Chicorka took the individual title.

“The win last year was a big breakthrough for us, and to win a tournament is great but to defend a title is better in some ways,” Burke said. “We love the golf course and our guys worked really hard in the weight room since last October. We hope the improvements we made and our hard work pays off.”

In the course of the next few days, the University of Rhode Island’s Collaborative for Explorations in Mathematics and Sciences will begin awarding scholarships from a $638,939 grant awarded by the National Science Foundation (NSF).

The Scholarship Program to Increase Numbers and Strengthen the Workforce in Technology and Mathematics (SPIN+) was awarded to the university by the NSF in February with the intent to support and attract underrepresented groups to science, technology, engineering and mathematical (STEM) disciplines.   

In order to obtain this grant, which is intended to improve performance and retention rates for minorities in need of financial assistance interested in STEM disciplines, a team of professional investigators (PIs) were established by computer science and statistics chair and Collaborative committee member Joan Peckham.

“Our goal is to improve the learning outcomes of people who are taking these courses,” Peckham said.  “There is so much unmet need in the industry right now. There are two to three times as many jobs available as there are students right now in these disciplines, so we’re hoping that this will help the URI Foundation raise scholarship money from industry to continue what it is that we’re doing.”

Peckham, along with co-PIs, mathematics professors Nancy Eaton and Jessica Libertini and engineering professor Yan Sun submitted a proposal to the NSF in August 2012.  When they received the grant this past February, they began working to create a support system for incoming minorities to STEM disciplines that would be receiving the scholarship. 

“In general we have a shortage of majors in these areas but we have a really serious situation of underrepresentation of women and other minorities and so we identified that we would look at minorities such as African Americans, Pacific Islanders and Hispanics,” Peckham said.  “Women are underrepresented in computer science and computer engineering so we are specifically looking at women candidates.”

The scholarships will be awarded to minority students who will be hand selected by members of the Collaborative, including Peckham, based on a multi-level ranking system that takes into consideration qualities such as their performance in high school, their rank in their graduating class, their status as a minority, and their interest in STEM disciplines.  

“What we’re really trying to do is the best and pick the greatest number of students that we can and try to provide the assistance we can to make the difference between choosing URI and studying in these areas or not,” Peckham said.  “The university calculates unmet need of students and we’re hoping to fill that gap and let students come to URI.”

In addition to providing financial support, SPIN+ will also be providing academic support to what Peckham expects to be a 12 person cohort of students. 

“We will have a group of people on campus who are experts in mentoring students and tutoring students,” Peckham said.

This group of experts includes director of URI’s Academic Enhancement Center and Collaborative member, David Hayes and engineering professor Chuck Watson, both of whom have extensive experience mentoring students and Betty Ericson who will be working with faculty to figure out how to best support these students.

“Nowhere is the problem of underrepresentation in higher education more pronounced than in the STEM disciplines, and URI is no different from other flagship institutions in this regard,” said Hayes in a press release.  “By providing the financial, academic and personal support needed to attract and retain students of color and women in STEM, we are taking a step forward not only in terms of diversifying the STEM workforce, but in strengthening our institution and paving the way for future generations of students.”

Peckham believes that this program will not only improve the university’s retention rates, but will also help the Rhode Island economy and even the global economic market.

“This is a very good thing for Rhode Island because the university is intimately connected to the well being of the state,” Peckham said.  “If we have more…potential employees in these areas it will help the states economic development.” 

Currently, the Collaborative is waiting to hear back from three other NSF proposals to address undergraduate instruction and K-12 education in STEM disciplines. 

“I just hope more students will choose to take STEM courses regardless of their major,” Peckham said.  “If you listen to [the] speeches that Obama gives and you listen to people in congress everyone is concerned that we do not have enough students in these [STEM] disciplines.”

Students of the public relations program at the University of Rhode Island hosted their second annual baby shower at the Phi Sigma Sigma sorority house yesterday afternoon.

Professor Regina Bell’s Public Relations Practices class (PRS 441) asked guests to donate new baby items to benefit the Jonnycake Center. The Center will be giving the donated items to mothers in need on Mother’s Day Weekend.  Some of the donations included diapers, clothes, bottles, toys and baby food.  From May 10 to 12, the center will put two tables with baby items outside for local mothers to take.

“Any local mother is welcome at the Jonnycake Center and she’s welcome to pick up an item for her child in celebration of Mother’s Day,” Bell said.

Bell and her students worked with Jonnycake Center’s “Lil Cakes” program, which provides personal care items to newborns and other children up to 5 years old.

“Last year, as a class, we decided to develop a relationship with a local nonprofit organization and the first organization that came to mind was the Jonnycake Center,” Bell said. “It was a natural fit because our [public relations] majors are destined to make a difference in the community, so we said ‘okay, let’s start right here in Peacedale.’”

Senior Madeline Dombi and juniors Phyllis Francis and Alexandra Baccari organized the event. “Last year’s class came up with the idea and we just decided it was such a success last year [that we wanted to keep] the momentum going this year,” Francis said. Francis and Baccari are members of the Phi Sigma Sigma sorority and Dombi is a member of the Alpha Xi Delta sorority.

After thanking the attendees and speaking about the charity, the students provided guests with pizza and desserts, as well as raffle tickets. The prizes included four sets of Coloud headphones and two gift cards to Panera Bread.

“It’s for a great cause and I think it’s a cute idea to host a baby shower in honor of it,” Phi Sigma Sigma member and junior Daren DeFrank said.

The Jonnycake Center’s Client Services Manager, Carol Brock, attended the event and collected the donated baby items. “We have a lot of organizations that have [baby] showers throughout the year, but our big push is during the Mother’s Day week,” said Brock.

The Jonnycake Center strives to help those in need in the areas of Narragansett and South Kingstown.  The organization supplies food, clothing and household items to people in need, Brock said.  It also provides snacks and toiletries to the local high schools.

“They’re well-established, they’re very strategic in their mission, they’re receptive to help, so they welcomed us with open arms,” Bell said.

Despite the looming threat of a rainy Saturday afternoon, the University of Rhode Island’s fifth annual Hempfest was a day filled with music, sunshine, and zealous discussions about legislation reform that helped make this year’s April 20 an especially positive and progressive occasion.

The all-day event was organized by the URI student-run organization Students For a Sensible Drug Policy (SSDP), with the ambitious goals of “raising awareness, specifically for the types of marijuana legislation that’s been put into effect in Rhode Island, and also taking the opportunity getting exposure to local talent and local music,” SSDP member Emily Cotter said.

Hempfest 2013 sported the most packed lineup thus far, featuring everything from the music of hometown heroes Roz Raskin and The Rice Cakes to live glassblowing demonstrations from artists Freeek and Jesse Haskins (the former of whom was the winner of 2010 Functional Glass Industry Awards). Of all the oddities, the booth that immediately caught my attention was the one that held the wares of David Renner, a designer and fashioner of “battle-ready” armor. Seriously, though, don’t let the quotation marks fool you; on display were chainmail vests and coverall medieval helmets that looked and felt straight out of Game of Thrones.

The list of musical performers was no less eclectic than the groups running the dozens of sporadically placed pot-themed kiosks that dotted the quad. WBRU Rock Hunt-winning duo VulGarrity returned to URI to crank out their trademark blend of sample-laced punk/metal and even threw in a couple of covers of 80s arena anthems. The crunchy grooves Providence-based funk band Fungus Amungus produces never fail to draw a dancing crowd the front of the stage. The band that impressed me the most was electronic act The Kolour Cult, who played rapid fire synth-pop in the vein of early Depeche Mode and Hot Chip.

Though they took the stage as no more than two guys with a retro vocoder and pair of synthesizers, the bands hypnotic, post-punk rhythms seemed more enveloping and organic than watching a big band on Broadway. Their oddly ethereal bloops and bleeps seemed to gain in ferocity as the sun slowly descended that evening, eventually devolving into an aggressive montage of tuneful static that ended with a climactic crash. I’m pleased to report that the sound and mixing of every band throughout each of their Hempfest sets was nearly flawless, barring those rare, unavoidable spurts of feedback from the monitors.

Chris Warren, president of WRIU, URI’s radio station, seemed as thrilled about the pristine sound and amiable atmosphere as I was.

“We’re into the idea of bringing people together, bringing people to URI and doing something outside that revolves around music,” Warren said. “There’s precious few free events like this that people can come out to and we really wanted to do something great for everyone.”

WRIU conducted the first live broadcast of Hempfest in 2011.

The event crowd was far from the stereotypical flock of listless stoners that populate Slightly Stoopid and Snoop Dogg shows, but instead a remarkably diverse spread of age groups, styles of dress and levels of involvement in The War on Drugs – so as to alleviate the risk of guest speakers, such as hempologist John Dvorak and representatives from Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (or LEAP) from preaching to the proverbial choir.

Watching an older, professor-looking gentleman in a tweed jacket stand next to a drug rug-adorned longhair as the pair while discussing the merits and drawbacks of two different types of irrigational tubing in front of the Growin’ Crazy hydroponic company booth was easily one of the most beautiful sights I saw all day. It spoke to the communal powers of events like Hempfest.

Apart from The ‘Fest, SSDP has been more active than ever after the recent statewide decriminalization of marijuana possession. According to Cotter, one of the proudest moments of her involvement with SSDP was “going to the State House to testify for legalization and regulation.

“The most real moment for me was sitting in front of all these people in a government setting who’ve fought so strongly for such a long time, who’ve really dedicated their lives to this cause,” she said. “Even talking face to face with people [who] were opposing [the decriminalization bill] was a huge opportunity…while it’s been a great year with legalization in Colorado and Washington, we still have a long way to go.”

To honor the brave victims of the Holocaust, the URI Hillel is bringing awareness to campus through the Holocaust Remembrance Week.

The goal of the week is to promote awareness of the atrocities of the Holocaust in hopes that it will never occur again.

“It is important for students to be aware of the Holocaust because over 11 million people perished,” junior political science and public relations double major Sabrina Brotons, who also serves as the Holocaust Awareness Week Chair, said. “The Jewish population were not the only victims, and in fact, Hitler’s regime targeted everyone and anyone who was considered different. People were singled out based on their race, religion, political views, or sexual orientation.”

The weeklong commemorative series of events began on Sunday, April 7 with a Field of Flags Memorial Display on the Hammerschlag Mall located on the walkway leading to the library. There are nearly 2400 small colored flags, each one accounting for 5000 Holocaust victims. This display will last until Sunday, April 14.

Last night, there was a candlelight vigil, consisting of songs, prayers, and poetry to remember the victims of the Holocaust.

The week continues with a presentation by archivist Elliott Caldwell titled “Solving the Mystery of ‘The Little Valise’” in the URI Library Galanti Lounge Wednesday. Caldwell will share the story of a suitcase that accompanied Jewish refugees in 1939, narrating one family’s journey through the hardships of the time period.

On Thursday, a screening of Kinderblock 66 will take place in Swan Hall Auditorium. The director of the film, Rob Cohen, is a URI faculty member and will hold a question-and-answer session following the showing.

On Friday evening, Holocaust survivors will share their personal stories at a Shabbat dinner at the Norman M. Fain Hillel Center.

The Holocaust Remembrance Week will conclude on Sunday with three final events.

The memorial flags will be removed in the afternoon and the Hillel Center will host a Yom HaZikaron – the Israel Memorial Day – lunch with a discussion of the relationship between the Holocaust and Israel over the years. The evening will conclude with an exhibit of Holocaust photographs and literature at the Hillel Center.

The URI Hillel is a Jewish organization on campus that provides opportunities to explore and celebrate Jewish heritage. The group takes trips to Israel and various other locations to participate in civic engagement.

The University of Rhode Island softball team split a weekend series with LaSalle University and was swept by Fordham University in a doubleheader Sunday afternoon.

The Rams dropped Friday’s matchup with the Explorers, 7-2, but rebounded Saturday afternoon to salvage their second Atlantic-10 Conference win of the season, 7-3.  Fordham was able to handle Rhode Island on Sunday, defeating the Rams 6-2 and winning the second game 12-2 in five innings. Rhode Island’s record drops to 7-19 overall with an A-10 posting of 2-5.

“I think overall it was a pretty solid weekend for us,” Rhode Island senior outfielder Kelly Coker said. “Playing in [Atlantic-10] play, every game is important for us to win, but I think we have a lot of confidence we can take from the weekend to use in our A-10 games for the rest of the year.”

LaSalle sophomore pitcher Alicia Aughton helped herself during Friday’s game with a two-run home run. Aughton stymied Rhode Island on the other side of the ball, only allowing one unearned run. The Explorers cemented their victory in the top half of the sixth inning after a solo shot from junior shortstop Megan Hodgson and a two-run home run courtesy of freshman designated player Paige Giunta.        

Junior pitcher Sam Bedore took the loss for Rhode Island, going six innings and yielding seven runs on eight hits with seven strikeouts, giving her more than 60 on the season thus far.

“I think offense is very mental and we’ve been working a lot on our mental game and just working on our strength in the cage,” Coker said. “We’ve had a lot of games where we’ve put up a lot of runs, so we just need to put it all together.”

In their second match-up with the Explorers, Rhode Island jumped out to an early advantage after a four-run first inning.  Freshman catcher Taylor Archer drove in one run on a single and freshman leftfielder Emily Hendricks grabbed an RBI with a bases-loaded walk later in the inning.  Coker, who had a RBI double earlier in the inning, was also able to steal home. 

Rhode Island allowed two unearned runs to score in the top of the third inning, but redshirt senior shortstop Courtney Prendergast quickly got the runs back for the Rams in the bottom of the third after hitting an RBI double and subsequently scoring on a wild pitch.

LaSalle put another run on the board after an RBI double from senior first baseman Tristan Musho, but the Explorers were shut down by the pitching of junior Erika Szymanski thereafter. Szymanski picked up her third win on the season, allowing only one earned run and striking out two on the afternoon.

Rhode Island started off strong against Fordham, taking an early 1-0 lead, but it wouldn’t last. Fordham jumped out in front for the first time in the bottom of the third following an RBI single from sophomore pitcher Michele Daubman and sophomore third baseman Kayla Lombardo’s two-run homer.

Junior designated player Ashley Olson tacked on a solo shot for Rhode Island to cut the deficit to one, but Fordham pushed three more runs across the plate in the later innings.

Szymanski was dealt her sixth loss of the season after yielding six runs on eleven hits to the Rams.

“I think [Bedore and Szymanski] pitched really awesome,” Coker said. “They both had a really good performance. I think they both pitched pretty well, but we need to back them up a little better and work as a team.”

Fordham’s offense exploded in the second game, scoring in each of the five innings of play and putting the Rams away early.

Up next for Rhode Island is a short drive up Route 95 for a doubleheader this afternoon against Brown University.

“This week in practice and our doubleheader [against Brown] we’re just going to focus on playing solid defense and working out the kinks so we are prepared for Charlotte this weekend,” Coker said.

After nearly four weeks since its last competition the University of Rhode Island’s men’s track team had a strong return with a win at the UConn Invitational in Connecticut.

After such a long time away from real competition, the Rams didn’t seem to miss a step after earning seven IC4A qualifying marks, taking first in four events and winning the entire meet overall.

“I was very excited about the meet, I was very excited about the performances we had,” Rhode Island head coach John Copeland said. “I think the kids really did a great job with getting ready for the first outdoor meet and it was great to have a nice day too, so that’s always a plus. I think we’re looking pretty good at this stage. We have a few weak spots that we’re trying to fill up now, but we’ll get that done before the end of April.”

One of the team’s best events was the 100-meter dash where sophomore Tyler Oliveira won the race with a time of 10.81 qualifying for the IC4A Championships. A team of Oliveira, senior Victor Boonham, redshirt senior Ronald Woodley and sophomore Jalen Young won the 4x100m relay with a time of 41.80. The time was also an IC4A qualifying mark.

The 4x400m relay team of Young, sophomore Andrew Sakovits, freshman Zach Campo and redshirted junior Anthony Davidson took first place with a time of 3:21.57. To round out the first place wins, Woodley won the triple jump with a mark of 47-4.5.

The other IC4A qualifying scores included those of senior Andrew Piscitelli’s second place finish in the shot put with a distance of 53'05 and his 169'05 throw in the discus earning him third place. Sophomore Sam Snyder earned qualification and a second place finish in the discus after a throw of 171’03. To round out the qualifiers, senior William Janes finished second in the hammer throw with a mark of 190'04.

“The IC4As are really one of our main goals for the year so it’s great to get those qualifications out of the way early in the season so we can start to do some of the things we want to do,” Copeland said. “Many of the qualifications were in events where we want to do some other work. This gives us a little option to do the things we want to do during the season.”

For this week’s meet, Copeland said he hopes to get another step up on the level of competition and run against some teams the Rams haven’t played in a while as well as continuing to adjust to running outdoors again.

“What we’re really looking for at this point is to try to get used to running outdoors again and to really start posting some quality times that will get us ready for the championships later in the season,” Copeland said.

The Rams will be travelling to Princeton, N.J. for the Howell Invitation this Friday and Saturday.

Inconsistency has been an issue for the University of Rhode Island baseball team (12-15) so far this season, and this week it became more evident.

After a solid performance in Tuesday’s 4-2 win against Northeastern University, the Rams were shutout in a loss to Central Connecticut State University yesterday.

Junior Milan Mantle (3-1) had six strikeouts in 5.1 innings of work in the Rams victory over the Huskies. Mantle allowed five hits and one run picking up his third win in his many starts.

Sophomore Ty Sterner came in after Mantle and held the Rhody lead for 2.1 innings. Sterner allowed one run and one hit before handing the ball over to senior Bobby Dean. Dean was not able to get the final four outs of the game and picked up his fourth save of the season.

The Rams got key production from their two-trough-five hitters in the win; Junior Jeff Roy batted in the two spot, went 2-4, and had one RBI. Senior Mike LeBel batted third; he also had two hits in the win and accounted for a run. Senior Pat Fortunato batted fifth and went 2-5 with one RBI and two stolen bases.

Just one day after the team’s 10-hit performance against Northeastern, the Rams were shutout and held to one hit in Wednesday’s loss to CCSU.

Central Connecticut used seven different pitchers to silence the Rhody bats, which made it difficult for hitters adjust.  

“Using a bunch of guys like that makes it hard for hitters,” Senior Kevin Stenhouse said. “Guys can’t pick up on what one pitcher wants to do, and really can’t communicate between innings because there’s a new guy out there every inning.”

Freshman Brian Russell started the game for Rhody and was knocked out of the game by the Blue Devils in the third inning.

Russell gave up a pair of singles and double that allowed a run to score. The next batter reached on a fielding error by Roy. That error allowed an earned and unearned run to score. Russell found himself out of the game with his team down 3-0. CCSU added one more run before the game came to a close with a final score 4-0.

“Sometimes I think the guys play to the scoreboard,” Foster said. “They see they’re winning and cruise, they see they’re losing and they, I don’t want to say quit, but the same effort isn’t there.”

Baseball is one of the few sports where a team can go on an offensive explosion one game and then get shutout the next. Although the Rams did not have an explosion of offense Tuesday, the team’s 10 hits was the third most they’ve had in a game this season. To come back Wednesday with a very similar lineup and get one hit does not bode well for any offense. 

“We just need to make more of our at-bats and take our time,” Senior Chris Famiglietti said. “We have a good hitters and pitchers we, just need to do our jobs better and play the way we know how.”

Last March, a University of Rhode Island sixth year pharmacy student spent eight days living in South Bay Retirement Living in South Kingstown as part of her six week geriatrics clinical rotation. 

Emily Anastasia spent March 8 to 15 living in the retirement home with a 92 year old roommate, Dottie Cusack, under the supervision of Chris Sheil, resident program manager at South Bay. 

During her rotation and eight days in South Bay, Erica Estus, a clinical assistant professor of pharmacy at URI, who influenced the aspiring pharmacist to live in a retirement home, mentored Anastasia. 

“Dr. Estus is really the reason that [living in the retirement home] came about,” Anastasia said.  “I took her geriatrics elective last year and [she] showed this documentary in class and it was absolutely amazing.”

The documentary was the first documentary made by now MTV star Andrew Jenks, and was called “Room 335”.  It documented Jenks’ experience living in a retirement home the summer after he graduated high school and was filmed by his two best friends. 

“The documentary followed the ups and downs, the hilarious moments and the sad moments,” Anastasia said.  “I said to [Estus] it would be amazing if you could get that kind of experience.  It would be something completely different and give you a new perspective on older adults other than just being your patients.”

Estus was on board from the beginning. 

“I was like yeah I don’t see why we can’t,” Estus said.  “We were talking in class and no other students would ever really embrace an opportunity to do that.”

While at South Bay, Anastasia participated in the full schedule of events every day with the other residents and attempted to get to know them on a deeper level than simply their medical history.

“You expect there to be moments when you’re bored and at the beginning there were,” Anastasia said. “By the second or third day I was totally in it.”

During her stay, she also ran into another sixth year pharmacy student who was volunteering at the home who and begged her to find her a book, said.  “By the second or third day I was totally in it.”

Anastasia formed many close bonds with residents throughout her eight day stay. Anastasia remains close to one resident whom she still Skypes with and invited to her home for Easter. Her connection with her roommate, Cusack, however, was one she particularly values.

“Dottie is incredible, she’s 92 but you would never know if you saw her,” Anastasia said.  “She’s the most positive person I’ve ever met, she greets everyone with a hug.  She’s never angry or upset and I think that’s why she aged so well.”

Anastasia’s admiration for Cusack is not an unreciprocated emotion.  Cusack found the experience just as fulfilling as Anastasia.

“She was wonderful,” Cusack, who has been living in South Bay for three years, said.  “For me it was just like having one of my granddaughters there, I really enjoyed it.

The experience Anastasia had, though shorter than a typical six-week rotation, arguably gave her more experience than students who take the traditional route of volunteering during the day.

“I think the biggest lesson I learned out of it is that you can’t look at [the residents] as  just their medical history and medications, you have to look at them as a person,” Anastasia said.  “Just as I said with Dottie, her positive personality made her age so well and if you just looked at her medical history you would never see that.”

Since Anastasia’s departure, the residents, Cusack included have missed her presence.

“For the first few days I really missed her because she was always laughing and full of energy, although for my age I’ve got pretty good energy myself,” Cusack said.  “I’m proud of Emily because she made it happen, I didn’t hesitate for a minute when they asked me if I wanted to have her for a roommate.”

Though Anastasia had been volunteering at South Bay for the past three years, helping host events such as the “Senior-Senior Prom,” it took more than a year and a half to make the opportunity possible.

“There were some roadblocks,” Estus said.  “It’s not typical and people don’t really see what the value truly is but it really is an amazing experience.”

The URI women’s track team competed in the Adidas Raleigh Relays in North Carolina as well as the U.S. Coast Guard Academy Invitational in Connecticut this past weekend, garnering multiple first-place finishes and one record-breaking performance.

In the Raleigh Relays, a four person team of senior Hayley Madsen, junior Frankie Brillante, senior Niamh Ryan and sophomore Lauren Columbare combined for a sixth place finish in the 4x1500-meter relay with a time of 19:07.46. The time broke the school’s previous record of 19:43.65 set by Amy Taylor, Tara Hutchinson, Kelly Martin and Megan O'Shea at the 2002 event.

“We don’t get to run it very often because you don’t see that race very often so we figured well we’re down there so we might as well do it,” Rhode Island head coach Laurie Feit-Melnick said. “That was one of our goals and we got an opportunity to do that. Who knows when we’ll see that relay again, but that was our goal to go down there and give it a shot.”

At the Coast Guard meet, URI was led by the play of senior Genevieve Rybicki. Rybicki claimed first in both the shot put and discus throw, and finished third in the hammer throw. Her best in the shot put event was a New England qualifying distance of 41'05.75. She again qualified for New England Championships in the discus when she threw a distance of 133'02. Her hammer throw went a distance of 160'05, earning her yet another New England qualifying score.

“Genevieve is a captain and she’s getting ready for a fantastic outdoor season,” Feit-Melnick said. “She is doing very well and we’re excited about how the rest of the season will progress. We’ve got a good strong group of throwers.”

Although many on the team appear to be in midseason form, Feit-Melnick said that the first action of the season for everyone who competed came in the Adidas Raleigh Relay.

“We were very pleased,” Feit-Melnick said. “For some, it was an opening up of the season. The group that travelled to North Carolina, that was their first outdoor race and I was very pleased with the performances. They got a good opportunity, good experience and they have a lot to look forward to.”

Feit-Melnick also said she will be looking forward to seeing how the team performs for the rest of the season, beginning with, this weekend’s meet in Connecticut.

“It’s just basically a lot of hard work now,” Feit-Melnick said. “We’re excited about going to [University of Connecticut] and of course, you do hope that the weather is decent. We’ll be putting in some hard workouts during the week and then we need to get a lot out of the meets. This will be like a complete team meet. We’re just preparing and hoping for a great weekend. Hopefully we can build on what we’re doing.”

The Rams will be on the road this Saturday for the day-long UConn invitational in Storrs, Conn.

A University of Rhode Island alumnus currently working for a newspaper based in Connecticut spoke to URI journalism and public relations students on the tedious task that is reporting tragedy. 

The presentation came in light of the recent tragedy in Connecticut in which 47 year old Debra Denison shot and killed herself and her two young grandsons, one of whom was celebrating his second birthday.

Timothy Cotter, managing editor of The Day walked students in his spouse Betty Cotter’s media writing class through the process reporters went through in order to cover this event.

“We want to fully develop who their people are,” Cotter said.  “They’re not just names.” 

According to Cotter, the first step in covering a crime such as the murder/suicide in Connecticut where the perpetrator is deceased is not in fact to rely on officials for information.  “It is not the police’s job to build the narrative,” Cotter said.

In order to create a complete picture for readers from the few hazy facts that were known about the incident, Cotter and the reporters began to develop a timeline, or as he called it, a “tick-tock.”

“Building this narrative-it’s hard to imagine that these things can happen,” Cotter said.

Cotter explained that he sent a reporter to the daycare from which the children’s grandmother picked them up shortly before the murder. He then sent reporters to houses of the parents, the paternal grandmother, and the neighbors. “People are very leery of the media today more than ever,” Cotter said.  “They think we’re just trying to sell papers.”

With this knowledge, Cotter advised students to be “respectful and polite, but forceful” in their reporting, stressing the line between what is journalistically acceptable versus what is ethically responsible. 

“You need to be able to sleep at night,” Cotter said. 

In addition to reporting on crime, Cotter emphasized to students the importance of undergraduate education. 

“Your undergrad is the foundation,” Cotter said.  “If you’ve got cracks in the foundation some day your house will fall down.” 

In terms of the long hours a newspaper reporter can often face, Cotter admitted that journalism can be a labor of love. 

“I think you need to love the work to make it worth it,” Cotter said.  “You don’t leave until its done.”

The University of Rhode Island softball team grabbed its first Atlantic-10 Conference victory in their home-opening doubleheader against St. Bonaventure University on Friday afternoon.

    The Rams dropped the first game, 11-6, despite having an early lead but claimed a win in the second half of the series stifling the Bonnies, 6-2. Rhode Island’s record sits at 6-16 overall with a 1-2 posting in A-10 play.

 “The first game was a little bit tough but coming back and winning the second game was a big win for the conference [record],” Rhode Island assistant coach Denise Marchese said. “I think bouncing back from that loss was the most impressive thing and how they rallied to get that done.”

Rhode Island charged out in front in the top half of the doubleheader after junior first baseman Jocelyn Mattison singled in senior centerfielder Kelly Coker, and a double from freshman catcher Taylor Archer drove in Mattison in the bottom of the first.

After a solo shot from sophomore centerfielder Ashley Snider in the top of the third, the Bonnies exploded for eight runs in the fourth inning to jump out to a seven-run advantage. Freshman shortstop Emily McDonough and senior designated player Jessenia Andujar each had two RBI in the inning, and two Rhode Island errors aided the offensive outburst.

The Rams tried to bring themselves back into the game in the later innings after Mattison slammed a solo home run in the bottom of the fourth, and Coker blasted a three-run shot in the bottom of the fifth, but freshman relief pitcher Alexis Sloat prevented any further damage.

Senior pitcher Erika Szymanski suffered her fifth loss of the season after surrendering nine runs on eight hits.  Only two of the runs were earned.

Rhode Island was able to take an early lead again in the second game after bringing three players across the plate in the bottom of the first. Junior second basemen Amy Gleason started the scoring after coming home on an error by sophomore third baseman Grace Rooney.  Sophomore leftfielder Megan Congro later drove in Mattison on a single while freshman third baseman Lauren Klepchick scored on another error during the same play.

    “I just think our defense was the most critical in the second game,” Marchese said. “I think the defense cleaned up, for the most part, and could really take care of those automatic outs and for us that’s a critical component. When our pitching and defense are on, we’ve been hitting the ball very well lately.”

The Rams tacked on another run in the bottom of the second inning when Archer lined an RBI single up the middle to score freshman leftfielder Emily Hendricks.

The Bonnies tried to come back after a solo home run from freshman second baseman Emily Belfield and an RBI single by freshman first baseman Katie Sinclair, but could not score any further against junior pitcher Sam Bedore. Bedore pitched a complete game for the Rams, picking up her team-leading fourth win while allowing six hits and striking out four.

Rhode Island sealed their victory in the bottom of the fourth when Klepchick hammered a two-run double into the gap in right centerfield, scoring Mattison and freshman Olivia Hendricks.

The Rams next series is against Fairfield University on Thursday, after which they will host A-10 opponents LaSalle University and then travel to Fordham University over the weekend.

“These games are very key, especially with teams like LaSalle and Fordham, they are very good teams,” Marchese said. “I think if we can get a couple of wins this weekend that will push us over the .500 mark in conference and that would really set us up for not having to back into a corner in a must-win situation later.”

The University of Rhode Island women’s rowing team opened up their season this weekend in winning fashion after earning another Resolute Cup title.

The Rams were able to net their seventh consecutive Resolute Cup after defeating Boston College. They also took first place in three of the remaining five races at the Narrow River against the Eagles, the University of Massachusetts and George Washington University.

“I thought they raced strong,” Rhode Island head coach Shelagh Donohoe said. “What I really liked is, from top to bottom, we had consistent racing and that’s really important to me.  It wasn’t just one boat, I think it was consistent throughout the whole regatta.”

The varsity-eight boat, comprised of senior Anne Mulholland, senior Ari Wakeman, sophomore Kari Tomeny, junior Lindsay Stephenson, senior Lotte Sherman, sophomore Kate Capistran, senior Anne Edwards and junior coxswain Kris Hudak, won their race by more than three seconds over second-place UMass with a time of 7:20.09.  However, it was their margin of more than eight seconds over BC that yielded Rhode Island’s Resolute Cup trophy.

The Rams finished second to the Eagles in the second varsity-eight race, but stormed back in the varsity 4A+ competition.  Junior Siobhan Norton, junior Alyssa Goley, freshman Quinn Snyder, sophomore Hannah Milam and freshman coxswain Avery Cohen led the Rams past the opposition with a time of 8:28.39. 

“We raced well against some strong competition,” Donohoe said. “It’s also very early and the [Atlantic-10 Championship] regatta is the first weekend in May. I think there’s a lot of speed to be gained by us and also by opponents.”

Rhode Island later dominated the varsity 4B+ race behind sophomores Michelle Forte, Jess Bergen, Allison Zolnowsky and Liz Swain and freshman coxswain Carly Amurao.  The Rams were able to blaze past the Eagles and the Minutemen, beating the former team by just fewer than six seconds after clocking in at 8:47.74.

Despite finishing 10 seconds behind BC in the third varsity-eight race, the Rams were able to close out the day on a high note after claiming first place in the varsity 4C+ event.  Freshmen Lily Herberger, Allyson Ancona, Elizabeth Shadle, C