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Backpacking, self-discovery in Wyoming

By: Nik Schiff, Transcript Correspondent

William Hayes. Photo courtesy of the OWU website.

This summer, a group of Ohio Wesleyan students will find their spiritual testing ground in the Wyoming wilderness.

Members of the Leadership and Discipleship in the Wilderness (LDW) trip will spend six weeks in the Wind River Mountains beginning June 4.

Since 1995 the trip has been taken ten times; on average about every other summer. It is run by the Coalition for Christian Outreach, a campus ministry at OWU and other schools in the region.

Some activities offered include backpacking, rock climbing and mountaineering. The purpose of the excursion is to learn lifelong lessons through experiences rarely available to the average person, to provide opportunities for personal growth and maturation, and to develop personal faith.

“The potential for these things is huge if students can find the right places and contexts for this learning,” said William Hayes, associate chaplain and director of Wilderness Ministry at OWU.

“The experience of LDW makes it possible for students to learn in ways that are just not possible through campus.”

During the journey, students will receive personal Christian discipleship in the context of a close community, giving them the opportunity to grow in their faith and to make lifelong friends.

“I still keep in touch with some of the people I met whenever I went,” said Haley Barber, class of 2013. Barber attended the trip in 2012. “Having the opportunity to meet new people from different backgrounds was a great experience,” she said.

“My favorite part of the trip was all the nature and wilderness, it was gorgeous,” Barber continued.

The group will be able to rock climb and mountaineer. Mountaineering occurs over snow, ice and glaciers to heights up to 13,000 feet.

“These activities provide physical challenges with potential for failure but with high rewards,” Hayes said.

To date, only two students have applied to participate in this summer’s adventure to Wyoming.

Bye bye stereotypes

By: Gopika Nair, Copy Editor

Actress Arden Cho. Photo courtesy of jackfroot.com.

I love movies, I love television shows and I love the world of make-believe so much that I grew up wanting to be a part of it. But as a kid, I had the disappointing realization that none of the leading ladies in Hollywood were anything like me.

They were rarely Indian, and if they were, they probably had a thick accent for ill-suited comedic effect along with a storyline about arranged marriages.

As a woman of color, I’m tired of seeing these overused tropes, and I’m not alone. The actors are tired, too.

After Deadline reported on the casting of the film “Death Note” on Nov. 12, Arden Cho, known for her role as Kira Yukimura on “Teen Wolf,” tweeted, “Great, another Hollywood feature film casting all white leads for a Japanese manga … Long way to go for Asians when we can’t even book animes.”

Cho has previously been vocal about turning down roles which feature “superhot Asian trophy wives with thick accents,” and took to Twitter in 2014, requesting writers and filmmakers write better roles for Asian actors.

The lack of worthwhile roles in Hollywood isn’t a problem that’s exclusive to Asian actors, however. It affects all actors who are women of color.

On Sept. 20, Viola Davis became the first African American woman to win an Emmy Award for best actress in a drama.

In her acceptance speech, Davis addressed the lack of roles for women of color in the entertainment industry.

“The only thing that separates women of color from anyone else is opportunity,” she said. “You cannot win an Emmy for roles that are simply not there.”

Out of several hundred network shows currently on air, only “The Mindy Project” is created, produced and written by a woman of color, Mindy Kaling.

Even shows that promote diversity, like “Modern Family,” often rely on one of the character’s accent for humor.

Actress Sofia Vergara. Photo courtesy of the Forbes website.

Unlike some women of color in Hollywood, Sofia Vergara, who plays Gloria Delgado-Pritchett on “Modern Family,” isn’t faking her accent. But her character does get ridiculed by the other characters often.

In an interview with Cosmopolitan magazine, Vergara said that there aren’t many ideal roles for Latina women in Hollywood.

Many untold stories about the lives of women of color still exist. So, ditch the tropes, writers.

Find new stories to tell. Tell stories about transgender women of color, gender-fluid people of color, non-binary people of color, bisexual women of color, asexual women of color and women of color with disabilities.

Tell stories that will earn Asian, Middle Eastern, African American, Latina and other women of color their Oscars, Emmys and Tonys. Keep telling those stories until a woman of color winning a prestigious award isn’t a complete rarity. Representation matters.

OWU chamber orchestra continues to impress

On Nov. 10, the Chamber Orchestra performed their fall concert in Gray Chapel. The group was conducted by Michael Malone.

Malone has been the conductor for the Chamber Orchestra since 2010.

Malone explained that a chamber orchestra is a smaller version of a full orchestra. OWU’s consists of six first violins, four second violins, three violas, three cellos, two basses, one flute, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, two horns and timpani.

According to his website, Malone “holds the PhD in historical musicology from The University of Texas at Austin,” and has taught courses in conducting, orchestration, music history and history of jazz.

The orchestra rehearses once a week as a group, however, the string section has a weekly sectional at which they practice separately.

Malone said, “It is my job to make sure that we are playing together as a group. I help them understand how their parts fit in with what else is happening in the music around them so that their individual parts make sense within the whole piece.”

Senior ZoAnn Schutte was appointed department concerto competition and therefore aided the process of selecting pieces for the performance.

“The most substantial piece on the program is Mozart’s Symphony No. 40, which is one of those pieces I have known and loved for a long time, so it is a great pleasure to have a chance to conduct it for the first time,” said Malone. “I always try to choose a big piece that will stretch the capabilities of the orchestra. This is a big, difficult piece, and so the students have had to work hard to learn it, but they have done an amazing job.”

Every year, the orchestra has a Concertmaster who is always a violinist.

Junior Chris Brinich is the current Concertmaster of the chamber orchestra. Brinich said that as Concertmaster he needs to “to be able to lead their section, as well as the whole orchestra in some instances. The concertmaster is generally the one who is most expected to know their part in the violin section. It also includes organizing separate string sectional rehearsals for the orchestra.”

Brinich has been involved in the Chamber Orchestra since his freshman year and has held other positions such as Principal Violinist.

Dinner with Jones

The Honors House, located at 123 Oak Hill Avenue, houses 11 students. Photo courtesy of the OWU website.

It’s not Breakfast at Tiffany’s, but it is dinner with Rock Jones.

The president of Ohio Wesleyan has either met, or is going to meet with Small Living Units around campus to talk about the SLU community.

Dinners, teas and meetings have been hosted in the past couple weeks and they have gone just as planned. Jones decided the timing was perfect because of the transition the SLU community is undergoing.

“With coming transitions in the SLU community and the construction of new buildings, I thought it was a good time for me to be in touch directly with each SLU and to experience the dynamic sense of community and purpose that exists in the SLUs,” Jones said.

One of the most recent dinners was with the Honors house. The residents of the house prepared breakfast for dinner and discussed the history of OWU. Junior resident and RA Lee LeBoeuf enjoyed the shared experience, along with Jones.

“I think he liked the food. He mentioned that his family used to have breakfast for dinner once a week,” she said. “We talked about our house’s history, how it became part of the OWU campus and about all the individual members of our house.”

Jones also recently met with the newest SLU on campus, the House of Spiritual Athletes (HSA).

HSA is located in Welch for the time being until they move into one of the new renovated houses next year. Junior Scott Harmanis, along with his housemates, talked about their current situation with the president.

“He wanted to get to know us so we all introduced ourselves and talked about our majors and what we’d like to do,” he said. “We also talked about how the year was going so far and how living in Welch as a SLU was going.”

Like Harmanis said, Jones does want to get the know the SLU community, which is a big reason for the dinners.

“The dinners give me an opportunity to visit with members of the SLU community, to hear about various house projects, to gain new perspectives on life in the SLU community and to talk about any concerns relating to transitions that will come with the construction of new buildings for the SLUs. I have thoroughly enjoyed the conversations and have learned a lot about how the SLUs are functioning this year.”

Jones wants to do this with the whole student body.

“I hope to find a way to replicate this experience with other student groups beyond the SLU community.”

Faculty shuts students out of their November meeting

In an unprecedented move, student representatives from the Wesleyan Council on Student Affairs (WCSA) and The Transcript were denied access to the Nov. 16 faculty meeting.

For the short period of time that students were outside Merrick Hall’s third floor meeting space, the monthly gathering of OWU faculty and staff simmered with controversy. Following the usual invocation, Provost Chuck Stinemetz moved to allow the student guests to enter the room.

After the motion was seconded, professor Bart Martin of the geology department raised his hand with a comment.

Citing the recent publication of Transcript articles in the Delaware Gazette reporting on faculty business, Martin asked that his colleagues consider barring student entry to the Monday meeting in the interest of confidentiality.

Martin’s speech was immediately condemned by an impassioned Paul Kostyu, an associate professor in the journalism department. He reminded the faculty that “we are members of the Delaware community,” and that “they have a right to know what goes on here.”

Kostyu also added that the faculty serves the students and that everything discussed at the faculty meeting “becomes public eventually.”

Professor Chris Wolverton of the botany department stood up to rebut this claim. “It is not unreasonable for faculty members to be allowed to make comments without fear of it being published in the newspaper the next day,” he argued.

As the tension grew between colleagues, one non-faculty member weighed in on the controversial motion. Deborah Peoples, head of collection services for Beeghly Library, said she supported Wolverton’s sentiment.

“I am thinking we deserve a place to air our feelings in relative safety where we are not feeling that it is going to be on the front page the next day,” Peoples said.

Peoples continued, suggesting that, “there are ways to make The Transcript widely accessible to every student and faculty member on this campus in its online form without having to make it accessible to the whole community.”

Sensing the emotion driving both sides of the argument, professor Thomas Wolber of the department of modern foreign languages noted that the issue at hand was indeed contentious.

“We have to find the right balance between transparency and valid argument,” Wolber reasoned, “but we also need to protect the integrity of the institution and the privacy of faculty.”

“I would recommend we not make a quick motion on this issue,” Wolber concluded. “I think somebody should study the issue carefully, weigh the pros and cons and come up with a decision that is rational and logical and that we can defend to the public.”

But professor Carol Neuman De Vegvar of the fine arts department objected to the idea that the faculty’s already precious time be further diminished. And if the faculty open the meeting to students, she argued, the entire Delaware community should be invited to sit in.

“Why don’t we just open the meeting to the entire township,” De Vegvar said. “Why don’t we put it on video and immediately broadcast it as it is happening. The answer is plain: we have business to do as a faculty, we admit people on vote. It is not a matter for the entire community.”

During the brief pause in debate that followed De Vegvar’s suggestion, Stinemetz interjected with a call for remaining comments. When no faculty members raised their hand, he requested a vote.

The faculty were at first asked to speak “yea” or “nay” on the motion to allow student representatives into the meeting, but with the sides being so close, a vote-by-hand was required.

After a silent minute, the motion to allow students into the faculty meeting failed.

With that announcement, Kostyu collected his coat and hat and walked out of the meeting.

As he left the building, Kostyu said his “principles prevent me from being a part of this.”

For the members of WCSA in attendance, the decision to bar their entry was a disappointment.

Junior Jessica Choate, president-elect of WCSA, hoped that her future “communication with the faculty can be open.”

Seniors Emma Drongowski, vice president of WCSA, and Jerry Lherisson, president of WCSA, reported similar feelings.

Speaking on both of their behalf, Drongowski said, “I am very disappointed that students were not granted access to the faculty meeting today. We believe that it is important for students to fully understand decisions that faculty members make, as it directly impacts us as students and as members of the OWU community. We sincerely hope that we, as students, will be included in these meetings and conversations in the future.”

Sigma Chi now closed on campus

The Sigma Chi flag. Photo courtesy of Sigma Chi's website. — The Sigma Chi flag. Photo courtesy of Sigma Chi’s website.

This story updated on 11/12/15

Late Wednesday, Nov. 11, the Ohio Wesleyan University community was alerted that the Sigma Chi fraternity is being closed immediately.

According to the email sent to students and faculty, the international headquarters of the fraternity were the ones to make the decision, due to “declining membership and commitment to the fraternity’s historic mission.”

The press release sent by Sig Chi’s headquarters said, “The Fraternity looks forward to maintaining a positive relationship with administrators at Ohio Wesleyan University and returning to campus after its current members have graduated.”

Dana Behum, the assistant director of student involvement for fraternity and sorority life, said OWU was alerted of the fraternity’s suspension Nov. 5. After a discussion with the fraternity’s international headquarters, they decided to tell the members on Nov. 11. The Executive Director of the fraternity, Michael Church, made the announcement to the members in person.

Directly after the announcement, the administrators had time to discuss staff resources and housing accommodations.

Behum said Residential Life is working with each member to identify his next step in housing. 30 Williams Drive, the Sig Chi house, will likely be closed for the remainder of the 2015-2016 academic year. Currently, there has been no discussion to the future use of the building. The current members are now considered to be Alumni members of the organization.

Kimberlie Goldsberry, the interim vice president for student affairs, said, “I do believe and have observed that in times of challenge, sadness and change there can be great demonstrations of empathy, strength and defining opportunity.”

Behum said, “Our Greek community…are surprised and heartbroken. I believe that the students in the OWU Greek community will continue to include our new Alumni Members of Sigma Chi in their campus interactions, social opportunities and identity group.”

We have attempted to reach out to current members of Sigma Chi. We have either received no response or a decline to comment.

Nine out of ten college students admit to using Netflix

Ross Hickenbottom, Transcript Correspondent

The cast of the first season of the popular Netflix show "Orange is the New Black." — The cast of the first season of the popular Netflix show “Orange is the New Black.”

On my news feed yesterday, I saw a headline that confused me. It read, “Netflix Binge Watching Negatively Affecting College Students.” Seriously? We get one thing that makes us happy, and there are negative affects from it? No way!

Here are some stats for you: “Nine out of ten college students admit to using Netflix.”

“After watching three or more episodes in a row, it is considered binge-watching.”

Are you guilty of being a “binge-watcher”?

The answer is, probably.

Since Netflix was founded in 1997, more than 30 million people worldwide have registered for the online streaming website, and it’s no secret that college students like you and I occupy a rather large percentage of those people.

But, to call myself a “binge-watcher?” Ouch.

It’s simple. People subscribe to Netflix because they like the ability to watch as much of a show as they would like in one sitting. They like the ability to watch a whole season of “The Office” when they’re laid up in their beds on winter break (or on a Thursday). They like to take study breaks with quick seasons of “Bob’s Burgers.” It’s okay. We’re obviously not alone.

The cast of The Office, which has been on Netflix for years.

In a world like ours, waiting on that new blockbuster to come out in theaters or a TV show to air next week is a struggle, so we resort to Netflix, where we don’t have to have the patience it takes to wait for the new “Grey’s Anatomy.” Want it now? Here it is!

But, as college students, should we have Netflix at all?

Of course we should.

Netflix’s target crowd is us, with their wide variety of young adult-oriented programs; they’re trying to suck us into their extremely long list of subscribers, and it’s working.

In actuality, Netflix shouldn’t be a “concern.” If binging on Netflix is of public concern, our public needs new concerns. Let’s be honest, we could all be doing something significantly worse than Netflix. Being a couch potato isn’t all that bad, especially when you have a whole world of shows and movies at your fingertips.

Netflix On, my friends. Netflix On.

Ohio Machine leaves Selby

By: Ross Hickenbottom, Transcript Correspondent

The Ohio Machine, Ohio’s only major league lacrosse (MLL) team has called OWU’s Selby Stadium home for the past four years. Starting this year, they are moving on to another venue.

On Oct. 27, the Ohio Machine announced their new host will be Panther Stadium, home of the Ohio Dominican University athletics teams.

Although the organization is moving on, Gregg Klein, Machine’s vice president of business operations, has nothing but great things to say about Selby Stadium and the OWU family.

“Let me start by saying how lucky we were to have such great partners in Ohio Wesleyan University the last four years,” Klein said. “From an expansion club in 2012, to hosting a MLL semi-final game at Selby Stadium, our team grew up at Selby.”

The move was part of a plan for the organization to grow, and according to Klein, Ohio Dominican is the perfect place to initiate the growth the Machine is looking for.

“As we grew over the years, our front office analyzed our season ticket member demographic and asked for feedback from our fan base,” Klein explained. “We discovered that finding a location central to the downtown Columbus area was an important next step in the team’s growth.”

Despite Klein’s helpful explanation, news of the move has not been widespread.

Junior Doug Sanders considers himself a “pretty informed” sports fan and said he had not heard about the move.

“I never even knew they were moving to Ohio Dominican,” Sanders said. “But I can see why the Machine would want to move closer to downtown Columbus. More people, more attendance, it seems smart.”

“I personally never went to a game and don’t know anyone who did, so honestly, I don’t think the OWU student body will miss the Machine too much,” said junior David Pugh.

In their new stadium, the Machine will add extra seats for the 2016 MLL season, planning to expand their seating capacity in Panther Stadium to over 3,000, which is 6,000 less than Selby Stadium.

A cappella singers, fans come together for A Cappellooza

Julia Stone '16 of The OWtsiders, OWU's only co-ed a cappella group, performs at the 3rd annual A Cappelloza hosted by CPB. Photo by Spenser Hickey. — Julia Stone ’16 of The OWtsiders, OWU’s only co-ed a cappella group, performs at the 3rd annual A Cappelloza hosted by CPB. Photo by Spenser Hickey.

On Nov. 7, members of the Delaware and Ohio Wesleyan community came together to enjoy song and laughter at the third annual A Cappellooza.

The event was held in Gray Chapel, with music fans filling the orchestra and balconies.

Organized by the Campus Programing Board (CPB), A Cappellooza brought together groups from OWU, Wittenberg University, Denison University and Akron University.

CPB also hosted a professional guest for the night, a cappella group Street Corner Symphony.

Street Corner Symphony sang Johnny Cash to open their set, a choice that reflected their southern heritage. The group’s band members are all from Nashville, Tennessee.

Senior Miranda Dean said “they sounded pretty Southern.”

Street Corner Symphony went on to invite volunteers from the audience to join them on stage as they sang the theme song from “Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.”

Oberlin's all-female a cappella group, Just Eve, begins their set. Photo by Spenser Hickey. — Oberlin’s all-female a cappella group, Just Eve, begins their set. Photo by Spenser Hickey.

Compared to last year’s group, sophomore Maddy Bonfield believed that Street Corner Symphony “tried to get the crowd more into it.”

Senior Julia Stone, member of both OWU a capella groups, the OWTsiders and Pitch Black, mentioned that “all the groups are really supportive of each other.”

Bonfield noted that it was “cool to see the other schools…and their fan base.”

After the event, all the groups were invited for an A Cappella mixer at the Peace and Justice small living unit.

Stone said “quite a few [from Denison] showed up and we just sort of improvised music together.”

It shows to the unifying effect that A Cappellooza had on the community.

Sneak peak: Orchesis 2015

By: Gopika Nair, Assistant Copy Editor

This year’s Orchesis is unlike past performances. For the first time in several years, Ohio Wesleyan’s theatre and dance department joined forces with the music department to devise the annual contemporary dance concert.

Orchesis features 24 dancers performing eight pieces created by students, faculty and a guest choreographer. The theatre and dance department at OWU will present “Orchesis 15/16” on Nov. 13, 14 and 15 in Chappelear Drama Center.

The choreographers of the show are primarily students who have taken a dance composition class, Rashana Smith, the artistic director of Orchesis and a professor in the theatre and dance department, said.

“It seems like the thread that’s going through all of our pieces is inter-connectivity,” Smith said.

The concert will conclude with the 24 dancers performing Smith’s piece, titled “Effort of Interface.”

The piece examines how much effort people put into being connected with one another, especially through technological devices and personal interactions. Smith’s inspiration stemmed from wanting to understand what the point of interface is.

Through dance, she explored the extent to which technology, besides making life easier, has improved the quality of life. The performance will feature original music by Jennifer Jolley, assistant music professor at OWU.

“[The collaboration with the music department] has been really nice because of how we all compose similarly, differently and trying to make all those things come together has been an interesting challenge,” Smith said.

All student pieces have varied musical elements. Junior Jeremy Griffin-Jackson’s piece explores breaking the traditional lines of dance and features original music composed by his cousin.

“It’s much different than what people would hear at Orchesis,” Griffin-Jackson said. “It’s piano- heavy, it’s violinheavy and it kind of has a cyclical nature, so it sounds like it repeats itself, but it’s just a lot of the same instruments used in different ways throughout the piece.”

Griffin-Jackson said that one of the most memorable moments from the rehearsal process was watching the dancers in his piece perform to the music for the first time. Their excitement gave him energy and they picked up the routine fast.

Griffin-Jackson’s piece was born out of his distaste for the more refined lines in dance such as the ballet line, which is the outline of a dancer’s complete body while performing steps or poses.

“To me that’s not pretty. That’s just mechanical,” he said. “So the idea [for this piece] just came from my own body and movement patterns.”

Each choreographer drew inspiration from something that resonated with them. Sophomore Alexia Minton’s piece, titled “Solitude of the Soul,” is an adaptation of a statue by the same name that she saw in the Chicago Institute of Art.

Minton’s piece explores the idea that no matter how closely people are connected, no one truly knows each other.

“When I went to Chicago and saw the statue, it was the one thing that really stood out to me,” Minton said. “When I got back to the university setting and had the opportunity, I thought it would be really beautiful to place movement into it.”

Some, like junior Diana Muzina, chose to express societal issues through dance.

The piece she choreographed deals with a specific thematic question involving society’s impact on women and the potential for messages to make them feel less human, she said.

“I’m really trying to comment on the socialization process, and allow the audience to place themselves in the piece.”

Over the last few years, Muzina encountered several physical and health problems that prompted her to modify her movements. One of the challenges she faced during the rehearsal process was choreographing for bodies that could do more than hers could, she said. Communicating certain movements to dancers that she could not demonstrate was also tough.

Rehearsals for the show have been underway since the second week of classes, Smith said.

Though the dancers have faced their share of challenges during the rehearsal process, they are excited to share their complex ideas with the audience.

“A lot of the work you will see will really make you think, and I believe it will have a huge impact on the audience,” Muzina said. “There is something for everyone to find a connection to in the overall performance.”

Tickets are free for OWU students with a valid student ID. Orchesis will be performed on the Main Stage in the drama center at 8 p.m. on Nov. 13 and Nov. 14 and at 2 p.m. on Nov. 15.