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Obama lays out national agenda

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An increase in financial aid, student loan reform and greater support for community colleges topped President Barack Obama’s higher education agenda as outlined in his State of the Union address to a joint session of Congress Wednesday night.

In a speech that focused on jobs, the economy and national security, Obama spoke briefly of his legislative goals for the nation’s colleges and universities.

“In the 21st century, the best anti-poverty program around is a world-class education,” Obama said.

The president went on to urge the Senate to pass the Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act, which was passed by the House of Representatives in September. The bill would eliminate bank-based federal student loan programs and use the billions of dollars saved to expand financial aid.

“Let’s take that money and give families a $10,000 tax credit for four years of college and increase Pell Grants,” Obama said.

Arguing that the bill would “revitalize” the nation’s community colleges, Obama also called for strengthened student loan repayment plans, limiting payments to 10 percent of a person’s income, and forgiving all debt after 20 years, or 10 years for those who work in public service.

“In the United States of America, no one should go broke because they chose to go to college,” Obama said.
“And by the way, it’s time for colleges and universities to get serious about cutting their own costs because they, too, have a responsibility to help solve this problem.”

Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell supplied the GOP’s official response to the president’s speech, agreeing with the president about the importance of higher education.

“All Americans agree that a young person needs a world-class education to compete in the global economy,” McDonnell said in a televised appearance from the House of Delegates’ chambers at the Capitol in Richmond. “As a kid, my dad told me, ‘Son, to get a good job, you need a good education.’ That’s even more true today.”

APA national recruitment halts

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The historically black fraternity Alpha Phi Alpha, Inc. has put a national hold on recruitment due to an alleged hazing incident which left one member critically wounded.

Nineteen year-old Fort Valley University student and APA brother Brian Tukes was hospitalized for acute renal failure after complaining of back pain and vomiting. He is currently in a stable condition.

Fellow Fort Valley student and APA member Bryson Trumaine Amey was arrested for allegedly beating Tukes with his fists and other body parts at the APA fraternity house.

“Following my review of 2009, it became clear to me that one area that needs our immediate focus is the conduct of the brothers involved in the intake process,” APA Inc. General President Herman Mason said in a memorandum addressed to the APA community.

Seven African-American Cornell University students established APA, the nation’s oldest historically black fraternity, in 1904. The Kappa Pi chapter of APA was established at the College of William and Mary in 1975.

Some of the fraternity’s more famous members include Martin Luther King Jr., Thurgood Marshall and Jesse Owens.

The College’s chapter is known for its step dancing show performances at various campus events.

Once the Kappa Pi chapter of APA receives a sufficient number of applications from potential members, the fraternity begins a two weekend rush period.

There are five active members of APA on campus, but none have been recruited this year. There have been no reported APA hazing incidents at the College.

“There have not been any problems here at the College, and we have been here since 1975,” APA Historian Lamar Shambley ’10 said.

Shambley could not comment on how the national halt on member intake could affect recruitment on campus.

It is still unclear how long APA recruitment will remain frozen.

Students try luck at lobbying

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RICHMOND, Va. — While most of the campus slumbered early Tuesday morning, a group of College of William and Mary students braved the cold and headed to Richmond to lobby Virginian politicians.

Road to Richmond, an annual trip to the state’s capital, is designed to bring students to the offices of the men and women who control a large amount of the College’s operating budget, and funds for building projects. Over the next two years, the state of Virginia faces a $4.2 billion budget shortfall, and funding for higher education is once again at risk for further cuts.

College President Taylor Reveley declared the prevention of further cuts the number one priority of the students on this expedition. Along with asking legislators not to cut higher education budgets further, students were assigned to prevent a levy on student fees, protect the current ratio of out-of-state students and get bonds for “brick and mortar” projects to get them rolling again.

“Every year here I have had an impact on legislation, and educated at least one legislator on an issue and changed a vote,” John Pothen ’11 said.

Pothen, who was on his third Road to Richmond trip, spoke with six legislators and their assistants.

“The biggest difference we can make is to put a face to William and Mary,” he said.

Adam Rosen ’11 said he attended Road to Richmond out of a deep love for the College.

“The College has its own special place and it must be maintained as a quality school,” he said.

Rosen met with a legislative assistant to Del. Tim Hugo ’86 (R-40), who is one of the most vocal proponents of higher ratios of in-state students at public universities.

Student Assembly President Sarah Rojas ’10 also participated, meeting with Del. Chris Jones (R-76), who is on the House’s Appropriations Committee for Higher Education.

“It was exciting to see students have a part in the legislative process besides voting,” she said. “We are privileged at William and Mary, but we also have a responsibility to give back.”

Rojas said that she plans to make regular lobbying trips to Richmond with interested students while the legislature is in session.

Many students said “giving back” was a major motivation to participate in Road to Richmond.

“Everyone on this bus showed tremendous initiative,” Scott Foster ’10 said.

Foster said he was impressed with the behavior and knowledge of the legislators in Richmond.

“They spoke frankly and were in tune with the issues facing the College,” he said.

Carlos Quintela ’12 said Road to Richmond enhanced his interpersonal skills, allowed him to meet with legislators and let him give back to the school.

“It’s really important to get the College’s needs out there,” Quintela said.

Bryan Alphin ’10 and Leacy Burke ’12, who intern at the College’s Office of Strategic Initiatives, organized the trip.

Alphin controlled the managerial aspects while Burke researched legislation that students should discuss with delegates.

Alphin said he organized Road to Richmond to prevent policies that would threaten the tradition of higher education.

“It’s easy for [legislators] to become detached from higher education and forget the tradition and its importance,” Alphin said.

Lee Desser ’10 said she took part in the trip this year because she is concerned with the state of public education.

“If funding is cut, it will become more expensive,” Desser said. “You can’t underestimate the value of higher education.”

Desser also said Road to Richmond is a good example of grassroots organizing, which is crucial to the democratic process.

Before lobbying, the students received crucial advice from Sen. Tommy Norment J.D. ’73 (R-3), who represents Williamsburg, among other localities. Norment emphasized the importance of advocating one’s needs.

“The squeaky wheel gets the oil,” Norment said. “If you are not heard, if you do not make your presence known, you will not get the things you are looking for. This is the real deal.”

Sullivan becomes first female president of U.Va.

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The University of Virginia has chosen its first female president. U.Va.’s Board of Visitors unanimously elected Teresa Sullivan, provost and executive vice president for academic affairs at the University of Michigan, to the position Jan. 11.

Sullivan will take office Aug. 8.

“Their selection is a wonderful choice for the students there, and we look forward to working with her,”
College of William and Mary spokesman Brian Whitson said.

Current U.Va. President John Casteen III is stepping down at the end of this semester after 20 years as president.

“The University of Virginia has enjoyed strong leadership in John Casteen for the past two decades,” U.Va. Rector John Wynne said in a press release. “The board is confident that in Terry we have found an excellent successor to lead the University as we work to elevate our teaching and research capabilities and to enhance our student experience. We are pleased to have attracted a person of Terry’s integrity, experience and vision.”

Wynne chaired the search committee, which included eight other members of the board of visitors, six faculty members, two former rectors and two students.

Sullivan was chosen from a pool of over 150 nominees after a five-month search.

“She is undaunted by the challenges and has a deep understanding of the complexities,” Wynne said. “She believes in public higher education and is committed to leading our university and to building on its excellence.”

Sullivan will address the challenges outlined by the university’s board of visitors, which include increasing international outreach and improving its financial aid program.

“The quality of higher education is threatened by increasing costs and declining state support,” Sullivan said in a press release. “The best of schools — the Universities of Virginia, Michigan, Texas — are the most affected, because sustained excellence requires resources. This cannot, however, keep us from our commitment to our students and to the states and the nation we serve. We must always honor our public mission — regardless of the level of the state’s contributions to our budgets.”

SA funds Richmond trip

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The College of William and Mary’s Student Assembly held its first meeting of the spring semester Tuesday.
Senators discussed numerous pieces of upcoming legislation, several of which were brought to a vote.

The 2010 Richmond Road Funding Act, which covers the costs of transporting students to and from the Road to Richmond event Tuesday, was unanimously passed.

“In the past, the president’s office has funded the bus for Road to Richmond, but this year they’re hurting,”
Sen. Erik Houser ’10 said. “I thought that it would be a good idea if we were willing to show that we’re willing to invest our own money.”

The annual event allows students to interact with legislators and lobby on behalf of the College.

A bill urging the Honor Council to hold another information session next week also came to a debate, though it was not passed.

Some SA members worried that the sessions, which are mandatory for any student interested in running for
Honor Council, were not publicized early enough. However, a majority felt that interested students were sufficiently aware of the sessions.

Several new bills were introduced for consideration.

A bill to keep Alan B. Miller Hall open to non-business majors at all hours was placed on the agenda to be discussed at upcoming meetings.

Currently, all students at the College pay an annual $150 facility fee for Miller Hall. However, from 10 p.m. to 5 a.m. Monday through Friday and 8 p.m. to 8 a.m. Saturday and Sunday the building is closed to students who are not enrolled in business classes.

A Facebook group in support of equal student access to Miller Hall 1,056 members as of press time.

The Help Haiti Now Act would allocate approximately $1,000 from the SA’s consolidated reserve to make t-shirts in support of Haiti relief efforts.

All profits will be given to the University of Fondwa, Haiti’s only university that offers degrees.

The Get With the Times Act would allocate up to $6,250 from the SA’s consolidated reserve to bring 200
issues of The New York Times to campus each day to be distributed at the Sadler Center and the Commons.

“We’ll be talking about … the logistics of distribution this week,” Sen. Betty Jeanne Manning ’12 said.

A potential bill to change the campus-wide ban on chalked messages, as well as the imposed free speech zones during SA elections, was also introduced.

Further, the Consolidated Reserve Interest Act would redirect interest accumulated on student activities fees into an account that would fund student initiatives.

The interest is currently kept in an account managed by the Board of Visitors.

The amount of interest has averaged $9,100 in the last five years.

The College Board of Elections Act would standardize student elections through Blackboard Academic Suite.

Sen. Ben Brown ’11 said that the current system worked well for the last student elections, but noted that some students did not receive the notification e-mail on time and that there were problems with the randomly generated passwords.

“We can have students log in through Blackboard, it just costs more money,” he said.

The SA meets 7 p.m. Tuesdays in Miller 1027.

NCAA flaunts feathers

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When the NCAA deemed our logo “hostile or abusive” in 2006 and subsequently banned it, we thought for sure that we had seen the last of the feathers. Imagine our surprise when just recently those bruised plumes emerged again in the most unlikely of places — on the NCAA’s own website. Frankly, the mind reels.

Initially, butting heads with the NCAA on this matter was a nightmare. When the organization’s ruling came down, it felt arbitrary and unfair. There was a sense that we were being made into the whipping boy, even as larger universities with similar monikers and logos avoided reproach. Worse, the conflict lasted years and, at its conclusion, threatened to revoke the privilege of hosting post-season event when the College of William and Mary was put in the awkward position of having to decide between protesting or bowing to a frivolous injustice.

The feathers were plucked in 2006, which unfortunately was just the beginning: Since then, the headache has only grown. For a full year, our teams took to the fields under no unifying logo.
At a snail’s pace, we crept toward the creation of a new symbol, incurring tens of thousands of dollars in costs during the largest recession in recent history. Just as the College closed its fist in areas where it counted — instituting hiring freezes and massive cutbacks — it also unnecessarily dumped money in this effort to come up with a new drawing for our T-shirts.

Because of the awkwardness of keeping the Tribe moniker but ditching the feathers, the Logo Committee’s hands were tied, creatively speaking. And, to say the least, the results of its effort were underwhelming. “It is hard to imagine any way that the Logo Committee could have produced a more bland new logo,” wrote The Flat Hat in a staff editorial criticizing the new design, which at the time we thought resembled “Microsoft WordArt.”

The recent work of the Mascot Committee suggests it struggled similarly with the added difficulty of earlier setbacks. Students decried the oddball offerings that made the short list, but with a bland logo, a very specific moniker and tight NCAA restrictions — based in a capricious sense of political correctness — on the mascot options available to tie them together, perhaps its arrival at a list of incoherent suggestions is the only outcome that makes any sense.

So, to find our old feathers, after all of this, on the NCAA’s website of all places may be a bit of a slap on the face, but there is a sweetness to the sting. After all, it took The Flat Hat, and not some Facebook-backed uprising, to bring the offending feathers to the organization’s attention. No one else noticed because no one else cared; from the get-go, this was a mountain made from a molehill, but unfortunately this process — which was perhaps a well intentioned, even if misconceived, gesture on the NCAA’s behalf — had real consequences for this university.

If this editorial is little more than an exercise in griping, then that little more is to be found in this message. Symbols are important. Sensitivity is important. But so is keeping everything in perspective.

Mindless aping of political correctness is great for creating a hullabaloo. It makes for excellent Sportscenter fodder or the odd opinions piece. But we must remember that at the other side of the fuss can be real consequence that has the possibility to distract and injure. This school and the NCAA each have their missions, and each is important in its own right. Snuffing out entanglements like these as early as possible allows them to keep their energies focused where they are needed.

Do One Thing campaign makes the global personal

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Zapfel ’09 is the College’s sustainability fellow.

You’ve got a lot on your mind: classes, work, sports, clubs, family, money, health — everyone’s busy, and global issues often get lost in the shuffle. For example, the College of William and Mary’s recent improvements and commitment to sustainability can feel pretty disconnected from our day-to-day lives.
Most of us are aware that the planet has seen better days, but it’s hard to make something like sustainability, even here on campus, a top priority when bills need to be paid and essays need to be written. And what does sustainability really mean, anyway? It’s hard to relate such a large, multifaceted term to everyday life.

Sustainability can be defined as the responsible use of resources so that future generations can use them as well. But on a very real, individual level, sustainability is simply the ability to preserve yourself. Personal sustainability is the act of keeping yourself going physically, emotionally, culturally and environmentally. It’s about living a healthy, happy and fulfilling life.

This individualization of sustainability was the basis for the Do One Thing campaign launched September at the Mason School of Business. The program, which originated from the sustainability strategy firm Saatchi & Saatchi S, and the first of its kind at any business school in the country, strives to get one billion people across the planet to adopt a personal sustainability practice. DOT helps people improve their lives and the lives of those around them.

In recognition of the hard work of the business school’s undergraduate Net Impact chapter and of program director Chris Adkins, Saatchi & Saatchi S CEO Adam Werbach spoke about DOT at the business school this past September. The school’s DOT Facebook page amassed over 1,000 DOTs from students, faculty, staff, administrators, alumni and community members in only a month.

In light of the wonderful success of DOT at the business school, we’re set to become the first DOT university: This past Monday, President Taylor Reveley announced that the DOT program is launching campus wide. Committee on Sustainability volunteers, led by law professor Erin Ryan and Caroline Cress ’10, have worked diligently for months to roll out the DOT program in each of the schools and departments across the College, beginning in business and law this week, and culminating in a campus DOT celebration around Earth Day in April.

To get involved with DOT, think about your daily routine, the little acts that make up your day. Pick just one of these acts, one thing that you can change to conserve resources, improve your health or the health of others, or build community, or create economic stability.

This change is your personal sustainability practice — your DOT. It can be something as small as printing on recycled paper or as large as switching to a more fuel-efficient vehicle. Reveley has chosen to use reusable coffee mugs and print double-sided whenever he can.

The College has made some fantastic strides in sustainability over the past few years. The Committee on Sustainability has over 100 devoted volunteers working on everything from composting the dining halls’s food waste to reducing our greenhouse gas emissions. The student green fee has paid for energy-saving building improvements and has inspired student research. Reveley has emphasized the College’s commitment to sustainability in the past, and now he’s asking for you to help.

We’re not asking you to save the world. The DOT program simply asks you to find a small way to improve your life, the lives of those around you, and the state of the world’s resources. We are asking you to show the world what this College community of 10,000 can accomplish when we each make one small choice. You only have to do one thing.

E-mail Phillip Zapfel at pmzapf@wm.edu.

Obama delivers state of disunion

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All eyes were on President Barack Obama Wednesday night as he delivered the State of the Union address. It has become the custom of pundits and news personalities to make bold claims regarding the importance of this event, and this year was no exception; except perhaps this hype held some kernel of truth. Obama and the democrats have seen a nosedive in their public approval ratings, as well as several electoral setbacks.

The president desperately needed to revitalize the party’s image and his own, and the forum of the State of the Union address gave him the perfect opportunity. His oratory skills have never been better. Obama defended his more controversial policies and explicitly referred to himself as an independent who will not seek popularity over principle. If he had not then launched into a stream of populist rhetoric and mediocre policies, it might have been the speech of a strong and capable president.

Before the speech, there was speculation on the part of the media as to whether or not Obama would strike an apologetic tone, given the growing opposition to many of his policies. The answer proved to be a resounding no. He defended the bank bailout as a necessary evil. Then, the camera cut away to Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, who looked completely joyful to find out that at least one person in the room supported him. Obama also touted the stimulus bill as an integral part of our economic recovery. He then refused to back down on health care reform; he offered only the appearance of contrition when apologizingfor not explaining it well enough. He said he didn’t care about being popular, and one could almost have believed it.

But as the speech continued, he just couldn’t seem to help himself. Maybe he missed the old days when he commanded respect and admiration from the majority of the country, or perhaps he wasn’t truly resigned to being a great one-term president. Either way, he just could not seem to avoid saying things people wanted to hear. The populist Obama railed against the amorphous forces we all love to hate: big banks, big business, partisan politicians and lobbyists. The usual praise and promises were made to the middle class, small businesses and principles of bipartisanship and common sense.

Any new policies seemed to have been crafted based on their appeal to the mythical middle America. Some were sound, albeit trite. Modest middle-class and small business tax cuts are a perennial favorite. Some were vague and formless. (What exactly is a jobs bill?) Most were meaningless. The proposed spending freeze, for example, would apply to a small portion of the overall population and have a negligible effect on the deficit. Also, the bipartisan commission on fiscal responsibility would have absolutely no teeth if not approved by the U. S. Senate, which already bipartisanly voted it down. Also, what are the chances the Senate actually posts all their earmark requests? At worst, his policies were completely off base. Trying to strong-arm companies to refrain from outsourcing jobs makes very little economic sense.

Most amusing was Obama’s method of dealing with more controversial issues. He seemed to believe that if he espoused a liberal policy he must quickly mention a conservative one. So he urged off-shore drilling and cap-and-trade in the same breath with nuclear power. Then, when he seemed to credit tax cuts for the creation of jobs, he quickly pointed out that many of these jobs were in the clean energy sector. It is a testament to Obama’s skill that he was able to both stress his independence and shamelessly pander to the American people with such grace. I guess he is a real politician after all.

E-mail Ed Innace at einnace@wm.edu.

Confusion Corner: Concerned with connectivity

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If there’s a journalistic trope I hate most, it’s the obligatory “Are we spending too much time online?” story. It’s the sort of thing that seems masturbatory at best, pure fluff — not to mention mind-boggling when viewed via the online-edition.

Now, that being said, I do spend entirely too much time on the web — by which I mean not just the internet, but also on the Twitter-face-text-sexting sorts of sites. But so, as it turns out, do you. According to the New York Times’s newest fluff piece, kids ages eight to 18 spend nearly every minute outside the classroom — which they are only in for seven and a half hours each day — on some sort of electronic device. We can assume that tendency doesn’t immediately evaporate when entering college, so consider yourself chastised. The article includes all the basic assumptions: Web-surfing, smart phone using or general electronic media consuming means that you’re wasting your time with mindless drivel, all while alienating yourself from the world around you.

This all may be true, of course, but the sentiment can’t help but seem a bit reductionist. See, for example, the New York Times’s accompanying slew of assenting letters to the editor on the subject — almost all school teachers complaining how those darned kids won’t stop texting in my class! Disproportionate anger about texting is like the schoolmarm’s manna — they seem to draw a sort of sustenance from it.

This sort of knee-jerk reactionism ignores the other half of the modern, and hypocritical, view of web-use. It’s both reviled as the harbinger of triviality and electronic reliance (our kids are too wired), while still celebrated as a marvel of convenience and productivity (Oh look, the iPad). Professors play the same game. On one hand, they’ll chastise an entire class for being overly connected — always on Facebook, they say. But should that professor send an e-mail the night before, or even just the hour before, his or her own class, it’s assumed the information must be received, internalized, and at times reacted to with immediacy.
We are apparently simultaneously too connected and never connected enough.

But seriously, screw all of that. No matter anyone else’s opinion, I refuse to view the internet with anything but sheer wonder. The other day, I found a documentary online about a former Liberian warlord named General Butt Naked (seriously), who as little as 10 years ago, led a group of entirely naked, cannibalistic raiders. He’s now a Christian preacher in that same community. My mind was — and is — blown. I could not have even imagined that our world contained a person who one minute was describing from memory cutting out a person’s heart and serving it to the children crowded around him, and the next is quoting scripture to a congregation. That’s why the internet is amazing. Not in the that’s-so-cool sense, but in that the sheer amount of information, of experience, at your fingertips — the likes of which you might never have otherwise seen — continues to be awe-inspiring. That may seem hyperbolic, but it takes only the digitized sight of a God-fearing ex-cannibal to make you realize how sheltered enclosed an experience you sometimes have. It seems perfectly logical, then, to see any unplugged existence as boring in comparison.

Now, did I also spend some of that time watching Youtube videos of a fat, Finnish man bouncing on a trampoline? Yes. Yes, I did. Conveniently enough, they were both on one website, Viceland.com. (Seriously, go to it. Their video journalism is fantastic, and I’m not just talking about the Finnish dude.)

Does this expanded, HD-enhanced experience imply that we’re better off? Does our connectedness help break us out of our own enclosed, limited surroundings, or are we in fact losing focus amidst an inundation of information we can never even hope to process? I have no earthly idea. Not that it matters anyway. I have no plans to log off anytime soon.

__Kevin Mooney is the Flat Hat Confusion Corner columnist. He encourages you to continue to stumble and Sporcle your way across the wide world of the internet.__

That Girl: Carolyn DiProspero

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__Carolyn DiProspero, a history and government double major from New Jersey, is cheerful and animated when we meet at The Daily Grind Wednesday morning. At first glance, one would not think that she is a big colonial history buff, part of her attraction to the College of William and Mary, with a soft spot for philanthropy, both with her sorority, Kappa Alpha Theta, and the campus sexual assault awareness group Every Two Minutes.__

*What are the differences between New Jersey and New York?*

Not that different. It’s not really exactly what it’s portrayed to be on television, like “Jersey Shore.” I love the show, but that’s, like, a small population.

*What kind of extra curricular activities are you involved in?*

I’m in Theta. I’m also involved in Every Two Minutes; it’s this group on campus that does all-female sexual assault awareness, education, prevention. I’ve been involved since my sophomore year. [I’ve] also [been] involved in Orientation as an orientation aide for the past three years. As a senior, I don’t really have anything to do now. I’ve kind of phased out all the leadership positions. I feel like I have so much free time.

*What do you do with your new free time?*

Well, I’ve been trying to really pay attention to my classes because I’m in this program that’s a five-year program for education, so next year I’ll be here working on my Master’s in elementary education. So I feel like it’s clear that what I’m learning in the classroom I’m going to need next year, especially in terms of education psychology. So I have this sort of epiphany like, “Oh my gosh. I’m going to be responsible for children.” That’s kind of a scary thought.

*So you’re a government and history major and you’re doing an education program?*

I didn’t realize I wanted to do the program until this past summer when I worked at a summer camp with kids. I had done work with kids, and I was enjoying it, but I feel like I need some sort of job where it’s different every day, because I can get bored with things very easily. So I feel like, being a teacher, it would be different every day, and it’s always changing. I was just kind of floating through a liberal arts education until I decided that I wanted to be a teacher. Then, luckily, the school had this program that you apply to by the second semester of [Junior] year, and I got in. I just had to take the GRE, and so it was a pretty sweet deal. Obviously it’s William and Mary, so it’s going to be a good education.

*What made you want to be involved in Every Two Minutes?*

Well, one of my friends in high school was sexually assaulted at a party our senior year. She didn’t really say too much about it, but she kind of hinted at it. I had no idea what to do, how to help her. I just did what I thought was best, which was be there for her and talk to her. But when I got here and I saw the program that we do for freshmen, I just thought that that was something that I’ve never really learned about. Sexual assault is kind of a taboo issue. I just kind of wanted to learn more about it. And I feel like my reasons to be in the group have kind of expanded since I’ve been here. Since it’s a taboo issue and people don’t really talk about it, you don’t really realize how many people have experienced either some form of sexual assault or felt uncomfortable in a situation, like out at a frat-dance-party kind of thing. So that has really motivated me. And the people that I’ve met at Every Two Minutes have been really motivating as well.

*Is Kappa Alpha Theta involved in any activities that stand out for you?*

One thing that we do that I really liked a lot: Our philanthropy is CASA, which is Court Appointed Special Advocates. They work with kids through the court system trying to be a voice for those kids in terms of divorce cases or child abuse, stuff like that. There’s a chapter right up Jamestown Road, so we usually have a couple interns there, [as well as] our philanthropy; all the benefits go to CASA. Last semester I went to CASA as part of an envelope-stuffing thing, and it was really cool to make that connection because, as service chair, I have worked to raise money for this cause, but I feel like there’s that stereotype that sorority philanthropies are meaningless. But it was good to make that connection and attach a face and people to that name we were working so hard to raise money for.

*What is a crucial part of your day?*

I usually go to Colonial Williamsburg. Being a history major and coming to William and Mary, that was a major draw for me. And I just love going down there with one of my close friends. That’s something I do pretty much every day. Just like a loop around DoG Street. It’s nice to get out of the house and get away from studying. And I just love the atmosphere and people-watching. It’s really funny watching tourists.

*What period of history do you find the most appealing?*

Colonial history. The things I’ve been able to do through the history department have been amazing experiences. My freshman seminar was on a Saturday morning at like, 9 o’clock. But, it was the first semester of freshman year, so I really don’t regret doing that. We would get up and go to Blair [Hall] and have a lecture for 50 minutes and then get in this van and drive all around Virginia, going to these historical spots that were dated anywhere from 1600 to 1800. My professor, professor [Jim] Whittenburg, who is also my adviser is just so knowledgeable and so interesting.

*Do you have any superstitions?*

I’m really not into superstitions. I’m really into “You are what you make it.” Well, I can’t get out of bed on the left side of the bed. I always have to get out on the right side. It’s a weird quirk.

*What are your biggest fears?*

I feel like I’m very into, as a second semester senior, missing something. I know that sounds kind of lame, but I kind of wanted to soak it all up, so I guess right now my biggest fear would be that I would miss out on some really awesome opportunity. But I think every day is a new opportunity.

__On that happy note, we end our interview. With a smile, Carolyn heads out the door of The Daily Grind and back into her favorite colonial wonderland to continue her new-found free time.__

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