The art of canvassing

09 Sep 2011, Posted by Walker Schiff in Backpages, 0 Comments

Irina Danescu/The Chronicle

American poet William Carlos Williams famously said, “It is not what you say that matters but the manner in which you say it.”

After spending a summer going door-to-door two hours per day on the campaign of a City Council candidate in my hometown of Cincinnati, I can now confidently say that there is some truth to this quote. I would, however, add that the way you look might have some significance in Williams’ equation. Since I am a shaggy-haired college student who often found himself as the butt of stoner and hippie jokes from fellow campaign workers, I would argue that I might have had a disadvantage when it came to canvassing prospective voters.

This summer, more often than not, I followed around my candidate from door-to-door (we would only hit doors of known consistent voters in City Council elections, so we weren’t actually hitting every door), intently listening to his conversations with voters and writing down any information the voter would reveal about themselves so that we could put it in a database for future reference. Other times, I canvassed with other interns or volunteers and go only to the doors of voters who consistently voted and shared a party-affiliation with my candidate. Near the end of my work this summer, I traveled up and down the most-trafficked streets in the city, went door-to-door (hitting every single door) with a stack of yard signs, and beg home owners to let me stick one in their yard. I did many other things for the campaign, but meeting strangers at their doorsteps was by far the most interesting and unique aspect of my work.

Let me try to put you in my shoes. You are standing on someone’s front porch. Your hands are covered in this slimy, metallic goop that the yard sign poles are greased with. You awkwardly lean about five yard signs against your leg, hoping that none of the poles slip through one of this stranger’s front porch’s floor boards. You are covered in sweat because Cincinnati is brutally humid in the summer, and the campaign t-shirt you’re wearing is dark blue. You just rang the doorbell and gave the door a few knocks for good measure. There is about a 50 percent chance that someone you don’t know is going to answer the door in a few seconds.

Here is the beautiful part to the whole process: you have absolutely no idea who the person answering the door is going to be. They might come out onto the porch and give you a robust handshake, or they might prefer to open the door an inch and hide behind a screen door. They might offer you water, or they might offer you their thoughts on hot-button issues in Cincinnati, the details of which I will spare you. They might take a yard sign because they are hungover and they just want you to get off their porch so they can go back to sleep or they might shut the door in your face because they are “not interested.”

All this being said, the overall response of the people I canvassed was surprisingly positive. I did have the occasional door slammed in my face, and I met my fair share of kooky people, but for the most part, people at least heard me out. If I had to give advice to someone about to embark on a summer of canvassing, I would say this: Enjoy the unpredictability of it all and remember the crazy people because they make for great stories later.

Phoning it in

08 Sep 2011, Posted by Hong Zhu in Backpages, 0 Comments

Kari Vaughn/The Chronicle

Compared to most others on campus, my Motorola KRZR is a dinosaur of a cell phone.

Today, many see my flip phone as an ancient artifact and a reason to wax nostalgic about the past. Although it was hardly unusual to own a basic phone—or not have a phone at all—just a few years ago, cell phones have now come to dominate our daily lives.

According to the Pew Internet and American Life Project, 83 percent of Americans own a cell phone of some kind. With a cell phone comes convenience, easy information access and entertainment—all of which have contributed to its understandable popularity.

The ubiquity of cell phones can certainly be seen at Duke, where many of us clutch our phones as if they were natural extensions of the human arm. Here we receive text alerts about everything from hurricanes to LDOC announcements. For many, a smartphone with internet access is especially handy for efficiently checking emails and Facebook.

“I upgraded to the iPhone after freshman year because I feel like it’s necessary to have email on your phone here at Duke,” said sophomore Kelsey Tarzia. “People just have this expectation that you’re always checking your email.”

Cell phone access is also regularly treated as a given in the academic setting, where many professors expect students to check emails frequently. While this standard makes for effective communication, it can also present problems.

Sophomore Audrey Hagopian recounted an exercise from a former Writing 20 class that asked students to live-tweet from Cameron Indoor Stadium during a basketball game.

“Because I didn’t have a smartphone at the time, I wasn’t able to participate in the assignment,” Hagopian said.

Cell phones have profoundly shaped social interactions as well, especially among young adults. 95% of young adults with cell phones use them to send or receive texts, according to the Pew project.

Certainly, being perpetually connected to other people through our phones makes communication speedier and easier. At the same time, having a phone—especially one with fun, fancy features—may mean constant distractions, fewer introspective moments alone and shallower conversation.

Freshman Cordelia Hao, who owns a pre-paid cell phone that she prefers to use infrequently, observed how cell phones ensure that people are “never alone.”

“So even if you’re alone or bored, just whip out that iphone and bam! You’re surrounded!” Hao said.

Despite her personal phone habits, Hao also acknowledged that cell phone use is an integral aspect of daily life for most people.

“I may just be old school, but I like it when two people are talking and paying full attention to each other,” Hao said. “[That is] probably too much to ask for in this era.”

Dream crushing 101

07 Sep 2011, Posted by Irina Danescu in Backpages, 1 Comments

Jisoo Yoon/The Chronicle

My parents have always told me that I can be anything I want to be. Obviously, my parents have never taken a weed-out course at Duke.

With an extraordinarily high proportion of hyper-motivated students and some cruelly difficult introductory courses, Duke is all too often a junkyard of broken, abandoned and dysfunctional dreams. Take a bus over to East Campus and ask any freshman what they’re studying. Statistically speaking, there is a 50 percent chance you will be enthusiastically informed that you are speaking to a future doctor. Wait a year, then find that same student and ask them again. Although this sophomore might give you the same answer, note the hollow tone of voice, the purplish circles under the eyes, and the slightly hunched posture associated with carrying a backpack the size of a small freshman. Wait a year, then ask again. You are probably no longer speaking to a pre-health student.

The term sends a shiver of dread through even the most determined students—a “weed-out” class, or an introductory course, designed to be unjustifiably demanding in order to separate the students that truly deserve to pursue a given major from the inferior “weeds.” It is not just idealistic pre-med freshmen that are scrambling to reevaluate life-long dreams after a first semester collision with organic chemistry or calculus. This label is increasingly being applied to intro classes in the humanities, leaving many students wondering if there are any safe choices of majors left at Duke. After all, if it’s not to intimidate students out of a major, why else would there be classes in which the average on the first exam is a 30 percent? Believe it or not, some professors are defending their motives, claiming that they are just trying to help students learn. Which everyone knows is preposterous.

Despite the widespread belief that some intro classes are becoming unrealistically hard, some professors say the opposite is true.

Dr. Mark Rausher, professor of Biology 102, said that over the thirty years he has been teaching, he has tended to simplify his curriculum, rather than make it more difficult. And in response to those who say that these classes are unnecessarily hard, many professors believe they might actually serve a purpose.

Elizabeth Vigdor, professor of Public Policy 55, pointed out that it’s better for students to know what they are getting themselves into from the beginning rather than finding out in a panic during their junior year. Furthermore, for the students that do have pre-medical aspirations, these classes can act as a litmus test.

“A student’s success or failure in these courses may reflect some combination of the desire, aptitude and capacity for hard work that is necessary to pursue a medical career,” wrote Richard MacPhail, a Chemistry 31 professor, in an email.

At this point, I was a little confused. They’re not really saying that these classes are…good for us, are they? It appears so. Professors are aware of the labels their classes have received, and although they may not agree with them, don’t expect them to change anything in order to compensate any time soon.

“Could I make the course easier? Sure,” Vigdor said. ”Should I? I don’t think so.”

Ironically, the problem may not be the professors. We might be doing this to ourselves. Or rather, to each other. It’s the hyper-competitive atmosphere created by the students, not the professors, that accounts for much of the stress of weed-out classes. Granted, that may be doing us a favor too.

“The simple fact is that far more students want to be doctors than can be doctors,” Rausher wrote in an email.

If students think that classes will get easier once they move on to further education, they will be in for a second rude awakening. Some argue that it’s not fair for non-pre-med students in Chemistry and Biology classes to be subjected to the same inflated level of competitiveness and grade consciousness.

On the other hand, Stephen Craig, professor of Chemistry 43, believes that students pushing each other constructively benefits everyone.

“That peer group-dynamic is one of the things—if not the biggest thing—that makes Duke the special place that it is,” the Chemistry 43 professor wrote in an email.

But maybe there’s one more point that needs to be made. Regardless of how we feel about it in the throes of our third all-nighter of the week, we came to Duke to be challenged. Although we pray for the greatest test of our time management skills to go to Shooters, Metro 8 and Mt. Fuji in the same night, we are here to learn.

“The whole game of an undergraduate education, no matter what field, is to learn the intellectual discipline of using models to break a very complex phenomenon—the economy, or an ecosystem, or a work of art—into manageable pieces that we can actually work with,” wrote Professor Connel Fullenkamp, professor of Economics 51, in an email. “If we don’t do that, we just end up spinning our wheels intellectually.”

Tryin’ out

07 Sep 2011, Posted by Andrew Luo in Backpages, 3 Comments

Chronicle File Photo

While many students started to buckle down at Lilly Library last Monday, musically minded students still had something else to look forward to: auditions.

Following the thrilling “Tuning Up!” concert on the eve of the first day of classes, swarms of aspiring a cappella hopefuls—ranging from sing-in-the-shower amateurs to high school music all-stars—signed up for a chance to be in one of Duke’s eight a cappella groups. The criterion is pretty self-explanatory. Sing a few scales to test your range and follow it up with a solo to show off your skills. Sounds easy… right?

Don’t kid yourself, my friend. At a school like Duke, the competition is anything but. Beginning last Tuesday night, Biddle Music Hall abounded in commotion, marking the start of the tryout period. Spirits ran high and nerves even higher as dozens of people tried to coax their way into just a handful of spots.

Amidst the tension however, it was not an easy task from the judge’s end of the table either. Many current a cappella group members said that choosing new members may even be a harder process than trying out.

“This year’s competition was extremely stiff,” said Alex Brockoff in the Pitchforks. ”We had a lot of people—nearly 100 guys—come out and [we] spent hours deliberating on decisions.”

With the odds and competition stacked this high, for only a lucky few, making an a cappella group is a dream come true.

“I’m extremely honored to have been accepted as a member of Duke’s Rhythm and Blue,” said freshman Adriana Froehlich. “I can’t wait to work together with them!”

With a cappella auditions come and gone, this is not to say that there aren’t other opportunities for performing on campus as well. Currently, auditions are still being held for Defining Movement, Duke University’s multicultural dance group.

“Explore in-depth your own ideas,” said  Spencer Paez of DefMo. “Know what it means to you. If you want us to see who you are, learn to show it through dance.”

All in all, it’s safe to say that these past two weeks has been an unforgettable and exciting experience for the Class of 2015 (along with the mini-earthquake, Irene and the DukeALERT tornado watch). Congratulations to everyone who made their way into their performing group of choice, and best of luck for all those who are still auditioning. And for everyone who didn’t get into a group this first time around, don’t fret.

“It’s not uncommon for us to not give someone a callback the first go around, but when they audition again, they get into the group,” said AJ Biggers of R&B.

Either way, we can all look forward to the amazing performances yet to come.

The no-meat feat

06 Sep 2011, Posted by Bailey Sincox in Backpages, 0 Comments

Julia May/The Chronicle

In the wake of Eating Animals, East Campus is buzzing about vegetarianism.

Can you get the nutrients you need to survive via a meatless diet? How difficult is it to be a vegetarian, especially here, on campus? How can I live without Bojangles chicken and biscuits? These questions and many others come to mind for skeptics and veggie-wannabes alike.

While some doubt that herbivorous eating can provide the same nutrition as a diet with meat, science indicates the contrary. The Vegetarian Resource Group, a non-profit organization that promotes vegetarianism and produces resources such as recipes and literature, cites a simple practice instrumental in a successful vegetarian diet: variety. According to the Group, a healthy veggie diet should include “vegetables, fruits, plenty of leafy greens, whole grain products, nuts, seeds and legumes.”

As for claims that vegetarians don’t eat enough protein, they’re all but mythical. There is non-meat protein to be had. Sufficient amounts can be obtained from cheese, cow and soy milk, nuts, vegetables, cereals and tofu. Other important vitamins such as calcium can be found in milk and other dairy products, as well also in unlikely places such as tahini, collard greens and fortified orange juice. Iron, another essential component in a healthy diet, exists in abundance in chickpeas, black-eyed peas, tofu and spinach.

“I do think that [concern about nutrition] is not a valid reason—many studies show that vegetarians suffer less from obesity and cancer, and generally speaking they have a longer life expectancy,” said Elisabetta Politi, nutrition director at Duke’s Diet and Fitness Center.

Being a vegetarian, however, does not necessarily indicate a well-balanced diet, Politi said.

“Be more careful about protein, but there’s plenty in vegetables, beans, soy, and nuts,” she said. “B-12 and iron are some other nutrients I reccomend vegetarians supplement their diet with. Special K is a cereal fortified with iron, and is a great cereal to eat in the morning.”

Vegans should also supplement their diet with clacium and Vitamin D to make sure they stay healthy, Politi said.

Duke offers many choices for vegetarian dining. At the Marketplace, the “Earth’s Fare” station provides vegetarian and occasionally vegan cuisine. At the Great Hall, “Spice” offers similar options. The Loop offers tasty salads and soups, as well as meatless pizzas, mozzarella sticks and onion rings. Pauly Dogs’ veggie dogs, Panda Express’s eggplant tofu and the Dillo’s veggie tacos are delectable options at some of campus’s favorite restaurants.

“It’s very easy to be a vegetarian at Duke,” said freshman Eleanor Kenimer. “It’s even easy to be a vegan if you have the willpower.”

Kenimer cited several of her favorite entrees at Marketplace to back up the claim. Although she was a vegetarian before Eating Animals, other students are now choosing to avoid meat after reading the book. Issues raised in the novel, such as animal cruelty, unfair labor practices and sustainability struck a chord with many freshmen. Many, however, chose not to change their diet. When asked why, a common response was that change is hard and meat is good.

With nutritional vegetarian meals so readily available, the only reason for not dropping meat seems to be personal preference. Whether we choose to adopt a new diet, to care about the issues raised in the novel without changing our eating habits or to not care at all, we can no longer refute vegetarianism’s validity as a balanced alternative diet.