Duke’s big weekend

04 Sep 2011, Posted by Sophia Palenberg in News, 0 Comments

See what happened this weekend at Duke with events ranging from Heat Wave to Jazz at the Beyu.

You can still save the world

02 Sep 2011, Posted by Lia Cromwell in News, 0 Comments

Sophia Palenberg/The Chronicle

Carolyn Kent, a Duke alumna and Peace Corps worker, said she believed Duke students are fitted with the proper tools to change the world.  She added that it is key for undergraduates to realize that postgraduates can bring a lot to the table.

Kent, Trinity ‘08, addressed a group of students at the Sanford School of Public Policy about her experience working for the Peace Corps. She encouraged others to take her lead.

A recent graduate with an International Comparative Studies major, a Spanish minor and an International Health Certificate, Kent is now serving for 27 months in the small town of Canilla, Guatemala.  She works as a Municipal Development Advisor in the Women’s Office of the 2,000-person village.

The area in Guatemala where Carolyn is stationed is wrought with immense poverty, mainly induced by cultural differences, she said.  There are 27 languages spoken in Guatemala, mostly dialects of what the ancient Mayans spoke.

“In Canilla, only 50 percent of the villagers are Ladina, white Spanish-speaking [Guatemalans],” Kent said. “And the other 50 percent are of Mayan descent.”

Kent highlighted her major development project in Canilla: a Mayan Education Center.  The building is environmentally friendly, constructed from over 7,000 recycled plastic bottles that were filled with inorganic trash.

It was difficult to gain the trust of local government in convincing the townspeople to build a community center out of trash, Kent said.

“They had to kick [a similarly constructed building] to see the bottles wouldn’t break or smell,” she added.

Junior Mariah Hukins said that she was eager to hear Kent speak because having a Duke alumna in the Peace Corps makes the goal seem more within her reach.

“[It was] an opportunity to see if I could get into the Peace Corps because I’m not going directly to medical school after graduation,” she explained.

One of Kent’s peers, Elizabeth Linzer, described Carolyn’s experience as something public policy oriented students should strongly consider.

“It’s interesting to think as undergrads about the type of person you are [and how the Peace Corps could affect that],” she said.

Kent spoke about the challenges and rewards of working in a foreign country.  When asked about the experience, she admitted mentally it was very challenging, likening it to living in a “fishbowl.” But she also issued encouraging words to students considering following a similar path after graduation. Kent expressed gratitude for the interesting experiences and diverse individuals she encountered.

Kent also discussed the application process for the Peace Corps, which takes approximately a year.  She urged seniors to begin the process in the near future even if they are unsure about what jobs will be available post-graduation.

Kent admitted that the qualification process to serve in the Peace Corps was grueling, jokingly reminiscing that she had to get her wisdom teeth pulled.

“I wasn’t a happy camper,” she laughed. “But the experience in Guatemala was worth the oral surgery.”

Kent’s experiences made a strong impact on the students in the audience, especially those with similar academic interests.

When asked what made Kent such a powerful role model, senior Kate Ferguson quickly replied that it was her commitment to helping people in the community and to listening as opposed to just imposing her own ideas.

Join The Chronicle

31 Aug 2011, Posted by Molly Himmelstein and Samantha Brooks in News, Recruitment, 1 Comments

The Chronicle: Duke’s largest and most widely-reached source of news, opinion and campus dialogue. Open the door to an array of opportunities, from sports to photography to entertainment and more. Where can you find us? How can you join our family? Watch this video by Samantha Brooks and Molly Himmelstein to find out

Once upon a tweet

29 Aug 2011, Posted by Chinmayi Sharma in News, 0 Comments

We have weathered the storm, literally.

James Lee/The Chronicle

Hurricane Irene—originally a category 2 storm, later reduced to category 1—made landfall Saturday near Morehead City in North Carolina, about 180 miles from Durham. Governor Bev Perdue issued a state of emergency declaration August 25 for all counties east of Interstate 95. The media focused in their far-reaching lenses on the storm and images of damage made the front page of nearly every major journalistic publication. Residents of east coastal homes kept their eyes glued to the television, awaiting news from their local stations about Irene’s progress.

Many others, however, simply tweeted.

This subset of the population were not logging onto their favorite social media sites out of indifference to the storm but rather to become more knowledgeable about its path, check on the welfare of other counties where friends and relatives might live, learn tips about steps for disaster preparation and discover Justin Bieber’s underwear preference (diaper, not boxers or briefs) all at the same time.

In today’s society, the popularity of smart phones has grown immensely and everyone from your local hobo to the president frequently updates their Facebook pages and twitter accounts.

Duke relies on a text message system and social media to notify its students and employees of breaking news often.

Paolo Mangiafico, director of digital information strategy, said he believes this is a change for the better.

According to the Pew Internet and Life Project, 50 percent of American adults use social media, 35 percent have smart phones and a whopping 78 percent are connected to the internet. Now, in your own personal experience, how often do you see people around you picking up the newspaper or watching CNN?

“It’s a very powerful thing to be able to get first-hand reports of events close to home and around the world in almost real-time and in a tone that feels conversational,” said Mangiafico.

While publications and television stations give general overviews of the most pressing pieces of information of the day, your twitter account can be personalized to show only what you deem most important.

He made sure to caution readers—or rather, tweeters—to be wary of news read on social media sources. The speed with which they are updated indicate that not much analysis may have been done or, the source may not be the most reliable in a particular field.

“The things being reported haven’t necessarily been researched and confirmed in the way a traditional news story would be,” said Mangiafico. “And that they might turn out not to be true or complete pictures of what happened.”

Organizations who take the wellbeing of their readership seriously usually set guidelines to counter this tendency. For example, Duke has set stringent guidelines for its social media.

Mangiafico added that the positives outweigh the negatives and that people would undoubtedly benefit from following organizations like Duke on social media to find the latest news about important occurances such as Hurricane Irene.

Pictures about the damage, video coverage of affected Duke facilities and logistical updates relevant to all Dukies can be found on Duke’s facebook and twitter account (@WorkingatDuke).

All in all, one can describe the social media as bitter-tweet.

Keepin’ it fresh(men)

29 Aug 2011, Posted by Lia Cromwell in News, 0 Comments

Chronicle File Photo

As the sun sets on a typically humid North Carolina Sunday, a general sigh is heard throughout Duke University’s East Campus.

For many, it is a breath of relief: we survived O-Week! For others, however, this may feel like the last free gulp of air before our freshman fears come to realization. Starting August 29, we will be hitting the books and the library—both foreign experiences after senioritis and summer vacation have left us wary as to how far our attention spans can stretch.

The concept of going to class this week is daunting, but an overwhelming sense of readiness seems to couple the trepidation felt around campus.

Freshman Elissa Levine said on dipping her toes into Blue Devil academia: “I’m nervous, but I feel prepared.”

What exactly happened this week to give us any sense of preparedness for our first semester here at Duke?

Orientation week acted as a wake up call that we are no longer in high school, and that senioritis does not exist here. At convocation, both President Richard Brodhead and Steve Nowicki, dean and vice provost of undergraduate education, stressed to our class that we must not be afraid of failure as it is pivotal to success. Programs such as True Blue taught us about how to stay safe and properly navigate through the murky blue water that is Duke’s social scene, and meetings with academic advisors guaranteed that the incoming students will walk into classes they can (hopefully) handle.

I spoke to students in the class of 2015 while hanging out at Marketplace, the East Campus bus stop, and the Freeman Center to see how people feel about starting school after orientation week. Below are what I found to be the common denominators of the freshman viewpoints of Duke after spending a week on campus sans any academic responsibility:

1. 1,700 freshmen on the same schedule leads to an interesting experience on the buses to West Campus.
2. Shooters!!!!!!!.…Extrapolate from that what you will.
3. Marketplace: We still don’t understand the food plan, but we love Wallace the omelette guy!
4. Everyone is from California, New York, or New Jersey, and they all know each other.
5. Thanks to Maya Angelou, we can tell our parents we did something other than just partying all week.
6. Duke students will do anything for a free T-shirt.
7. Convocation taught us that we could turn our heads both left and right.

Having a week to get acclimated with roommates, dorms and a general sense of direction was extremely useful, and I think the Class of 2015 now feels officially oriented to life at Duke. Not only will we enter classrooms knowing where they are, but we will also have a few friendly faces twenty rows up in Economics 51 who can lend us notes if we cannot see the blackboard off in the distance.