Features

A deep dive into the most important issues on campus.



Features

George Washington & Georgetown: Universities in flux

What do students at Georgetown and students at George Washington have in common? They both got into George Washington. That’s the joke, anyway, but in many ways it’s becoming a relic of a bygone era. Georgetown isn’t on the decline, but it suddenly leapt into the upper echelon of respected global universities under the guidance of President Timothy S. Healy, S.J. in the ‘80s and has basically stood still since.

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Stuntin’ like their daddies

When the Georgetown men’s basketball team tips off its season against Hartford, the program will be entering its 100th season. Georgetown boasts one of the nation’s most storied college basketball programs, which began in 1907. If the Hoyas are going to throw any kind of birthday party this year, you can expect it to be a dance party, just like the ones that have become a staple of Midnight Madness at Georgetown.

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The grass is always greener

Caitlin Pedati (NHS ’07) said that when she moved into her house on the 3300 block of Prospect St. this summer with five other girls, dead roaches littered the floor and the interior needed cleaning and repainting. “I don’t think the house was safe when we moved in,” Pedati said. “I easily put a grand into cleaning and fixing up things.”

The girls found paper towels under a radiator and cracked or missing tiles on the kitchen and bathroom floors. There were no ground wires for electricity, and none of the fire alarms worked. The only fire extinguisher downstairs was “ancient,” Pedati said. “It’s been an absolutely miserable experience. “

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Signs of Protest: Inside Gallaudet

The thousands of silent protesters in front of the Capitol building last Saturday must have appeared to tourists to be the most polite agitators ever to stand on that lawn. Not a word could be heard amongst the observers as one lone voice echoed from the speaker’s platform, but the crowd rippled with constant, soundless motion.

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Artists Behind the Chair: Georgetown’s Duke Ellington School is home to some of DC’s most creative young minds

As you walk through the front entrance on 35th St., you might believe you’ve stepped into a run-of-the-mill high school. Paintings hang from the walls, signaling the presence of an art program in this school. It’s nice, but nothing you haven’t seen before. This is, after all, just another public school in the District of Columbia. Then you notice the dancers.

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Motley Crew: Inside GU Rowing

During New Student Orientation, the crew team brings a boat to Copley Lawn and propositions freshmen passing by, handing out pamphlets and answering questions. Most of the freshmen have never seen a crew boat, let alone rowed, yet they are courted aggressively.

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Forgotten Science: What Georgetown is doing to improve its waning science program

The facilities date back to the 1960s. The microscopes have outlived some of the teachers. Chronically under-funded and crammed into buildings too small to hold them, Georgetown University’s science programs can hardly measure up to the nationally renowned security studies major, the Jesuit standbys of philosophy and theology or the guaranteed-to-make-money business degree that have traditionally distinguished Georgetown as an institution.

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Fall Fashion ’06: no frills fall

Another fall arrives, the season when girls shed their “hips don’t lie” attitudes and wardrobes, to don the more tailored designs of crisper weather. This season, we recommend pinning up the likes of Katherine Hepburn on your wall. Or for a more feminine approach, order Rosemary’s Baby on Netflix. We’ve got both looks on display in this issue, and some in between, all inspired by fashions of the past.

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Raised on Soccer—Three siblings show their skills in the U.S. and across the pond

Two young soccer players stand at midfield set to kick off another match. One has his foot resting on the ball and the other stretches out while they await the sound of the referee’s whistle. Fast forward a little more than a decade. One of the young boys is now a senior co-captain of the Georgetown University soccer team, while the other is a member of the U.S. National Team and plays for Reading FC of the English Premier League, one of the top soccer leagues in the world. Those two young boys are much more than teammates, though. They are brothers.

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One year after Katrina…

For most Georgetown students, hurrican season usually means little more than a few rainy days, or perhaps, as in 2003, a couple days off from school. Last year, of course, was different—Hurricane Katrina shocked us all. We were horrified by the images on television. We felt deep sympathy for the plight of New Orleans. Some of us even gave money or joined relief organizations. Our daily life, though, was largely unaffected. But for some Georgetown students, not a day has passed since then that they haven’t felt the effects of the hurricane on a deeply personal level.

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The Homestretch

Home rule is still a relatively new concept in the District of Columbia. In 1974, a new era dawned as the first popularly elected Mayor and City Council took office, beginning the District’s experiment in limited autonomy. Now, 32 years later, the pending retirement of Mayor Anthony Williams means next Tuesday’s Democratic primary, the de facto election in a city where almost three-fourths of residents are registered Democrats, will see the election of D.C.’s fifth unique popularly elected mayor.

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State of Alert—D.C.’s Response to the Crime Emergency

Welcome back to Washington, averaging more than a murder per day during the first 11 days of July 2006. Police Chief Charles Ramsey has declared it a “crime emergency.”

The District of Columbia saw 14 homicides between July 1st and 11th, from the murder of John Jackson by automatic weapon fire in Southeast to the stabbing of Alan Senitt on Q street in Georgetown.

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Eating Out: Where To Go on a Date in D.C.

Venturing beyond Georgetown’s front gates can be a daunting experience for newcomers to the Hilltop. If you’re looking for a night out on the town with new friends, visiting parents or a hot date, here are some surefire culinary hits.

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Third Annual Voice Photo Contest

We’ve said it before and we’ll say it again: Georgetown isn’t known for its arts. After three years of Voice photo contests however, we remain consistently impressed with the capabilities of the campus’s amateur artists. After careful consideration of an overwhelming 140 entries, we narrowed the candidates down to eight, and are pleased to present some fantastic photos.

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Two Identities, Two Challenges

The faith and culture of Islam at Georgetown

Georgetown’s Muslim Chaplain, Imam Yahya Hendi, flourished his palm pilot, tapping away with a stylus. In his office, decorated with woven verses from the Qur’an and Muslim calligraphic art, the electric device seemed out of place while he discussed Islam’s relationship with the West. But soon tiny print appeared on the screen: the palm pilot contained the entirety of the Qu’ran and the Bible, completely indexed. Its tiny speakers even produce recitations of holy verse.

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The future of theater at Georgetown

As you walk into the new Royden. B. Davis, S.J. Performing Arts Center it is impossible not to be taken aback by the wide-open spaces, long white-tiled halls, and state-of-the-art theatrical equipment. The new space mirrors the vast expansion of the theater program at Georgetown in the past year. At the heart of this expansion is the completion of the Center.

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Are internships worth it?

Your job, your future: Keeping your fingers crossed

If you stopped a random sample of Georgetown students in Red Square and asked them about their employment plans for the summer, chances are that very few would respond by excitedly telling you about their full-time waitressing gig at Applebee’s or nannying job for the next-door-neighbors. Instead, you’d be peppered with a mélange of decidedly impressive sounding employers—think tanks, senators, Wall Street firms, NGOs, major publishing houses. Not only have these internships replaced the traditional summer job, they have become de rigeur for many Georgetown students during the academic year as well.

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Fixing what’s broken

How to Revitalize Student Government

The GUSA office is undergoing some physical remodeling, Twister Murchison (SFS ‘08) explained. For the recently sworn-in president of the students’ representative body, there could not be a more apt metaphor for what the organization needs: remodeling. Two controversial elections in three years serve as proof enough of that.

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Garden Party

Hanging out in New York City at the Big East Tournament

This past weekend, a 26 year-old tournament got a chance to relive a 20-something-year-old rivalry. The Orange of Syracuse and the Georgetown Hoyas highlighted the semi-final round of the Big East Championship. It was the 12th match-up between the two historical titans of the conference, but it was the first time John Thompson III graced the sidelines rather than his towel-toting father, Big John. The weekend, however, would not belong to Thompson’s brood, but a red-hot Orange man, Gerry McNamara.

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Getting the message across

Being deaf won’t stop her

MJ Muller-Chillier was diagnosed as hard-of-hearing at the age of three, and her hearing capacity has since decreased almost totally. Nevertheless, she is now an independent and worldly 23-year-old in her junior year at Gallaudet University, in the District of Columbia. She is also the first Gallaudet student in at least 10 years to take a foreign language class through the D.C. Consortium, and she has opted to do it at Georgetown.