Caroline Kimmel – The Stanford Daily https://stanforddaily.com Breaking news from the Farm since 1892 Fri, 13 Oct 2017 02:26:12 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.4.3 https://stanforddaily.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/cropped-DailyIcon-CardinalRed.png?w=32 Caroline Kimmel – The Stanford Daily https://stanforddaily.com 32 32 204779320 Stanford’s newest sorority establishes a sisterhood https://stanforddaily.com/2017/06/06/stanfords-newest-sorority-establishes-a-sisterhood/ https://stanforddaily.com/2017/06/06/stanfords-newest-sorority-establishes-a-sisterhood/#respond Tue, 06 Jun 2017 07:50:05 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1128959 Over the course of the quarter, Alpha Chi alumnae and active members from other schools have helped the new chapter navigate its inaugural year as it builds up a community.

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Stanford's newest sorority establishes a sisterhood
Alpha Chi is Stanford’s newest sorority (Courtesy of Savannah Pham).

Stanford’s newly installed Zeta Iota chapter of Alpha Chi Omega (Alpha Chi) has worked hard to establish its sisterhood this spring.

Over the course of the quarter, Alpha Chi alumnae and active members from other schools have helped the new chapter navigate its inaugural year. After the Inter-Sorority Council’s (ISC) formal recruitment, Alpha Chi Omega conducted a two-week-long informal recruitment that consisted of 15 minute interviews led by Alpha Chi alumnae.

Newly elected chapter president Savannah Pham ’18 joined Alpha Chi to make a difference in the greater Stanford community.

“A big thing for me was the idea of being able to challenge what Greek life looks like here at Stanford and to really practice diversity and inclusion,” Pham said.

Leah Slang ’18, vice president of standards for the chapter, joined seeking strong sisterhood.

“I was really looking for a community of women who were interested in leadership and service,” Slang explained. She had never considered joining Greek life through formal recruitment before, but after hearing about the new chapter, Slang decided she wanted to experience sorority life.

Following recruitment and interviews, Alpha Chi’s official bid day was April 30. The group welcomed 43 women into its inaugural pledge class. Since then, the chapter has focused intensively on building its new community.

On April 26, the chapter participated in Sexual Assault Awareness Month by tabling in White Plaza for “Denim Day,” a day on which participants wear all-denim to draw attention to sexual assault. Sisters gave out turquoise ribbons to show solidarity for sexual assault victims.

On May 13, the new sisters bonded on their on-campus sisterhood retreat. The girls gathered in Tresidder to get to know each other through group activities that ended with a hike to the Stanford Dish.

To foster close friendships between members, the chapter paired two sisters together each week. The chapter then implemented a “twin sister” arrangement. Mirroring the “big-little” system in existing sororities, students were asked to list a few other Alpha Chi members whom they would like to get to know better. The chapter’s alumnae consultants then paired the new members according to their preferences. The chapter held a twin reveal at which each sister was given a pair of unique socks and was sent to find a girl with a matching pair.

New member Taryn Fitzgerald ’19 describes the chapter as “a group of girls with a lot of diverse interests, who are all very much looking forward to the sisterhood, supporting one another and being actively involved in the community.”

“They are all talented, bright beautiful women who really wanted to take on the challenge of being a founding member of a new chapter and also wanted to leave a legacy here,” Pham continued. “One of the most inspiring things for me is that we all have very different backgrounds and all have this common goal of being part of something new.”

Both Slang and Pham stated that getting to know the other members and learning about their impressive interests has been a highlight of their experience in the chapter so far. The range of class years, freshmen through senior, gives new members the chance to make friends outside of their own circles, they said.

As their sisterhood becomes more cohesive, the chapter is eager to start working on its philanthropy project: domestic violence awareness. On May 24, Alpha Chi joined Stanford’s Kappa Kappa Gamma sorority to make care packages for local women affected by domestic violence. In the future, the group plans to partner with other sororities and to co-sponsor events during Sexual Assault Awareness Month in addition to holding smaller philanthropy events over the course of the year.

“I am excited to see what kind of impact Alpha Chi Omega can have on the community through service,” Slang said. “I am also excited to work with other sororities and fraternities to elevate our presence on campus and do good work together. There’s a lot of potential here.”

Following the initial bonding events, the sisterhood also selected its executive and non-executive leadership boards. Members interested in leadership positions met with the chapter’s alumnae advisors to discuss their interest. Two sisters were then slated for each position. Each gave a short speech detailing her platform, followed by a chapter-wide vote.

Originally hesitant about the time commitment her senior year, Pham was inspired by the chapter consultants to take on a leadership role as a platform for encouraging diversity in Greek life.

“I came in with all these big ideas about what I would like to see Alpha Chi look like, and as a rising senior I really wanted to leave a legacy and impact change,” Pham said. “It’s a way for me to challenge myself and continue developing as a leader and be a role model for the younger girls.”

Most recently, each of Alpha Chi’s new members was initiated into the sorority by alumnae and consultants on June 2. The following morning, the chapter was officially installed at Stanford and given a charter, making it the 144th national chapter of Alpha Chi Omega. The chapter will continue to integrate new members over the course of next year through a continuous open bidding process.

“My goal, which is pretty lofty and something that hopefully will be worked on in years to come, is that Alpha Chi be a chapter that practices diversity and inclusion and be known within Greek life as very accepting,” Pham said.

 

Contact Caroline Kimmel at ckimmel ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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Symposium presents cutting-edge research in math and computing https://stanforddaily.com/2017/05/22/symposium-presents-cutting-edge-research-in-math-and-computing/ https://stanforddaily.com/2017/05/22/symposium-presents-cutting-edge-research-in-math-and-computing/#respond Mon, 22 May 2017 07:28:53 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1127880 Faculty research presented at the Institute for Computational and Mathematical Engineering's annual Xpo ranged widely in application, from improving solar energy to understanding genetic disorders.

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Faculty of Stanford’s Institute for Computational and Mathematical Engineering (ICME) shared their cutting-edge research at Friday’s ICME Xpo, the department’s annual research symposium.

Margot Gerritsen Ph.D. ’97, associate professor of energy resources engineering and director of ICME, and Gianluca Iaccarino, associate professor of mechanical engineering and co-director of ICME, kicked off the event with an opening welcome and introduction. They were followed by a series of seven presentations on current research conducted by faculty in ICME and other engineering departments.

Afterward, attendees had the chance to see a range of work in ICME and other fields during a poster session.

The talks provided an opportunity for attendees to gain insight into the various applications of ICME’s research, such as mathematics, data science and scientific computing. Topics ranged from solar energy to understanding genetic disorders.

Aaron Sidford, assistant professor of management science and engineering, gave the event’s opening talk on faster algorithms to solve what he called “one of the most fundamental problems” in his area of study. Ali Mani M.S. ’04 Ph.D. ’09, assistant professor of mechanical engineering, followed with a presentation titled “Mini-Stories from Engineering Puzzles of a Fluid Dynamicist.” With a background in fluid dynamics and computational engineering, Mani educated the audience on how to use particles in a gas for applications like solar energy harvesting.

Ken Jung, a research engineer at the School of Medicine and one of three recipients of the ICME Seed grant, spoke about his work using electronic data to address a health issue. Jung researches familial hypercholesterolemia (FH) — a genetic disorder more commonly known as high cholesterol that causes a build-up of low-density lipoproteins at a young age and is often underdiagnosed. Jung’s lab aims to use available data in electronic health records to create a means for identifying whether or not a person has FH. In addition to sharing his research, Jung framed his presentation as a recruiting talk for ICME students to join his lab.

Mary Wootters, assistant professor of computer science and of electrical engineering, taught attendees “Lessons from Coding Theory.” Her work includes solutions to problems in communication and data storage.

“Coding and information theory for communication and storage is still a vibrant research area,” she said.

Associate Professor of Management Science and Engineering Amin Saberi gave a talk on the dissemination of social network innovations that introduced two models for the spread of a behavior or technology: an “epidemic” model and a “game dynamic” model. In the epidemic scenario, technology spreads similarly to a disease moving from individual to individual. In the game dynamics scenario, the likelihood of someone adopting a technology can be modeled as a game in which people’s choices are influenced by their neighbors’ decisions.

Amir Zamir, postdoctoral researcher in computer science and recipient of an ICME Seed grant, discussed his efforts to develop algorithms with “human-like” perception. His ongoing project involves tax taskonomy, or taskonomy, which allows computational models to learn different tasks for a more comprehensive intelligence.

The final presentation was by Mykel Kochenderfer ’02 M.S. ’03, assistant professor of aeronautics and astronautics and director of the Stanford Intelligent Systems Laboratory. Kochenderfer’s research deals with models and algorithms for intelligent decision making under uncertainty. His presentation focused on the use of a mathematical model to prevent in-air aircraft collisions. While working at Lincoln Labs, Kochenderfer designed the traffic collision avoidance system (TCAS) mandated in all commercial airplanes. The model has significantly increased air safety, and Kochenderfer himself was on the first flight test of the technology.

“I would have to say that few things are more exciting than being on a large aircraft flying at another large aircraft and hoping that this … stuff works out,” Kochenderfer said.

The event also included three presentations utilizing the ICME HANA Immersive Visualization Environment (HIVE), a 10-feet-tall by 24-feet-wide screen meant to facilitate visualization for teaching and research. Presentations featured innovations such as the Stanford Virtual Heart, a Lucille Packard Children’s Hospital initiative to harness virtual reality for science education, and the David Rumsey Map Center’s high-resolution maps.

 

Contact Caroline Kimmel at ckimmel ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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Students discuss mental health for Wellness Week https://stanforddaily.com/2017/03/03/students-discuss-mental-health-for-wellness-week/ https://stanforddaily.com/2017/03/03/students-discuss-mental-health-for-wellness-week/#respond Fri, 03 Mar 2017 09:08:23 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1124258 Students came together on Wednesday evening for Take Back the Stigma, an initiative encouraging students to pay attention to and discuss mental health issues on campus.

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Students came together on Wednesday evening for Take Back the Stigma, an initiative encouraging students to pay attention to and discuss mental health issues on campus as part of Wellness Week.

Students discuss mental health for Wellness Week
Take Back the Stigma, a Wellness Week event, sought to combat stigmas around mental health (Courtesy of Madda Wilson).

Wellness Week comprises a variety of events aimed at promoting the Stanford community’s wellbeing. Hosted by Stanford Mental Health Outreach (SMHO) and co-sponsored by student groups including Stanford Happiness Collective and Power 2 ACT, Take Back the Stigma began with a rally in White Plaza. Students created signs highlighting mental health issues and encouraging viewers to discuss them openly. Participants then marched silently with their signs to the Black Community Services Center, where attendees had the opportunity to speak out about their own mental health journeys.

Take Back the Stigma is one of a range of panel discussions and campaigns hosted by SMHO throughout the year to encourage students to discuss mental health issues more openly.

SMHO funded Take Back the Stigma by applying for a grant from the national organization Healthy Campus 2020. The format and name of the event were inspired by Take Back the Night, a sexual violence awareness campaign.

Megan McAndrews ’17, co-president of SMHO, noted that, while suicide is the second leading cause of death among college students, most college students themselves are unaware of the statistic.

SHMO believes that Take Back the Stigma will educate Stanford students about the real impacts of mental health issues, especially by providing peer discussion of lived mental health experiences.

“There are very few places on campus where we talk about things like suicide, self-harm, eating disorders, depression or anxiety,” McAndrews said. “That lack [of resources] perpetuates the danger of [mental health issues] and [its] harm to students.”

 

Contact Caroline Kimmel at ckimmel ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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Frost Music and Arts Festival moved to Stanford Stadium https://stanforddaily.com/2017/02/22/frost-music-and-arts-festival-moved-to-stanford-stadium/ https://stanforddaily.com/2017/02/22/frost-music-and-arts-festival-moved-to-stanford-stadium/#respond Wed, 22 Feb 2017 09:00:48 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1123442 The Stanford Concert Network (SCN) has moved its annual Frost Music and Arts Festival to Stanford Stadium while Frost Amphitheater undergoes renovations.

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The Stanford Concert Network (SCN) has moved its annual Frost Music and Arts Festival to Stanford Stadium while Frost Amphitheater undergoes renovations funded by Peter Bing ’55.

SCN executive leaders Robert Webber ’19, Tommy Choi ’18 and Rosalind Lutsky ’18 learned of the venue’s unavailability two weeks before the start of the school year.

According to Choi, the timing forced SCN to make a difficult decision.

“We had to decide to either hold Frost and have to change it in ways we didn’t know yet or to ultimately cancel the show,” Choi said.

Faced with these choices, SCN opted to begin planning a revamped Frost, deciding as a group that the event’s importance to the Stanford community made it worth extra logistical efforts. Choi explained that SCN sees Frost as “very much central to what life on campus is.” He noted that it is the most attended student event of the year and one of the few chances for the whole student body to spend time together outside.

“We want to make sure that all of the incoming freshmen have this same experience,” Choi said.

SCN’s main criteria for a new venue for Frost were capacity, safety and novelty. The group wanted a location that could excite students. According to Choi, Stanford Stadium was the only viable option that satisfied each criterion. This year’s Frost festival will take place there on May 20.

The move to Stanford Stadium, finalized in early December, has given SCN a number of new variables to consider in planning Frost.

“The amount of contingency we have to build into our budget has to be a lot larger just because we have a lot more unknowns,” Choi said.

Lutsky explained that protecting the stadium grass is a particular concern for the organization. Damaging the field would pit SCN against Stanford Athletics and affect this June’s commencement walk on the field.

SCN will also need to cover the cost of transporting stages and equipment into the stadium. In previous years, the group simply used an existing concrete stage at Frost Amphitheater.

“We had to make some uneasy sacrifices about continuing all of our shows throughout the year in order to have Frost,” Webber said.

SCN also decided to cut back on the frequency of other large-scale shows throughout the year, most notably by canceling its Fallout concert. The group has focused on co-sponsoring events such as Black Love, Dance Marathon and Snowchella with other organizations.

To maintain the energy and parts of the ambience of past Frost festivals, SCN plans to recreate the bowl-shaped amphitheater with the stadium’s seating arrangement. Students will have a combination of field and stadium seating at their disposal.

“Although we’ve talked about a lot of the challenges this move has brought us, we are exponentially more excited about the new opportunities that it brings,” Webber said.

SCN also hopes to use the existing infrastructure of the stadium to integrate the festival’s art displays. Art will be interspersed throughout the venue, allowing attendees to interact more with the works during Frost. The stadium’s lighting and ability to contain sound have also made it possible to host the show later in the evening.

SCN views Frost’s revamping in a positive light because of the excitement the change can bring to students as well as the challenges it has brought to SCN.

“The venue change has forced us as an organization to grow in a way that we previously hadn’t,” Choi said. “We have had to come together much more as a team because we have to deal with things that we had never even heard of in the past.”

“We want to emphasize how fun this is going to be for the student body,” Webber said. “We’re really excited to give them a show that they can come out to as a group. It’s one of the rare opportunities that the community comes together.”

 

Contact Caroline Kimmel at ckimmel ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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Viraj Mehta ’18 competes on ‘Jeopardy!’ College Championship https://stanforddaily.com/2017/02/14/viraj-mehta-18-competes-on-jeopardy-college-championship/ https://stanforddaily.com/2017/02/14/viraj-mehta-18-competes-on-jeopardy-college-championship/#respond Tue, 14 Feb 2017 17:44:03 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1122934 Viraj Mehta ’18 recently competed for $100,000 in the 2017 edition of the Jeopardy! College Championship, which will begin airing this week.

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Viraj Mehta ’18 recently competed for $100,000 in the 2017 edition of the Jeopardy! College Championship, which will begin airing this week. The three-round competition airs Feb. 13-24 on ABC, with Mehta’s first round broadcasted today.

Mehta will first face Jennifer Katz, from Macalester College, and Hannah Whisnant, from the U.S. Military Academy, West Point, in Tuesday’s quarterfinals. He will advance to the semifinals if he wins or is among the top four non-winners across the board.

A math and computer science major, Mehta has aspired to be on the show since he was a child.

“I’ve been watching ‘Jeopardy!’ since I was as little as I can remember,” Mehta said. “I knew that I was never going to be a professional football player, but I always figured that I am pretty good at trivia. I know a lot of random stuff.”

To make the final cut, Mehta underwent a multi-stage auditioning process, beginning with an online test. After the test, the studio asked Mehta to fly out to New Orleans where he took another test, played practice rounds of the game and interviewed with the producers. The producers asked him about his background and what he would do with the money if he were to win. Mehta said he felt “just over the moon” when he finally received the call about his acceptance two weeks later.

After his acceptance, Mehta prepared and studied for the contest on top of his regular coursework. His four central study strategies included reading an almanac cover-to-cover, reading a comic-book version of the Bible, reading Shakespeare plot summaries and watching taped episodes of the show with a clickable pen to practice buzzing into questions.

The last practice was important, he explained, because the timing of the buzzer was the most difficult aspect of the show itself. Since most contestants knew the answers to the questions, the differentiating factor became response time.

Highlights of the experience for Mehta included seeing the show’s host Alex Trebek backstage.

“The first time I ever saw him, before the game started, Alex Trebek stuck his head out into the studio wearing jeans and a Jack Daniels t-shirt,” Mehta said. “I thought, ‘This dude’s so cool.’”

He also enjoyed seeing his family watching in awe in the studio audience. “I would occasionally look and see my brother looking at me with an ‘are you insane?’ face,” Mehta said.

Mehta’s quarterfinal round airs tonight at 7:00 p.m. PST on ABC and will be featured on campus at The Treehouse.

 

Contact Caroline Kimmel at ckimmel ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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Stanford ICME hosts Women in Data Science conference https://stanforddaily.com/2017/02/08/stanford-icme-hosts-women-in-data-science-conference/ https://stanforddaily.com/2017/02/08/stanford-icme-hosts-women-in-data-science-conference/#respond Wed, 08 Feb 2017 08:25:33 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1122616 Speakers at the Women in Data Science (WiDS) conference gave attendees insight into cutting-edge research in the data science industry last Friday.

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Speakers at the Women in Data Science (WiDS) conference gave attendees insight into cutting-edge research in the data science industry last Friday.

This second annual conference was the result of partnerships between the Stanford Institute for Computational and Mathematical Engineering (ICME) and other technology-focused organizations. Margot Gerritsen, director of ICME and associate professor of energy resources engineering, presided over the conference with assistance from the event’s co-directors. According to its mission statement, the event, which is hosted at a number of locations worldwide, aims “to inspire and educate data scientists — regardless of gender — and support women in the field.”

Over the course of the day, the conference hosted a moderated fireside chat, two keynote addresses, a variety of “technical vision talks” and a career panel.

Stanford ICME hosts Women in Data Science conference
(Courtesy of Ved Chirayath)
Last week’s Women in Data Science Conference drew speakers from the tech and business world and beyond.

The morning’s fireside chat featured Lori Sherer, a partner at Bain & Company, and Caitlin Smallwood M.S. ’93, vice president of science and algorithms at Netflix.

Smallwood discussed the applications and challenges of data analytics and algorithms at Netflix, noting that the greatest challenge in her role is less computational and lies in the interpretation of data given human factors.

“The area of being able to effectively communicate about data science is so valuable, particularly as algorithms get a little bit better since they are so opaque,” Sherer said.

The first set of technical vision talks was led by Miriah Meyer, assistant professor at the University of Utah, and Sinead Kaiya, COO for products and innovation at SAP. Meyer presented on the importance of data visualization, noting that “visualization is what brings the knowledge to bear and helps make decisions,” while Kaiya focused on the connection between global business and data science. Kaiya, who confessed that she is in actuality not a “data scientist” but has a degree in fine arts, concluded that the relationship between the two fields is at a tipping point, with business decisions needing to rely more on data.

The second set of technical vision talks ranged in topic from machine learning and artificial intelligence to human rights data.

Megan Price, executive director at Human Rights Data Analysis, presented about her organization and its practices, demonstrating how data can be exploited in pursuit of solutions to social inequity. One of Human Rights Data Analysis’s major roles is to provide expert testimony in court cases on the behalf of those whose rights have been violated. Their analysis is done through specific Python modules.

“We’re essentially the behind-the-scenes scientists for human rights advocacy organizations,” Price said. The conference continued with another keynote address given by Deborah Frincke, director of research at the National Security Agency (NSA).

Frincke opened with enthusiasm for the event’s focus on female participants before turning to present on the NSA’s three core missions of information assurance, foreign intelligence and cyber network operations. She was unable to answer where the organization drew most of its data from.

Harvard University assistant professor of computer science Finale Doshi-Velez gave one of the event’s final technical vision talks, emphasizing machine learning’s ability to boost health care and optimize treatments for conditions such as HIV. By combining different approaches to treatment and capitalizing on their complementary strengths, Doshi-Velez hopes to create accurate models for necessary treatments.

For Doshi-Velez, the application of machine learning research to help save lives goes beyond data.

“I am able to deliver the warm fuzzies that I really care about with cold hard numbers,” she said.

The third annual WiDS Conference will take place on Feb. 1, 2018.

 

Contact Caroline Kimmel at ckimmel ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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Students get their questions on sex answered at “Sex in the Dark” https://stanforddaily.com/2017/01/25/students-get-their-questions-on-sex-answered-at-sex-in-the-dark/ https://stanforddaily.com/2017/01/25/students-get-their-questions-on-sex-answered-at-sex-in-the-dark/#respond Wed, 25 Jan 2017 10:11:07 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1121921 Aptly named, "Sex in the Dark" presented an anonymous, all-you-want-to-know question-and-answer session about sex in a pitch black room.

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Rather than showing a play or film screening, on Tuesday evening Roble Theater showcased “Sex in the Dark.” Aptly named, the event presented an anonymous, all-you-want-to-know question-and-answer session about sex in a pitch black room.

As students entered the dark, they were handed glow-in-the-dark bracelets and necklaces and offered cupcakes with glowing frosting. An index card and a fluorescent condom was placed on each participant’s seat.

Roble Hall Resident Fellow (RF) Becky Bull prefaced the event and its intentions.

“Whether you are choosing to have sex or not, you should know what you’re doing, and you should enjoy it, and it should be consensual,” Bull said.

Professional sex educators Colin Adamo and Dorian Solot began Sex in the Dark on a light-hearted note with a joke about sexuality, where Solot asked that audience members not silence their phones but rather “leave them on vibrate.” Solot is the co-founder of Sex Discussed Here!, an organization that provides pairs of sex educators to present engaging sex education programs at colleges, high schools and business around the country. Adamo is the creator of “Hooked Up & Staying Hooked,” an online sexual health and relationship resource for teen boys.

To start, Adamo and Solot encouraged audience members to write their personal questions about sex and sexuality on the index cards, which were then handed in to the coordinators via a neon-painted question box.

Before commencing the Q&A, the Adamo and Solot reminded the audience that a diversity of backgrounds affects the way we each think about sex and that the event was a safe space for all types of questions.

Questions covered a wide variety of sex-related topics. One question that many students might find practical asked, “How do you deal with others having loud sex in a dorm?” to which Adamo and Solot suggested an equally loud playlist. Others included, “How can women achieve better orgasms with a male partner?”; “How do you make a girl squirt?”; “Is masturbation bad for you?”; and “Does penis size matter?” On the latter, Adamo and Solot concluded, “It’s not the size of the boat but the motion of the ocean that matters.”

The duo also fielded much weightier questions informatively. One question asked, “How do you avoid thinking about past sexual assault when aroused?” Solot explained that no simple solution exists and that some may seek help from counseling, a sex therapist or journaling. She additionally recommended books to survivors that guided them through the healing process.

Adamo and Solot hope that the event in its entirety informed the audience on all aspects of sexuality.

“We want to make sure you leave here with information that helps you make decisions that are healthy, responsible and right for you,” Adamo said.

 

Contact Caroline Kimmel at ckimmel ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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Marijuana still not permitted on campus despite state legalization https://stanforddaily.com/2016/11/30/marijuana-still-not-permitted-on-campus-despite-state-legalization/ https://stanforddaily.com/2016/11/30/marijuana-still-not-permitted-on-campus-despite-state-legalization/#respond Wed, 30 Nov 2016 08:47:26 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1120501 On Nov. 8, California passed Proposition 64 to legalize marijuana, but it will remain illegal on Stanford's campus.

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Marijuana will remain illegal on Stanford campus despite its recent legalization in California.

On Nov. 8, California passed Proposition 64, the California Marijuana Legalization Initiative, which legalized use of recreational marijuana for those 21 and older. In response to the bill, many at Stanford have wondered if the university would amend its Controlled Substances Policy regarding the use of marijuana on campus.

Following the Proposition’s passing, the Office of Alcohol Policy and Education (OAPE) responded by posting a Stanford University Marijuana Policy Statement to its webpage  and sharing the document with university residential staff. The document addressed Prop. 64 and maintained that marijuana will remain illegal on Stanford campus because marijuana remains illegal under federal law.

Stanford’s policy statement reads,“Marijuana is still illegal under federal law and categorized as an illicit substance (Drug Enforcement Agency Schedule I) under the Drug-Free Workplace Act of 1988 and the Drug-Free Schools and Communities Amendments of 1989.”

OAPE further explained that Stanford must comply with federal laws before states laws because the University receives federal funding, including funding for research and student financial aid, and could risk funding withdrawal by noncompliance.

Ralph Castro, Associate Dean of Students and Director of OAPE, maintains that thus far, the office has had no need to revise the policy and has encountered no significant issues.

“[The policy on marijuana] is pretty clearly laid out in regards to the prohibition on illicit drugs, and it’s not something we have had to address on a global scale, as we do with alcohol,” Castro said.

However, some students do not believe that the policy has been well-defined thus far. Katie Keller ’19 felt that the University’s policies on marijuana have not been articulated well to the student body.

“I would say that most students are not aware of our marijuana policy,” Keller said.“I think we all know very clearly what the rules are with alcohol and the new policy, but I think that talking about marijuana has been a pretty big taboo because it was illegal in the state of California until recently.”

Furthermore, there has been some misconception on campus about possible future policies in regard to Prop. 64.

“I think people [students] are mostly interpreting the California policy, [Prop 64], as what’s right even though Stanford’s policies may be different,” Keller said.

Now that recreational marijuana use is legal for a subset of the population beyond Stanford campus, Castro believes students should take the time to understand Stanford’s stance.

“It’s important for students to educate themselves on what’s expected here, so even though possession, cultivation and use is legal in California, it still is illegal here,” Castro said.

OAPE additionally plans to conduct more educational efforts on its policies and on safe marijuana consumption. In particular, Castro says OAPE may begin to look at the risks associated with edible marijuana.

 

Contact Caroline Kimmel at ckimmel ‘at’  stanford.edu.

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Sigma Chi celebrates 125th anniversary on campus https://stanforddaily.com/2016/10/21/sigma-chi-celebrates-125th-anniversary-on-campus/ https://stanforddaily.com/2016/10/21/sigma-chi-celebrates-125th-anniversary-on-campus/#respond Fri, 21 Oct 2016 08:00:58 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1118382 Stanford Sigma Chi, Alpha Omega chapter, is celebrating its 125th anniversary this weekend, marking it as the only fraternity continuously residing on Stanford’s campus since the University’s founding.

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(Courtesy of Bob Ottilie)
(Courtesy of Bob Ottilie)

Stanford Sigma Chi, Alpha Omega chapter, is celebrating its 125th anniversary this weekend, marking it as the only fraternity continuously residing on Stanford’s campus since the University’s founding. Festivities for the 125th anniversary began with a kickoff dinner for active members and 200 to 300 alumni at the Faculty Club on Thursday night.

The festivities are co-hosted by the chapter, headed by president and former Daily staffer Jordan Wallach ’17 and its Housing Corporation, headed by Bob Ottilie ’77. They recognize the chapter as the only continuous fraternity on campus for 125 years, chartered at the University in 1891.

“A lot of the values that I’ve learned in Sigma Chi have been really applicable to my day-to-day life, and since Sigma Chi has given so much to me, I wanted to give back,” Wallach said. “I’m honored to be the president of the house at this time.”

“There is a tremendous amount of opportunity for our organization to be a leader on the campus, and we are responsible to provide and perpetuate leadership through an active alumni organization,” Ottilie added.

Milestone

The 125th celebration highlights some of the most notable examples of Sigma Chi leadership in its history.

In the 1960s, Stanford Sigma Chi pledged its first African-American student. National Sigma Chi alumni vetoed the pledge, and in response, the Stanford chapter was the first to withdraw from the international Sigma Chi organization. Once all chapters revised its policies, the Stanford chapter became rechartered with Sigma Chi in 1974.

In 2002, the University mandated that the chapter conduct at least $600,000 of seismic improvements to the house. The chapter worked out an agreement to sell its house to the University to finance the renovations because monetary gifts to fraternity houses are not considered tax deductible.

A group of alumni, including Ottilie, came out in opposition to the agreement. This new Housing Corporation worked closely with Roger Whitney, Stanford’s Chief Housing Officer, to set a campaign goal of $3 million for independent renovations. The chapter also worked with the University to obtain a private letter ruling from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) that made donations toward the renovation tax deductible due to the location of the house on Stanford property. They reached this goal through alumni donations and also received an additional $1 million contribution in the form of construction from John Arrillaga, whose son had lived in the house. Construction took place in 2006.

Ottilie attributes the success of this endeavor to the chapter’s close collaborative relationship with the university.

“If you’re going to succeed at anything, you have to have solid relationships, and Stanford has consistently been our partner in everything we do, not withstanding,” said Ottilie.

Sigma Chi remains the only privately-owned student residence.

Alumni support

Ottilie also attributes the chapter’s lasting presence to its active alumni support. The chapter is the only house on campus that works with alumni and national-level chapter advisors on a daily basis. Over the next two years, the Housing Corporation is recruiting over two dozen alumni for an in-house leadership speaker series.

“Sigma Chi itself has been a course in leadership for me,” said Wallach. “I wouldn’t have been able to find the leadership training that I did anywhere else on campus. A lot of that is dealing with real problems on a day-to-day basis, and a lot of that is learning from the alums in the House Corporation and the chapter advisor.”

Sigma Chi has adapted in recent years through an aggressive risk management program jointly supported by the brothers and the Housing Corporation. In 2013, the thorough program was recognized as the best for Sigma Chi internationally.

Ottilie and the corporation mentor the brothers to constantly assess risk inherent to daily life in the house, from hosting parties to alcohol consumption. They conduct biannual risk management training sessions.

“The risk management training goes along with the theme of extra responsibility of owning our own house and of collective responsibility … it’s embedded in the culture,” Wallach said.

Changes in social life

A Sigma Chi-specific party-planning policy is an integral part of the chapter’s risk management strategy. The chapter and Housing Organization implemented a new policy in 2006, and since then, the house has had no major alcohol-related incidents at its parties.

The chapter also has specific alcohol policies. Starting in August 2012, the house banned all hard alcohol and additionally banned alcohol in common spaces and amplified music from 2 a.m. Sunday until 8 p.m. Thursday.

“[These changes] had a dramatic impact on the number of incidences that we were having with our tenants related to alcohol and a dramatic impact on the quality of our residence,” said Ottilie. Wallach believes the university’s new alcohol policy has not changed the house culture.

Additionally, the fraternity has designated drivers and sober monitors Thursday through Saturday nights and stopped serving alcohol at all-campus parties starting last year.

“All of these changes have been made in concert with me and other members of the house,” Wallach said. “I think it is important to get buy-in from the entire chapter. We want the house corporation and everyone to be on the same page, and we want to agree on the path we want to go down.”

The chapter is carrying on its spirit of progressivism through extensive philanthropy and a new pledge program, Preparation for Brotherhood. Last school year, the brothers raised $4,500 for the Huntsman Cancer Foundation. Preparation for Brotherhood is marketed as a “Blended Instructional Approach” to pledging. It includes literary exercises, historical learning, a journal and e-learning modules.

The chapter and the Housing Corporation hope to use the 125th anniversary as another milestone in Sigma Chi’s presence on campus.

Update: This article was updated to reflect the fact that Jordan Wallach was formerly a Daily staff member.

Contact Caroline Kimmel at ckimmel ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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ASSU, Stanford + Mental Health host alcohol policy discussion https://stanforddaily.com/2016/10/05/assu-stanford-mental-health-host-alcohol-policy-discussion/ https://stanforddaily.com/2016/10/05/assu-stanford-mental-health-host-alcohol-policy-discussion/#respond Wed, 05 Oct 2016 08:00:07 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1117621 On Tuesday night, Stanford + Mental Health collaborated with ASSU to host a dinner and discussion regarding the new University’s new alcohol policy.

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CAROLINE KIMMEL/The Stanford Daily
CAROLINE KIMMEL/The Stanford Daily

On Tuesday night, Stanford + Mental Health collaborated with ASSU to host a dinner and discussion regarding the University’s new alcohol policy with Anna Lembke, Chief of the Stanford Addiction Medicine Dual Diagnosis Clinic and member of the Alcohol and Drug Subcommittee that helped inform the new alcohol policy. David Lim ’18 of Stanford + Mental Health and ASSU Executive Amanda Edelman ’17 co-moderated the discussion.

“We wanted to host this event because we found it a relevant issue to everyone on Stanford campus, whether you drink or not,” Lim said. “And we wanted to take the discussion to the next level and add a perspective that people don’t usually get to see, if that changes minds or changes the general conversation about alcohol.”

The committee

Along with several faculty members, students and public safety stakeholders, Lembke was invited to become a member of an ad hoc committee that met about once per quarter because of her experience treating patients with alcohol and drug use problems.

“Over the course of about three or four meetings we came to a general consensus — I would not say it was unanimous — that there needed to be more restriction and intervention around alcohol use on campus,” Lembke said. “I do not know how the views of our committee were communicated to anybody in the Stanford administration. I do not know if we had an impact on the final decision.”

“The final recommendation was that hard alcohol be banned from all freshman dorms, and that was based on the increase in emergency transports due to alcohol intoxication especially among freshmen,” she added.

Lembke said the committee, headed by director of the Office of Alcohol Policy and Education (OAPE) Ralph Castro, gave input and recommendations to Stanford administrators.

Lin asked at one point what other alternatives were considered.

“There were a lot of discussions back and forth,” Lembke said. “I think one of the recurring themes that came up in our committee was the issue of enforcement. I certainly felt strongly about that. There was some very interesting commentary by the students who were there, a couple of whom were RAs. The other thing that came up recurrently is the law in the State of California, that those under 21 should not be drinking alcohol. If that is California law, why is Stanford not enforcing the law? I was happy to give voice to my concern and my desire for more oversight on campus and, frankly, more enforcement of California State Law. “

Among the topics brought up during the committee’s discussions was Stanford’s traditional “open door policy.” Lembke said students on the committee talked anecdotally about how this policy really became an “open invitation policy” where students’ dorm rooms offered “full bars” stocked with any kind of alcohol students wanted.

Lim asked for Lembke’s opinion on various surveys of the student body that have been done since the institution of the new alcohol policy, some of which suggest students are not taking the policy seriously.

“Surveys are a notoriously bad way to measure these kinds of social phenomena,” Lembke said. “They have social desirability bias. To me, a better outcome measure is to look at emergency transports or the number of DUIs around campus involving students or the number who attempted suicides, which is often associated with these issues.”

Enforcement and reporting

According to Lembke, her ideal, responsible campus culture would have opportunities for get togethers, fun and sexual intimacy without alcohol. While acknowledging that some recreational use of drugs and alcohol can be healthy, she estimated that 10 to 15 percent of the student body eventually progress to misuse of such substances.

Following up on Lembke’s mentions of medical transports, Edelman asked about potential negative safety consequences resulting from students’ not reporting alcohol poisoning or even assault events for fear of punishment under the new policy. While Lembke acknowledged that this was a discussed concern, she didn’t think it would be an issue.

“Certainly any public policy with teeth is going to have unintended adverse consequences,” Lembke said. “I don’t think Stanford’s new alcohol policy has teeth, so I’m not sure that there will be any effect at all from it, except for sending a general message about concern for campus drinking.”

Later in the event Lembke stated that she did, however, hope for future steps that would say what is allowed, what is not allowed and what would happen to students who break the policy.

Sexual assault concerns

Toward the end of the discussion, Lim pursued possible motivations for the new policy linked to sexual assault prevention. Although Lembke said she was unable to speak to the intentions behind the policy, she does not find the issues to be unrelated.

“To me, there is a clear link between sexual assault, alcohol and drug use,” Lembke said. “Almost every Stanford student that we’ve had referred to our clinic who have experienced sexual assault […] has a concurrent alcohol or drug use problem. To me, it’s very obvious that if you are intoxicated, you are more vulnerable to be a victim of sexual assault and also to perpetrate sexual violence upon others. This is why I feel very strongly that we need a campus policy that is going to address campus sexual violence and also address the intertwined problem of campus drug use.”

Regardless of this position, Lembke continued that relation to sexual assault was explicitly not discussed in the committee on the new policy as it was “outside the scope” of such conversations.

 

Contact Caroline Kimmel at ckimmel ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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Roble Hall institutes new sustainability initiative https://stanforddaily.com/2016/09/29/roble-hall-institutes-new-sustainability-initiative/ https://stanforddaily.com/2016/09/29/roble-hall-institutes-new-sustainability-initiative/#respond Fri, 30 Sep 2016 05:12:19 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1117443 Beginning in the fall of 2016, Roble Hall will pioneer a new sustainability initiative, the Roble Living Laboratory for Sustainability at Stanford (ROLLSS) under the leadership of resident fellow (RF) Jeffrey Ball.

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The ROLLSS logo depicts an oak tree outside Roble Hall, whose name itself designates an oak. (Courtesy of Sean McKibbon)
The ROLLSS logo depicts an oak tree outside Roble Hall, whose name itself designates an oak. (Courtesy of Sean McKibbon)

Beginning in the fall of 2016, Roble Hall will pioneer a new sustainability initiative, the Roble Living Laboratory for Sustainability at Stanford (ROLLSS) under the leadership of resident fellow (RF) Jeffrey Ball.

Ball is a Stanford Law School lecturer as well as a scholar-in-residence at the Steyer-Taylor Center for Energy Policy and Finance, which is dedicated to researching economically sensible ways to advance clean energy. In his second year as an RF in Roble Hall, Ball realized that issues relating to sustainability and the environment intrigued many students at Stanford. Ball set out to establish ROLLSS, pairing this realization with his background in energy research.

ROLLSS is the product of efforts started in Roble last year by the Roble Sustainability Initiative, comprised of residents and staff led by Ball. Charlie Jiang ’16, a Roble staff member and former president of Students for a Sustainable Stanford, worked closely with Ball on the initiative throughout the 2015-16 academic year.

“[ROLLSS] really demonstrates extra leadership by Stanford faculty in sustainability and environmental efforts in every capacity that they have, not only as professors but as RFs,” Jiang said.

According to Ball, the goal of ROLLSS is to “create a place where students can explore all of the messiness around sustainability on a daily basis … [and] to retrofit Roble … into a model of natural-resource efficiency” in an economically sensible way. As the residence hall nears its 100th anniversary in 2018, Ball hopes to catapult Roble into its second century with a new focus on sustainability.

To reach these objectives, the ROLLSS program features an onsite organic garden, public service projects for sustainability, educational activities on producing less waste, seminar courses and a speaker series.

An organic garden has been set up on the east side of Roble with funding from Residential and Dining Enterprises (R&DE), and some of the vegetables grown will be served in meals at Lakeside Dining. A Roble Growing Club will be established to maintain the garden. The garden opens for a planting party this Friday at 3:30 PM.

Roble has set up a number of sustainability-oriented activities for students. A contest among residents will test who can live most sustainably, and the residence staff have created a “Live-It List” featuring weekly advice on ways to live with a smaller environmental impact. This week’s recommendation is to think seriously before buying a dorm fridge, highlighting how widespread improper fridge disposal has become both an environmental and economical problem.

This fall, three seminar-style sustainability courses will be held in Roble, taking advantage of the dorm’s newly renovated seminar room.

The first, “Stanford Sustainable Living Lab” or CEE 126A, is taught by Michael Lepech, a professor in the department of civil and environmental engineering. Fall quarter students will “measure Roble’s environmental footprint” by conducting a lifecycle assessment of the dorm, and winter quarter students will “analyze and try to implement cost-effective ways to reduce that footprint.”

The second seminar, “Grow It. Cook It. Eat it” or EARTHSYS 148, is co-taught by Matthew Rothe, founder of the FEED Collaborative at Stanford, and Dara Silverstein, manager of R&DE Stanford Dining’s sustainable food program. Students will work in the Roble Garden, at the Stanford farm and in Stanford’s teaching kitchen.

The third course takes advantage of the “Hard Earth” speaker series in Roble Theater every other Thursday night, starting last night. At each event, Stanford graduate students speak about their work researching environmental sustainability problems. CEE 126X will meet on Thursdays following each talk for a discussion- and reflection-based seminar.

To date, Ball says he has received positive feedback and praise regarding ROLLSS.

“Whenever I mention the garden, there are just big smiles on students’ faces,” Ball said, noting the excitement that has built surrounding the graduate student speaker series.

“Sustainability is not just a cosmic term,” Ball said. “It is the sum of myriad small decisions that each of us makes every day, and each of those decisions potentially involves a tradeoff. Understanding that is precisely the reason there needs to be ROLLSS.”

 

Contact Caroline Kimmel at ckimmel ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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After suicide clusters, Palo Alto community searches for solutions https://stanforddaily.com/2016/05/31/after-suicide-clusters-palo-alto-community-searches-for-solutions/ https://stanforddaily.com/2016/05/31/after-suicide-clusters-palo-alto-community-searches-for-solutions/#comments Tue, 31 May 2016 07:56:32 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1115897 School administration, school boards, parents, students and Stanford have all been part of a community response that has implemented programs to improve student health and wellbeing.

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In the past seven years, Palo Alto has experienced two suicide clusters, defined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) as “three or more suicides in close proximity in regards to time and space.”

The first cluster stretched for nine months, beginning in spring of 2009. Four Gunn High School students and recent graduates, along with two other local teens, died by suicide during this time. In the second cluster, spanning from October 2014 to March 2015, four more Palo Alto Unified School district students and alumni lost their lives by suicide. And this April in Palo Alto, a 19-year-old Gunn graduate’s death was ruled a suicide as well.

This year, the clusters have motivated the CDC to investigate Palo Alto for risk factors of suicide, similarly to how they would investigate viral outbreaks.

The suicide clusters prompted much grief and reflection in the Palo Alto community, including many at Stanford – from Gunn and Palo Alto High School (Paly) alumni to professors whose children attend school in the district to educators and experts who worry about the area’s pressure-cooker culture of academic achievement. The clusters have also attracted attention nationwide, drawing many responses of concern about the Palo Alto school environment and student stress.

School administration, school boards, parents, students and Stanford have all been part of a community response that has implemented programs to improve student health and well-being. The combination of their efforts has led to some visible changes in the school communities. But some wonder how effective these changes have been, and those close to or knowledgeable of the local suicide issue agree that more steps must be taken to truly shift student mindsets.

Community response

Ken Dauber, parent of five and Palo Alto School Board member, and his wife Michele Dauber, Frederick I. Richman Professor of Law at Stanford, founded We Can Do Better Palo Alto in response to the first cluster. Modeled after Project Safety Net, a local network whose goal is to create a “safety net” for youth through community efforts, the organization aims to change the high-pressure culture in Palo Alto schools through efforts from the school board, school administration and students. Ken Dauber says that he and his wife were concerned that the school district was “paying less attention than it should to issues of student stress and wellbeing.”

Dauber explained that the initiative targets schools rather than the community at large.

“It is much easier to change the practices in the schools than it is to make changes in the attitudes of an entire community of people,” he said.

“Students are vulnerable to the idea that they are not good enough and that they need to present a face to the group that has everything under control,” Dauber explained. “There are different ways to address that. One is making sure that students in our schools really are successful. Another is to de-stigmatize admitting that you are not perfect, even admitting that you need help.”

We Can Do Better hopes to implement both strategies. The group has sought incremental change in the district’s policies on homework, scheduling, student guidance counseling and curriculum in order to create a healthier environment in which students can excel academically while also feeling comfortable enough to address personal struggles.

Students also took initiative in response to the first cluster. At Gunn, the student government created a Wellness Coordinator Position in order to make mental health a student body priority. They formed the peer advisory group ROCK (“Reach Out, Care, Know”), which focuses on eliminating the stigma around mental health and providing support to students.

The Gunn student newspaper started running a column called “Changing the Narrative” that normalizes the struggles of students and staff.  

The schools themselves also responded. They organized wellness classes to address stress management. The Gunn administration created and publicized multiple student and faculty panels openly discussing the issues of mental health and teen suicide, and started a photo blog expressing school pride in response to the deaths.

In one of its most concrete actions, the school district removed Zero Period, a block of the school day starting at 7:20 a.m., from the daily schedule in an effort to reduce students’ stress. Zero period was an optional way for students to fit in an extra class, or start and end their days earlier.

Dauber explained that such an early start is not consistent with the recommendations of the American Academy of Pediatrics. He and Steven Adelsheim, director of Center for Youth Mental Health and Wellbeing and clinical professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Stanford, both believe that the delayed start benefits student health.

However, Michael “Minku” Lee ’19, a Gunn alumni and Stanford freshman, found the change immaterial. He explained that the removal of Zero Period was an example of “school administration handling [the suicide clusters] a lot differently than people thought they would.” He felt the schedule change did not affect school culture.

“A lot of people viewed the elimination as just finding excuses,” Lee said. “Taking that option away raised a lot of eyebrows.”

Lee also believes that his high school failed to address the prevalence of cheating in the Gunn student body. He says that the school’s competitive culture has led students to use any means, including cheating, to be academically successful. Lee felt that “that point didn’t really get across” to the administration as they evaluated ways to deal with the suicide clusters.

The cheating, Lee explained, was just one manifestation of the overall culture of “duck syndrome” at Gunn, a phenomenon often associated with Stanford: Everyone appears to be gliding effortlessly along the surface, but is actually paddling frantically beneath the water to stay afloat. Lee felt that the school’s culture was very much “everyone out for themselves,” and that students were even less open about their struggles at Gunn than they are at Stanford.

Dauber, however, feels that the school district has effectively increased its focus on student health and wellbeing since the first cluster, which occurred before Lee was enrolled at Gunn. There are now set limits on homework time, and the implementation of block scheduling reduces daily workloads and the need for multitasking by having fewer classes meet per day, for longer chunks of time.

But “the implementations [of the homework limits] are seriously lacking,” Dauber said.

Stanford’s role

Dauber acknowledges that the Stanford psychiatry department has played a large role in helping the district. Adelsheim said that Stanford programs such as CAPS and the Bridge Peer Counseling Center are working to spread awareness of just “how pervasive” mental health issues are.  In response to the first cluster, the Stanford Center for Youth Mental Health and Wellbeing worked with Paly and Gunn to implement Project Safety Net; Adelsheim is on the project’s leadership team.

Still, Dauber recalled a common phrase he has heard: “El Camino is the ‘widest street in America.’” On campus this notion manifests itself in the “Stanford bubble,” the impression that the University community is isolated from the outside world. Dauber believes there are many more untapped opportunities for close collaboration between the local community and the University.

According to Dauber, Stanford should better communicate to prospective students that “things like numbers of AP classes by themselves aren’t the important metrics for understanding that you are an attractive candidate in the school.” Instead, he said, Stanford should focus on opening a dialogue on the importance of well-rounded students.

Dauber also feels that the schools themselves still need to take steps toward a more advisory-based model for student counseling and toward more conscientious scheduling of tests and assignments to reduce work pile-ups.

Additionally, Adelsheim thinks Stanford should extend the model of resources such as CAPS and the Bridge to local high schools.

Some believe Stanford is part of the broad problem of student stress. Lee said that Stanford’s proximity to Gunn and Paly contributed to their unhealthy, competitive environments.

“Stanford does have a big influence,” he said. “It over-hypes the competitiveness.”

However, Lee feels that, all things considered, the University is not responsible for the suicide clusters, and academic environment is only one part of a complex issue.

“A lot of the suicides aren’t from a pure academic pressure standpoint,” he said. “A lot of the students did suffer from depression previously. There were other factors.”

Lee thinks that more resources should be devoted to expanding mental health education at Paly and Gunn. At present, Gunn has what Lee called “a more toned-down version of the Bridge.” Lee said the school district should expand this program, in addition to adding a counseling system modeled after Stanford’s CAPS.

But Lee says that the broader culture at Gunn also needs to change to break down persistent stigmas surrounding mental health.

“A lot of people viewed [mental health issues] as almost like weakness or brushed it off,” Lee said.

Dauber is “very optimistic” that school-related pressures leading to the clusters can be eliminated – and that these changes will reverberate beyond high school campuses.

“If we make these changes in the schools then the culture around academic achievement in Silicon Valley will change,” he said.

 

Contact Caroline Kimmel at ckimmel@stanford.edu.

 

WARNING SIGNS OF SUICIDE

  • Talking about wanting to die
  • Looking for a way to kill oneself
  • Talking about feeling hopeless or having no purpose
  • Talking about feeling trapped or in unbearable pain
  • Talking about being a burden to others
  • Increasing the use of alcohol or drugs
  • Acting anxious, agitated or reckless
  • Sleeping too little or too much

  • Withdrawing or feeling isolated
  • Showing rage or talking about seeking revenge
  • Displaying extreme mood swings

The more of these signs a person shows, the greater the risk. Warning signs are associated with suicide, but may not 
be what causes a suicide.

WHAT TO DO

If someone you know exhibits warning signs of suicide:

  •       Do not leave the person alone 

  •       Remove any firearms, alcohol, drugs or sharp objects that could be used in a suicide attempt 
  •       Call the U.S. National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 800-273-TALK (8255) 

  •       Take the person to an emergency room or seek help from a medical or mental health professional

THE NATIONAL SUICIDE PREVENTION LIFELINE 800-273-TALK (8255)

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Talk examines ‘past, present and future’ of art and art history at Stanford https://stanforddaily.com/2016/05/18/talk-examines-past-present-and-future-of-art-and-art-history-at-stanford/ https://stanforddaily.com/2016/05/18/talk-examines-past-present-and-future-of-art-and-art-history-at-stanford/#respond Wed, 18 May 2016 07:00:09 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1115313 On Tuesday, the Stanford Historical Society (SHS) hosted “Department of Art & Art History: Past, Present and Future,” a talk examining the department’s growth over the years.

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On Tuesday, the Stanford Historical Society (SHS) hosted “Department of Art & Art History: Past, Present and Future,” a talk examining the department’s growth over the years.

The event, held in partnership with this year’s Stanford 125 initiative celebrating the University’s 125th year, featured Mona Duggan, deputy director emerita of Cantor Arts Center, and Alexander Nemerov, Carl and Marilynn Thoma provostial professor of arts and humanities and chair of the department of art and art history.

Duggan spoke about the intertwined history of art and art history at Stanford.

“Jane Stanford ensured arts would be part of curriculum from the beginning,” Duggan said, explaining that the early Stanford art curriculum was not particularly notable, with a small faculty focusing mostly on graphic arts.

The majority of Duggan’s talk focused on what she termed the “Eitner Years,” the period from 1963 to 1989 in which Lorenz Eitner served as both chairman of the art department and director of the museum. Duggan, who came to Stanford herself in 1970, described Eitner as an “effective leader, excellent and popular teacher, and wise administrator.” Upon arriving at Stanford, Eitner was “dismayed at the deep neglect in which the arts had languished at Stanford,” Duggan recalled. The Stanford Museum was also in poor condition. Eitner had to build his departments from scratch.

Duggan recounted how, after less than ten years of Eitner’s leadership, the Stanford art department became one of the nation’s top ten institutions. Eitner established advanced degree programs, brought artists-in-residence to the University and built up collections for teaching and research. Eitner also directed the museum without pay.

Duggan discussed two events in 1989 that affected the Stanford art department: Eitner’s retirement and the Loma Prieta earthquake, which forced Stanford’s art museum to close after many of the pieces in its collection were ruined. The museum was in transition for several years, until 1993 when Duggan was appointed director of development.

In January of 1999, the museum reopened as the Cantor Arts Center. Although Cantor was incredibly well-received by the public, Duggan said, the art department faculty was not as receptive.

Duggan said that the art department and Cantor were “two units with new leadership, new players, operating separately with separate goals.”

In the early 2000s, Duggan helped lead the first Stanford arts initiative “to ensure that all students had opportunities to engage with the arts.” The initiative established professorships in the art department and helped bring the new McMurtry Building to Stanford.

Duggan retired from her position in March of 2015.

After Duggan’s closing remarks, Nemerov addressed the present situation of art and art history at Stanford. He argued that there is a negative stigma around the arts today at Stanford.

“There is a sense of the arts here, among the undergraduates, as a useless adornment to life,”  Nemerov said.

However, Nemerov wrapped up his discussion with optimism that the close relationship between art and art history would continue, particularly because of the physical proximity of the new McMurtry building to Cantor.

Audience member Ernesto Matalsol discussed the benefits of the talk.

“The community learned more about the culture of an entire academic institution,” he said. “As [Nemerov] said, Stanford is very pro-art today. Most of the Stanford community is very appreciative of art.”

Duggan encouraged the audience to view the exhibition “Soulmaker: The Times of Lewis Hine,” opening in Cantor on May 21.

Both Duggan’s and Nemerov’s talks were preceded SHS’s 40th Annual Members’ Meeting in which they welcomed seven new board members: Megan Davis, Leslie Kim ’98, Victor Madrigal ’94, Michele Marincovich ’68, Richard Shavelson and Rick Yuen.

Contact Caroline Kimmel at ckimmel ‘at’ stanford.edu.  

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New center will address disparities in ‘precision health’ https://stanforddaily.com/2016/05/02/new-center-will-address-disparities-in-precision-health/ https://stanforddaily.com/2016/05/02/new-center-will-address-disparities-in-precision-health/#respond Mon, 02 May 2016 07:34:56 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1114524 The School of Medicine is establishing the Stanford Precision Health for Ethnic and Racial Equity (SPHERE) Center, thanks to a grant received from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) last year.

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The School of Medicine is establishing the Stanford Precision Health for Ethnic and Racial Equity (SPHERE) Center, thanks to a grant received from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) last year.

The grant follows a 2015 NIH call for applications for precision health centers focusing on health disparities. The Stanford School of Medicine’s application was accepted, and Stanford received a five-year, $11.5 million grant for SPHERE. The new trans-disciplinary center will draw on expertise from multiple fields within Stanford’s School of Medicine and collaborate with two other centers funded by the NIH.

The ultimate goal of the NIH funding behind SPHERE is to make precision health services universally accessible in the United States.

The Stanford initiative is co-led by Yvonne Maldonado M.D. ’81, professor of pediatrics and of health and research policy, and Mark Cullen, professor of medicine and director of the Stanford Center for Population Health Sciences.

Maldonado, whose research is in global health and pediatrics, explained that precision health is the preventative form of precision medicine.

“Precision” refers to “taking the vast medical knowledge we have and applying it to an individual person,” Maldonado said.

Precision health involves bringing together all accessible information on population health, such as genes, cultural trends and family medical history, for a wealth of information that will allow the SPHERE center to advise and treat individual patients in a more informed way.

According to Maldonado, precision health and medicine is almost exclusively available to upper-middle class Americans at present. Lower-income Americans instead receive reactive care: Because they lack access to medical information, they only seek and receive treatment after an ailment begins.

SPHERE seeks to address these disparities, which Maldonado called “a big problem in the U.S. in terms of healthcare,” by making precision health widely available. As a virtual center, it provides a concentration of information and a way of connecting people.

Maldonado, Cullen and others spearheading SPHERE believe that precision health will be particularly successful at Stanford because of the University’s surrounding communities.

“We have a great diversity of communities here in California, and we serve a lot of these populations,” Maldonado said. “This is an opportunity to build a platform to reach communities […] that might lack access to healthcare.”

He also believes that Stanford is an ideal place for this type of research due to its collaborative research practices.

“Being able to work with other people and other fields is pretty natural here,” he said. “We can help coordinate areas of knowledge and learn from each other.”

To strengthen the relationship with the local community, the NIH’s grant stipulates that SPHERE work with community organizations to determine the most effective way to make its findings accessible and clear to its users. These connections will be overseen by the Office of Community Health in the School of Medicine, Maldonado explained.

SPHERE is funding three specific projects that will start in 2017.

Michael Snyder, professor and chair of genetics, will lead a project looking for biomarkers of rheumatoid arthritis in the Lakota Sioux tribe of South Dakota.

VJ Periyakoil, clinical associate professor of medicine, will lead another project investigating how best to communicate genetic cancer risks to Latino and Asian Americans.

The project will observe how doctors and patients communicate over a one-year period as well as how families respond to information about genetic cancer risk. From this information, the researchers hope to determine how families ultimately make health decisions.

Thomas Robinson B.S. ’83 M.D. ’88 P.D. ’91, the Irving Schulman, M.D. Endowed Professor in Child Health and professor of medicine, will be in charge of the third project. For the past two years, Robinson’s team has been conducting a study on obese children in low-income Latino families in the area.

“I’m the person who brings all these populations together,” he said. “We intervene on them. We do randomized control trials. We change behavior. This, and prevention, is my focus.”

Building on his existing research, Robinson will gather data on clinically overweight Latino youth to find effective strategies for prevention and treatment of youth obesity and related health problems, particularly diabetes.

Robinson’s study provides one example of how SPHERE’s collaborative focus could benefit medical research. Robinson and his team have collected physical data, lifestyle surveys, family history and health information and saved genetic samples. Over the course of the study, they have applied two randomly assigned treatment programs. With SPHERE, Robinson’s project will continue in collaboration with geneticists, including Snyder.

Robinson is optimistic that this cooperation will allow his team to analyze changes in biology over the course of treatment and “learn a tremendous amount more about the biological factors combined with the behavioral, cultural and social factors that determine health and well-being for a group that tends to have a higher risk for poor health.”

According to Robinson, the union of his existing data with the genetic analysis done by Snyder and his team will make Robinson’s research subjects “the most thoroughly biomolecularly profiled population in the history of the world.”

Robinson summarized the goal of precision health as using available data to determine, “What to do? How to do it? To whom, when, and where?” — with the “why” being implicit.  With continued research, SPHERE aims to gather enough data points to answer all of these questions.

 

Contact Caroline Kimmel at ckimmel ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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