Hands-on learning: Students participate in a first aid demonstration during last year’s conference.
Photo courtesy of Alpha Epsilon Delta.

In keeping up with healthy new-year resolutions, Saint Louis University’s Alpha Epsilon Delta organization will host a pre-health conference on Feb. 8 for the St. Louis community.

The conference, an all-day event, is themed “The Changing Landscape of Healthcare” and will focus on the current needs of the U.S. healthcare system. It is the largest event that AED hosts throughout the school year and will be their second annual pre-health conference.

“We are using this conference to highlight the great strides certain organizations or people have made to the betterment of our community,” said Tiffany Chen, Vice President of AED’s Public Relations. “At the same time, we will be discussing issues that have yet to be resolved.”

SLU’s AED organization is centered on pre-professional health education and providing students with a forum to develop these common health-related interests. They have been preparing for this conference since November and, despite some budgeting and speaker-confirmation issues, the process has been a reportedly smooth one. AED reached out to pre-health representatives from surrounding universities as well as advertised through many SLU outlets. The organization hopes to have at least 200 people in attendance, including faculty and staff members and students from universities such as Wash U, Mizzou, and Harris Stowe.

Last year’s conference, with about 120 participants, was held in April and themed “Health for All.” It consisted of over 20 different sessions and the group found that this created conflicts in attendance, as participants had to choose between simultaneous sessions. This year, AED has modified the event’s structure and looks to have 10 sessions throughout the whole conference. They assure that a wide-range of topics will still be offered.

“We are very excited for the speakers we have invited, and hope they will elucidate the sometimes confusing world of healthcare,” stated AED President Shelby Lee. “In addition, this conference has something for everyone. It is a chance to broaden your understanding of the changing landscape of healthcare and have a little fun while doing so.”

Keynote speakers for the conference will touch on everything from the importance of a healthy lifestyle to genetic counseling and risk testing. There will also be a panel of speakers discussing medical malpractice cases and a medical student panel to answer audience questions. For more hands-on activities, participants can learn self-defense from the St. Louis Combat Institute, take a Zumba class from Simon Recreation Center representatives or even practice stitching up a fake piece of skin during a suturing lab. Attendees can partake in the entire conference, which is free, or just pick and choose which sessions they wish to attend. Many of this year’s sessions will focus on the future of healthcare and educating participants on critical aspects of the healthcare field. Others hope to facilitate discussions about healthy lifestyles.

“AED is hoping we can spread health awareness through this conference,” said Chen. “With each individual session we hope to address some pressing issues we may have as pre-health students, as professionals in our future careers and within our communities.”

AED also hosts a number of blood drives throughout the year and each member participates in at least 15 hours of medically-related community service.

Suturing: Students participate in a suturing seminar during last year’s AED Pre-health Conference.
Photo courtesy of Alpha Epsilon Delta.

The panel: Audience members with panelists from the “Voices from Syria” event.
Photo by Adnan Syed.

Syrian citizens share their experiences

In August 2012 Syrian government forces invaded the city of Daraya and brought about the worst single massacre the country had ever seen. The body count exceeded 400 in the town alone and Syria has since then accumulated a death toll of an estimated 130,000. Bringing stories of these horrors to Saint Louis University, survivors of the massacre shared their experiences on Feb. 5 during their North American tour “Voices from Syria.”

The cosponsored event consisted of three panel speakers, each with a different story to tell about the Syrian tragedies and crimes of the Assad regime. An Arabic translator helped the men to account their experiences while photos from the massacre were displayed.

“In Syria, we got used to death,” the first speaker, Mohamad Khir Alwazir, summarized of the terrors he saw in Syria. Alwazir was imprisoned for his involvement in the revolution against the Assad regime. He reported experiencing beatings, electric shock and whippings while in prison, and he commented that international pressure ultimately led to his release. Afterwards, however, Alwazir lost his wife when his city was bombed in March of 2012.

The second speaker, Anas al-Dabas, recounted similar tragedies as he spoke of the massacre in Daraya.

“I could have just as easily been one of the people massacred,” said al-Dabas. His building was one of the first raided in Daraya and he described how soldiers forced residents to strip their upper-body clothing before being interrogated. If soldiers declared anyone suspicious, or simply disliked their eye color, the citizens were immediately executed. Neighboring buildings were subjected to heavy gunfire and bodies were found within each home.

Al-Dabas recounted that all protests at the beginning of the revolution were peaceful but Assad’s army met them with violent retaliation.

Not having experienced these current violent encounters first-hand, the last speaker was an older prisoner of the Syrian regime. Oussama Chourbagi was part of a group wanting to help the city of Daraya, and after fearing he would be captured wrote to his family saying, “Today I choose my freedom and your freedom.” His family didn’t receive the letter, however, as a chemical bomb was later dropped near his home.

In October of 2012 Chourbagi helped establish the Local Council of Daraya, an organization based on the unification of revolutionary forces. The council aims to provide services to the besieged city and to work towards the removal of Assad’s regime. They continue to demand the release of detainees, including children, and serve as a reminder of the continued suffering of the people of Daraya.

Chourbagi left the audience with a wish: “May God help those who have actually seen the massacres.”

The panelists asked the audience to serve as “ambassadors of truth” and to carry their messages of the tragedies in Syria on with them. They acknowledged the dark times still ahead but said they remain hopeful for the future.

“These revolutions don’t happen overnight,” said Chourbagi.

Voices: Panelists share survival stories from massacre.
Photo by Adnan Syed.

In a matter of months, Saint Louis University will instate its 32nd president. Until then, however, the Board of Trustees and Presidential Search Committee have their work cut out for them.

Since the retirement of Lawrence Biondi, S.J., and the creation of the Presidential Search Committee in September, plans for finding SLU’s next president have steadily progressed and are reportedly right on track. Eleven carefully-selected individuals, headed by chairman of the Search Committee and board trustee Jim Smith, have spent the past three months working towards an efficient and successful way to fill the presidency position. Aiding in this effort is search firm AGB Search of Washington, D.C. and their managing partner Dr. James Ferrare.

The Search Committee is comprised of six board trustees and five other members representative of key stakeholder groups: SGA, the College of Arts and Sciences, the School of Law, the School of Nursing and the Faculty Senate. These members have been entrusted with the ultimate responsibility of carrying out the search and evaluating candidates, while using care to have the SLU community’s best interests in mind.

“It has been a good, working committee and that has helped us make progress,” commented Smith. “So there has been very little discord…they’ve been able to work through things.”

AGB’s role in the process has been no small one, either, as Ferrare and four others have provided the Committee with guidance both in assembling the Search Committee and in conducting the presidential search. The firm has helped in identifying many of the people that the committee has spoken with for the search, whether that be candidates or people with recommendations. AGB has also played a large part in identifying best practices for the search and in helping to create the position profile for the new president.

The profile was built input from two campus forums, the Madrid administration, the Arts and Sciences faculty committees, SGA, the Faculty Senate, college deans and essentially every other group on campus.

“That’s another part that has been good: all of the work that has been done to identify the position description,” said Smith. “I think that was important because we were able to explain what we were trying to do in the search, and we got a lot of feedback that was helpful in designing the position description.”

In the profile, the committee has provided a detailed and thorough description of every aspect that they felt each candidate should reflect and value. Overall, those include a commitment to the Jesuit mission, a decisive and inclusive leadership style, an ability to effectively fundraise on behalf of the university and a vision for future education.

Smith said that candidates must not only vouch for these characteristics, but must also somehow prove to the committee that they will effectively portray them and follow through in each of these departments.

“If we recommend three [candidates], it’s because we think that any one of those three could be a good president—and it won’t be any more than three,” stated Smith.

Currently, the committee is still taking nominations and is in the process of identifying candidates, talking with them and reducing the pool to a more manageable number. Reference checks and background checks have been a critical part of the search, and by the end of this stage they hope to have around 10-12 people – at which point the interviewing phase will begin.

In an effort to ensure consistency with each interview and to encourage an open process, the Search Committee is creating standardized questions and will interview each candidate as a group. After thorough evaluations and various meetings, they look to ideally have two to three candidates by the end of Feb. whom they will recommend to the Board.

While unable to disclose any specific profile information about the individual candidates, Smith did reveal that included in the group are Jesuits, women and even current presidents of other universities. Despite the most crucial steps still ahead, he remains appeased about the search progress thus far.

“It’s a good mixture of Jesuits, laymen, laywomen…and from there we think there’s a high likelihood we’ll have a good president from the groups we have identified,” said Smith. “It’s going to be interesting going forward…we have a lot to do yet.”

Photo by Jessica Winter

Latin professor expresses love of language and his work

A former student and now Latin professor at Saint Louis University, Joe Koerner embodies those ideals most revered in any teacher. His love of SLU, appreciation of his students and passion for his work are enough to make any student want to study Latin – including his 13-year-old granddaughter.

“She decided, on her own, to start studying Latin…and [we’ll] text in Latin,” said Koerner. “Spell check goes crazy.”

The language professor, born in Hays, Kansas, received both his undergraduate and graduate degrees at SLU, where he was also an eight-year ordained Jesuit scholastic. He starting teaching Latin at SLU High School during the last year of his regency and later went on to receive his Masters in Philosophy and Letters from SLU. Deciding, however, that teaching philosophy wasn’t exactly his forte, Koerner proceeded to explore business and marketing where he eventually developed his own consulting firm, Qualis Co. When he found himself ready to retire from his business 20 years later, he was once again confronted by his love for Latin and began teaching at Webster University and later SLU.

“I’ve always had a great reverence for and interest in ancient times,” said Koerner.

Taking this interest in history and combining it with his interest in the languages – Koerner has studied not only Latin but German and Greek as well – has given the professor a deep appreciation of everything his subject symbolizes.

“The Latin language brings together a forceful aesthetic and emotional content to our insights and understanding,” he stated. “For those people who do like the language, they find a certain mental and aesthetic satisfaction in [it].”

So what of those people who claim Latin is a dying language? Koerner claimed that Latin has never exactly been spoken conversationally, but rather by those of higher education in ancient times and will always be relevant in the translation and understanding of such ancient texts. Furthermore, he pointed out that appreciation and investment in a language does not have to come from its practicality and usefulness, but rather can come from acknowledging it as an art form.

“We place a lot of emphasis on what we can use and transform into our careers and so on, but if you take a look at the high schools and other universities, [Latin] is still around,” Koerner stated. “I have a feeling it’s going to become a little more prominent again as it once was.”

The language professor, a trained voice and former stage actor, marveled at how content he is in his life, his work and being back at SLU once again.

“Arriving back at the place where I started…I’m very grateful,” said Koerner.

Saint Louis University looks to have an eventful semester as it finds the deadline for choosing a future food provider rapidly approaching. Hoping to make a final decision by March or April, the university will spend the remainder of this month receiving presentations from the four companies bidding on the contract.

The four bidders, Chartwells, Bon Appétit, Aramark and Sodexo, will pitch their presentations to the Food Request for Proposal Evaluation Committee by Jan. 23. The committee is comprised of many stakeholders at the university, including representatives from SLU’s Facilities and Sustainability departments, SGA, academic departments such as the law school and several others. These representatives will evaluate each presentation, reporting on the pros and cons that each food vendor offers.

“We will hear the strong points of each vendor presentation from the committee, and then the next step is to go visit some of the sites of the vendors,” stated Evelyn Shields, Student Development Director of Business and Auxiliary Services. “We plan to narrow it down to our top two vendors sometime around March.”

SLU has previously hired both Sodexo and Chartwells. Chartwells won their current contract in 2002 after Sodexo had spent nearly 15 years on campus. Aramark, on the other hand, has competed in the past for the contract but has yet to receive it, while Bon Appétit brings a new name to the table.

“We’re looking for a vendor who is committed to providing the best level of service possible to our students, faculty and staff,” said Shields.

After narrowing the list down, SLU’s executive staff, who are the final decision-makers on the matter, will then complete their financial analysis and proposal evaluations and will make a recommendation for awarding the contract come March or April. However, the executive staff assures that others’ opinions, especially those of the students, are being considered throughout this process.

“This process started somewhere back in January of 2012, and we’ve had SGA involved in all phases of the project,” said Shields. “Students are heavily involved in the decision-making process.”

This includes a student-survey that was sent out last year concerning food preferences or concerns of the student body, as well as any other issues that have been brought to SGA’s attention.

“Students have voiced many concerns about what will happen to front-line staff should the contract be awarded to another vendor,” said SGA President Vidur Sharma. “There is a significant affinity between the front-line staff and students. We intend to ask each vendor about its plan for retaining current front-line staff during the vendor presentations.”

Shields commented that, at this point, all four potential vendors have committed to the idea of interviewing and employing the current SLU food staff. Each company is also submitting a management and associate staffing plan to the committee.

As Chartwells’ current food contract is set to expire in June, any future transitional changes that might take place would not begin until the end of the semester. Once the decision is in effect, the future food provider would inhabit SLU’s campus for a comfortable minimum of five years and a maximum of ten.

“The quality of the bids by the four vendors is very high,” Sharma assured. “We look forward to interviewing all four vendors in the next two weeks and advocating for affordable, nutritional and diverse food options on campus.”

A new year means new resolutions, and Saint Louis University’s MOVE Committee is doing its best to make sure that those resolutions are healthy ones. From Jan. 13 until June 16, the group is hosting a ‘Biggest Loser’ competition for the SLU community in which faculty and staff members can enter to win prizes for losing the greatest percentage of body weight.

A sub-committee of the Human Resources Department, MOVE was established in 2010 and aims to highlight its four main foundations: motivation, optimism, value and engagement. The group provides events that work towards recognizing a balanced life, building a sense of community and promoting a life built around the Jesuit mission.

“Our main goals are to provide a positive, energetic and engaging work environment and to build and foster trust and collaboration among employees,” stated MOVE Committee Chair Megan Mitchell.

Their ‘Biggest Loser’ competition will look to accomplish these goals by inspiring the SLU community to join in efforts for a healthier lifestyle. The event was started in the fall of 2012, first running from the end of September until Thanksgiving. It consisted of groups with 5 members competing against each other and the group that lost the largest percentage of overall body weight won a class session at the Simon Recreation Center. This year, Human Resources Financial Coordinator and MOVE Committee member Terrie Perry is spearheading the competition and looks to enhance the program.

“The purpose of the event is to bring people together and share a common goal, to improve camaraderie and confidence, strengthen self-image and improve everyone’s health and fitness,” said Perry. “We have 114 [people] enrolled … but I would love to see at least 200 this year.”

Last year’s competition consisted of 33 teams and 127 participants and was reportedly successful. The event received positive responses from those involved, and participants even asked for it to return. The MOVE Committee didn’t disappoint, and this year’s competition looks to be a promising event.

“Bottom-line, MOVE is fun,” said Mitchell. “It allows me to interact with people outside of my department and plan events that make working at SLU enjoyable.”

The group’s next event, SLU is Sweet on You, will take place in February and will encourage employees to recognize their co-workers by sending a personalized message and Hershey’s Hug.

New Program Manager discusses global inspirations and making SLU her home

As a small town girl from Canton, NY, Katie Gauthier Donnelly is proof that sometimes small-town citizens can become global inspirations. The new Program Manager at SLU’s Center for Global Citizenship (CGC) as of October, Donnelly has been all over the states as well as the world, and now finds refuge in SLU’s international affairs.

“SLU is an institution full of students, educators, and scholars who know they can have a positive influence on their communities and in the larger world,” she said. “It is a fantastic environment for someone like me, who wants to bring more creative discussions about global citizenship to campus and to our larger community in St. Louis. I believe it is a timely and important pursuit.”

Before coming to SLU, Donnelly studied at Saint Lawrence University, receiving her Bachelor’s degree in Political Science and African Studies, and later on at the University of Oregon where she got her Master’s degree in International Development.

These educational experiences helped to shape her career and life paths as well as allow her to discover a fascination in international affairs.

“As an undergraduate I spent a semester in Kenya on a very intensive academic and experiential semester program – it changed my life, my understanding of the world and of my home community … and it made me curious. This curiosity has led me all over the United States and to a decade long relationship with East Africa.”

Since 2006, Donnelly has lead experiential service learning programs in Tanzania with National Geographic and their partner programs. She has served as a Rotary Scholar in Uganda, worked on international programs at four different universities, and worked with the international non-profit community. So essentially, there’s nothing small-town about her.

Regarding setbacks in her life, however, Donnelly admits that it’s never easy adjusting to a new place.

“Being an expatriate can be lonely, it isn’t always glamorous, and likewise, being new to a city in your home country can also be challenging – it takes time to build community.”

It would seem that so far, though, she likes it just fine in St. Louis. In between yoga, jogging and watching a lot of soccer (as she is the wife of a soccer coach), Donnelly is just as busy as during her years as a traveler and seems more than content with her work life at SLU. Commenting that she finds the CGC space “welcoming, lively, supportive and deeply collaborative,” Donnelly looks forward to seeing how the new CGC will evolve in the future and what new programs can be fostered to help engage students.

As for Donnelly’s dream job? She thinks she has arrived. “It took 10 years, but I think this might be it!”

While students at private institutions enjoy many luxuries, these students are not always afforded the same level of First Amendment protection as students at public universities. In choosing to attend a private school, one relinquishes certain aspects of one’s freedom of speech on campus and is subjected to an institution’s conduct code and disciplinary system. This trade off raises the question of just how much a school can limit a student’s First Amendment rights—including their right to peaceably assemble.

Students all over the nation have been exercising their right to free speech in a coordinated effort to stop actions which damage the climate. Organized by the Rainforest Action Network (RAN), a campaign against Bank of America and Citibank has engaged college students to stage protests when these bank recruiters visit their campuses. Bank of America and Citibank are among the largest funders of the coal industry; by protesting, these students hope these banks will divest in their funding of fossil-fuels.

In September, this protest movement reached Saint Louis University after RAN contacted a couple of students about the cause. Citibank was visiting SLU’s campus for the job fair and recruitment purposes, but their plans were altered after a handful of students protested at Citibank’s recruitment presentation. The action caused Citibank to withdraw their position at the job fair and the students involved soon saw the limitations of their First Amendment protection.

“This situation has developed into quite a different issue,” stated Landon Brownfield, one of the students involved with the protest. “Through struggle with student conduct and the administration, the situation has turned into a disagreement over students’ right to free speech.”

The students were given a variety of sanctions from Student Conduct and were charged with failure to comply, disorderly conduct, and inappropriate conduct.

“All of our sanctions are intended to be educational,” said Student Development Coordinator Diana Foster. “The University does not prevent students from protesting… but [it] says that there is a time, place and manner that you can do that.”

Foster pointed out that the school has a stated policy in the student handbook on protests, and that one person’s protest cannot disrespect another’s speech.

“We want to make sure that students are being respectful in the process [of their protest],” said Foster.The students involved with the protest disagree with this sentiment and feel that their protest was not done in an unnecessary fashion.

“Our protest was planned under the guidelines of non-violence, respect for others, and minimal disturbance,” stated Claire Daaleman, another student involved. “I feel that in this situation, I was given an opportunity to stand up or stand by.”

The students have been in contact with other universities that hosted the same protest and to their knowledge no other university students have received repercussions for participating in the protests, including students at Washington University. They have appealed their sanctions and hope that others will see the significants of the free speech issues being discussed.

Extraordinary change can come from the most unexpected of sources –even from a shy, 13 year old girl. Mary Beth Tinker was an 8th grade student with a cause and a little bit of courage, and with that she changed the First Amendment rights for students and teachers nationwide. After using a political fashion statement to express her opposition to the Vietnam War, Tinker found herself facing the Supreme Court in an effort to stand up for her beliefs –and won. Saint Louis University hosted the honorable Tinker and First Amendment attorney Mike Hiestand on Wednesday evening as one of their last stops on a nationwide “Tinker Tour.”

“I grew up in a time of great inequality, racial discrimination, war and a war economy,” stated Tinker. Having a childhood peppered with political movements and emotional happenings, the Vietnam War was yet another disheartening event influencing Tinker’s life. She and her siblings would come home from school and watch broadcasts of the war on television, seeing soldiers in body bags, homes in flames and terrified children. Tired of feeling helpless, they decided to express their opposition to the war and their support for Kennedy’s 1965 Vietnam Christmas Truce by wearing black arm bands to their public school.

“We were mourning for the dead on both sides of the war,” said Tinker.

The school suspended Tinker and the handful of peers who also bore the arm bands, and with the support of her political activist parents, Tinker sued the school board. The case eventually went to the Supreme Court in 1969 and, with a 7-2 ruling, Tinker won. Protecting the First Amendment rights of students and teachers in public institutions, the case stated that these individuals do not “shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate.”

It wasn’t until years later, while studying nursing at SLU, that Tinker began to fully grasp the significance of her case ruling. She realized that everything from nursing to law textbooks contained her momentous court case and that by standing up for what she believed in, she had unintentionally stood up for children’s rights all over the U.S.

Having outgrown her public speaking fears and shy persona, Tinker remains adamant about the significance of students’ free expression rights and is touring the nation in an effort to spread this message. She and Hiestand have been on the road since Sept. 15 and have made over 50 stops at colleges, high schools, law schools and other institutions.

“We want to encourage young people to speak up and stand up about the issues of today,” said Tinker. “It’s just a human drive to want to express yourself.”

Hiestand is helping in this effort of spreading real-life civics lessons around the nation and has been assisting students and administrators with student speech issues for the past two decades. He commented on the necessity of student feedback in educational institutions.

“There is a give and take….that’s what education is all about,” stated Hiestand.

Helping to bring their message to the local SLU community, communications professor Dan Kozlowski arranged for the Tinker Tour to stop at SLU. He introduced Tinker at Wednesday’s event, referring to her as an “unpretentious rebel.”

“She is a free speech rock star…and has an important message,” said Kozlowski. “It has been 40 some years, and [the] Tinker standard still stands.”

At the end of her speech Tinker commented on the importance of maintaining students’ free expression rights and continuing to oppose those who challenge them.

The Tinker Tour will be wrapping up their fall tour soon and will take on the Western states for their spring tour.

With the start of each new year come the customary resolutions for better habits and healthier lifestyles. Next semester, however, some of the SLU community might find itself with a new obligatory health resolution, as SLU administrators have proposed a tobacco-free policy.

On Oct. 27, the senior leadership for the SLU College for Public Health and Social Justice brought forth a draft proposal for turning SLU into a tobacco-free campus.

Dean of the College for Public Health and Social Justice Edwin Trevathan spearheaded the proposal and spoke with SLU’s Student Government Association at their meeting on Wednesday about the proposal. “We believe that it’s time for SLU to fall in line and do the right thing,” said Trevathan on the policy proposal.

Trevathan spoke on the many health benefits of tobacco-free policies and on the hundreds of other universities who have already adopted such a policy for their own campuses, including St. Louis’s Washington University.

Senators expressed concerns after the meeting concerning policy effectiveness and safety.

“My dad worked at Wash. U. when they passed their proposal and said that it actually made [the problem] worse,” stated junior SGA Commuter Senator Corey Walters. “It doesn’t fix the problem, it just pushes it into the public spaces.”

Senior senator for the College of Arts and Sciences Tim Keogh similarly expressed apprehension over the idea and the problems that it could implicate, saying that safety would be a big concern with the policy. Should the policy be approved, persons who wished to use tobacco products would have to be at least 25 feet from SLU property before doing so. This poses security issues, especially for those who would need to leave campus at any time in the evening.

“A common concern with these policies is that they will backfire, and disproportionally affect students,” said Walters. He pointed out that while a majority of the SLU faculty and staff community leave campus at the end of the day, many students do not have this same relief from campus and would be subject to the policy at all times.

The SLU Tobacco-Free Policy draft defines tobacco as including cigarettes, cigars, pipes, spit tobacco, electronic cigarettes and various other products. Potential disciplinary actions for violations were mentioned. An implementation date of Jan. 1, 2014 was also in the original draft proposal.

Some students doubt the success of the policy and see it being met with a lot of opposition in the future.

Senior Kevin Guszkowski made the point that there is currently a rule requiring smokers to be a certain distance from entryways, but students often ignore the rule. Other students mirrored this general sense of opposition.

Rime Sbai, a study abroad student from the SLU-Madrid campus touched on the issue that smoking can sometimes be a large part of international students’ lifestyles, which in turn could affect the international student population.

The proposal, having been discussed with the Faculty Senate and SGA, will next be presented to the Staff Advisory Committee. A final policy proposal will then be established and submitted to all three groups with a request for support. Should it gain support, the policy will be proposed to the President’s Coordinating Committee for adoption.

“SLU is a highly reputable university and should do all that it can to keep such a high-esteem by others,” said Mykelya Holmes, vice president of Smoke-Free SLU. “That should include the promotion and upkeep of healthy lifestyles.”