Today, we celebrate Turkey in honor of the many global scholars and spouses from Turkey. A few weeks ago, Merve Falan gave a fantastic presentation about her home country. She shared about the country’s history and culture and even provided Turkish treats for everyone to try. Merve shared that “Istanbul is a magical city that tells you about everything. The city is a storyteller.” By the end of her presentation, most of the audience was ready to pack their bags and travel to Turkey.
Midterms are alive and well. As students, we’ve all realized that the hard way, unfortunately. In an act of solidarity, I’m gonna share some wisdom from Jean Hanson and Jo Supernaw at the Wellness center. With these myths busted you’ll, in my opinion, be able to kick midterm’s a** better. (Hint: It involves more sleep.)
Myth #1: The effects of my all-nighter only impacts me.
You may be the only one who gets to sport the Dukie-meets-phantom-menace look, but your worsened mood? Lack of focus? Degree of inefficiency? You can’t be as productive a teammate, as present a friend, nor as pleasant an acquaintance.
All-nighters don’t make you cool or more impressive. They make you tired.
Myth #2: Staying up those extra few hours to cram will help my GPA.
First-year students joined in a panel style conversation last night with William Wright-Swadel, the Fannie Mitchell Executive Director of the Career Center and David Ong, the Senior Director of Corporate Recruiting for Maximus, and two undergraduate seniors Emma Welch and Zamantha Granados. The goal was to help first-year students maximize their four years at Duke and begin early preparation for the career searches that would come in their later years. The group discussed everything from how to write your first resume to how to begin networking as early as possible. Read more about the questions and answers below:
Jack D explains what happened:
As many of you know, early in the morning yesterday someone entered my dorm and sprawled on the wall of the first floor, “Death to all fags @ Jack.” In just five words and an ‘at’ symbol, my sense of security and safety on this campus was shattered.
Efforts have been made to find the assailant but the likelihood of success seems minimal. However, the person who wrote on the wall is greatly unimportant.
I would like for people to understand who I am. I wish to be a peer and not a name. I grew up near Boston with a single mother and siblings. I played sports throughout school and spent summers volunteering. I am a freshman but have lived as a proudly out and visible gay man on Duke’s campus. I am Jack. I am the fag. I do not deserve this treatment. No one deserves this treatment.
Nominations are now being accepted for the Class of 2019 Duke Common Experience. As a piece of the coming changes to Orientation this summer, we have decided to enhance our Summer Reading program. While we will still have a book the incoming class will read, there will be a variety of programs connected to the book both during the summer and over the course of the fall semester. These will include:
However, the biggest change is the format for hosting the author and discussion about the book and what we seek to do over the summer.
Collaboration & Change for a Common Good
A Reflection on Collaboration in Campus Life
India Pierce and Sean Novak
One way that we can work effectively to create change for a common good is to work collaboratively across communities. With this in mind, India Pierce from the Center for Sexual & Gender Diversity (CSGD) came together with Sean Novak from the Center for Multicultural Affairs (CMA) to create a program that explored the intersections of race and sexual orientation. As part of the CMA’s En/Countering Racism series (E/C), they created a program for students to gather and explore intersectionality. This was done in order to deepen participants’ understanding of themselves and others as a means to building stronger coalitions for social justice.
Dear PNMs,
For this blog post, some of the interns at the Women’s Center decided to share our personal history with feminism. We have all had different experiences and there isn’t a singular theme among our stories, but we hope that our experiences encourage others in the Duke community to explore what feminism means to them.
From Colleen O’Connor (Community Building and Organizing Intern): `
What is college life? What is it really that defines the ground floor of the quintessential American college experience? After two years at Duke University, Iâm only just beginning to understand the answer to that question. Hereâs a head start: The answer is you. You are the one and only factor that will define what college life is to each and every person you tell about âthe good old daysâ when you attended one of the most prestigious institutions in the United States.
