Scene Seventeen: Layoffs II

Despite the efforts of SEIU Local 560 and Dartmouth Students Stand with Staff, despite the vigil on the Green, and despite the opposition of numerous other faculty and community members, President Kim released a letter to the Dartmouth community today that includes the following passage:

We have taken a number of measures to avoid layoffs, including offering voluntary retirement, reducing hours, eliminating unfilled positions and freezing salaries. To date, more than 105 non-teaching employees have accepted the College's retirement incentive, and we have reduced unfilled positions by 43. These actions come on top of 158 positions that were eliminated last year.

While these steps and the other actions noted in this letter have made a significant impact, they unfortunately did not fully eliminate the need for layoffs. We have had to make 38 layoffs now, and expect a comparable number in April. Approximately 60 percent of these layoffs involve professional and managerial employees. We are deeply grateful for the work of these employees, and for the contributions they have made to Dartmouth College.

Dinner time at Homeplate is usually lively, but even the students waiting in line for the evening's special caught the somber mood of the staff behind the counter. Of the faces I have come to know, which will I no longer see? The letter asserts that "approximately 60% of the layoffs involve professional and managerial employees," but I heard a laid-off staff member quip, "Managerial? I oversee a bunch of kids behind the sandwich counter!"

I love my school, but this was not the right move to make.

Scene Sixteen: Terry Tempest Williams, Revisited

I stand in the foyer of the Montgomery House with Terry Tempest Williams and two others, discussing a statue that occupies an alcove by the main entrance. It is of an unnaturally tall, unnaturally slim woman with a bun and long dress. Her almost nonexistent mouth is contrasted by hauntingly large eyes and her spidery hands are laced in front of her groin area...

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After the intimate conversation that we had last week at the White House dinner, Terry Tempest Williams invited we eight East Wheelockers to join her, along with any friends we wished to bring, at the Montgomery House for a reunion over dessert. With cake from the Hanover Inn, we enjoyed the low-key setting in which people came and went as their schedules permitted. Too often, my life at Dartmouth lacks the low-key. Even though it was wedged between an FSP application and Religion homework, I relished this respite.

Scene Fifteen: The Two-Hour Lunch

"I found the budget cuts!" I chortled, gesturing to the down-sized sweet potato that made up part of my Homeplate dinner. Two trippees sat across from me, rolling their eyes at my quip.

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If you plan on coming to Dartmouth, go on a First Year Trip. I repeat: GO ON A FIRST YEAR TRIP. On my trip, I knew the love of H-Croo, Lodge Croo, AND VOX Croo. I earned the nickname "Baby Cairn" while lost in a storm in the Presidential Range. I ate Nutella-fondued Canadian Groundfruit. I kissed Mother Nature on her open mouth, and I liked it. So, go.
The bonds you make on trips will last much, much longer than the ache of your muscles (unless you do psycho-hiking; I think its kind of a toss-up there). Let me return to my narration..
I sat in Homeplate with two trippees, trying to make merry the dually grave topics of budget cuts and portion downgrades. An hour after finishing our meals, we still sat. Our quarry was life goals, after all. Two of us are quite attached to the idea of a title, a degree, a.. future? Typing it, I feel even more ridiculous than saying it. Yes, I admit that I am one of we two. Since childhood I have fantasized about being a doctor. I want to be the mythical being that knows how every part of the human body works and how to fix it when something goes awry. I want to travel the distant lands like the Inner City and the Gambia to treat illnesses that I can't yet name in people that I can't wait to meet. I want to wield life.
But, I do not like math. The problem is not that I cannot understand complex mathematical concepts, I often did better in high school math classes than in my coveted language classes, but that I do not enjoy understanding complex mathematical concepts. What am I to do? Even for the most bio-based med school requirements, I resent the amount of physics and chemistry that I would have to study. When Dartmouth offers classes like Goddesses of India and Intense Greek, why would I put myself through a math-based curriculum?
I am still clinging to my dream of being a doctor, but I am coming to terms with a different (*gasp* - uncertain) future. That doesn't mean that I won't take the Biotechnology First Year Seminar, though.

Scene Fourteen: Compas

I break with the format of my blog to bring you an article from the D about Dartmouth's performance arts community's response to the tragedy in Haiti. As a member of Hafiz Shabazz's World Music Percussion Ensemble, I was among the hundreds who made up this mega show.

Scene Thirteen: Terry Tempest Williams

Eight East Wheelockers, myself included, are poised around Professor Susan Brison's living room in the White House, attent on Terry Tempest Williams.
"You said, sort of in passing, that you always tell your students not to apologize," I say in reference to last night's public lecture, "What do you think the role of the apology in our lives should be?"

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There is a term at Dartmouth to describe those times that define your experience here. They are the things that you will remember long after the grade from your First-Year Seminar fades from memory. We call them "Dartmouth Moments." The answer that Terry Tempest Williams gave is one of those moments.
I will not even try to recapture the eloquence with which she spoke, but know that her words were life-changing. I don't use cliches lightly.
If you followed the link of Mrs. Williams' name above, then you know that she is on campus as one of Winter term's Montgomery Fellows and Professors. I had the pleasure of being required by my Writing 5 professor, Nancy Crumbine, to attend Mrs. Williams' lecture at Tuck earlier in the week. By its end, several streams of tears had left tracks on my cheeks, and I was not among the minority. For an hour (or more?) she suspended time with her finely spun stream of words. Through tales of triumph and tales of tribulation, she reminded us what it is to live. Then, with the quick precision of an expert seamstress, she cut us free.

Dartmouth is nothing without its people, and oh what people it has.

Scene Twelve: Mahna Mahna

"Mahna Mahna, doo doo doo doo doo..."

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Sometimes even something as enjoyable as writing to you is too time-consuming. Today is one of those times. So, listen to Cake. I promise its what I'm doing as I write out my life story in Arabic.

Scene Eleven: Advance Transit

"Clear!" barks a wizened bus driver as he signals for new passengers to board. I step into warm relief from the biting breeze and name my stop, "DHMC."

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Advance Transit is the Upper Valley's free public transportation system. Routes run to Lebanon, Norwich, White River Junction, and several other nearby towns as well as to DHMC, the Route 12A Plazas, and all parts of campus. For students like me, sans automobile, it is the only way to get around without spending on a taxi. To be fair, the local taxi companies are run by friendly (however shrewd) people and are reasonably priced, but a free alternative is alway trump to me. The only catch is that the buses don't run on weekends. At all. Ever.
For me, this is a disabling catch. On weekdays I am often busy from 7am until 6pm and the buses stop running between six and seven. Even if I have time to get a bus to somewhere, I have no way of getting back.. other than a taxi. I am very grateful for the bus system, but I would like to see it more accommodating of my college schedule.