Honoring life

Fourth annual relay for life

By Chris Donovan

Over 24 organizations gathered together to help raise money to put towards cancer research.

Students had a good time supporting their organizations, including the swim team

This last Saturday, the campus quad was filled with tents, activities, and students all working towards the common goal of promoting the fight against cancer at the fourth annual relay for life at UMass Dartmouth. There were a total of 24 teams made up of members from RHC, CAB, various sororities and fraternities, the Reading and Writing center, 20 Cent Fiction, nursing students, and other organizations.

The relay itself is an all night event where at least one member of each team must continually walk along a track with the common goal of raising money to fight cancer.

This year’s walk raised over $28,000, all of which will be donated directly to the American Cancer Society. The American Cancer Society is the nationwide community-based voluntary health organization dedicated to eliminating cancer as a major health problem by preventing cancer, saving lives, and diminishing suffering from cancer through research, education, advocacy, and service.

The event started off with a group of cancer survivors taking the first lap around the track. The day is then truly started, and all the other participants join in. Participants often go in pairs as to keep each other company, and also motivate each other to keep moving on throughout the day.

The walk, although for a serious cause, did a lot to keep new things happening through out the night. Some hours had themes, including men dressed drag, luau, pajama, and trick or treating. Entertainment was also provided in the form of music that played throughout the night, movies that were shown in a tent, guitar hero, and many outdoor activities. UMass Dartmouth student trustee Tamara Endich felt that this “was the best relay I’ve attended here.”

The night however did focus on a lot of serious issues, most importantly being the fight against cancer. At 9 p.m. there was a lighting ceremony of luminary’s, which are decorated bags that have a candle inside to light them up. Most of the bags are dedicated in memory to someone who either has, or had battled with cancer. Along the steps near the campus center there was a beautiful display of luminary’s illuminating the night spelling out the word “hope.” The campanile had another touching display where there was one luminary in remembrance for every victim of the Virginia Tech massacre.

The walk which lasts just about 16 full hours, had many students weary and tired at the end, but they kept moving to support the cause. Junior political science major Daniel McSweeny expressed that “even when I felt worn out I kept walking because the fight to walk is a lot less than the fight against cancer.”

Students who want to get involved with events such as the relay for life, can check out the American Cancer Society’s website at www.cancer.org.

A luminary lighting ceremony was held at 9p.m.

Memorial service for Virginia Tech

By Megan Gauthier

UMass Dartmouth paid homage to the nation-wide “We Are All Hokies” day of remembrance with a memorial service held at 11:30 a.m. in the Library Browsing Area on Friday, April 20. Over 100 students and faculty members gathered to pay their respects just four days after the tragic murder of 32 members of the Virginia Tech community.

Associate Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs, Dr. David Milstone began the memorial service by stating, “We come together this morning not to discuss motives or details of what faculty did or did not do in light of this tragedy. We come together to pray and remember for those who had lost their lives.” He then proceeded to read off the names of the 32 innocent victims, students and faculty alike, who lost their lives on Monday, April 16.

A moment of silence was held to remember the victims, and Milstone willed everyone to “Let the depth of our compassion and strength of our collective faiths be with their friends, family, and community.”

Expressions of faith and the call to create a community that “empowers people to chose hope” over violence and leaves no place for “seeds of violence to grow,” as encouraged by Chancellor Jean MacCormack, both inspired attendees and forced them to consider the “possibility of violence where we thought there was none.”

UMass Dartmouth Hindu Chaplain Swami Yogatmanada also focused on our campus’ relation to the unfortunate shooting, reminding attendees that although the event happened far away from us physically, the event itself did not actually happen far away from us because “we are part of the same humanity.”

In accordance with MacCormack and Yogatamanada, Dr. Christine Frizzell, Director of Counseling Services, ruminated on the events and how each person is affected by the murders in some way, even if they don’t have any connection to anyone who lost their life. Frizzell lamented “It’s a wonderful and mysterious part of being human to feel what others are feeling. We’ve hurt for them and with them.”

All speakers expressed their desire for an end to violence. This message was particularly prevalent in Swami Yogatamanada’s recitation of a series of Sanskrit prayers, which translated to “Let all the directions be peaceful, let all the skies be peaceful, [...] let our minds be peaceful, let all power in the universe be peaceful. May all creatures be happy, may all creatures be free of pain, [...] let morally good people become peaceful and manifest divine freedom and help others reach that state.”

Student Trustee Tamara Endich also chose a prayer, this one focusing on remembrance, and using the Holocaust as a parallel for the violence that was witnessed at Virginia Tech, and also a special tribute to a victim of the shootings who had survived the Holocaust.

Christine Frizzell spoke of the fear that students and faculty must face after such tragic events, and which leave everyone questioning, “Have I done enough? Do I have the resources to prevent these kinds of things from happening?”

Yet she took on a more positive note when she quoted a personal mentor who had said to her “Hidden within every tragedy is a gift.” She conceded that at first, the quote seemed appalling to her, but she knew there was truth in it, because people always find something in their experiences to positively change their lives or the lives of others and to take action. “It doesn’t take the pain away,” Frizzell said, “but it allows us to make something good of it.”

Across the country, people responded to the shooting in a positive and constructive manner, including the UMass Dartmouth community. All attendees received maroon and orange ribbons (in honor of Virginia Tech’s school colors) and were notified that a condolences banner would be available after the memorial service throughout the day in the Campus Center, and would be mailed to Virginia Tech. Also, coordinators of UMass Dartmouth’s Relay for Life on Friday, April 20, lit luminaries and held a memorial service in honor of Virginia Tech, noting that V.T. was also conducting their Relay for Life fundraiser that same day.

The memorial service struck a chord with many attendees, who flocked to the banner at the conclusion of the service, writing messages such as “God Bless,” and “You’re in our prayers.”

Junior Biology major, Kara Maloney, was moved to tears during the memorial, and said, “I cried when they talked about how violence spreads through community. I didn’t know anyone involved, but it still hit home.”

Missy Joyce of the College of St. Rose in Albany agreed with Maloney, noting “I liked the fact that they mentioned the Koreans being unjustly represented and stigmatized by the attack, just as in 9/11 when people directed hatred toward people from the Middle East,” although she confessed that she is still “worried people will deal with grief in the wrong way instead of remembering those who died.”

However, at least for the nation-wide memorial for Virginia Tech victims, thousands of people across the country took the time to remember, to reflect, to pray, and to mourn the unforeseen tragedy of the shooting in the right way, connected by the idea that “Today We Are All Hokies.”

Will your dorm room be going green?

By Melanie Corerria

Currently, at UMass Dartmouth if a student wanted to recycle, the most efficient way would be to collect all of their items themselves and continuously schedule pick-ups through the Housing Facilities Operations and Services (HFOS) office. This is not going to be the case anymore. Starting in the fall there will be a pilot program installed into three of the residential dorms, one in Maple Ridge, one in Pine Dale and one in Ivy. This program will make the ability to recycle more accessible to the residents of those dormitories.

Each of the dorm rooms will come with a blue re-useable bag for all of the residentís recyclables (not unlike the blue bins most people have at their homes). The program that the HFOS offices have decided to use is called “single stream.” This means that residents will not have to separate anything, it all goes in one bag which goes into one bin. Each of the halls will have a place where the students can go and place their recycled goods, conveniently before designated rubbish area. This use of single-stream recycling is already in effect in each office of the residential buildings. The program has been very successful in the offices so far.

There will even be scheduled pick-ups for electronics, though those would have to be placed separately. As a partner of the CRT Recycling Inc, the UMD Housing Recycling Program will accept items such as computer hard drives, monitors, keyboards, mouse, wires, TVs, printers, fax machines, typewriters, phones, fridges, air conditioners, microwaves, stoves and most Freon or non-Freon appliances to reduce the amount of solid waste.

The HFOS stated that they are really excited for this pilot program and hope that the students will react well. They hope that in the following years they will follow up with the program and install it to the rest of the residential buildings. Ted Petsas, chair of the Social Change Society, stated, “I hope students take full advantage of the new recycling in the pilot dorms and make it successful enough to extend the program to all on campus housing.”

The Social Change Society has been focused on developing a green living guide for students, and has had continued support and feedback from housing with regards to this guide. They hope that students use this green living guide to become more sustainable and create the need for more sustainable initiatives on campus. They feel that it is important for people to understand that we can all contribute to a sustainable future even in small ways such as recycling, turning off lights and Tv’s when their not in use, and by simply considering what type of impact your actions might have on the world around you.

This program depends solely on the participation of the students. Recycling one ton of paper saves the equivalent of 17 trees, saves enough energy to power an average home for six months, saves 7,000 gallons of water, and keeps 60 pounds of pollutants out of the air.