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News & Notes: Dean of Forbes College Hodgson to retire

News & Notes: Dean of Forbes College Hodgson to retire

Corinne Lowe

John Hodgson announced his decision to retire from his position as dean of Forbes College in an email sent out to the Forbes listserv on Wednesday. After 20 years at the University, Hodgson said in the email that he will spend his free time working on his next book, titled “Ventriloquism Becomes American: Richard Potter and the Origins of an American Performance Tradition.” Hodgson explained in the email that he had found limited periods of time to work on his book, primarily during weekends and summer vacation, while acting as dean.

NEWS | 04/24/2014

Sociology department sees most growth in concentrators among social sciences

Lorenzo Quiogue

The sociology department saw the greatest increase in concentrators among all the social science departments, with 12 more students entering the department this year than last year. The department had 42 sophomores declare as sociology concentrators this year, compared to the 22 sophomores who joined the department last year.

NEWS | 04/24/2014

U. contribution set to increase by over 10 percent to $2.75 million in 2014

Daily Princetonian Staff and Anna Windemuth

The University will contribute $2.75 million to the town of Princeton’s municipal budget in 2014, an increase of over 10 percent from last year’s contribution of $2.475 million. The new agreement, which was announced on Thursday afternoon, is scheduled to last seven years, with an annual increase in contribution of 4 percent. Under New Jersey law the town can only increase its property taxes by a maximum of 2 percent per year, University Vice President and Secretary Robert Durkee ’69 explained, ensuring that the relative value of the University’s contribution will grow consistently. The contribution over the seven-year timespan will total $21.72 million by 2020, the University said in a press release.

NEWS | 04/24/2014

Despite overall downward trend in humanities sign-ins, history shows unexpected surge

Paul Phillips

Two hundred sixty-nine members of the Class of 2016 declared concentrations in the humanities by the end of the sophomore major declaration period on Tuesday.The same number of students declared a humanities concentration in the Class of 2015, whereas 286 did in the Class of 2016.The humanities majors with the largest number of concentrators remain history, with 90, and English, with 48.

NEWS | 04/24/2014

Geosciences, astrophysics departments see increase in number of concentrators

Konadu Amoakuh and Sheila Sisimit

Both the geosciences and the astrophysical sciences departments experienced a near doubling in the numbers of declared sophomore concentrators this year. Ten students in the Class of 2016 signed into astrophysics, compared to five students from the Class of 2015, while 19 students signed into the geosciences department, compared to 10 students from the previous year. Astrophysics department representative Neta Bahcall said the department has not done anything differently this year to attract more students.

NEWS | 04/24/2014

Updated: Princeton to make Bexsero available to U.-affiliated individuals in relationships with students

Lorenzo Quiogue

The University will expand access to the unapproved meningitis vaccine Bexsero to include University-affiliated individuals under 30 years of age who are in intimate relationships with students. The decision was made after ongoing discussion within the University in consultation with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, University spokesperson Martin Mbugua said.

NEWS | 04/24/2014

Breaking: U. commits to increasing contributions to municipality in new seven-year agreement

Daily Princetonian Staff and Anna Windemuth

The University will contribute $2.75 million to the town of Princeton’s municipal budget in 2014, an increase of over 10 percent from last year’s contribution of $2.475 million. The new agreement, which was announced on Thursday afternoon, is to last seven years, with an annual increase in contribution of 4 percent.

NEWS | 04/24/2014

Despite bumpy past, town-gown officials hope to build on common interests

Daily Princetonian Staff and Anna Windemuth

Although the relationship between the University and the town of Princeton has featured a number of heated debates over taxes, the Dinky station and the Arts and Transit Neighborhood, Mayor Liz Lempert said the two entities are focusing on common interests and effective communication. University President Christopher Eisgruber ’83 has been on a comprehensive listening tour since before he was inaugurated last fall, and he met with town Council representatives at a public event to discuss pertinent issues such as transportation and diversity a few months into his term. “I think it’s been a great first step,” Lempert said of Eisgruber’s community outreach. Most recently, it was announced on Thursday that the University would increase its monetary contributions to the town by 4 percent every year. Lempert also noted that Eisgruber openly addressed the controversy over the University’s Arts and Transit Project, a development that demanded the relocation of Princeton’s historic Dinky train station. “He acknowledged the scars that that decision has left, and just the acknowledgment of that was important for the community to hear,” Lempert said.

NEWS | 04/24/2014

Princeton professor warns about ‘House of Debt’

Daniel Johnson

While new financial regulation has focused on bank oversight and risk management, economics and Wilson School professor Atif Mian and professor of finance at the University of Chicago Booth School of BusinessAmir Sufi argue in an upcoming book that not enough attention has been paid to the role of high levels of private, household debt in the Great Recession. “The profession at-large and also the policy side have severely underestimated the importance of debt for the whole of the economy,” Mian explained. Their book, called "House of Debt," is complemented by anew blogthat bears the same title and debuted inMarch.

NEWS | 04/23/2014

News & Notes: Columbia Daily Spectator drops daily print edition

Charles Kyungchan Min

The Columbia Daily Spectator, the student-run newspaper at Columbia University, will discontinue its daily publication and switch to a weekly print edition beginning in the fall, Editor-in-Chief Abby Abrams announced on Wednesday. The Spectator is the first Ivy League newspaper to drop daily publication.

NEWS | 04/23/2014

Holt discusses wilderness preservation, Keystone Pipeline

Holt discusses wilderness preservation, Keystone Pipeline

Do-Hyeong Myeong

Congressman Rush Holt spoke about wilderness protection, the dangers of using fossil fuel energy and pipeline projects at a talk on campus on Wednesday. Holt, a member of the House Committee on Natural Resources, has mainly supported conservationist legislation that includes wilderness protection, promoting the use of alternative energy and capping greenhouse gas emissions. In addition to serving as congressman of New Jersey's 12th district, which includes the town of Princeton, Holt is the former assistant director of the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory. Listing examples such as oil spills, climate change and fossil fuel energy use, Holt said that it is general citizens who have to suffer the damage of such environmental destructions while the companies responsible for the damages often benefit and escape the responsibility. He said that people around the world, as well as in the United States, are “dying early and unnecessarily” because of the way we produce and use energy and the effects of climate change. Holt then explained the importance of the Udall-Eisenhower Arctic Wilderness Act, which was introduced to preserve the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.He is currently co-sponsoring the act and noted that preserving the wilderness in Alaska is important because “It deserves to be there.” “This Arctic Wilderness Act is a nice designation to have because of all this wildlife, but it is a necessary designation to have because the oil companies are licking their lips at the prospect of being able to extract oil from this area,” Holt said.

NEWS | 04/23/2014

Princeton to build off-campus art storage facility

Sarah Kim

The first University-owned, off-campus fine art storage facility will be built in order to accommodate the University Art Museum’s rapidly growing collection. Designed specifically for the purpose of housing art, the 20,000 square foot local storage facility will be located on the University's Forrestal Campus, according to University Art Museum Director James Steward.

NEWS | 04/23/2014

Q&A: Anne-Marie Slaughter ’80, New America Foundation president & CEO

Ruby Shao

University professor emerita and New America Foundation President and CEO Anne-Marie Slaughter '80 joined Huffington Post Media Group chair Arianna Huffington in a discussion about Huffington's book "Thrive" on Tuesday night. Following the event, Slaughter, former director of policy planning for the U.S.

NEWS | 04/22/2014

Q&A: Arianna Huffington, author of 'Thrive'

Do-Hyeong Myeong

Arianna Huffington, chair of The Huffington Post Media Group, as well as its president and editor-in-chief, argues in her latest book, “Thrive,”that people need to redefine success by implementing the Third Metric of success —well-being, wisdom, giving and wonder.

NEWS | 04/22/2014

NJ Transit to suspend service to Newark airport

NJ Transit to suspend service to Newark airport

Alex Jafari

Service to Newark Airport Rail Station along the Northeast Corridor will be suspended for 75 days starting May 1. The closure of the airport train station is related to maintenance work being done on the Newark Airport Monorail, which travels between the terminals and airport parking lots,according to the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. In a written statement, the Port Authority wrote that the closure is needed to allow for repairs to several eroded sites along the monorail's tracks. Instead, riders will be able to take NJ Transit buses to the airport from Newark Penn Station. However, Jack May, vice president of the New Jersey Association of Railroad Passengers,said this is not the most convenient solution for passengers, because NJ Transit could run a bus service directly from the Newark Airport train station to the airport itself, rather than from Newark Penn Station. Emergency access roads were constructed near and connected to the NJ Transit/Amtrak/Monorail Intermodal Station when the Monorail was built in 1996. “I think it’s a very poor policy of theirs,” May said.

NEWS | 04/22/2014

News & Notes: Supreme Court upholds Michigan ban on affirmative action

Alex Jafari

By a vote of six to two with one abstention, the Supreme Court turned down a challenge to a Michigan law that bans the implementation of affirmative action in college admissions. The Tuesday ruling made in Schuette v.

NEWS | 04/22/2014

News & Notes: Chance the Rapper cancels performance at Yale’s Spring Fling

Ray Mennin

Chancelor Bennett, more commonly known as Chance The Rapper, has canceled his performance for Yale University’s Spring Fling on Saturday. Chance was expected to perform at the event with electronic-dance DJ Diplo and pop artist Betty Who. According to a letter posted on his Twitter account by his manager Patrick Corcoran, Chance fell ill Friday night following his performance at the Brooklyn Bowl in Las Vegas.On Sunday morning, he was hospitalized at Hollywood Presbyterian Hospital with a high fever and difficulty speaking. Chance is currently recovering at his home. The announcement that he would not be able to perform at Yale occurred the same day he announced that he would not recover in time for his second set of the closing night at the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival.

NEWS | 04/22/2014

Q&A: Raila Odinga, former Prime Minister of Kenya

Jacqueline Gufford

After his lecture “The Awakening African Lion” on development and change on the African continent, former Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Odinga sat down with The Daily Princetonian to discuss current Kenyan politics, his experience as an African Union negotiator in the Ivory Coast’s 2010-11 conflict and the rise of terrorism and terrorist groups in Africa. The Daily Princetonian: Political pluralism was established in Kenya as recently as 1991, and yet the presence of multiple political parties seems to make maintaining a stable state even more difficult.

NEWS | 04/21/2014

Former Kenyan Prime Minister discusses development of African continent

Former Kenyan Prime Minister discusses development of African continent

Jacqueline Gufford

Africa has made economic strides in the last several decades and will expand further in coming years due to political advancement, former Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Odinga argued on Tuesday, in a lecture on development and change on the African continent. “If the continent you have in mind is of dictators and looters, think again,” Odinga said. Odinga, son of the first Vice President of Kenya, Oginga Odinga, held the position of Prime Minister of Kenya from 2008 to 2013, when the political position was abolished with the passage of a new constitution.

NEWS | 04/21/2014

Huffington urges need to redefine success

Huffington urges need to redefine success

Do-Hyeong Myeong

Arianna Huffington urged the need for a definition of success that accounts for personal well-being in a panel discussion held on Tuesday.In her latest book, “Thrive: The Third Metric to Redefining Success and Creating a Life of Well-Being, Wisdom and Wonder,” Huffington, chair, president and editor in chief of The Huffington Post Media Group, claims that people need to stop associating success only with money and power and instead consider “the Third Metric of success.” The Third Metric is constituted of what Huffington calls “four pillars” — well-being, wisdom, wonder and giving.Huffington said that her own collapse in 2007 due to extreme stress allowed her to question the traditional metrics of success.“By conventional definition of success, I was successful,” she said, “but by any sane definition of success, if you are lying in a pool of blood on the floor … you are not successful.”That experience led Huffington to ask herself the questions that “all the philosophers have asked forever — What is good life?

NEWS | 04/21/2014

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