Project Playground

An update on how the Downing Street playground project has been progressing

by Claire Tierney
Scarlet Staff

As many students know, Project Playground is the initiative led by Katy Cleminson, Angelica Surra, Ali Canino, and Kat Hills, to revitalize the dilapidated playground on the corner of Downing and Florence Street.

The land the current playground is situation on is actually owned by Clark University. The group heading the project has been diligently working towards obtaining funding and support from Clark as well as the Main South community.

Their hard work is paying off, with the Project Playground planning on being completed this year.

Back in September, Project Playground gained over 700 signatures from Clark Students. When Student Council found themselves with a surplus of $70,000, Project playground began to campaign for funding.  According to Katy Cleminson, a senior, Project Playground originally asked for $45,000 for Playground equipment, $5000 of which is intended for more costly, but also sustainable construction materials such as rubber. The group was awarded $39,100 from the Student Council’s surplus, as well as an additional $500 from the Student Leadership and Programming Office.

According to Cleminson, $30,000 will definitely be used for purchasing playground equipment. Short $5,000 of their projected budget, Project Playground is currently accepting donations in an effort to garner the rest of their funding.

Project Playground will be holding a general meeting for members of the Worcester community at the CDC Main South on February 8th, though students are welcome to attend.

Cleminson says, “At the community meeting, we will be finalizing the design, getting input from the parents of the children who will be using the playground.”

From the Archives

A History Lesson: Why publications started at Clark and what kept them going

By Ashley Klann
Editor-in-Chief

We’ve been stickin’ it to the man since 1927, but over the decades, The Scarlet has changed in many ways since it was first published. But then again, some things never change. “From the Archives” will be a semester-long look at when things were different and how The Scarlet became what it is today. Clarkies of the past have Spreed like the best of us, enjoyed nice weather on the Green, and sweated to death in the JC, and although we are all intrinsically linked by our alma mater, Clark and its students have changed over the years. And The Scarlet has served both as a record and a changing entity of its own.

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Throughout the archived student publications in Goddard, roughly 100 years are enclosed. The title, cover stories, concerns, and opinions of the writers have changed drastically over time, but as I perused the archives, I found things that could have been written yesterday. Some things are timeless. Clarkies will always be Clarkies, but The Scarlet has served unique purposes in its time.

From 1918 to 1919, The Clark College Reveille was printed to cover various campus news, but predominantly that relating to WWI. Cover stories included images of the College Commandant, Col. Thomas W. Griffith, a graph of Clark’s contribution to the United War Work Campaign, and various opinions from students and faculty about the financial struggles therein and the 54 students who left to join the war.

Bliss or miss?

Worcester placed second on CareerBliss.com’s list of happiest U.S. cities in which to work

by Kathryn Natale
Scarlet Staff

Recently, CareerBliss.com compiled a list of the happiest and unhappiest cities to work in.

Photo Courtesy of CareerBliss.com

Forbes published these findings last week, calling attention to a surprising runner-up for the happiest city to work in: Worcester. Clark’s beloved hometown placed second on the list with a score of 4.10 out of 5, just behind Miami, which placed at number one with a score of 4.14. The unhappiest city on the list was New Haven, CT, with a score of 3.46, followed by Dayton, OH, and Milwaukee, WI.

Scores were based on data received from over 43,000 employee reviews throughout 2011. The survey asked employees to rate their work experience in ten areas, including relationships with bosses and coworkers, compensation, work environment, and growth opportunities. Each factor was rated on a five point scale and weighted against how important employees indicated the factor was to their happiness.

Many Clarkies would never have guessed in a million years that Worcester made the list. “I was shocked to hear that Worcester was listed as one of the happiest places to work,” said Amelia Eimert, a senior at Clark. “I wouldn’t get that from what I see every day.” Walking through Main South, a myriad of unhappy faces can be seen in the streets lined with small businesses and abandoned factories. So just who are these jolly workers? CareerBliss’s survey only required fifty participants from a city in order for it to qualify, so perhaps there was not a representative sample from Worcester included in the survey – or maybe there is more to Worcester than meets the eye. CareerBliss’s chief executive, Heidi Golledge, told Forbes that the key factors for worker happiness are opportunities for growth and company culture. Even if only fifty people from Worcester participated in the survey, that’s at least fifty people who view Worcester’s performance in these areas as exceptional.

Horoscopes

Predicted by Anonymous

Aries (3/21 to 4/19) – Don’t make too much of a fool of yourself at Euphoria; the semester has just started.

Taurus (4/20 to 5/20) – Set your alarm twenty minutes early tomorrow; you will need to dig your car out after an unexpected snowstorm.

Gemini (5/21 to 6/21) –  Don’t let your roommate catch you with a mysterious someone in your bed when they wake up in the middle of the night.

Cancer (6/22 to 7/22) – Stop playing it cool… make a move!

“Change” the world

Let’s ditch the penny

By Jeremy Levine
Scarlet Staff

There are few things that I really hate. Genocide tops the list, along with SOPA, black olives, and pennies. The first three, I like to think, are generally despised by the majority of

image courtesy of http://www.whatdaphuk.com

fair-minded people, and their place on my list requires no further explanation. However, whenever I cite my hatred of pennies in social situations, which is surprisingly often, I get some bizarre looks.

Here’s the deal: you do not use pennies. Ever. Nobody is ever able to fish that elusive penny out of their wallet to even out a transaction, or use them in charitable contributions. Frankly, if you’re willing to give charity, you’re willing to give more than a cent. However, the fact that the penny is useless is not enough of an argument to get rid of it, for plenty of useless things still continue to thrive, like TV Guides and Nickelback (more on nickels in just a moment).

The bottom line is that pennies are not only worthless, they actually detract from our society as a whole. First of all, they are expensive to make. On average, 8.1 billion dollars in pennies have been made every year since 2000 While this number has been declining, it doubled between 2009 and 2010, and about half of the coins fall out of circulation within the first year. Since it costs 1.7 cents (yup) to make a penny, we essentially spend 5.67 billion dollars annually subsidizing the existence of the coins, money that, as I’m sure you know, could be spent on schools, defense, social security, or a million other things. For the record, it costs almost ten cents to make a nickel.

Have it your way at home

Burger King delivers all the obesity you can handle

By Kiera Bloch
Contributing Writer

In case fast food wasn’t quite fast enough, Burger King has recently began delivering to the comfort of your home. This

Image Courtesy of http://cache.gawker.com

new phenomenon of door-to-door fast food service is just starting out, pioneered by “the King” and hasn’t yet sped across the country.

For now this convenience is isolated to the D.C. area, Maryland and Virginia, but it’s only a matter of time before everyone will be logging on to the Burger King website and designing their own wholesome meal.

Yes, in the hopes that the Whopper will finally pass the Big Mac and pull ahead to the number one spot in the burger big leagues, Burger King will keep their customers loyal by bringing their favorite beefy sandwich to their home.

As long as you live in a ten-minute radius of the nearest delivery-friendly restaurant, you will be able to enjoy anything off of the regular menu without ever leaving your couch. The process could not be simpler.

Thanks to the technology of today, you can now “build it your way”. I kid you not. You can actually design your own sandwich online.

Cougars take on WPI

Home team falls behind

By Josh Tessler
Contributing Writer

The Clark University Cougars suffered their eighth loss of the regular season to the Worcester Polytechnic Institute,

John Karas drives to the hoop.

WPI, Engineers with a 64-51 final score.

WPI began the game with a 7 – 0 run, that was powered by Center, Matt Carr, who had collected fourteen rebounds during the game. The run ended with Clark’s Guard, Drew Billington, who had a lay-up.

However, Clark’s troubles on the court had continued from there. The Cougars were in foul trouble early in the game and were giving up too many turnovers.

“At times, we were careless with the ball and this again goes back to maintaining a high level of play throughout the whole game. At one point we had cut the lead down to 5, we had two stops in a row, but on the offensive end we also had two turnovers in a row. At a critical point in a game we had to execute better on the offensive end, “ said Marko Radovic, Cougars’ Forward.

Even though the Cougars, had many foul and turnover troubles, they were shooting well. Especially Radovic, who came off of the bench to score 8 points in the first half. He ended up with 14 points in the game.

With Radovic’s spark, the Cougars came out onto the court in the second half energized to win the game. But, their defense let them down.
The Cougars had let the Engineers shoot five three pointers in the second half. Sam Longwell, Engineers’ Guard, had nine points from beyond the arc and Marco Coppola, Engineers’ Guard, had six points from three pointers. The five three pointers helped WPI pull of a 64-51 win.

“We knew they were going to shoot threes. But, we just broke down defensively,” Jake Gubitose, Cougars’ Guard said of the Engineers’ outside game.

The Cougars next face WPI on their home court on February 18th and it seems that the Cougars will want revenge.

“If we play defensively and play aggressive for a full fourty minutes,” Gubitose said of their chances of beating WPI on their court.

Cougar of the Week

by Mai Hayashi
Scarlet Staff

Photo by Mai Hayashi

Name: John Karas
Year: Junior
Home: Glastonbury, Connecticut
Sport: Basketball
Position: Guard

Q. How long have you been playing basketball?

A. I have been playing basketball since 5 years old. I liked it a lot.

Q. How is this season going?

A. The season has been up and down for us. We are 8-9 currently and have lost the last 2 games. We have hit a rough patch lately and are working hard to snap out of it. The NEWMAC conference is one of the toughest in America, and there are no easy games. So we have been focusing one game at a time and hope to put a string of wins together to end the season and push us forward into the playoffs.

Q. How is the condition of your team?

A. One of best players, Brian Vayda, is out for the season with a foot injury. We have been without him for most of the season and proved we can play well without him, so we need to start playing at a high level again.

Q. How were the Christmas games in New Orleans?

A. Our trip to New Orleans was great. We beat Southern Maine in our first game. Our team came out focused and ready to go. The second game, we faced Birmingham-Southern. This is the best team we’ve faced this season, and they are currently ranked no. 12 in the country. We came out hungry and proved we can play with the best teams in the nation. Our defense play was stellar, and we were able to take Birmingham Southern out of their element. We had two shots to win it at the end of the game with less than 5 seconds left, but could not convert either, and ended up losing by 1. It was a tough loss, but we took so many positives away from the trip and all the games.

Our rights under attack?

Why the National Defense Authorization Act might take your mind off internet censorship 

By Claire Tierney
Scarlet Staff

Americans, particularly internet users, have been expressing their discontent in the continuing SOPA debate in recent weeks. The goal of the Stop Online Piracy Act and the Protect IP Act is to put a stop to the illegal downloading of copyrighted material by

Photo Courtesy of http://freakoutnation.com

restricting user’s access to sites that facilitate this act of copyright infringement, or “pirating.”

Many fear that the wording of SOPA’s bill contains too much grey area, which potentially leaves the government’s ability to censor the internet unrestricted. The goal of this is to end internet piracy; instead it is creating censorship legislation. This is a frightening idea for many Americans, who consider their liberty to be paramount.

The notion of our government controlling our ability to surf the internet is scary. Scarier, however, is the American government’s ability to hold its citizens without trial under the assumption that you “associate” with “terrorists.”

A world of advertising

by Ashley Klann
Editor-in-Chief

I hate flying home for the holidays. The ends justifies the means, so I do it, but the whole process of getting to the airport, being practically strip-searched in front of strangers, and having to hold a jumping jack pose while being electronically scanned is just ridiculous. I feel like it probably couldn’t get much worse.

When I finally get through that headache and am sitting in Logan’s kind of crappy terminals complete with hotel reject carpeting and linked chairs reeking of hospital waiting rooms, I take the free Wi-Fi gladly. I can waste some time on Facebook, keep mom up to date with my safe traveling, and see how much warmer it’s going to be when I’m home, and finally in the door.

This season, however, BMW wanted to make my life a little more ridiculous. Boston Logan, an airport that always prides itself on its free Wi-Fi for guests, now has BMW introducing the service. On their login page, the option for free Wi-Fi is only available if you take a survey or watch a video. Granted, I did write this in the meantime, so I wasn’t so subjected, but c’mon… Now, not only do I have advertisements blasting in my ear, on TVs and the intercom, but also on my own computer when I’m trying to get your free Wi-Fi? Enough already!