Originating in 1927, Pomona's sponsor group program is one of the most advertised aspects of the college's first year experience. The school's website boasts of the sponsor group as a built-in support network and surrogate family for the homesick first-year. The reality of many students' sponsor group experience, though, is rarely idyllic. How, then, should sponsor groups be made? What should fuel the decision process behind who you live with your first year on campus? Should its formation be intentional, or should we move away from that model?
The PSU invites you to a student-led snackussion about the formation of the sponsor group - what the process has been, and it what it could be. Student panelists, including Cameron Cook, Cole Clark, and Aiman Shafiq Kastro Chaudhary, will help get the conversation started, but all are welcome to speak and participate! This is a wonderful opportunity to have your voice heard by people who matter: many of the deans in the Office of Campus Life (OCL) and Student Affairs (including Dean Feldblum, Dean Townes, Dean Jan, and Dean Grundy) will be there as silent observers of our conversation.
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Join the Pomona Student Union as we make sense of the most recent Midterm Elections. How will a Republican-controlled Congress affect policy and politics? Was this a mandate against the President? Will we see more or less discord— does this force the parties to reconcile or simply fuel the existing divides? How does the President's executive action play into to these results and future electoral possibilities?
Kristen Soltis Anderson -A successful political consultant, commentator, and fresh mind in the GOP. Kristen is a reform minded and insightful Republican with a lot to say about where the party is going. She has just completed her fellowship at Harvard! Sahil Kapur - Sahil is Talking Points Memo’s Senior Congressional Reporter and a CMC alum. He too is a respected commentator and reporter. There will be a Q&A, and the event is free and open to the public. Who gets to be the “activist”?
How does the activist stay active? How do we take the “-ism” out of activism? The Draper Center states that over 400 students at Pomona College participate in some form of community engagement every semester, and they believe this to be a conservative estimate. While many students who travel outside of the Claremont bubble to do this type of work are comfortable identifying themselves as “activists,” others believe that “activism” is a term loaded with political baggage and exclusionary connotations; moreover, many students who do work that they believe is “activist” are focusing their efforts in ways that we might not typically associate with the word. The Draper Center, the Asian American Resource Center, and the Pomona Student Union invite students to brainstorm the various ways that they can turn public service and community engagement into “sustainable” practices, both during and after their time in Claremont. Three speakers, each of whom represents a different form of activism, will discuss their experiences with public service and the techniques that they have used to make their work sustainable. After the panel, we will launch into a discussion led by six students about the forms that activism takes on Pomona’s campus and how they can be made more effective. PANELISTS Valorie Thomas Marina Wood Anna Wirth STUDENT FACILITATORS Debbie Frempong Natalie Daifotis Ricardo Morales Ariel Hernández Ramírez Maki Tohmon Joyce Nimocks As Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, prepares to host the 2016 Olympics, many vulnerable communities are experiencing eviction, gentrification, and police violence. Join us as Theresa Williamson gives a talk on how Rio’s favela residents are using community organizing to respond to these changes. There will be a Q&A afterwards. The event is free and open to the public.
Theresa Williamson is the founder and executive director of Catalytic Communities. Catalytic Communities is a non-profit dedicated to bridging the gaps between formal and informal settlements in Rio de Janeiro through leadership training, education, dialogue, and advocacy. She has a Ph.D. in Urban and Regional Planning from the University of Pennsylvania. Studies show that 1 in 6 American women and 1 in 33 American men have been the victim of attempted or completed rape in her or his lifetime (RAINN). In 2009, 19% of undergraduate women experienced attempted or completed sexual assault since entering college (CDC).
From the 1990 Republican gubernatorial nominee, Clayton Williams, saying about rape, “If it’s inevitable, why not just sit back and enjoy it?” to mainstream media mourning the football careers of the convicted rapists in Steubenville (2012), to Robin Thicke’s “Blurred Lines” (2013), rape culture is pervasive and normalized. Join the PSU on Tuesday evening, October 28th in Rose Hills Theater, for a panel discussion with Zerlina Maxwell, Andrea Pino, and Conrad Woodall, three experts on various aspects of rape culture. Zerlina Maxwell: Political analyst, speaker, contributing writer toEBONY.com, Mic.com, and RHRealitycheck.org http://zerlinamaxwell.com/ Andrea Pino: Co-founder of End Rape on Campus; helped write Campus Safety and Accountability Act http://endrapeoncampus.org/ Conrad Woodall: Owner/master sensei of Woodall's Self-Defense; developed R.E.C.O.V.E.R. model of therapeutic self-defense http://woodallsselfdefense.com/ Join the PSU this Thursday evening in Edmunds Ballroom to have a conversation with three movers-ands-shakers of LA about food access and food deserts in LA. LA and the Inland Empire (including nearby cities like Pomona) are home to some of the largest food deserts in the country. Food deserts are described as a geographic area where the residents' ability to access affordable, healthy, fresh food is restricted or non-existent. In this event, we will talk with Ron Finley, Alex Ortega, and Clare Fox to discuss in depth how Los Angeles came to be a food desert, what methods have tried and failed, what do they see as the most promising solutions moving forward, and what can we (and should we) as college students do to become involved.
COMMUNITY Ron Finley rose to fame after he fought against the City of Los Angeles for the right to garden and grow food in his own neighborhood. His 2013 TED talk catapulted him into the media spotlight, a role he has since used to promote urban farming and healthy eating within his community. Watch his TED Talk here - http://www.ted.com/talks/ron_finley_a_guerilla_gardener_in_south_central_la POLICY Clare Fox is the Director of Policy and Innovation for the Los Angeles Food Policy Council where she collaborates with food advocates as well as public and private representatives to catalyze projects and build leadership capacity for sustainable, equitable food systems. PUBLIC HEALTH Alex Ortega, internationall recognized epidemiologist and community health research, is a Professor of Public Health and Psychiatry and Bio-behavioral Sciences at UCLA. His work focuses on the physical and mental health and medical needs of Latino children and their families in the US, particularly within LA. ASL INTERPRETATION PROVIDED
Sponsored by Pomona Student Union and the Department of Linguistics and Cognitive Science Ask anyone in the United States and they will likely have an idea of what is good English and what is bad English. But what do we really mean when we talk about "proper" English? And whose English is labeled as correct, and whose English is labeled as broken? One famous case that provoked national debate was the "Ebonics Controversy", when in 1996 the Oakland School District in Northern California passed a resolution recognizing Ebonics (more commonly known now as African American English) as a language system, and classifying its many of its students as speakers of Ebonics. This provoked national outrage from many different communities and people across the political spectrum. While case happened almost two decades ago, it still offers an understanding of how the language ideologies that exist in our nation. What was the intention of the Oakland School District? And why were people so angry? And what are the implications for how our students are educated? Join us on a panel with sociolinguist Dr. Walt Wolfram and educator Dr. Sharroky Hollie as they discuss these issues. This event will not be centered on the Ebonics Controversy, but it will certainly be focused on understanding the ideologies and debates that have given rise to it. The discussion will also revolve around experiences of students in the classroom who are not deemed as speaking "proper" English, particularly students of color. What obstacles do they face, and how do they navigate them? Additionally, how should society and academia approach the notion of linguistic diversity within the United States? Panel Discussion/Presentation with Q&A afterwards Someone who is shy, quiet, and unable to make friends easily (Cambridge Dictionaries Online)
The state of or tendency toward being wholly or predominantly concerned with and interested in one's own mental life (Merriam-Webster) A shy, reticent person (Oxford Dictionaries) What does being introverted or extraverted really mean? Why and how do we act both in and out of character? It’s difficult sometimes to understand both ourselves and those around us, and Dr. Brian Little will shed some light on our personalities during his talk. Dr. Little is currently a Distinguished Scholar at Cambridge University and has taught previously at Harvard, Oxford, and McGill Universities. He lectures world-wide on personality, motivation, and well-being. Light refreshments will be served afterwards. As midterms approach and the 2016 presidential elections moves closer, everyone wants to know: will the factions within the Republican Party split completely, reunify, or will one dominate over the others? What will this mean for the Democrats, and for conservative America?
Join the PSU as Reihan Salam and Conor Friedersdorf tackle these questions and more, addressing the past, present, and future–grim or hopeful–of the Republican Party. Reihan Salam is the co-author of Grand New Party: How Republicans Can Win the Working Class and Save the American Dream. He is a lead blogger for National Review’s The Agenda, a columnist for Slate, and the host of a weekly podcast for Vice. Conor Friedersdorf is a Pomona alum from class of 2002 and a staff writer for The Atlantic. He is the founder of the “Best of Journalism,” a biweekly newsletter that highlights fantastic nonfiction. Friedersdorf has previously written for the Huffington Post and served as a senior editor to Andrew Sullivan. |
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December 2014
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