THETUF DAILY IWhere You Read It First . Monday, Novembers 10,1997 Volume XXXV, Number 46 ~ I ti RUNNING IN CIRCLES ustees and faculty . cuss state of Tufts Former custodians are topic at luncheon byKARENEmIN the market rate in the community.” Daily Editorial Board According to DiBiaggio, however, the The University’s stance on former services did not improve. “Overall, things UNICCO workers, updates on the $400 mil- were not much better.” lion Capital Campaign, and the debate over ‘‘Aftertwo years,” DiBiaggio said, “the the teaching versus research nature of Tufts services were not improving. The Univer- were all topics of discussion at the annual sity saidto UNICCO, we’ll give you another Faculty/Trustee luncheon Friday afternoon. year, and if you can show us you can Members of the Board of Trustees and improve our services, we’ll continue with faculty dined in Gifford House, the home of YOU,^' 4 University President John DiBiaggio, be- DiBiaggio said that UNICCO’s services Daily file photo fore engaging in conversation. did not improve, however, and the Univer- A whole lot of running with no place to go. Nathan Gantcher, chairman ofthe Board sity decided to solicit bids from other clean- of Trustees, led the discussion. “You are ing companies. truly the guts of this University,” Gantcher “There were four bidders and it wasn’t said to the faculty in his introductory speech. just strictly a matter of cost, it was a matter NEMC merger will help “It is ourhope that we can continuewhat meeting a certain set of specifications,” has really happened over the last several DiBiaggio said. years and that is to continue to have an These specifications, he said, included to fund Medical School improved, and ever-improving faculty at providing services at times they had not every school, because that is the way that beenprovidedwith UNICCO which included by JORDAN SOLOMON this University has become so recognized Daily Editorial Board in the last several years,” Gantcher said. In what appears to be a union that will provide benefits to all sides involved, New Commentingoithe improvementsmade England Medical Center (NEMC), Tufts’ primary teaching hospital, recently officially to the University over the past few years, completed a merger with Lifespan, a Rhode Island-based health care system. Gantcher said, “Many of us on the board ... DeanoftheMedical School John Harringtonsaidthatthe $1.5 billionmergerwill finally know we’d never be accepted tothis school.” rectify what has been a difficult situation for NEMC and the Medical School over the past Gantcher referred to Tufts as an “ever- few years. Harrington said the Center has been struggling financially and has been changing, ever-improving institution.” searching for an outside source to increase funds. After a question about community rela- “This is the end of a three-year struggle for the New Englanhedical Center to find tions by Maryanne Wolf, associate profes- a suitable partner for itself,” Harrington said. sor of child development, DiBiaggio ad- Harrington said this improved financial status will enable the Medical School to keep dressed the issue of the former UNICCO its current faculty and hire new members. workers. He began with the history of cus- Lifespan, Rhode Island’s Iargest health care system, is also the primary teaching todial services at Tufts. hospiia! for the Schooi of Medicine zt 3rown University. According to 11arringtoi1, both In ;he ’BOs, DiBiaggio said, the Univer- Tufts’ medical school and Brown’s medical school will remain independent under the new sity first began thinking about contracting affiliation with Lifespan. He added, however, that their new association with Lifespan out the janitorial services. “There was a opens up the possibility for increased collaboration between the two schools. high level of dissatisfaction with service Although the merger became official in the beginning of this month, Tufts has been being offered at that time,” he said. working on the plans for the collaboration since January of this year. He explained thatthe administration was “This is the culmination of ten or 1 I months of work,” Harrington said. pleasedwithUNICCO’sworkafterthecom- The merger also keeps with arecent trend ofmergers involvinghospitals in the Boston pany was brought in to clean two buildings. Three years ago, DiBiaggio said, the Daily‘file photo area. “There has been a great deal of consolidation in the health care industry around the Nathan Gantcher Boston area recently,” Harrington said. decision was made to contract out all cus- Harrington said he hopes and expects to reap benefits similar to those of the other todial services to UNICCO. “The union cleaning residence halls on Sundays. The consolidations.“It’s agreat day for New England Medical Center, and therefore it’sagreat representing the workers negotiated a con- new contract also built in penalty clauses, opportunity for Tufts University School of Medicine,” he said. “This will certainly tract whereby the custodians were given he said, so if services were not provided at strengthen our relationship with the Medical Center, and their relationship with us. Win, the same level [of pay] that they had re- win, win, all the way around.” ceived from University which is higher than see TRUSTEES, page 2 UC-Berkeley ranks Tufts as 12th most demanding school UC-Berkeley Law School ranking system by DAVIDPLWOSE above Yale University, University Untilrecently, accordingtoYee, Swarthmore College 89.5 Amherst College 84.5 Daily Staff Writer of Pennsylvania, and Northwest- there was no fair way to judge the Tufts is the 12th most demand- ernuniversity. Explaining howthe relative strength of an applicant’s Williams College 89.0 Reed College 84.5 ing school in the nation, accord- ranking system is applied to ad- undergraduateGPA. By using this Dukeuniversity 88.5 VanderbiltUniverSity 84.5 ing to a report from the Boalt Hall missions, Yee said that applicants system, she said, unfair prefer- Carleton College 88.0 BowdoinCollege 83.5 SchoolofLawattheUniversityof to Boalt Hall who studied at a top ences based on pre-conceived ColgateCollege 88.0 Tufts University 83.5 California at Berkeley.Receiving tier school have points added to notions about the quality of spe- Johns Hopkins 87.5 Vassar College 83.5 83.5 points, Tufts was tied with theirGPAs; applicants fiommiddle cific undergraduate schools can Bowdoin and Vassar Colleges in range schools have no points be eliminated. University Bryn Maw College 83 .O ihe ranking. added to their GPA, and appli- According to Tufts Provost Sol Nola Yee, the coordinator of cants from the least demanding Gittleman,graduate schools have University of Chicago 87.0 HdtonCollege 83 .O publicity and communications at schools have points subtracted always rankedthe relative value of Dartmouth College 87.0 OklinCollege 83.O Boalt Hall, said the admissions fiomtheirGPA. undergraduate grades. Weslyan University 87 .O Univesity of 83 .O office ranks the difficulty level of Y ee did not say how the schools “Boalt Hall has done formally HarvardUniverSty 86.5 Pennsylvania each college and university in or- are divided into the three different what many schools do informally,” der io objectively compare stu- categories. Gittleman said. CorneIlUnivmiity 86.0 RiceUniverSity 83.0 dents for admission into the law She emphasized that the point We said that Tufts students tra- PrincetonUnivmity 86.0 Claremont- 82.5 school. system established by Boalt Hall ditionally perform one point higher Middlebury College 86.0 McKenna College Swarthmore College was is not a formal ranking, but rather on all graduate school standard- 85.5 YaleUnivdty 82.5 ranked number one with 89.5 an objective method to compare ized tests than most students, but Bates College points, followed closely by Will- the level ofdifficulty ofthe under- he added that they have lower MtT 85.5 BrandeisUniversity 82.0 iams College with 89.0 points. graduate curriculum at various GPAs than most other students, Havedod College 85.0 Northwestern 82.0 Other schools ahead of Tufts in- schools. indicating that grading at Tufts is clude such powerhouses as Whathappensmanytimes,Yee especially hard. Pomona College 85.0 Harvard and Princeton Universi- said, is that students who gradu- Gittleman said thatmost gadu- Univexsityofvirginia 85.0 81.5 ties, but also some lesser-recog- ate from Harvard, or other nation- ate schools recognize that Tufts nized schools such as Carlton ally-recognized institutions, are students work very hard. College, Vanderbilt University, given automatic preference over “Over time, people have come -information courtesy of The Amherst Student and Reed College. students who graduate from to know the quality of a Tufts In the report, Tufts was ranked lesser-known schools. education,” Gittleman said. ’age two Monday, November 10,1997 -- ___ THETUFTS DAILY THETUFTS DAILY-- Letters to the Editor P.O. Box 18, Medford, MA. 02153 (617) 627-3090; Fax: (617) 627-3910, [email protected] Palestine violating peace process.” Faisal Husseini said on Paris radio Online: http://www.tufts.edu/as/stu-org/tuftsdaily in the same month, “...this dccision gives the green peace process light for riots, clashes, startirig a battle, a war.” Karen A. Epstein the Editor: Demirdjian misstates and misinterprets UN Reso- Editor-in-Chzef To In his viewpoint (“Twisting the definition of ‘ter- lution242. He writes, “And wlhy doesn’t Israel accept Managing Editor: Gregory Geiman ,orism,”’ 1l/6), Rami Demirdjian states, “Today the UN Resolution 242 -which acts for the stopping of Associate Editors: Amy Zimmet, Jason Cohen ’eace accordsare frozen. How can we explain it?’ He the settlement policy.” Maybe because the term “UN NEWSEditors: Pete Sanborn, Lauren Heist iccuses Israel’s Netanyahu administration of trying Resolution” does not mention that and it does not Assistant Editors: Linda Bentley, Leah Massar, Andrew Freedman o make the world believe all Arabs are terrorists, even mention buildings or settlements.