Welcome, Families! MIT’s Oldest and Largest The Weather Today: Wind and rain, 44°F (7°C). Newspaper Tonight: Wind and rain, 39°F (4°C). Tomorrow: Chance of rain, 50°F (10°C). Details, Page 2 http://tech.mit.edu/ Volume 129, Number 45 Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139 Friday, October 16, 2009 DSL Releases Break- down of Student Life Fee; UA is Surprised By Jessica J. Pourian dent services. STAFF REPORTER The $22 is split into $14 for stu- After several years of inquiry dent government and activities, and from the Undergraduate Associa- $8 for athletics, Dean for Student tion and The Tech, the office for the Life Chris Colombo told The Tech Dean for Student life released the in June. breakdown of the student life fee last The distribution of the $22 came Tuesday. as a surprise to the Undergraduate The student life fee increased Association, which hastily revised to $272 this year, up $22 from last its budget in response last week, ac- year’s $250. This is the third year in counting for additional funding. a row that the fee has been increased. Undergraduate Association Pres- Both undergraduate and graduate students pay this fee to support stu- Student Life Fee, Page 9 Where Does the Student Life Fee Go? $1,200,000 MENG HENG TOUCH—THE TECH $1,150,000: DAPER (Z-Center) Ece Gulsen G receives an influenza vaccine at MIT Medical’s student-only flu clinic in the Student Center on Thursday. All 1000 doses reserved for the day were used. $600,000: MIT Medical/Mental Health Services $1,000,000 $325,000: Graduate Education Dean $100,000: Student Life Dean $800,000 Dining Plans Awaiting Task Force; $393,000: Student Activites $35,000: Fall Festival $100,000: Spring Weekend $50,000: Assisting Recurring Cultural $600,000 and Diversity Events Dean Says No Changes This Year (ARCADE also gets $25K from the Dean for Graduate Education) By Maggie Lloyd It is estimated that the Institute Student Life plans to meet with $100,000: Large Events Fund STAFF REPORTER will release this report by the end of the housemasters of the four dorms $400,000 $108,000: Club Sports Changes to MIT’s dining sys- the month or the beginning of No- with dining halls to hear their re- tem will have to wait another few vember, according to Dean for Stu- sponse to the Task Force’s final $150,000: Undergraduate $200,000 Activites months—at least. Competing pro- dent Life Chris Colombo. recommendations, said Karen A. $60,000: Class Councils posals released last spring from the Colombo said he has looked over Nilsson, Senior Associate Dean for $90,000: Undergraduate Assocation Blue Ribbon Dining Committee and both dining committees’ propos- Residential Life. (This $90K covers nearly 30% of the UA’s budget; MIT’s General Institute Budget the UA Dining committee await the als and met with the leadership of The UA committee is concerned $0 covers the rest.) final report from the Institute-wide the committees over the summer to with two of the Task Force’s recom- SOURCE: TOM GEARTY, DIVISION OF STUDENT LIFE Planning Task Force before discus- review their proposals, which were Recently released data from DSL provides the much-awaited sions concerning them can continue. released at the end of last term. Waiting for Dining, Page 11 breakdown of MIT’s student life fee. $1.1M goes to DAPER. MAS.967 Pushes Phone Medical Tech., Payments Rotberg Brings Smartphones to Developing World By D.C. Denison for a patient being tested for tuber- THE BOSTON GLOBE culosis. It’s an unlikely medical device: The software, created by a non- a sleek smartphone more suited to a profit organization called Moca, is nightclub than a rural health clinic. one of nearly two dozen cellphone- But it’s loaded with software that based projects that have sprung from allows health workers in the remote NextLab, a course at the Massachu- northernmost Philippines province setts Institute of Technology. It’s of Batanes to dramatically reduce taught by Jhonatan Rotberg, who the time it takes to get X-rays to a radiologist — and to get a diagnosis MAS.967, Page 10 In Short ¶ Stephen D. Immerman has been grabbed from behind while stopped appointed President of Montser- to tie his shoe, and two suspects, both rat College of Art, a small residen- “dark-skinned black males, 5'7"–5'9", tial art college in Beverly, MA. Im- approximately 15 years old” attempt- merman has been at MIT in various ed to remove his backpack. The as- positions since 1979. sailants were unsuccessful in taking the backpack and fled east on Vassar AARON M. THOM ¶ An attempted robbery took place St. towards Main St. On Tuesday evening, Elephants walked down Memorial Drive in front of Killian Court on their way last Friday at the intersection of Mass to the TD Garden in Boston, where they will perform in the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Ave., and Vassar St. at 11:12 p.m., Send news information and tips to Circus this Fall. the MIT Police said. The victim was [email protected]. Comics Parents taking ARTS World & Nation . 2 you out for din- Built to Spill Dig Further Down Opinion ����������������������������������������4 ner? But don’t Page 5 Arts ����������������������������������������������5 know where to Byrne, Bikes, Buenos Aires, Oh Comics / Fun Pages ��������������������7 go? See inside. My!: A Review of Bicycle Diaries Sports . 12 Page 7 Page 5 Page 6 Page 2 THE TECH October 16, 2009 WORLD & NATIO N For Colorado Boy, 6, Harrowing H1N1 Vaccine Is Fresh Balloon Ride Never Began By Dan Frosch and Monica Davey Fodder For Opponents THE NEW YORK TIMES FORT COLLINS, Colo. For hours on Thursday, people around the country were gripped by By Jennifer Steinhauer “Nationally right now there is a “I wonder if the people dissemi- television images of a homemade, silvery balloon careening through the THE NEW YORK TIMES tremendous amount of attention on nating this false information about skies near here, whooshing over fields and trees and yards with a 6-year- People who do not believe in vac- this vaccine,” said Dr. Thomas Farley, this vaccine realize that what they are old boy believed to be inside. cinating children have never had much the New York City health commis- doing could result in some people los- A search party was readied — on foot, on horseback, in helicopters sway over Leslie Wygant Arndt. She sioner. That focus has given vaccine ing their lives,” said Dr. Jonathan E. with infrared sensors — to scan the aircraft’s path of more than 60 miles, has studied the vaccine debate, she opponents “an opportunity to speak Fielding, the director of the Depart- some fearful that the boy might have fallen from his perch. said, and came out in favor of having out publicly and get their message ment of Public Health for Los Ange- In the early afternoon, the balloon landed near Denver International her 10-month-old daughter inocu- amplified that they didn’t have at les County. The comments of vaccine Airport, but the boy was not in it. At last, near dusk, the boy was found, lated against childhood diseases. But other times,” he said. dissenters, which he said “politically hiding in a box in his family’s garage attic, fearful his father would be there is something different about the Barbara Loe Fisher, president of come from the left and the right,” angry at him for touching the flying machine his father had built in their vaccine for the H1N1 flu, she said. the National Vaccine Information were frequently, he said, “not just backyard. “I have looked at the people who Center, an advocacy group that ques- counterproductive but downright dis- “Quite frankly, I couldn’t stand,” the boy’s father, Richard Heene — are against it, and I find myself tak- tions the safety of vaccines, said the graceful.” whose family (including three young boys) has appeared on a reality ing their side,” said Wygant Arndt, swine flu has “breathed new life” into Web sites, Twitter feeds, talk radio television show on ABC, “Wife Swap,” and been interviewed by local who lives in Portland, Ore. “But then the cause. “People who have never and even elevator chatter are awash media in Denver for their love of chasing stormy weather — said of the again, I go back and forth on this ev- asked questions before about vac- with skeptics decrying the vaccine, moment his youngest son, Falcon, reappeared inside the family’s home in ery day. It’s an emotional topic.” cines are looking at this one,” Fisher largely with no factual or scientific Fort Collins. “I just hit the floor with my knees,” Heene said, as Falcon, Anti-vaccinators, as they are said. basis. The most common complaint chomping pizza and occasionally grinning, stood among reporters in the often referred to by scientists and The increased interest is frustrat- is that the vaccine has been newly family’s front yard. “He scared the heck out of us.” doctors, have toiled for years on the ing to health officials, who are strug- formed and quickly distributed with- By nightfall, questions were emerging about the public costs of the margins of medicine. But an assem- gling to persuade an already wary out the benefit of clinical trials; in saga, which briefly interrupted departures from the Denver airport, and blage of factors around the swine public to line up for shots and prevent fact, the swine flu vaccine was made about how Falcon had managed to stay hidden in the attic of the garage flu vaccine — including confusion the spread of the pandemic.