THE TUFTS Where You Read It First VOLUME L, NUMBER 55 DAILY WEDNESDAY,NOVEMBER 30, 2005 Oh, the places they will go: ROTC seniors get placements BY BRIAN MCPARTLAND Officer Qualifying Test, similar to the SAT Senior Staff Writer but with added sections for pilot and navi- gator topics. The test includes questions on As some seniors go to career fairs for spatial reasoning and asks students to draw finance and others go to fairs for communi- maps. cations, one group of students is headed Dixon took the test in February of her someplace else entirely after graduation: the sophomore year and applied for the pilot U.S. Armed Forces. and navigator programs. Her score qualified In the past couple of weeks, students in her to become a navigator, an eight-year the Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) commitment. program have begun to receive their post- She applied for a position in personnel, graduation assignments. though, and received her first choice last Senior Caroline Kennedy will be going April. She was also assigned her third choice into military intelligence in the Army — her location, RAF Mildenhall which is 70 miles first choice. ROTC participants send their outside of London. “I specified that I wanted choices and applications to ROTC head- to be assigned to a base overseas,” she said. quarters for their branch of the military: Dixon applied for a postponement of her Army, Navy or Air Force. Marine Corps stu- active duty to attend graduate school in dents go through the Navy ROTC. community health, and she said she will Kennedy will spend 18 weeks in Ft. decide within two weeks whether to accept Huachuca, Ariz. before her permanent her assignment. assignment begins. Most ROTC scholarship Navy students choose between service recipients are required to serve four years on warfare, aviation, special operations and active duty. submarines. It is also possible to sign up for Students’ applications include their aircraft carriers — ships that run on nuclear superiors’ rankings, their performance on power — but this is a highly selective pro- physical fitness tests, the ROTC courses they gram, senior Peter Downes said. took and the positions they held. Downes was assigned to service warfare. All Tufts ROTC students take their classes Before Spring Break, the Navy ROTC stu- and participate in the program through the dents in each field are ranked and allowed to Massachusetts Institute of Technology. pick the ship on which they serve. The Kennedy is the student Battalion largest naval bases are located at Norfolk, Commander for the Army ROTC Paul Va., San Diego, Pearl Harbor and Japan, Revere Battalion at MIT. The ROTC program Downes said, so he will most likely be sent at Tufts ended after student protests during to one of these places. the Vietnam War. “Basically, when you pick your ship, it is Senior Frances Dixon, a member of the like picking your home port,” he said. Air Force ROTC program, said superior offi- According to junior Nicholas Schroback, cers rank the students based on leadership a member of the Marine Corps ROTC pro- skills, the positions they held and the results gram, Marines students do not receive their of peer evaluations — a process she called assignments until after graduation. JEFF CHEN/TUFTS DAILY “racked and stacked.” Students are ranked after a six-month train- A student prepares for competition at October’s Army ROTC Ranger Challenge in Ft. Air Force students also take the Air Force ing program and then given assignments. Devens, Mass. Tufts students get preview He’s no Brownie, but the former FEMA of film on peace activists chief had a ‘heck of a job’ uniting agency BY JEFF LINDSAY non-violence is the only way to Daily Staff Writer resolve the conflict over control Wallace Stickney details history of emergency relief groups from of the West Bank. When his The 20 students who attended friend disagreed, Ali cited the days of Second World War through the Carter Administration Tuesday night’s screening of Gandhi’s success and said that BY JENNA NISSAN started during World War II. “All activity, the first people that are excerpts of the unfinished docu- violence destroys Palestinians’ Daily Editorial Board of this legislation was occa- going to show up are the local mentary “Encounter Point” got a international support. sioned by disaster,” Stickney fire department,” he said. glimpse into the world of Israeli “Today you must convince the The man in charge of disaster said. “Washington won’t come until and Palestinian grassroots world that you are not [terror- relief under President George The Office went through over much later.” peacemakers. ists],” Ali said in the film. H.W. Bush spoke to students a dozen name changes before it The Somerville Fire Nahanni Rous, manager of Other screened scenes told Tuesday on the U.S. became FEMA in 1979, when Department responds to about educational outreach for Just the story of a pair of Israeli and Government’s experience in the President Jimmy Carter com- 12,000 emergencies per year, he Vision, the non-profit behind the Palestinian fathers, Tzvika and field. bined the national agencies. said, and local relief systems work, told the students the film is George. Both of their daughters Wallace Stickney, Bush Sr.’s During his tenure at FEMA, only ask for help if the situation intended to serve as “a conduit were murdered, the first’s by a director of the Federal Stickney said, the agency was is beyond their control. “If the between people on the ground suicide bomber and the second’s Emergency Management only beginning to act as a single event overcomes the resources doing work and those who want by an Israeli soldier. Agency (FEMA), led an informal agency. “One of challenges with of a state, that is the point a gov- to support them.” The Israeli daughter, a 12- discussion of about 20 students, dealing with any sort of public ernor asks the President to The violent elements of the year-old, was shot when riding mostly engineers or members of policy is you have to deal with declare a natural disaster,” he Israel-Palestine conflict have with her father because their car the Human Factors and the ineffective parts as well as said. received extensive press cover- was mistaken for that of a want- Ergonomics Society, the group the effective parts,” he said. He said dealing with the age, Rous said. She said she ed Palestinian. A crowd of that brought Stickney to cam- The first year he served in media was also important in hopes “Encounter Point” will Palestinians marched at the pus. government, emergency disaster relief work. “If you can help convince people that daughter’s funeral, chanting, During his tenure at FEMA, response functioned in a two- make people believe that you’re Israeli-Palestinian relations are “The voice of Christina is saying, Stickney signed the first inte- pronged system. The first dealt doing well, then you’re doing “not just what’s going on in the ‘Don’t forget my friends in the grated federal emergency with natural disaster, and the well,” he said. “Once they think media, but that there’s a grass- name of the Bible and Koran.’” response plan and directed other dealt with response to you’re not doing well, it’s hard to roots peace movement.” One year after the deaths, the response and recovery activities national emergencies. The sec- convince them otherwise.” The first film excerpt showed a two fathers joined the Bereaved for multiple disasters. ond part made up 80 percent of Stickney answered questions young Palestinian man, Ali, try- “The goal here this evening is the relief and was totally secret, from students on the assess- ing to persuade his friends that see FILM, page 2 to talk about emergency efforts he said. ment of damage after a disaster. and how we got to where we According to Stickney, there After Hurricane Katrina, he said, are,” he said in the ASEAN were six locations around the emergency relief officials failed Auditorium. country with highly-equipped in many respects. Hospitals in INSIDE INDEX Stickney detailed the history communication capabilities. If Louisiana knew a large scale The Daily thinks Fiona Apple is golden News | Features 1 of disaster management in the the United States was in extreme emergency was likely but did delicious Arts | Living 5, United States. Some local pro- danger, each region would take not prepare their facilities well see ARTS, page 5 Editorial | Letters 8 grams began in the 1930s. directors, go into a cave and run enough, he said. Balance 11 Federal programs then began to the government from there. “Mother Nature is not a ter- National 15 Getting comfortable emerge, including the Federal Every state has its own emer- rorist, by any means, but the International 17 with Rakoff’s latest Insurance Administration, the gency relief plan in addition to power of Mother Nature, as we Comics 20 Fire Protection and Control the federal emergency relief have seen over the past year, is Classifieds 21 Administration and the Federal see ARTS, page 5 plan, and states are most impor- stupendous,” he said. “So how Sports Back page Weather Service. tant in organizing relief. “If there do we deal with it? We make tuftsdaily.com The Office of Civilian Defense is a natural disaster or terrorist plans.” 2 THE TUFTS DAILY NEWS | FEATURES Wednesday, November 30, 2005 OFF THE HILL | BOSTON UNIVERSITY When you can’t hibernate, To infinity, and the city of On! some tips for keeping warm BY KAYLEIGH KARUTIS layers are one of the key points.