On Saturday March 31, Hamden unveiled a brass plaque commemorating 151 veterans. The plaque will serve as an addition to the Hamden Veterans’ Memorial.
By Cliff Nadel
Earlier today, Hamden Town Clerk Vera Morrison and the Hamden Veterans Commission unveiled a new brass plaque containing the names of 151 Hamden veterans.The ceremony took place in front of Hamden Middle School on Dixwell Avenue, with a full crowd in attendance.
The plaque is the fifth addition since the memorials installment in 1991, according to Morrison. The 2.5 ton memorial is said to contain the names of more than 8,000 Hamden veterans.
Upon the plaques unveiling family, friends, Hamden residents and veterans lined up to take a picture of the new plaque.
While the Mayor of Hamden, Curt Leng, wasn’t present due to prior engagements regarding the holiday weekend, Morrison read a statement on his behalf. Referring to Hamden veterans, Leng said the town is ” truly, truly grateful for everything you’ve done for us.”
On March 26, Quinnipiac University President John Lahey presented a $700,000 check from the University to the town of North Haven and first selectmen Michael Freda at the North Haven’s Memorial Town Hall.
Quinnipiac President John Lahey presenting check to North Haven First Selectmen Michael Freda. Photo Via Quinnipiac University Photographer Autumn Driscoll
According to a press release from Quinnipiac, Freda and the town of North Haven plan to use the money for two new playgrounds at the Montowese Elementary School and Ridge Road School.
“Quinnipiac has enjoyed a mutually beneficial relationship with the Town of North Haven, where we have invested more than $350 million since 2007 to develop our North Haven Campus,” President Lahey said at the press conference according to Quinnipiac’s press release.
Kathryn Russo the Principal of Montowese Elementary School, said that the school’s new playground will be a kindergarten playground for kids five to six-years-old.
“We are hoping to have the playground completed by the beginning of next school year (August 2018),“ Russo said.
Patrick Stirk the Principal of Ridge Road Elementary School, said that the playground committee hasn’t decided on what playground equipment to purchase yet, but that the playground will be designed to make sure that all students can use it.
“The new playground is designed to ensure that students can access it regardless of any physical limitations. The equipment will allow/promote all of our students to play together,” Stirk said.
Both Principal Stirk and Russo said that their schools plan to hold dedication ceremonies for the new playgrounds but the dates for them haven’t been set.
The money Quinnipiac has given to the town of North Haven has been used to pay for the instillation of lights at North Haven’s town softball field and a playground at Green Acres Elementary School.
In early February, a woman gave birth in her cell at York Correctional Institution in Niantic, Connecticut’s only women’s prison. Two days later reports began circulating that the institution was investigating how a child could’ve been born at the facility while health workers knew of the pregnancy.
Only one of the news reports published soon after the incident featured a headline referring to the new mother as a “woman.” Among the other headlines, one labeled her a “prisoner,” five labeled her an “inmate” and the remaining three referred solely to the birth of the baby.
Amber Kelly, a partner of the Quinnipiac University Prison Project and Quinnipiac assistant professor of social work, noted a similar trend. According to Kelly, when the news media refers to the female as an “inmate” or “prisoner” she is dehumanized.
“She is a woman. She is now a mother, and to read ‘inmate gives birth in cell’ hits you so differently than ‘a woman gave birth in her cell’, [than] ‘a pregnant woman gave birth in her cell,’” Kelly said. “When most people hear the word inmate there’s immediately a distancing. [People view the incident as] ‘That has nothing to do with me.’ ‘ I am not that thing.’”
Graphic by Thamar Bailey
At a time when incarceration is a widely discussed and polarizing topic, experts say journalists’ word usage may have an effect on the public’s perception of previously incarcerated people and those currently incarcerated.
Don Sawyer, a Quinnipiac sociology professor who is serving as the university’s chief diversity officer, explained that upon reentry previously incarcerated people run into obstacles obtaining housing, applying for jobs and being accepted back into the community. Instead, they’re viewed as “monsters” that shouldn’t have been let out of their cage, Sawyer said.
The news media places a label on people by using stigmatizing words such as: inmate, prisoner, convict and offender, according to Quinnipiac Assistant Professor of Criminology Stephen McGuinn. When journalists use these words, they don’t realize the “dramatic stigma” associated with them, he said.
“And the disservice initially is that we don’t see [incarcerated or currently incarcerated people] as individuals,” he added. “We see them as part of some kind of group that we’ve outcast and don’t belong back in.”
Society reflects this mentality. Previously incarcerated people are disenfranchised upon their exit from prison and re-entrance into society. For instance, they are stripped of their right to vote in various states and are excluded from some state-managed welfare programs. Society, by implementing these laws and restrictions, reinforces the idea that incarcerated people are somehow undeserving of these rights and in turn they are treated as second-class citizens, Sawyer said.
Graphic by Thamar Bailey
Kelly, the social work professor, points out that stigmatizing words act as labels that extend the punishment beyond the criminal justice system.
“Why is it that the consequence thrown down by the state isn’t enough? Why do we need to continue punishing someone on so many levels?,” Kelly asked. “Who decided journalists were a part of the punishment of society?”
Sawyer explained the weight behind labels by comparing it to what happens when a child gets in trouble at school.
It begins with the initial instance of calling the student “bad.” The teacher then tells the child’s next year professor to “watch out” because that child is a “bad” student. Sawyer explained that this child is then perceived as such and will be treated accordingly. Along the way the student begins to internalize that they’re a “bad” student and eventually behaves in that manner because it’s expected of them. It becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, according to Sawyer.
The role of the news media in perpetuating the stigma against incarcerated people is borne out by the words often used in articles regarding previously or currently incarcerated people.
A search of the Hartford Courant site found that in headlines and articles journalists at the Courant had a higher propensity to use the word inmate to refer to incarcerated people, while felon, offender, convict, prisoner, and ex-con were less frequent but still used.
data-animation-override> “Why do we need to continue punishing someone on so many levels? Who decided journalists were a part of the punishment of society?”
— Amber Kelly, Quinnipiac assistant professor of social work
Meanwhile a search of the New Haven Register site found that in headlines and articles journalists were more likely to use the words: prisoner, offender, felon and inmate to refer to incarcerated people.
Josh Kovner, a journalist at the Hartford Courant, has spent the past 21 years covering criminal justice, mental health and child protection. Kovner tends to refer to incarcerated people by their name in his articles. When asked why Kovner explained it in terms of a story he was recently working on about bad mental health care, noting that the humanity of the person should be at the forefront of the story.
“It’s not totally advocacy journalism, it’s straight journalism,” Kovner said. “If we’re talking about bad medical care or bad mental health care or a brain injury or something, then you know, they’re a person first.”
Does the language used depend on the story being written?
Kovner notes that he sees no reasons to use words other than the name of the incarcerated persons unless quoting from police documents or other official documents to that effect. However, overall according to Kovner, journalists shouldn’t be afraid to use words like offender and inmate, even with the stigma they entail.
“I don’t need to dehumanize them further to make a point,” Kovner said. “But you know if they weren’t wrongly convicted, they got themselves into a situation and they’re going to have to take a certain amount of pain and stigma.”
New Haven Register City Editor William Kaempffer, a previous fire and police reporter, explained his stance on the use of these words. On one hand he acknowledges the negative connotation that comes with the words inmate, convict etc. However, according to Kaempffer there are words that are better to use than others. He specifically prefers the word offender or ex-offender.
“Words matter and different words carry different connotations, different implications draw different inference, and we as writers and reporters need to be mindful of that,” Kaempffer said. “Because you’ll hear conversations about unconscious biases.”
On Jan. 26 Quinnipiac University held a panel “The Real Women of Orange is the New Black: A Discussion of Women’s Experiences of Prison in the U.S.” One of the purposes of the event was to start a dialogue about the unconscious biases in society that not only people in power have but also everyday people, according to Sawyer, who co-sponsored the event.
These unconscious biases apparent in society are ingrained in individuals via the language one sees, reads, hears as well as the way prison is depicted in the media, among other things, according to Sawyer.
For example, when a previously incarcerated person attempts to buy a house, neighbors whisper. They question whether anyone conducted background or credit checks, Sawyer said. This line of questioning is in response to the act that a person was in jail. It’s an unconscious bias, according to Sawyer.
“It creates a monster in our minds, it creates a boogeyman,” he said. “And then when someone is coming out of prison and they tell you ‘I was formerly incarcerated,’ what does your mind go back to? Seeing those images on TV, seeing those 100-feet walls, seeing those electric fences and the barbed wires and the guards that were used to contain this individual, so they must have been a monster if they were in there.”
Graphic by Thamar Bailey
In response to this reality, McGuinn emphasizes the importance of using people-centered language.
“I’d say language is real powerful and there is no reason to broad stroke an entire population with one word,” McGuinn said. “The label, yeah, that’s a part of their past, but that’s not them. That’s why people-centered language is important. Yeah, you might have to type a couple extra words instead of inmate or ex-imate, you might have to say formerly incarcerated person.”
McGuinn shrugged and added, “But if that’s the worst of it.”
Kaempffer agrees that some words are better to use than others, but disagrees that there should be an enforced uniformity among journalists’ word usage when regarding a person currently or previously involved in the criminal justice system.
Word usage should be left in the hands of the journalist writing the story, Kaempffer said. Noting that there are various ways to refer to the incarcerated population Kaempffer said word usage depends on what fits a particular story.
“So to say an ex-prisoner versus an ex-offender, my preference is ex-offender. Sometimes, you know, ‘the prisoner was in jail’ fits into the story,” Kaempffer said. “I’m not sure there are set rules that need to be put in place. I think we trust our journalists, hopefully, to be cautious in the language that they use.”
But the fact remains, Kelly said, that damaging language is still used at a high rate as proven by the recent incident involving the woman that gave birth at York Correctional Facility. Journalists’ words have an impact on every level, all the way to the landlord who takes in the news every day and is debating whether to rent to a previously incarcerated person, she said.
The prolonging of pain is unnecessary and the stain of a label and the stigma it carries isn’t easy to come back from, according to Sawyer.
“Labels shape the perception that we have of the person that’s labeled,” he said. “So if you say that someone is an ex-con they are forever tied to what they did and so their personhood becomes their crime. They exist as a person who committed a crime. They never get to the space where they’ve paid their debt to society.”
Quinnipiac is prepared to create a 220-bed residence hall on its York Hill campus, Lynn Bushnell, vice president for public affairs, said in a statement.
On March 27, the Hamden Planning and Zoning Commission approved Quinnipiac’s plan to build a new senior residence hall that would include air-conditioned single rooms and three community rooms, according to Bushnell. The community rooms are said to be able to hold more than 200 people. According to the statement, the new building will provide additional space for students and student organizations to hold meetings.
Below you will find an aerial view of the York Hill campus as well as where the university plans to construct the new residence halls, courtesy of hamden.com.
Quinnipiac philosophy professor Anat Biletzki spoke at the International Women’s Day Teach-In,” which she helped organize.
By Grace Manthey
Snow may have postponed the International Women’s Day Teach-In by a few weeks, but that didn’t stop the speakers from embracing the “Silence Breakers” theme in the Quinnipiac Piazza on Thursday, March 29.
The goal for the event was “to elicit a discussion about those who have taken active measures and public stances to disrupt a culture of silence,” according to the organizing committee.
Linda Lindroth, a part time professor at QU, and one of the 16 speakers at the event, talked about racism and sexism in the fashion industry. She showed photos of clothing and ads that reflected racist and sexist sentiments. In one instance, Lindroth showed a photo of a t-shirt that a clothing company sold that read, “It’s not rape, it’s a snuggle with a struggle.” She showed another image of boots for sale online that make swastikas with its footprints.
Lindroth also discussed H&M, a popular clothing chain, that has $4.8 billion in unsold merchandise. Lindroth advised people to try shopping at consignment stores and nonprofits to help with waste and unfair working environments in the fashion industry.
Sixteen speakers spoke at Quinnipiac’s International Women’s Day Teach-In.
While some topics were clearly controversial, some controversial discussions came from less controversial topics. Communications professor Ewa Callahan’s presentation about the forgotten history of Polish female journalists during the solidarity movement sparked a debate about abortion.
At the end of her presentation Callahan talked about the problems still facing women in Poland, including abortion rights. When a member of the audience tried to debate more about the issue, organizer Anat Biletzki cut it short, trying to stay on time.
But the event wasn’t all negative. Lindroth talked about how polo shirt company Lacoste, who is famous for their alligator logo, put a series of endangered animals on their shirts to help with the environmental issue.
Economics professor Linda Fisher talked about ways women can close the wage gap “regardless if there is discrimination or not.” Specifically, she talked about negotiating wages, something she said women are less likely to do than men.
Biletzki, who is a philosophy professor at Quinnipiac, seemed to be happy with the turnout and the support from Quinnipiac organizations.
The first teach-in, Biletzki said, had an audience of “maybe one,” and now with seeing how many women were at the forefront of the March For Our Lives rallies across the nation, she feels like “progress has been made.”
Toys R Us is closing its doors nationwide. While local students are disappointed about losing the experience taking a trip to the toy store, they understand the change in today’s toy culture has contributed to the close.
“I think it’s kind of sad,” said Pat Pitts, a junior journalism major at Quinnipiac. “Everything they [kids today] want is on electronics or something like that, so they don’t have that toy experience that you and I had growing up.”
In its long history, Toys R Us has emerged as an important part of the childhoods of Quinnipiac students. Ben Kuru, a freshman marketing major at Quinnipiac even had a specific memorable experience.
“My favorite thing there was a bike that I got to ride around there a little bit,” said Kuru. “The workers there were really friendly and it’s unfortunate that the place is closing down.”
Over the past year, Toys R Us has faced a series of financial miscues that have led to the company’s downfall.
On September 18th the company declared bankruptcy after being over $5 billion dollars in debt. Four months later the company announced that it would be closing over 100 stores across the country.
By March Toys R Us announced its liquidation, leading to the closure of over 700 nationwide locations.
While debt is arguably the biggest contributor to the company’s demise, some saw different reasons for Toys R Us’s decline.
“I noticed that their video game section wasn’t that drastic,” said Shannon Marmot, a junior public relations major at Quinnipiac. “They tried to base it more on board games and I feel like that was a huge downside to them.”
Others saw issues with the pricing of the items in the store.
Kuru said he thought prices at Toys R Us were “a little bit out there,” but it’s not the only reason he thought the toy store failed.
“Kids are more into technology than they are into physical toys nowadays,” said Kuru.
Lori Hershman, an employee at Evan’s Toy Shoppe in Hamden, Connecticut, had similar feelings on children’s shift towards technology.
“I see in restaurants that they’re playing with iPads instead of coloring books,” said Hershman. “In cars, they’re watching movies or playing games instead of looking out the window.”
Amy Cavallo, a sophomore finance major at Quinnipiac, said there could have been a way to save the store.
“If debt was truly the issue…I think at that point you really need to refocus your business practice on repaying,” said Cavallo. “You could’ve invested that [money] into repaying your loans.”
With the end of the Toys R Us in sight, Hershman is concerned that the absence of the company could have a negative effect on children.
“If there isn’t a toy store and they couldn’t get what they want, that would be detrimental. It’s important for kids to have that experience of saving their pennies and getting that toy they’ve wanted,” said Hershman.
Toys R Us has commenced liquidation sales in all of it’s nationwide locations. The company is anticipated to run out of money by May.
Quinnipiac University’s School of Law held its 2018 Symposium at its ceremonial courtroom on the North Haven Campus on Friday. The school titled the event, “Psychiatric and Epigenetic, Legal, and Public Health Challenges Facing Refugee Children: An Integrated Approach.”
The 2018 Quinnipiac University Law School Symposium at the ceremonial courtroom at Quinnipiac’s North Haven Campus.
The symposium not only included speakers from Quinnipiac, but also Brown University, Yale University and Integrated Refugee and Immigration Services.
Quinnipiac law and medicine professor W. John Thomas and his colleagues want the Symposium “to initiate a world-wide conversation about the potentially multi-generational consequences of failing to serve the needs of refugee children,” said Thomas.
An audience of about fifty people attended the symposium.
The presenters led the attendees through the history of the laws pertaining to international refugees. They explained that current laws relating to international refugees were based off of World War II white European international refugees, as opposed to non-western groups that make up the majority of international refugees today. Professor Thomas said how drastically different the Trump administration’s refugee policy is compared to past administrations.
“In 2016 we had a limit of 110,000 refugees and according to some actors around the world that was sufficient enough to fulfill our moral obligation and obligation as fellow human beings,” Thomas said.
But according to Thomas, the Trump administration announced a new maximum of only 45,000.
Thomas also said the United States had a moral responsibility for creating some of the refugee crises that exist today.
Quinnipiac law and medicine professor W. John Thomas explaining the US’s moral responsibilities.
Similarly, Quinnipiac law professor Sheila Hayre discussed the complex issues surrounding immigration and refugee laws. She explained the legal definition of someone who should receive refugee status, as well legal terms associated with refugees.
Here is a video of Professor Hayre explaining the legal definition of someone who should receive refugee status.
Hayre explaining the differences between Asylum Seekers and Refugees.
After a short lunch break the second half of the Symposium began with Brown University senior neuroscience student Caleb Brown. He talked about epigenetics, which is the idea that gene expression can be altered by personal experience.
Brown University senior neuroscience student Caleb Brown explaining the relationship between epigenetics and the refugee experience.
“If you have these very drastic effects in your genome because of extreme exposure to stress this can also be seen in your progeny,” Brown said.
He also explained refugees could be particularly influenced.
“The extent to which that actually effects how they react to every day life is still being tested, but there are some implications that could effect how your progeny interacts with stressful environments,” Brown said.
Thomas, whose last two books have been oral history projects, said he thinks that presenting information about refugees in an engaging way is an important tool to help educate people. But it’s specifically the stories about people that have the greatest effect.
“I have come to believe that personal narratives are most effective in honestly and accurately presenting information in a form that draws in the viewer/reader/listener,” Thomas said. “I urge journalists to seek out personal narratives of refugees to use a stage from which to report their plight.”
Thomas and his colleagues have already presented their findings about the challenges facing refugee children in Washington, D.C. and Spain. He has also recruited several experts in relevant fields to write chapters in what will be an edited book about the challenges facing refugee children. Thomas and his colleagues plan to present their findings this summer in Prague and Japan.
Hartford, Connecticut joined Washington D.C. and hundreds of other cities in a “March For Our Lives” rally to demonstrate support for stricter gun laws in the United States on Saturday, March 24.
Experts are trying to figure out how to support Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals recipients in the wake of President Trump’s passed March 5 deadline for DACA, according to Maria Praeli, Quinnipiac University alumna and immigration policy associate at FWD.us, a bipartisan organization with a hand in commonsense immigration reform and criminal justice reform advocacy.
The Obama Administration established DACA in 2012. It granted undocumented immigrants who came to the United States as minors with a temporary and renewable two-year work permit and protections from deportation, according to informedimmigrant.com.
But President Trump put the program in jeopardy in September. He announced a March 5 deadline, after which no one can renew or or submit an application.
A week before the the Trump Administration’s deadline the Supreme Court announced they would not hear a California case concerning the integrity of the DACA program. As a result, the case returned to the ninth circuit. The court ordered an injunction that made the deadline obsolete. While it didn’t create a solution, Praeli described the injunction as a “small victory.”
Timeline by Thamar Bailey
“What the court petition did was that out of a California injunction say that the way in which the Trump administration ended the program wasn’t right and therefore the administration had to accept renewal applications,” Praeli said. “But what it did not do was say that the administration had to accept new applications.”
FWD.us is currently working on is assisting businesses and universities to support their DACA recipients.
“It’s someone’s well being being turned upside down, but it’s also people within their communities, their circle that’s affected by this,” Praeli said. “So if you’re an employee your employer is now losing someone and that’s [a] cost to business. If you’re a teacher at a university you would be potentially losing a student.”
Several universities have showed their support for DACA recipients by paying for legal fees associated with applying for and renewing DACA permits as well as offering scholarships.
More than 700 college and universities signed on to the Pomona College statement, symbolic of their support for DACA students, otherwise known as DREAMers, stating their refusal to share information on DACA students and refusing to use campus enforcement for deportation.
Quinnipiac University was not one of those universities, according to Executive Vice President and Provost Mark Thompson.
“The concern that the president had with signing on to the [Panoma statement] was about the potential political backlash against those institutions that were signing on to that agreement,” Thompson said. “So he didn’t want to position our students who are DREAMers to potentially in any way be impacted by any backlash that would come from the federal government.”
While Quinnipiac didn’t officially sign the Panoma statement, Thompson said the university follows the same sentiment. In an email addressed to the Quinnipiac community on Sept. 6, 2017, Thompson reaffirmed the universities commitment to diversity and inclusion.
“DACA students are an integral part of our community,” Thompson wrote. “The university does not share private information about our students in accordance with the Family Educational and Rights of Privacy Act (FERPA). While the university is bound to comply with state and federal laws, enforcement of federal immigration policy primarily rests with federal authorities.”
Praeli, who graduated in 2016, believes the university could have firmer policies. During her time at the university she noted she had great professors, but lacked a sense of community. Instead, she had to make her own network of professors and faculty members to support herself.
According to Thompson, the Quinnipiac Department of Multicultural and Global Education would’ve been in charge of facilitating such a network and community. He added that he believes this is something the university ought to do if it’s not being done already.
Community is only one issue of various academic barriers that DREAMers have to face, Praeli said.
In Connecticut prior to 2011, even if a student had lived in the state their whole life they wouldn’t be eligible to pay in-state tuition. It wasn’t until Governor Malloy signedAn Act Concerning Access to Postsecondary Education in July 2011, that undocumented immigrants who met the criteria were eligible for in-state tuition.
Praeli also explained that DREAMers are not privy to financial aid and state funding in the forms of grants and loans, which is why various private institutions have created scholarships for DREAMers.
Quinnipiac doesn’t offer any scholarships specifically designated for DREAMers, according to Dominic Yoia, the university director of financial aid. However, Yoia said all students are considered for academic scholarship, regardless of their U.S. citizenship status.
While there’s no official count of the number of DACA students attending Quinnipiac, Thompson suspects the number is relatively low.
However, executive director of the Albert Schweitzer Institute and political science professor Sean Duffy said regardless of the number of DACA students, the university should provide better assistance for them, especially because there’s a reality that many of Quinnipiac students have mixed-status or undocumented families while they are citizens themselves.
“It would be nice if our university actually had more than just to say ‘oh if you’re concerned about this then go to the office of multiculturalism and global education and they’ll be able to refer you to some resources in the community that may be able to help,’” Duffy said. “That’s really a kind of weak kind of support in my mind.”
The department of multicultural and global education was unavailable for comment for this story.
Quinnipiac’s Spring Break has passed, but the memories the students have made will last them a lifetime. Below is a compilation of pictures from some of the students’ experiences during their time off.
One of the many beaches visited by Chris Brachlow during his trip to Costa Rica.
Another view of the beach during the sunset.
Christina Bruno had the opportunity to visit the Sistine Chapel in Vatican City.
Bruno also had an opportunity to visit the Colosseum in Rome.
Megan Thorogood had the chance to visit Ireland during St. Patrick’s Day.
Not every student had to go abroad to have an unforgettable experience, as Danielle Yostpille spent her time at Disney World in Florida.
Lauren Clearly was also able to go to Ireland, taking in some of the breathtaking scenery to country has to offer.
There were also some students who used their time off to attend a service trip to Haiti. Cassandra Krebbs had the opportunity to work with some of the communities in the country.
