University administrators are considering designating Hereford College as a housing option solely for first-year students beginning next year. Hereford residents discussed their opinions on the possible change at last night’s Hereford Student Senate meeting.

This discussion arose in light of the University’s ongoing attempt to rebuild the Alderman Road first-year dormitories, University spokesperson Carol Wood explained, noting that the Alderman Road buildings are “coming down more quickly then expected” and the University needs somewhere to house first-year students during the construction process.

Wood emphasized that the University has not made a final decision about Hereford’s future residents yet but is hoping to have a decision by the end of this week.

Hereford College President Nancy Takahashi said if Hereford is designated as first-year student housing only, it will impact Hereford’s upperclass residents, who will need to find alternative housing for next year.

Takahashi added that the possible change is, and should be, a concern to students in the residential college. She also noted that she welcomes students’ input into the decision.

At the Senate meeting held last night, students expressed concern about the University’s neglect in informing students of the possible change. Students reported having no knowledge of the possible change until they tried to renew their rooms for next year, only to find that they had been “displaced.”

“Just imagine that this was happening to you, suddenly having your home abolished out from under you with no warning,” said fourth-year College student Zack Yezek, a Hereford resident, at the meeting. “The way Housing [Division] has acted is frankly dishonorable, taking no time to interview students and listen to their concerns beforehand.”

Third-year Engineering student Esteban Fuentes, a Hereford resident, noted that the change, if it occurs, would not affect him because he is planning to move off-Grounds next year, but that it would impact those students who wish to stay in the residential college.

“Hereford is sort of like a sanctuary for some people,” he said. “Where else are they going to go?”

First-year College student Eric Kim, a Hereford resident, said for him, the change would limit his housing options for next year, and therefore he is personally against the possible change.

“I’m trying to live off Grounds next year but if I can’t find any houses off Grounds, Hereford would be my first choice,” Kim explained, noting that Hereford is his first choice for on-Grounds housing because he likes the available bus transportation and having Runk Dining Hall so close to his dormitory.

First-year College student Charles Joynson, a Hereford resident, on the other hand, said he could see how having only first-year students in Hereford could be beneficial by allowing them to create a strong first-year community.

During the meeting students voiced several ideas for conveying their opinions on the upcoming decision, including forming a group to speak with the Housing Division as well as sending letters to parents describing how the situation was handled.

“What we want to know is if there is anything we, as current Hereford residents, can do to keep Hereford and still satisfy housing needs for next year,” Yezek said. “What could we do to make everyone happy?”

The Advancement Project of the NAACP sued the Virginia State Board of Elections, Gov. Tim Kaine and the electoral boards and general registrars of Richmond, Norfolk and Virginia Beach Monday for inadequate preparation for the large voter turnout expected at polls next week.

According to the complaint submitted to the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Richmond Division, despite “record registration numbers, and the Commonwealth’s acknowledgement of the increased turnout on November 4th, the Commonwealth and its jurisdictions are inadequately prepared.”

This same complaint also states, “the allocation of polling place resources is plainly irrational, non-uniform and likely discriminatory.”
This lawsuit against Virginia governmental institutions springs from Advancement Project analyses that show “all localities are under-resourced, and in the three localities of the lawsuit, under-allocation had a disparate effect in precincts with high percents of voters of color,” Advancement Project staff attorney Francisco Maldonado-Ramírez said.

State Board of Elections Chair Jean Cunningham contradicted the claim of any racial discrimination in polling place resource allocation, saying that if long lines occur, they will be long “for all Virginians, not just minorities.”

Cunningham added that, Virginia will have far more poll workers than ever before for the upcoming election and twice the amount of equipment as in 2004.

Susan Pollard, director of communications for the State Board of Elections agreed, noting the Board has been preparing for the influx of voters. This year, the board “launched a campaign called ‘Ensure the vote’ to get 10,000 new officers of election and alternates,” Pollard said. “This year 30,000 people are serving as officers of election.”

As a result, she noted, the commonwealth has 10,000 more election officers now than in 2004.

In correlation with the increase in the number of election workers, there has been a 77-percent increase in polling machines statewide versus what was available in the 2004 election, Pollard said. The Board allocates polling machines according to Virginia law, which “requires one machine per 750 registered voters and one privacy booth for every 425 registered voters.” Pollard explained. “Any additional machines are determined by locality.”

The Advancement Project does not dispute that each Virginia locality upholds these standards but instead claims that this minimum requirement is an unreasonable ratio, Maldonado-Ramírez explained.

“A touch-screen voting machine can’t handle 750 people in a day ­— not even close,” Maldonado-Ramirez said. “A touch screen can’t be expected to handle more than a few hundred people in a day. They’re just not fast enough [with the] time it takes people to vote, check in, and show ID.” He added that the current standard is a “recipe for bottlenecks.”

While the NAACP believes that areas such as Richmond, Norfolk and Virginia Beach are not prepared for the mass voter turnout expected Nov. 4, Charlottesville General Registrar Sheri Iachetta does not foresee major problems for city residents on Election Day.

“We have extra machines, brand new electronic pollbooks and different parking arrangements,” Iachetta said, noting that the city’s decision to double the number of available voting machines and to purchase a new voting system stems from the reality that many citizens have registered to vote for the first time.

The office is also working to encourage people to carpool or walk to the polls, she noted. The city also has established Nov. 4 as a fare-free transit bus day.

Last night Student Council passed a resolution supporting the creation of the Community Garden Project, a project proposed by the Environmental Sustainability Committee that aims to create a sustainable on-Grounds garden during the spring semester.

“We want to educate people on growing sustainable food and teaching them where their food comes from,” Environmental Sustainability Committee member Connie Migliazzo said. “We want this to be something that is used to bond the Charlottesville community and the University community.”

The garden would be used to grow produce that could be used to benefit the Charlottesville community, Environmental Sustainability Committee member Sarah Yates said.

“Our vision is to have the produce go to lower-income people in the Charlottesville community,” Yates said. “That might take several different forms; for example, there is a homeless shelter that is being started downtown that would open this summer which would coincide with when our produce would start coming out, and they’re really interested in serving local produce.”

In addition to providing produce for those in need in Charlottesville, committee members also hope the garden will be an educational opportunity for the University community. Migliazzo explained that the academic aspects of the program are based on a garden that currently exits at Yale University.

“There is a program at Yale that is exactly like this, where they have an academic component where they now have a concentration in sustainable agriculture under their environmental sciences department and they have courses in the garden,” Committee Co-Chair Melissa Warnke said. “The garden is not only used for extracurricular activities but also for classes.”  

Committee members also hope to use this academic component of the garden to ensure they have volunteers to tend to the garden during the summer months, when many University students are not in Charlottesville.

University Landscape Architect Mary Hughes, who has been in contact with the committee, noted the importance of ensuring there are student volunteers to help with the garden during the summer.

“There is the seasonal problem considering the fact that our classes end in early May every year, and that’s just about time that you would start to plant the kind of summer crops that everyone most desires,” Hughes said. “There are also very few student workers during the summer … it will take a lot of planning to ensure they have a workforce here throughout the summer if they want to grow a summer garden and keep it because it runs contrary to normal class schedules.”

Migliazzo said the academic aspects of the project will hopefully increase summer participation in the project.

“We would want to have internships or work-study programs set in place by the time summer comes so we will have students who have an incentive to stay [during the summer].” Migliazzo said, adding that the committee is looking for an academic department interested in sponsoring a program like this one. The project cannot finalize a location or make concrete academic plans until the committee gains this support.

“We’re currently in the process of talking to the environmental sciences department and the department of urban and environmental planning and looking for institutional homes in both places so this [project] can become a part of those departments and hopefully gain more support,” Migliazzo said.

After committee members find an institutional home for the project, they will then be able to address the issue of location.

“We have three potential locations, and those conversations are still evolving.” Warnke said. Yates added that the location of the garden should be convenient for students and faculty.

“The location is tentative right now, but we definitely want it to be on Grounds because one of the most important things to us is accessibility to the people in the U.Va. community and to the Charlottesville community, and if they have to drive 30 minutes to get to the garden, that kind of defeats the purpose,” Yates said.

After Council passed this resolution during its regular meeting, it held a full-body meeting in the Newcomb Ballroom to discuss with the entire body all other projects and pieces of legislation Council has worked on during this semester.

As a result of collaboration between two Mid-Atlantic research networks announced Monday, the University soon will be able to draw upon an expanded network of research resources.

Virginia Tech announced that the Mid-Atlantic Terascale Partnership and the Mid-Atlantic Crossroads, research networks that serve as consortiums for research institutions in Virginia, Maryland and Washington, D.C., have joined together to improve and expand their networks, said Mike McPherson, University associate vice president and deputy chief information officer. The University currently uses the MATP network, which its officials helped to create six years ago.

The MATP network and the MAX network provide access to Internet2 and National LambdaRail, Internet-like networks that allow universities and government organizations to share these research resources in a collaborative manner, McPherson explained.  

Internet2 is a network dedicated solely to research and education allowing universities to connect more quickly than regular Internet connections would.

McPherson explained that while Internet2 is a shared network, NLR’s focus is to provide access to connections dedicated to universities unable to work on a shared network.

The collaboration between MATP and MAX, McPherson said, is about connecting these two organizations in a way that will allow each network to receive the benefits of the other. While MATP has the ability to allow its users to take advantage of Internet2 as well as NLR, MAX originally only had access to Internet2. The result of this, he explained, is a more efficient connection.

The collaboration, McPherson said, is about connecting the two networks to allow people to research from either Internet2 or NLR.

“This new collaboration will offer additional opportunities for science and technology research at the University as well as opportunities for faculty members to work with their colleagues in their region and across the nation more efficiently,” University spokesperson Carol Wood said.

As junior midfielder Jonathan Villanueva slipped behind the American defense unnoticed and threaded the ball past the diving goalkeeper and into the top left corner of the net to give Virginia a decisive 4-1 lead, the Cavalier faithful breathed a sigh of relief.
The Virginia men’s soccer team (9-5-1, 5-2 ACC) finally found its footing last night following a three-game winless streak, prevailing 4-2 against the Eagles (7-6-2) at home, and perhaps gaining some confidence as they head into their final two home-conference matchups of the regular season.

“We’ve had a three-game stretch where we haven’t gotten the results,” Virginia coach George Gelnovatch said. “I feel like, going into the last games of the ACC, we all knew this was important for a lot of reasons — for momentum and just for confidence.”

Overcoming the elements on a chilly and blustery night at Klöckner Stadium, Virginia managed to capitalize early on its offensive opportunities, something the squad struggled to do in its three-game skid. In close losses to Boston College and Duke and a tie with non-conference opponent Longwood, the Cavaliers outshot opponents 37-30 but managed to net only four goals.

Against the Eagles, however, Virginia put the ball away with ease. In just the seventh minute of action, freshman forward Brian Ownby put a dazzling move to beat two American defenders down the left side to the endline, drew out American freshman goalkeeper Matt Makowski and connected with Villanueva in the penalty area. Villanueva left the ball for junior forward Matt Mitchell, who scored on the empty net to give the Cavaliers an early 1-0 edge. After some back-and-forth play and a few missed chances by both sides — including a shot by Virginia sophomore forward Chase Neinken that banged off the crossbar — the Cavaliers again found the back of the net in the 33rd minute, when Ownby found the low corner after he was launched by a long ball from Villanueva.

“I think it was really important to get that early first goal, and the second goal was even bigger at halftime,” Gelnovatch said.

Although Ownby finished with a goal and an assist on the day, perhaps the Cavaliers’ biggest spark on offense came from Villanueva. A former U.S. under-20 Men’s National Team member as well as an ACC All-Freshman Team player in his first season at Virginia, he struggled as a sophomore, scoring just two goals and tallying only six assists on the year. The floodgates opened for him against the Eagles, however, as the junior midfielder was in on each of the four goals and scored his first two goals of the season. After he was credited for two assists on Virginia’s first two goals, Villanueva converted on a header in the 48th minute to give the Cavaliers a decisive 3-0 lead and scored again about 15 minutes later to put the final touches on the Virginia victory.

“It’s been a long time coming,” Villanueva said. “It’s finally good to get the monkey off my back.”

If Villanueva’s production continues, it could be especially important for the injury-ridden Cavaliers, who are in search of an offensive threat following the recent loss of freshman midfielder Tony Tchani. The squad’s leading scorer with nine goals on the year, Tchani suffered a partial ACL tear in last week’s tie with Longwood, and while his status for the season remains uncertain, the injury will require surgery at some point. Tchani’s injury followed a season-ending injury to fellow standout freshman Chris Agorsor, who tore his ACL Sept. 23 against Central Connecticut State.

Villanueva acknowledged that both Tchani’s and Agorsor’s absences have been physical and emotional losses for the team.

“Everyone on the team has to step up and take a little more leadership,” Villanueva said.

Without Tchani for the just the second time this season, the Cavaliers were not perfect last night; they allowed two American goals by freshman forward Jack Scott in a six-minute span of the second half. Overall, however, the win serves as a confidence-booster for Virginia heading into Friday night’s crucial ACC matchup against No. 6 Maryland.

“We scored some great goals, we managed the game, we moved the ball well,” Gelnovatch said. “Obviously I’m not happy with the two — what I think are — soft goals, but at this point, we’re just going to take the victory and get ready for Maryland.”

Et tu, NFL?

Late last week, news broke that a number of pro football players violated the league’s substance abuse policy. The big-ticket name was New Orleans Saints running back Deuce McAllister, but others included the Williams Wall, Minnesota’s defensive tackle combo of Kevin and Pat Williams.

The stain of steroids and other narcotics has already driven Major League Baseball into the shadow of the NFL. America’s pastime is no longer played on the diamond but on the gridiron.

Certainly the transgressions of McAllister and others do not even begin to compare to the rampant steroid abuse in professional baseball. When Peter Gammons sums up the history of baseball, he counts the early 1980s through the early 2000s as the Steroid Era. Every record is tainted, be it pitching, hitting, baserunning or fielding.

Most famously, of course, is the demise of Barry Bonds. Barry’s fall from grace should be in the Cliff’s Notes for hubris. It began in jealousy as he watched McGwire and Sosa soak up national headlines in their drug-fueled frenzy of a home-run battle, then suffocated his career into a collection of pulled hamstrings and mass public disdain.

Yes, the record books say he has hit more home runs than any other player in MLB history. And yes, there’s an argument to be made that even if he was using steroids, so were the pitchers he was hitting off of. But therein lies the problem.

Steroids have so thoroughly infested the Game That Ruth Built that even the simplest records are no longer simple. Every accomplishment of the last 20 years will, or at least should be, held in question. We may never know just how deep the parasite burrowed and instead just have to guess from the scars it leaves.

So for a football freak like me, even the slightest whiff of steroids near the NFL is enough to trigger sensations of dread and fear.

To its credit, the NFL has had a much tougher drug-testing policy than the MLB. The structural setup of the NFL has helped keep the enemy outside the gates for some time as well, while most Major League steroid-users began their habit somewhere in the minors, where tests were even more lax, hoping to get a leg up and a call to The Show, in the NFL, you’re in or you’re out, and if you’re in, you’re tested randomly and regularly.

More often than not, the only thing that shows up in football drug tests is the occasional trace of marijuana (paging Ricky Williams?). Occasionally, college prospects will test positive at the combine, like Northwestern’s Luis Castillo, who now plays with the San Diego Chargers, before the 2005 draft. The specter of substance-enhancers that reared its ugly head last week, however, changes the equation entirely.

The NFL Players Association needs to learn from the mistakes the baseball players’ union made. The MLB Players Association was so intent on protecting its members that it fought tooth and nail to keep drug testing out of baseball. In doing so, they’ve essentially chucked two decades of baseball history into the crapper.

If the NFLPA embraces tougher drug testing and tougher enforcement schedules — not as harsh as the “three strikes” policy in the MLB, but something with real deterrent value — it sends a message that the integrity of the game is professional football’s primary goal. Failing to do so could create a public opinion nightmare. Just ask MLBPA Executive Director Donald Fehr.

As athletes get bigger and yet still faster, as they get stronger and yet more agile, questions will invariably linger about whether all accomplishments were achieved with sweat, blood and God-given talent. With a little bit of luck, hopefully football fans will always be able to know the answer is yes.

And now, a brief aside to end this week’s installment: Since you’re reading this on Wednesday, Oct. 29, 2008, Election Day is less than a week away. Go. Vote. The Venable precinct may be a little nuts, but Momma Wiley and many other great volunteers will be there to help make sure everything goes as smoothly as possible.

When you do go vote and being an intelligent reader I know you will, keep in mind the new Virginia ban on campaign paraphernalia inside a polling location. If you have an Obama T-shirt, wear a U.Va. sweatshirt over it. If you’re rocking your McCain-Palin buttons, put them in your pocket for the five minutes you’re inside. Tell your friends to be careful about what they wear to the polls and be ready to throw on a poncho in case you forget.

That is all. Next week, back to your regularly scheduled programming.

The men’s and women’s swimming and diving teams are suiting up for their first home meet of the season today at the Aquatic & Fitness Center, where they will face off against one of their biggest rivals: Virginia Tech.

Last year in Blacksburg, the Cavalier men’s team won 172-128, and the women earned 188 points to the Hokies’ 110. As the score reflects, it was a powerful day for the Virginia women, who broke four pool records. The team of junior Mei Christensen, junior Katherine McDonnell, freshman Lauren Smart, and senior Kristen Wallace posted a 1:43.62 in the 200 medley relay. Other records were set by junior Jen Narum in the 1000 freestyle,senior Megan Evo in the 200 butterfly, and Christensen in the 200 backstroke.

Key swimmers from the men’s team in the teams’ last matchup were sophomore Matt McLean and junior John Azar. Azar helped the team with two wins in the 200 individual medley and the 200 breaststroke, while McLean boosted the Cavaliers’ score by winning the 100 and 200 freestyle events.

Though Virginia dominated the lanes last year, a team is never guaranteed continued success as a new season opens up, and the Cavaliers will have to work to grab another victory today. Virginia Tech is coming off an impressive effort against West Virginia last weekend which featured both its men’s and women’s teams winning by more than 90 points.

“I was very impressed with Virginia Tech’s performance this past weekend,” Virginia coach Mark Bernardino said. “They showed good early speed. The key to success for us is to lay with our depth, and we will have to swim well with our experienced upperclass athletes. All of our swimmers will have to be on the front edge of all of the races.”

Finding aggressiveness should not be a challenge with fifth-year senior Ryan Hurley back on the team. Hurley took last year off to train for the Olympic trials, so tough competition is nothing new to him.

“It’s tremendous to have him back,” Bernardino said. “He was one of the captains as a junior and elected captain again this year. He has NCAA, ACC Championship and international experience. He has an exceptional personality and great work ethic. He knows how to work with a team as a leader, and we desperately needed a national-class breaststroker, and he fits that bill very well.”

Bernardino is not the only person excited to have Hurley back on the team. Though the Olympic experience was undoubtedly rewarding, Hurley is glad to be competing with his teammates after being away from the collegiate swimming atmosphere for a year.

“It feels great,” Hurley said. “It’s definitely much more fun, exciting and a rewarding experience to be swimming with the team again.”

Hurley had standout performances in the 100 and 200 breaststroke events during the 2005-06 season, and he has only gotten faster. The team hopes that Hurley’s speed in the breaststroke leg of the 200 medley relay will help the Cavaliers advance past the Hokies in one of Tech’s strongest events.

“Tech has a great 200 medley relay,” Hurley said. “It’s faster than ours and it’s the first event of the meet. We’re looking to win that event and some of the sprint freestyle [races] because they’re known as sprinters, so it would be great to upset them in that event as well.”

That upset could be likely if the Cavaliers perform as strongly Saturday as they have so far this year. Virginia started the season off with two consecutive wins last weekend in South Carolina, defeating both South Carolina and ACC-rival Clemson in their home pools. The women’s team, seeded at a strong No. 10 in the nation, earned a 169-131 victory against Clemson, while the No. 15 ranked men left the Tigers in the dust with a score of 189-105.

The Virginia swimming and diving teams are going into Saturday’s meet ready to compete in hopes of earning the reputation as the stronger side of a notorious rivalry.

“They’re a solid team, but we’re really strong this year,” Hurley said. “I think we’re ready to make a pretty big statement Wednesday. I’m really optimistic on how well we’re going to do.”

Let’s play a game.

Let’s take a look at the college football standings and see which teams have a shot at finishing the season undefeated and heading to the national championship.

Only two teams go to the national title game. Right now there are eight undefeated teams: No. 1 Texas, No. 2 Alabama, No. 3 Penn State, No. 6 Texas Tech, No. 10 Utah, No. 11 Boise State, No. 18 Ball State and No. 19 Tulsa. The only game pitting two of these teams against each other is a showdown in Lubbock, Texas between Texas and Texas Tech this Saturday.

That means we could theoretically have seven undefeated teams at the end of the season. Seven! Since 2002 only once have there been more than three undefeated teams at the end of the regular season.

Of course, it’s likely that at least a couple of these teams will be upset in the remaining three or four weeks of their schedules, plus the conference championships. But that could still leave four or five teams with immaculate records.

Interestingly, it’s the four remaining undefeated major-conference teams that have the toughest shot at running the table. Texas and Texas Tech not only play each other but have some dangerous games looming. The Texas Longhorns face Kansas on the road, while the Texas Tech Red Raiders still have Oklahoma and Oklahoma State on the horizon, both of whom are ranked in the top 10. Not to mention there’s the Big 12 championship, which could very well host a rematch between the two Texas teams.

Alabama has a home game against Auburn and an away game against No. 15 LSU to topple before it can approach perfection. Penn State seems to have the easiest path to 13-0 — its biggest threat is a home match against No. 22 Michigan State — but the schedule is still no pushover.

Nevertheless, if Texas can overcome Texas Tech this Saturday, we might see the Longhorns and Penn State’s Nittany Lions in the Jan. 8 BCS title game.

But let’s suppose for a moment that each of the four teams from major conferences that are still undefeated suffer a loss before bowl bids are announced, and suppose Utah, Boise State, Tulsa and Ball State all finish off the season undefeated. Each of these teams has consistently been putting up convincing victories, so a prediction that these four win out isn’t quite as presumptuous as it might initially seem.

What would happen? Would each of these teams get a bid to one of the major BCS bowls? Would any of them get a nod for the title game?

As much as I love the underdog and as much as I think these teams should at least have a shot at a title if there was any justice in the world, it’s likely that none would head to the title game. It’s even possible Tulsa or Ball State would be locked out of the premier bowls, regardless if they finished their seasons with a bang.

Is that fair? On the one hand, these teams have conquered every challenge placed in front of them so far. Boise State and Utah in the past have proven that the mid-majors can hang with the big boys in bowl games.

On the other hand, each of these teams plays a patsy schedule compared to any team from a major conference. For a team from the Southeastern Conference or Big 12 to escape any season with just one loss and maybe some narrow victories is probably more of an accomplishment than someone wiping out a mid-major conference.

To put it another way, suppose I challenged my 10-year-old brother in a round of golf and beat him badly. Meanwhile, suppose my dad challenged Phil Mickelson to a round of golf and lost. My dad is still probably the better golfer. That he lost and I won is clearly irrelevant. Likewise, questions about football superiority aren’t simple questions to answer, even by looking at the loss and win columns.

And debates like this really do matter. Hypothetical who’s-better-than-whom arguments are a little bit different and more significant in college football than they are in the NFL or in college basketball since the outcome of your season in the NCAA football ranks is determined by polls.

On most levels of most sports, such polls and power rankings are just a fun distraction for small talk until the postseason rolls around. In college football, they define the postseason and thus the legacy of a team. How good people think a team is ends up being just as important as how good the team actually is.

In case you’re not familiar with how it works, a bunch of these polls and computer-generated rankings are rolled into one mega-ranking to determine who has a shot at the national championship and who gets considered for the big-money and big-coverage bowl games. This “mega-ranking” is known as the BCS ranking.

Taking a look at the current BCS rankings, it seems that any team from a major conference that finishes without a loss will get top billing for the title game and, should at least three of those four teams fall, then the one-loss teams — Oklahoma, USC and Georgia — are next in line to take a spot. Well below them are the other undefeated teams. A two-loss team like Ohio State or Missouri might even have a shot at sneaking in ahead of a undefeated team from a smaller conference.

Did I mention how silly all of this is, how I wish discussions like this didn’t have to occur? It would be so completely logical and elegant to set up a playoff bracket with the conference champions against each other.

If there’s one thing I hate, it’s the Dallas Cowboys. But if there’s two things I hate, it’s the Cowboys and college football’s postseason system. Any discussion about which NCAA football teams are the best and deserve a championship ultimately reach one conclusion: We don’t know and we can’t know until there’s a legitimate playoff.

Like I said at the beginning of the column, all of this guessing and projecting is just a game that you play. So much is unpredictable and so much changes that even guesses made in late December might be proven wrong by early January.

In the meantime, though, keep pulling for the Ball States and the Utahs out there. The harder these undefeated teams crash the BCS, the faster they’ll get the playoff system they deserve.

Students living in Hereford Residential College who have attempted to renew their housing arrangements for next year have found themselves assigned a rather disturbing label: “displaced student.” The University is currently unsure whether it can offer these students housing in Hereford next year, because the residential college may be disbanded and its buildings converted to first-year housing. The University needs to find additional first-year housing, and if it must do so in Hereford, then it seems unavoidable that these students be displaced. Still, the University should try to make the transition as easy as possible by announcing a decision soon.

University officials say they are still in the process of deciding what to do with Hereford next year, so they cannot tell Hereford residents what their housing situation will be yet. An e-mail to residents from Hereford Principal Nancy Takahashi stated, “The goal to reach a timely conclusion has unfortunately been complicated by staff illness.”

Though we are sincerely sympathetic to these health issues, the question of finding housing for the Class of 2013 is hardly unforeseen. Replacing Alderman Road dormitories with new buildings has been in the works for years now, so the University should have known how it was going to substitute for the buildings being torn down. The need to find alternative housing for first-year students is not sudden.

Hereford Residential College does seem like a logical place to locate these students. Had the University decided that when it planned the construction project, it could have phased out upperclassman housing during the last few years, allowing current residents to stay but not allowing new residents to move in. It could at least have warned Hereford residents their housing would soon disappear.

The University’s housing Web site guarantees residents the right to stay in on-Grounds housing and first priority should they want to stay in the same rooms. We wonder where the University plans to house these students if Hereford is no longer an option, but even if there is room in other housing areas, Hereford students had no reason to believe their housing would not be available next year, and they had every reason to assume they could remain at Hereford. If the University had known this was not the case, students who do not care for other on-Grounds housing options could have made arrangements for off-Grounds housing already.

Since it is a residential college, other housing options are not substitutes for Hereford. Though it has traditionally been a less cohesive community than Brown Residential College or the International Residential College, Hereford residents have recently changed that reputation to some degree through efforts such as the herb and vegetable garden planted last year. The appeal of the residential college environment is worth preserving — in Hereford’s case, it helps to make up for its remote location. Even if Hereford’s buildings are used for first-year housing, the University should seek to maintain the residential college in a new location.

By not planning adequately for a lack of first-year housing, the University has now left Hereford residents in a state of uncertainty at a time of the year when many of their peers are already making housing arrangements. Since the University has not yet made a decision, they do not know whether to find new housing or stay put. Regardless of the University’s decision regarding the fate of Hereford Residential College, it should be announced soon.

NEW YORK Times columnist Joshua Kurlantzick says in his travel article “36 Hours in Charlottesville, Va.” that “arriving in Charlottesville from the lush, rural Virginia countryside, you almost feel like you’ve stepped back into ancient Rome.” What follows is an elaboration of this statement, a description of Charlottesville as a city that is classical in appearance, European in feel, and quaintly Southern in taste. Kurlantzick relies on readers’ common assumptions of what this kind of culture implies in order to explain his perception of Charlottesville as some sort of ideal Southern paradise.

Conversely, take Saturday’s Culturefest, where more than 20 University CIOs performed dances, prepared food and put on a fashion show in order to demonstrate the customs and traditions of their respective cultures. What Culturefest lacked was a more inclusive view of culture. Organizations without an ethnicity in their title were absent from the program predominantly because students have come to perceive such an event as focusing on non-Western and non-white cultures only. James Burney, the co-director of the University Program Council’s Art and Enrichment Committee, which sponsored the event along with Student Council, said, “We sent the Culturefest invitation to pretty much everyone this year: IFC/ISC, Multicultural Greek Council, National Pan-Hellenic Council, and all CIOs and it was still the usual group of people.” Both of these cases — Kurlantzick’s elitist notion of culture and students’ notion of culture as something possessed by the non-white “other” — confirm that it is time to engage in a more universal dialogue about what exactly culture means.

Kurlantzick sticks to the high culture theme throughout his travel article, describing the downtown mall as a rich haven for artists, street performers, and musicians, peopled by casual diners relaxing at outdoor cafes. He also writes about unassuming farmhouses speckled throughout the rolling mountains, wineries whose regional vintage would make Thomas Jefferson proud, a “Gone With the Wind-style Southern mansion” (the Clifton Inn), and “dining amid the ruins” at the Palladio Restaurant in Barboursville. If I hadn’t lived here for the past four years, I wouldn’t recognize the place from the description, not because all of this doesn’t exist, but because the culture of Charlottesville is more than just fine wines and quaint cafes.

But it isn’t just what Kurlantzick says about the Charlottesville scene: it is also what he doesn’t say. Nowhere does he mention the city’s various music venues — save for Miller’s, at which he recommends catching the “famed bebop jazz trumpeter” John D’earth. The restaurants he recommends are all upscale regional gourmet in fare, and he omits mention of the dozens of other cuisines available to the weekend traveler. Finally, he suggests a stop at the Kluge-Ruhe Aboriginal Art Collection as a “fascinating detour” filled with “stark and sometimes inscrutable works of art.” The art museum, for the writer, is a detour rather than a stop along the way, a break from high culture and a peek into the exotic world of a cultural other.

I could go on about Kurlantzick’s perception of Charlottesville, but I think you get the picture. What his article amounts to in the end is an endorsement of the age-old model of Western cultural superiority, of columned buildings, presidential houses, and wineries as the quintessential definition of American high culture. Everything else is disregarded as an illegitimate tourist destination.

Similarly, for all the work Culturefest does to give CIOs the opportunity to make themselves visible to the University community, the divide between those who decide to participate and those who do not makes evident exactly what students think about culture. It is quite illuminating to look at who is on stage and who is in the audience. The physical divide between these two groups mirrors the unspoken divide that we live with everyday on Grounds, the divide between who we think constitutes a culture and who we think defines the norm.

The point is that culture continues to lack definition. For some, like Kurlantzick, high culture implies elite, European-style living or a Scarlett O’Hara-like outlook on Southern history. It’s the only culture that counts. And while Kluge-Ruhe may offer a glimpse into aboriginal life in Australia, that culture is something to be gawked at rather than enacted. It is intriguing, but for Kurlantzick, it is not attractive. For others, like some who attended Culturefest on Saturday, culture amounts to anything that is deviant from the mainstream. It is something to be gawked at and somehow understood by observing a dance, listening to a song, or reading a poster about another country. Neither definition is tenable, and both are highly dangerous.

Kurlantzick’s version of Charlottesville can easily be found if people come looking for it. Hopefully, however, that is not all that they will see. The same applies to Culturefest. While it is entertaining to watch the Indian Student Association dance for 10 minutes, such an act hardly counts as cultural enlightenment. So before we collectively commence once again to construct our own notions of a culture, we should take the time to think — and to talk — about exactly what culture means. If we are truly able to do this, we may arrive at some striking conclusions.

Amelia Meyer’s column appears Wednesdays in The Cavalier Daily. She can be reached a.meyer@cavalierdaily.com.