Tag Archives: parents

FEATURED
Parents Talk: Winter Break Controversy ’12/’13

We’re now four weeks into break with one left to go. As a senior back on campus, I can tell you it seems a lot of people have found excuses to come back early. Is break too long, or does it offer the optimal amount of time to get a job, an internship, work on one’s thesis, or do something else productive? Regardless of how you feel, your parents sure have opinions. Some gems from the “parents_talk” listserv:

“At this moment we Californians are blessed with a relaxing, sunny (as in no snow) riotous (bumpy backroad stand-up-in-the-jeep) vacation with our daughter who is also preparing for her upcoming “internship” when we return to the Bay Area. It couldn’t be sweeter. That said, in speaking to her about the viewpoints expressed here, she’d gladly “trade” several winter break days for a couple of extended weekends with no classes to get on top of the voluminous workload at school…just because she loves it so much!!” – P’15

“If you live in a rural college town that is also dormant for part of Wes’s break, there are no museums open. Many local businesses also close. The local college kids sew up any internships, via long-standing program relationships. Sleeping, movies, reading, and walks are fine for a few weeks, as is visiting, but eventually sibs and high school friends head back to school. And the Wes kid – is – still – on – break. It’s like waiting for Godot.” – P’15

“My daughter works SO hard on her double majors at Wes that she both needs and benefits from the downtime over winter break. I know she is going back re-charged and ready to give her best for the spring semester and have no problem with the well deserved rest.” – P’?

“The time away has afforded my son the opportunity to experience unique travel and service programs related to his life and learning at Wes. He is currently in Africa, and is working with the people in rural areas, as well as with the small businesses looking to launch successful entrepreneurial ventures. I think this is an important part of his learning experience.” – P’14

Also of note, Roth mentioned “thinking now about new January programs” in his latest blog post. Read past the jump for more thoughts from our parents. Also, as always, please share your thoughts in the comments section.

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EVENT
Gag Reflex Homecoming Weekend Show

Gag Reflex, Weseyan’s oldest improv comedy group, presents their fun-for-the-whole-family Homecoming show:

We live in a dark world. Take a break from the yelling and the screaming and the “what do you mean this isn’t Yale’s second campus??” conversation, by taking your family to watch some good old American improv comedy.

Date: Friday, October 19th,
Time: 7 pm
Place: World Music Hall
Bring: Families!

EVENT
Apply to Work for Homecoming & Family Weekend 2012

Want to escape from your parents/make some bank during homecoming? Well… (from Alumni & Parent Relations Interns):

Have you ever wanted to…
Meet alumni and parents from around the world?
Make money, friends and gain a whole new perspective on life at
Wesleyan?
Drive a shuttle van around campus and use a walkie-talkie?
AND get a FREE Wesleyan T-Shirt?

Apply now to be part of Homecoming/Family Weekend 2012. Student workers play an integral role in the weekend by greeting guests at the registration site, assisting with activities and event preparation, escorting guests around campus in shuttle vans, and much more! 

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Roth and Elaine, Sitting in the TimesCenter

F-U-N-D R-A-I-S-I-N-G.

Remember that time President Roth ’78 enjoyed some bodacious chilling with HIMYM homeboys Carter Bays ’97 and Craig Thomas ’97 at the Paley Center for Media in L.A.? Wesleyan’s YouTube team was good enough to upload it and throw it on the Wesleyan main page. Roth’s well-documented high-profile schmoozing continues this week with an interview with Seinfeld costar and Wesleyan parent Elaine Julia Louis-Dreyfus P ’14, who premiered the first episode of her new HBO show, Veep, at The TimesCenter in New York. As Roth explains it in his slightly tangled logic,

Why am I here to see Julia Louis-Dreyfus? Because, of course, Julia Louis-Dreyfus is part of the Wesleyan family! Because she’s making culture! And that’s what the Wesleyan family does!

Word, brah! And lest you doubt that Ms. Louis-Dreyfus is a card-carrying member of the Wesleyan family, the Seinfeld actress gets all Proud Mother on her son ’14 (“Wesleyan was his absolute first choice . . . I screamed with happiness and then I wept like a baby”) and implores audience members to “open your wallets and give all of your money to Wesleyan University.” There’s no need for subtlety when you’re in the Wesleyan family.

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Parent Complaint Hits ASHA Sexual Health Presentation

For the past fifteen years or so, members of ASHA—Wesleyan’s AIDS and Sexual Health Awareness group—have been visiting Durham’s Coginchaug High School to provide workshops on sexually transmitted diseases and complement the high school’s sexual health curriculum. Now, the program has been called into question after a single parent complaint following the group’s April 13 presentation.

“I see this as a perversion of what sex is supposed to be,” said the parent, who spoke to CT Patch on condition of anonymity. “This coming in a health class, I don’t see anything healthy about what they were taught.”

There’s more, too. According to the parent, topics in the class presentation included erotic urination and fetishes:

The parent, who asked not to be identified, said her daughter came home upset after discussion during the workshop moved to subjects such as “foot fetishes” and “urinating on your partner.”

“My daughter had no idea,” the parent said. “She was shocked, she was very upset.”

The parent, who called herself a “devout Catholic,” told Patch while she does not oppose sex education being taught in the classroom she felt the manner in which the group presented the topic was inappropriate.

ASHA members were asked not to return to the school last Tuesday; according to the high school principal, Andre Hauser, the school’s relationship with ASHA is being reevaluated:

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MUSIC
Ono Homecoming A Capella Concert TONIGHT

From Batman ’12:

Stop by Exley Lobby at 7 pm on Saturday, November 5 and hear Onomatopoeia’s new and improved set list!  We’ve got 5 new members to welcome, and would love for you to join!  Def bring your parents.

Date: TODAY
Time: 7 pm
Place: Exley Lobby
Get ready: to jizz your pants

EVENT
Randy Newman –> Wes –> Parents’ Weekend –> Wat?

“You’ve got a friiiieeeend in… Green Street Arts Center?”

So, uh, this just in from my parents. Randy Newman P ’14, the legendary singer-songwriter and six-time Grammy winner behind Sail Away and other masterpieces (or, to some, the dude from that Toy Story song), is Wesleyan-bound on November 4th, the Friday night of Parents’ Weekend. Newman will be playing a benefit show in Memorial Chapel for the Green Street Arts Center, performing “songs from throughout his career in intimate solo piano arrangements.”

Tickets are on sale now: $25 for students, $50 for general admissions, $100 for “preferred seating and a signed CD.” Not so bad, when you consider that it’s Randy Newman and all proceeds go towards Green Street’s After School Arts & Science Program and your parents really want that signed CD anyway.

What-a-week for breaking-news visitors: Antonin Scalia and most of Sleater-Kinney and Randy Newman, oh my. Add to that list the uninvited Steven Spielberg-lookalike crashing Argus production night tonight (thanks for coming, P-Safe) and you’d have a hell of a Spring Fling lineup.

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Family Weekend Employment Opportunity

If you’ve always wanted to get paid to use a walkie-talkie around campus, this is probably your big break. From our Office of Alumni and Parent Relations interns:

Have you ever wanted to…

  • Meet alumni and parents from around the world?
  • Make money, friends and gain a whole new perspective on life at Wesleyan?
  • Drive a shuttle van around campus and use a walkie-talkie?
  • and get a free Wesleyan T-Shirt?

Apply now to be part of Homecoming/Family Weekend 2011. Student workers play an integral role in the weekend by greeting guests at the registration site, assisting with activities and event preparation, escorting guests around campus in shuttle vans, and much more!

Continue reading →

To Wesleyan Parents, Re: Argus Article

Good afternoon. This here be your main man, frostedmoose.

Just a quick note: It has recently come to my attention – through a cursory reading of the most recent Argus, or more specifically, this article about Wesleying – that parents of both Wesleyan students and potential Wesleyan students have not only been consistently using this blog as a resource, but are also greatly encouraged to do so by multiple layers of the school including its administration.

Now, our Dear Leader Zach might have his own opinions about this, but I for one find this a wonderful little predicament, and I wholeheartedly welcome you – the parent, the care-giver, the tireless savant who spent some 18 years producing and raising a little hellspawn and then had the audacity to trust us the Wesleyan community with the realization of your offspring – to our esteemed and warm readership.

Or, to put it in more simple terms:

Oh hello, to all you moms out there.

Happy Friday, Wes!

Wesleyan Community Demands a Staff Position Dedicated to Sexual Violence

The following is also published as a Wespeak in today’s Argus. Keep an eye out for a response from the administration:

The one-year anniversary of Johanna Justin-Jinich’s murder is fast approaching. This Thursday, May 6th will mark for the Wesleyan community one year that has passed since we lost Johanna in what was undeniably one of the most horrific acts of violence this campus has, and ever will, experience. Her murder was a hate crime, a ruthless act of gender violence and anti-Semitism.

Gender violence is a persistent problem on this campus, as was once again brought to the fore by the recent Wespeaks written by students who have been sexually assaulted at Wesleyan, as well as those written by staff and students calling for greater administrative accountability to issues of gender violence prevention and response. Additionally, at the forum on campus violence on Tuesday, April 27th, students, staff, and alumni came together to discuss possible improvements to Wesleyan resources.

Students have been working with the university for years to improve University policy, response, and prevention around issues of sexual and gender violence on campus but still have found little sustained administrative support. The only way more effective resources, policies, and prevention efforts can be put into place is to establish a full-time staff position that would be responsible for advocating on behalf of survivors of sexual and gender violence, heading sustained prevention efforts, and helping all members of the Wesleyan community work together to build a campus that is safe for everyone. Safety means a community in which everyone is accountable for creating an environment that promotes respect, consent, critical thinking, and sex-positivity.

Persistent student pressure on the administration resulted in the creation of the Sexual Assault Response Team (SART) Intern, but this position alone cannot adequately address a campus climate of gender violence. The intense responsibilities of the position are too demanding for any one student to carry out effectively. Although there are various support systems in place for students (i.e. the faculty/staff on SART & OBHS), it is unfair and unsustainable that the only person on campus who is paid to be specifically knowledgeable about sexual assault and gender violence is a ten hour per week student position that isn’t even written into a specific departmental budget. The Intern position currently gets its funding through the SBC.

The University has a responsibility to invest in a staff position which would allow us to address this pervasive violence. This isn’t a question of available funding, but a question of priorities. Comparable schools such as Barnard, Amherst, Trinity, Bates, Bard, Skidmore, Bowdoin, Colorado College, Lewis and Clark, Whitman, and Brown have invested in at least one staff position, and it’s time for Wesleyan to follow suit.

The above document circulated via the internet for only three days and, in that time, received formal support from 536 members of the Wesleyan community: 405 students, 47 alum, 37 parents/family members, and 27 members of the Wesleyan faculty/staff.

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