Keepin' It Fit … Downtown

By wpengine | December 5, 2003

January means New Year’s resolutions, and losing 10 pounds tends to be high on most people’s lists — especially after weeks of gorging on Christmas cookies and latkes and downing eggnog. Luckily, Cornell students have their pick of fitness centers when it comes to shedding those extra pounds.

Starting in January, they will have another option.

The Finger Lakes Fitness Center is set to open early next year in the lower level of the Ithaca Center on the Commons. The shopping center also houses stores such as Easy Street and Mountain Edge Outfitters along with several restaurants.

“The idea is that once you come down here, you can incorporate many things in your visit. If students come down to do a little shopping or use the library here or to eat, they could incorporate working out with that,” said Susan Whitaker, marketing director for the Ithaca Downtown Partnership.

The new fitness center will occupy 400 square feet of space and include new shower and locker-room facilities. Programs to be offered include yoga, strength training and aerobics with an emphasis on personal training.

“We are committed to giving everybody the opportunity to achieve their own optimum conditioning levels. Emphasis will be placed on all levels of fitness, suiting the needs of first-time as well as veteran fitness enthusiasts,” said Dan Stehm, the new facility’s owner.

Stehm added that he hopes Cornell and Ithaca College students will look at the Finger Lakes Fitness Center as an opportunity to get off campus.

“Its location in the heart of downtown is purposeful. We want to target employees of the downtown area as well as people who live in the surrounding downtown neighborhoods,” he said.

Currently, most Cornell students use Cornell fitness centers on campus, Courtside Fitness Center in East Hill Plaza and City Health Club, located downtown, and many are satisfied with the options offered at those facilities.

“I like going to Cornell fitness [centers] because I like going to the gym when I’m on campus — I can make it part of my day,” said Bill Gensheimer ’04.

Several students said they would consider making a switch. Some are also looking forward to a new addition to their list of available fitness facilities.

“I am really dissatisfied with the old equipment at Courtside,” said Jessica Greenspan ’04. “Only two of the eight ellipticals are new.”

“If it’s cheaper than Courtside, I’d join,” said Alyssa Cohen ’04.

Stehm says he will offer student rates, but he had not yet determined what those would be. In addition, he will be hiring students as trainers, receptionists and fitness instructors.

Archived article by Stacey Delikat

String of Break-ins Plague Cascadilla

By wpengine December 15, 2003

A series of break-ins has upset life in Cascadilla Hall, where three female students’ rooms were broken into over Thanksgiving break, sparking anger and fear among residents. According to an e-mail sent to the Cascadilla community by Scott Helfrich, the residence hall director, there is no evidence that the rooms were forcibly entered, and very little was taken from the rooms. In a subsequent e-mail sent to Cascadilla residents and obtained by The Sun, Helfrich reported that one of the women whose room was entered, Marsha Lien ’04, requested that certain information about her case be shared. The e-mail explained that although “almost nothing was taken from the room,” Lien “found that her bed and pillow had been urinated on and the comforter pulled back over the mattress to conceal this situation.” According to Lien, she first noticed that something was wrong as she came back to her room Sunday night after break. Lien said that she saw that the door was crooked, and when she entered her room she found that the door had been unlocked and the lights turned on. When she asked her resident advisor if anyone had been in her room, her R.A. — who had heard of two similar cases — asked her to check her bed. Lien lifted her comforter to find a “huge stain.” “First I did not know what the hell it was,” Lien said, explaining that the previous cases had included instances where the perpetrator had ejaculated in the room. Because the Cornell University Police Department is conducting an investigation into the break-ins, information is limited. Helfrich warned in his e-mail that “some information will remain confidential and not be inclusive of the full situation.” Linda Grace-Kobas, interim vice president for communications and media relations, did say however that “it doesn’t appear that robbery was the prime motive.” Adam Brown ’04, whose friend lived in one of the invaded rooms, said that residents in Cascadilla continue to remain frightened by the break-ins. He said that one of his friends, an R.A., moved out for about one and a half weeks and only recently moved back in. “Once R.A.s start moving out of dorms, it’s a really bad sign,” Brown said. Brown reported that his friend whose room had been entered went home because of the incident. His friend, whom he said was “pretty shaken up about it,” asked not to be contacted. Brown and Lien both expressed extreme disappointment with the authorities’ response to the incidents. “I’m not very happy with [the response],” Lien said. “They’re very hush-hush.” She also said that the CUPD in particular were very unclear to her in regards to the other incidents. “I think that everyone should know,” she said. “Many of my friends that live there are worried that the police are doing little to protect them and to protect the evidence, and many feel they are not safe staying there,” Brown wrote in an e-mail to The Sun. The CUPD continue to conduct an investigation and “have asked that people keep their eyes open” for suspicious behavior, according to Grace-Kobas. She added that authorities are working with Campus Life, but both she and Helfrich said they cannot comment on the investigation because it is ongoing. Helfrich wrote in one of his e-mails that authorities were not yet sure how the perpetrator entered the rooms, but that “no master keys for the community have been reported missing to the knowledge of Cornell University Police or Community Development.” Helfrich said that although residents in Cascadilla are more cautious of letting strangers into the hall, he felt that the general atmosphere “is not that different from last year at this time.” Lien, however, said that she and many of her friends are “scared shitless” and will not sleep in their rooms over the weekends. She said that her floor is especially cautious both because it is the first floor — a high traffic area — and also because most of the residents there are female. Lien expressed frustration that Campus Life would not let her or other residents install deadbolts in their rooms, but said that she plans on installing one anyway. She also said that many of her friends push furniture against their doors at night as an added precaution and that she has taken to going to sleep with a knife. According to Grace-Kobas, the CUPD have not yet identified any suspects. She also could not predict what punishments the perpetrator would eventually face if caught, as that would largely depend on charges brought. Grace-Kobas further explained that because new evidence and information from questioning often arises once a criminal has been apprehended, it is too soon to know yet what the charges will be. Helfrich and Kobas have asked anyone with information about the break-ins to contact the CUPD at 255-1111.Archived article by Yuval Shavit
Schwab Named Dean of Law School

By wpengine December 12, 2003

Last Friday, President Jeffrey S. Lehman ’77 announced that Prof. Stewart J. Schwab, law, has been named the new Allan R. Tessler Dean of Cornell Law School. Schwab, replacing Lee Teitelbaum who resigned last winter after serving since 1999, inherits an “extraordinarily healthy” institution, according to Kevin Clermont, the James and Mark Flanagan Professor of Law and a member of the committee that recommended three candidates to Lehman. The committee was formed last spring and has met weekly this semester, looking for a candidate who had administrative experience, ambition, character, scholarship and commitment to teaching and students, Provost Biddy (Carolyn A.) Martin told The Sun earlier this summer. A list of five finalists was released in early October, and that list was then whittled down to three recommendations from which Lehman chose from. Before that final list, however, each finalist took part in a two-day interview process, allowing two non-University based candidates get a feel for the campus and Cornell in general. “I was honored to have been chosen as a finalist,” Schwab said, the last of the five to be interviewed. Schwab is now responsible for 45 full-time faculty members and about 600 students in the school’s J.D. degree program and another 60 additional students in the masters of laws degree program. “I am confident that, with his strong leadership, the Law School will make ever greater contributions to our understanding of the law and legal institutions and will continue to prepare our students for lives of accomplished service within a rapidly changing profession,” Lehman said. Schwab’s credentials indicate a range of experience and knowledge suitable for the position. He earned an M.A. in labor economics and a Ph.D. in economics from the University of Michigan, after which he clerked for the Hon. J. Dickson Phillips of the U.S. Court of Appeals and U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Sandra Day O’Connor before joining the law school faculty in 1983. At Cornell, Schwab has taught courses on subjects ranging from comparative labor, contracts in a global society and corporations to empirical studies of the legal system, torts and law and economics. He’s also moonlighted at various other positions, serving as distinguished visiting professor at the University of Nebraska Law School this spring and a Fullbright senior scholar at the Australian National University’s Centre for Law and Economics in 1998. He’s also been a visiting fellow at Oxford University’s Centre for Socio-Legal Studies, and has served in various other positions at Victoria University, University of Virginia Law School, Duke University and the University of Michigan. Schwab has also written widely, authoring with Samuel Estreicher Foundations of Labor and Employment Law and also writing Employment Law: Cases and Materials alongside such legal luminaries as Steven L. Willborn and John F. Burton, Jr. His writings have been featured in the law journals of Yale University, University of Chicago, New York University, William and Mary, University of Michigan and Cornell. He currently is the co-editor of the Journal of Empirical Legal Studies. He has also served as a consultant for the World Bank on reform of labor and employment laws throughout the former Soviet Union and has been called upon for consultation for ERISA, ESOP and Title VII litigation. “Stewart brings to the position 20 years of teaching and scholarship in areas that have enormous significance and breadth. He is one of our most productive and distinguished legal scholars and is widely respected by his colleagues. I look forward to working with him,” Martin said. The members of the search committee were Martin; Walter Cohen, vice provost; Stephen Crane, chair, Law School Advisory Council; Prof. Theodore Eisenberg, the H. A. Mark Professor of Law; Prof. Stephen Garvey, law; Prof. Barbara Holden-Smith, law; Prof. Sheri Lynn Johnson, law; Prof. Annelise Riles, law; Prof. Faust Rossi, the S. S. Leibowitz Professor of Trial Technology and Prof. Carol Grumbach, senior lecturer and director, Lawyering Program. Archived article by Michael Morisy