Students react to Penn Badgley, countdown to the runoff election, and Trump’s indictment
plus, potential severe weather on Election Day
Welcome back to ‘In the Loop’! It’s your newsletter team — Kate, Hailey, Cary, Citlali, Sam, Lauren, Bridget and Emily — here with the news you need to have a great week.
With less than 24 hours before polls close in Chicago, the city will soon know its next mayor and the 14 remaining city council members. Polls open at 6 a.m. tomorrow, but check out 14 East’s voter guide for day-of voter registration and voting locations.
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Today, students look back and reflect on last week’s popular “Can We Talk” event on campus featuring Gossip Girls and You star Penn Badgley. Voters in Chicago brace for severe weather as the National Weather Service says the area is at an “enhanced risk.” Plus, tornadoes swept the South and Midwest over the weekend which led to four deaths in Illinois and more in other states.
If you haven’t already, get out and vote tomorrow! With that, here’s the news.
Students React to “Can We Talk” with Penn Badgley
By Hailey Bosek
The first Tuesday back from Spring Break featured an event hosted by DePaul called “Can We Talk?” a discussion-based presentation hosted by Dr. Nura Mowzoon. This series, based on discourse of healthy communications, building relationships and approaching conflict, has been traveling to campuses around the country including trips to Arizona State University, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and San Diego State University.
The event was instantly popular, selling out its 553 seats within the first day it had been posted on DeHub. Room 120 AB had hundreds of students by the 4:30 pm start time, all straining in their seats to try and get a good view and picture of the star of the show Penn Badgley. Badgley moved to LA when he was 11, and grew up in the acting scene. He starred in Gossip Girls and currently plays Joe Goldberg, the delusional serial killer in the hit Netflix series You.
“I primarily went because my friend wanted to and because of Penn,” said Senior Sarah Gornatti, a DePaul student and attendee of the event. Gornatti explained that while she isn’t a huge fan girl like her friend, she still liked “Gossip Girl” and “You”.
The event was guided by a series of questions that Badgley and Dr. Mowzoon posed to the crowd. Several students stretched their hands to be called upon by Badgley to answer questions like “-what stops you from having meaningful conversations?” and “when are you more willing to hear the other side?”.
“I definitely think the event was super organized and I would deem it an absolute success in that regard. It was well put together, I loved the audience participation and it was easy to see and hear the speakers,” Gornatti wrote in a message to 14 East.
While Gornatti says the event was organized well, some students had fundamental issues with the content. Gornatti explained that she appreciated that the event was free, but felt like Penn’s presence was off-putting.
“I honestly don’t think I got a lot out of the event except for my newfound beef with Penn. He just kind of gave off the vibes that he’s a man that experienced empathy once and now thinks that makes him well versed on the intricacies of intersectionality,” Gornetti wrote. Other students had similar concerns with the fundamental core of the content.
“Dr. Nura tried her hardest and was very sweet, but I think this message that they had was not thought out enough,” wrote sophomore Lilly Staurt in a message to 14 East. Stuart also expressed concerns of Penn’s validity of facilitating conversations around these issues. She felt that no one really knew what they were showing up to in the first place.
“I think that the message of what the event was meant to be about should’ve been thought out a lot more, and then discussed to the people that were coming. The intro was also very vague. I think that they really meant to talk about was personal relationships and more things that are one-on-one but instead, it began to be a conversation about other very important issues,” wrote Stuart
Penn noted throughout the seminar that Dr. Mowzoon had more of authority on the topic, and his presence was to facilitate conversation and learning from it. Mariah Hernandez reported in a 14 East article published last week.
“I became really interested in this idea that personal transformation is intimately linked with social transformation and that we currently have this idea — understandably — that we complicate and politicize matters that sometimes are simple,” Badgley explained.
Badgley continued to write on a notepad throughout the event, noting things students brought up. The event had many people wanting to speak and went over the scheduled time to try to address more students. A follow-up event occurred on that following Friday, March 31 for students who wanted to continue the conversation. However, this was a much smaller event. An email was sent to registered students to clarify Penn would not be at the follow-up event.
“But overall, the whole thing would’ve been a lot better if they had better demonstrated, and explained what exactly the questions were going to be,” Stuart wrote.
DePaul News
By Cary Robbins
Listening session to combat religious intolerance on campus
Tuesday, April 11, DePaul will be hosting a listening session with a working group that will “explore the challenges and opportunities on our religiously diverse campus,” according to the DePaul Newsline. President Robert L. Manuel announced in January that he wanted to address religious intolerance on the campus, and plans to listen to the campus community in this session. The event will be held at 5:30 p.m. in Room 325 of the Lincoln Park Student Center. The listening groups will be a chance for administrators to learn from the DePaul community’s experiences, and other sessions have been arranged to listen to faculty, staff and student groups’ concerns. Read more about the event here.
DePaul’s 2023 Gnome Hunt
Have you always wanted to decorate, name and create a backstory of your very own gnome? Student organizations and DePaul offices are welcome to join the Gnome Hunt 2023 to adopt and build their own gnomes. The gnomes will then be hidden around the Lincoln Park and Loop campuses, where people will then be able to hunt for the gnomes from April 17-21. Sign-ups are currently open through April 5 at the Office of Student Involvement (LPSC 201) or the Loop Life Office (1st floor in the DePaul Center). Hints and pictures will be shared on the Office of Student Involvement’s social media sites for anyone wanting to take part in the hunt. Read more about how to get involved in the hunt here.
DePaul’s three-session management training series
DePaul is hosting a three-session training series for any DePaul faculty or staff managers looking to grow their skills and connect with other managers. The courses include goal setting and maintenance, performance appraisal process and ongoing feedback and coaching. They are a part of DePaul’s overall Management Foundations curriculum. Read more about the sessions and how to sign up with this link.
Lastly, here is your weekend sports update (March 31- April 2):
DePaul men’s tennis team lost 9-13 against VCU on Friday.
DePaul’s softball team won 15-6 against Providence on Friday.
DePaul women’s tennis team lost 5-2 against Xavier on Friday.
DePaul women’s tennis team lost 5-2 against Cincinnati on Saturday.
DePaul’s softball team won 9-5 against Providence on Sunday.
DePaul men’s tennis team lost 5-2 against Georgetown on Sunday.
Chicago Headlines
By Citlali Perez
Election Day and severe weather threats – Tuesday April 4th is the last day to get out to vote. Chicagoans will be deciding on the next mayor, and residents of 14 wards will be voting on their alderperson for this runoff election. Officials warn of severe weather threats for those who will be voting in person on Tuesday. More on the weather forecast from NBC 5 Chicago. Kelly Bauer with Block Club Chicago has more information on voting options for April 4th.
The wait for election results – Chicagoans will be waiting in anticipation for the election results after Tuesday, April 4th. However, the Board of Elections expects 90,000 mail-in ballots to be returned after 7 p.m on Monday, all vote-by-mail ballots postmarked by April 4 must be counted by Tuesday April 18. Fran Spielman with the Chicago Sun-Times has the story.
Greektown Starbucks workers become Chicago’s 8th unionized shop – Starbucks employees across the country are unionizing and demanding better pay and working conditions. More than 250 shops have unionized nationwide. Employees at the Greektown location (116 S. Halsted St.) voted Friday to unionize. As they prepare to negotiate their contract, one of their demands is for training on de-escalating and preventing dangerous situations as drug overdose and mental health crisis happen frequently. Kayleigh Padar with Block Club Chicago has the full story.
National Headlines
By Sam Freeman
Millions could lose their coverage on Medicaid – During the beginning of the pandemic in 2020, it was required that the state keep people on Medicaid, even for those who no longer qualified. However, that coverage is coming to an end. Beginning Saturday April 8, state officials across the country will be removing people from Medicaid who no longer qualify. The federal government estimates that about 15 million people will lose coverage, most of whom will likely be Black or Hispanic. The process of coverage removal is called “unwinding” and is estimated to take roughly 12-14 months to complete. Noah Weiland from the New York Times has more information.
Trump indicted – Former President Donald Trump was indicted by a Manhattan grand jury on Thursday. The grand jury has been hearing evidence about Trump’s involvement in the payment of hush money to porn star Stormy Daniels in 2016 during the final days of his first presidential campaign. One of Trump’s lawyers Susan R. Necheles said that Trump is expected to turn himself in and be arraigned on Tuesday. After that, he will likely be released because the indictment contains nonviolent felony charges. Jonah E. Bromwich, Ben Protess and William K. Rashbaum of the New York Times have the story.
States to improve school safety after Tennessee shooting – A school shooting in Tennessee last week left three children and three adults dead. Florida, New Jersey, New York, and Oregon are introducing bills that would require schools to install technology, such as video surveillance and panic buttons. Most of these bills have gained bipartisan support, providing a way to increase protection without political gridlock. Experts, however, argue that teacher safety training is a better and cheaper alternative. Claire Rush from the Associated Press has more information.
Tornadoes in the South and Midwest kill 32 – Severe storms caused destruction to the South and Midwest, killing 32 people. President Joe Biden issued a major disaster declaration, and the White House plans to provide federal resources to support recovery. The storm consisted of at least a dozen tornadoes with winds as high as 165 mph in Little Rock, Ark., according to the National Weather Service. The Associated Press has more information.
Hey, Check This Out!
With Featured Columnist Lauren Sheperd
Hello everyone, and happy Monday! I hope you all had a good first week of classes and are looking forward to warmer weather. This week, I’m going to talk about food (again) but not a restaurant. Instead, I want to give you a simple way to meal plan and grocery shop to save money, and time and eat healthy.
I made it my goal to start cooking at home more for a lot of reasons, but mainly to save money. I started with this goal a couple of weeks ago, and have since discovered a love for cooking. However, starting is hard and knowing how to plan out meals and grocery trips is even more difficult. Knowing there is an app for everything, I went searching for one and found Mealime. Though I don’t use this app to plan out my entire week of meals, I use it for inspiration and to make sure that I’m not reusing the same recipes over and over and getting tired of them.
The first step of creating a grocery list with Mealime is searching through all of the free recipes they have. You can add those to a list and when you are finished choosing, the app will compile a list of all the groceries you will need to make the recipes. The app also has a place where you can select allergies, diet types and dislikes, and they will recommend recipes to you that fit these requirements. After you receive your list of groceries, you just check off what you already have and head to the store, it’s that simple.
For anyone who wants to start cooking for themselves, it is important to find recipes and meals you like and then plan. This makes it possible to shop on a budget and avoid the temptation of products you don’t need.
Finally, remember to vote tomorrow in the Chicago municipal elections if you can!
Resources
Need resources regarding cooling centers, rental assistance, abortion access, COVID-19 testing and vaccines or mental health? Check out our complete list here.
That’s it for today! See you next Monday.
The 14 East Newsletter Team