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imately 120 more students registered this year than last year. I went to ADOCH as a prefrosh, and it definitely impacted my decision to go to Brown, Lee said. Lee and Co-Coordinator Rebekah Stein 14 wanted to make the experience memorable for potential members of the class of 2016, she said. After arriving on campus, prospective students were treated to a barbeque dinner on Pembroke Campus Monday night, giving them a chance to meet current students and get to know their potential classmates. Later in the evening, they were led to the Main Green, where Dean of Admission Jim Miller 73, Provost Mark Schlissel P15, Lee and Stein welcomed the students to campus. Were delighted youre here, Miller said. Weve read about you, weve written about you, weve argued continued on page 3
About 780 prospective students accepted to the class of 2016 arrived on campus Monday night to spend some time getting to know the University in the annual event A Day on College Hill. High school seniors hailing from as far as Australia and South Korea had the chance to mingle with prospective classmates, interact with current students and briefly experience college life as part of the ADOCH program. Several Ivy League universities were forced to schedule their admitted student events on the same day due to the timing of Passover and Easter, said Bora Lee 13, ADOCH co-coordinator. Though Yale, Harvard and Penn each held similar events Monday, enrollment numbers for ADOCH did not suffer approx-
Public health Show captures life of a city parking enforcer Parking enforcers like BonParking Wars is not another prof tackles nie Brown are the stars of Park- drama-obsessed reality show ining Wars, an A&E series, which stead, its a walk in the day of the Parking enforcement officer Bon- is featuring Providences ticketing lives of parking enforcers, Dunn obesity nie Brown remembers walking crew for the first time this season. said. Parking enforcement is a tough down Thayer Street one day when The show, now in its sixth year, job that requires patience and scruepidemic a woman across the street yelled at portrays life on the streets for the tiny. It takes a certain personality
By KatE DESiMonE Staff Writer By KriStina Klara Staff Writer
Fifty-one students presented their research projects in the form of a poster at yesterdays Public Health Research Day, where Yale Professor Kelly Brownell discussed the growing obesity epidemic for the 13th annual Dr. and Mrs. Frederick W. Barnes Jr. Lecture. Roughly 150 students, faculty and staff members gathered in Andrews Dining Hall for the event. I was thrilled. We had more posters than ever, said Terrie Wetle, associate dean of medicine for public health and public policy. Awards were given in three categories. Yuanchao Zheng GS won first place in the doctoral and postdoctoral student category, Prajula Mulmi GS in the masters student category and Blair McNamara 12.5 in the undergraduate category. The aim of McNamaras project was to describe the prevalence of Hepatitis C infection among a group of drug-using inmates under the age of 28 at a Rhode Island prison. Currently, Rhode Island prisons only screen those who admit a history of injection drug use for Hepatitis C, McNamara said. McNamaras study showed that many people positive for Hepatitis C had continued on page 5
her, Thanks a lot, you f b! Bonnie Brown is on the receiving end of insults like this all the time, but they dont bother her, she said. As a parking enforcement officer with the Providence Police Department, she issues tickets for illegally parked cars, and said encountering angry drivers is just part of the job.
people who ticket, tow and boot the cars of problem parkers. The show also films in Detroit and has previously filmed in Philadelphia. Parking in Providence is unique because its an older city it wasnt designed with automobiles in mind, said Andrew Dunn, the series producer.
to do that every day, he said. Americas a place where we all love our cars, Dunn said. On the show, drivers get emotional when their cars are towed, and some channel their frustration into verbal abuse toward the officials. The show continued on page 3
President Ruth Simmons will present eight honorary degrees on behalf of the University to influential individuals who are leaders in their fields during Commencement Weekend. The recipients were selected by the Board of Fellows of the Corporation, the Universitys highest governing body, following recommendations from the Advisory Committee on Honorary Degrees, composed of faculty and students, which seeks candidate nominations from the University community. The recipients this year come from a variety of fields, including science, politics and media. You always try to go for a diverse array, said Samuel Magaram 12, one of two undergraduates on the advisory committee. This years recipients include chemist Carolyn Bertozzi, awardwinning actress Viola Davis, Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., Pulitzer Prizewinner Marilynne Robinson 66, musician Sebastian Ruth 97, journalist Diane Sawyer, political theorist Gene Sharp and engineer Wei continued on page 4
The majority of students approve of how President Obama is handling his job, according to a poll conducted by The Herald March 12-14. A total of 78.8 percent of respondents expressed approval, with 16.5 percent expressing strong approval and 62.3 percent stating that they somewhat approved. Only 12.8 percent disapproved, and 8.5 percent reported that they had no opinion. These strong approval ratings are consistent with previous student feedback. During midterm elections in 2010, 77.5 percent of students expressed approval of Obamas work, and in 2008, 86.1 percent of students supported Obama for president over Republican presidential candidate John McCain. In contrast to the high approval ratings on campus, Obama has a low national approval rating of 48 percent, according to this weeks
Gallup poll. The reason (the Herald poll numbers) are as high as they are is that the Obama administration has worked hard to pursue policies that are of particular importance to people of our age group and people of our social and political persuasions, said Shawn Patterson 12, president of the Brown Democrats. Specific examples of such policies include student loan reform, health care reform, anti-discrimination fair pay legislation and the repealing of Dont Ask Dont Tell, Patterson said. Many students expressed that one or all of these issues were important factors in their continued approval of Obama. I approve of the job Obama is doing on social matters, said Brice Gumpel 14, adding that he thinks Obamas popularity on campus also has to do with the high percentage continued on page 2
Do you approve or disapprove of the way President Obama is handling his job as president of the United States?
Strongly approve 16.5% Strongly disapprove 3.2% Somewhat disapprove 9.6% No opinion 8.5% Somewhat approve 62.3%
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The Brown Daily Herald (USPS 067.740) is an independent newspaper serving the Brown University community daily since 1891. It is published Monday through Friday during the academic year, excluding vacations, once during Commencement and once during Orientation by The Brown Daily Herald, Inc. Single copy free for each member of the community. POSTMASTER please send corrections to P.O. Box 2538, Providence, RI 02906. Periodicals postage paid at Providence, R.I. Subscription prices: $280 one year daily, $140 one semester daily. Copyright 2011 by The Brown Daily Herald, Inc. All rights reserved.
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out about 60 tickets a day during the week and 80 on Fridays. She said there are three cars she gives a ticket to every single day. Though she does not know who the owners are, she knows their plate numbers by heart and said she thinks they probably work for the University. Parking is very difficult all year round on College Hill, Bonnie Brown said. Since many spaces are two-hour parking only, its just like musical cars every two hours people move their cars to another spot. Brown employees know the game. If you work for Brown, youre good at parking, she said. Its definitely really difficult to find parking around campus, said Caitlin Brisson 12. Dealing with time-limited parking spaces is a hassle, she said, because you have to move your car or you get ticketed pretty immediately. Finding parking around campus in the middle of the day is especially difficult because the area is so busy. Brisson said there have been times when she searched for a parking space for 20 minutes before finally finding one. Brisson, who lives close to Thayer Street, said she often sees Bonnie Brown patrolling and cars parking at her house have received tickets for being on the sidewalk or being parked at night. Though Brisson said she doesnt watch Parking Wars, she and her housemates looked up the show online after seeing Bonnie Brown with a pack of film people around campus several times. Bonnie Brown said the Parking Wars film crew spent about four weeks last year following her around her post. Filming the show was more difficult than she expected, she said, because she is not used to stopping to explain out loud the violation for every ticket she issues. I dont want to stand there and get chewed out by drivers, she said. I hit and run and get out of there. Dunn said filming the show has changed the way he sees the streets. Many people assume that if they park illegally for just a few minutes, it is unlikely that any danger will come of it. But parking enforcers have seen everything, Dunn said. Once, while the film crew was working, a blind man literally walked into a car parked on the sidewalk, he said. One thing he has noticed that amazes him is that more people park for two minutes to go to ATMs in Providence than Ive seen anywhere else, he said. He has seen people park illegally, walk right past a parking enforcer and come back from the ATM with a $30 ticket, which he calls the most expensive ATM fee ever. Sergeant Paul Zienowicz, commanding officer of the traffic bureau of the Providence Police Department, said it is not the case that parking is difficult to find in Providence. But he added, people dont like to be inconvenienced often drivers will choose to double-park than to park half a block away from a store they are hoping to get in and out of quickly. Though irritated car owners sometimes claim enforcers dont have real jobs, Zienowicz and Dunn disagreed. Dunn pointed out that Bonnie Brown keeps traffic flowing on Thayer Street while still allowing trucks to supply its businesses. Without that, I dont know what would happen to activity on Thayer Street, Dunn said. Since Brisson has had her car on College Hill for a few years, she said she has learned to navigate parking better, but added that the ability to find parking definitely varies every day. She said she knows many people who have cars on campus, and that the overall consensus is that there is a lack of student parking at Brown. Other students echoed Brissons outlook on parking on College Hill. Dmitry Vagner 12 said he knows several people who have gotten parking tickets, both from Providences and from the Universitys parking enforcement, and said the parking situation causes lots of strife. Michelle Graff 13 said she might bring a car to campus this summer and is already nervous about finding parking. I think it might be a disaster to park, she said.
4 Campus news
continued from page 1 Yang PhD 85. Bertozzi, a professor of chemistry and molecular and cell biology at the University of California at Berkeley, is renowned for advancing bioorthogonal chemistry. A number of her inventions in bioorthogonal chemistry have been used in diagnostics and therapeutic applications, according to the press release. Davis has appeared in more than 20 films and a variety of other productions during her 15 years as a professional actress. She was recently nominated for an Academy Award for her role as Aibileen Clark in the 2011 film The Help. Davis grew up attending public schools in the Central Falls area and graduated from Rhode Island College in 1988. Lewis will be honored for his lifelong commitment to human rights, demonstrated by his bravery during the civil rights movement and his current ethical leadership in Washington, according to the press release. Lewis participated in protests against segregation, serving as the chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and helping to organize the August 1963 March on Washington. Lewis was elected to his current position in Congress in November 1986. Robinson has written three wellreceived novels since her time at Brown. Housekeeping, Robinsons first novel, published in 1980, was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize and was named one of the books of the century by the New York Times. Robinson won the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award for her second novel, Gilead, published in 2004. Ruth, a violist and violinist, is being awarded for his involvement in the Providence community through music. Ruth established the nonprofit organization Community MusicWorks in the West End of Providence upon graduating from Brown. Community MusicWorks offers musical instruction to community members for free and seeks to use music to enrich the community, according to the press release. The organization was awarded the 2010 National Arts and Humanities Youth Program Award from First Lady Michelle Obama, and Ruth won the MacArthur Genius Award two years ago. Sawyer is a renowned broadcast journalist and anchor for World News on ABC. She has been honored for her journalism with numerous awards duPonts, Peabodys, Emmys and the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Investigative Reporters and Editors, Inc. and entered the Television Academy Hall of Fame in 1997. Sharp has explored the use of nonviolence in bringing about so-
Science 5
Brownell said. Medication and operations have also been tried, he added. But these efforts, which have continued for 40 years, have proved a failed experiment, since rates of obesity have continued to climb, Brownell said. Brownell said other public health issues have been addressed by creating optimal defaults circumstances that push people toward living healthier and safer lives. You can teach people to brush and floss or you can put fluoride in the water. You can teach people to drive slowly on the highways or you can put airbags in cars. Brownell said. Currently, disastrous defaults exist for food, including too much access, large portions and food marketing, Brownell said. He showed pictures of chocolate-covered bacon and deep-fried butter from food stands at the Indiana State Fair. Food and addiction may prove a potential game-changer in the way government and society recognize the obesity problem, Brownell said. He cited many studies suggesting that sugar and palatable foods may act on the brain in the same way as drugs of abuse. There is some evidence of craving, withdrawal and possible development of tolerance when sugar was tested in animal models, Brownell said. He proposed a tax on sugarsweetened beverages, calling them the single greatest source of added sugar in the diet. Brownell projected that if each ounce of sugarsweetened beverages were taxed one penny, consumption would decrease by 10 to 23 percent, and he calculated that $150 billion would be raised over a 10-year period. Brownell concluded by emphasizing the importance of change agents such as the press and solid scientific evidence in the prevention of obesity. I hope you can all take part in the food fight, he said.
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An article in Tuesdays Herald (U. selects senior orators for commencement, April 17) incorrectly stated that Leor Shtull-Leber 12 worked with the Hasbro Childrens Hospital. In fact, she interned at Hasbro, Inc., a toy and board game company. The Herald regrets the error.
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ness in mind, I believe that a popular vote on how to use that money would have led us down a different path. And to those who dig the Rattys new flair, think about the Blue Room. I love the food, but this otherwise beautiful establishment simply does not work. When its busy, lines criss-cross and burst out the door, and the chaos is so profound that any hope of thwarting thievery is quickly quashed. Navigating efficiently is a nightmare for both staff and students a fact that visitors miss as ed that unless one wanted to steal and pick locks, little was offered for creative amateurs. Single-section, low-enrollment, concentrator-restricted art classes almost make sure of it. When I finally saw one of our workshops, unoccupied space confirmed the senselessness of it all. Then Granoff opened, and classrooms were to be utilized for cutting-edge, interdisciplinary work in arts and multimedia. Remaining spaces turned into galleries, and rooms remain bare. When several classrooms per building are unocests. The Corporations job is to impress donors and applicants, a necessity if we are to maintain a healthy endowment and a competitive student body. It does not monitor student concerns, so in the process, our interests and ideas can be inadvertently overlooked. This divide between the University and the student body can only be bridged by effort on both sides. The University and its constituent departments must attempt to distribute campus-wide surveys and consider more than the official opinion of the Undergraduate Council of Students when making decisions. Just as in Congress, the views of our representatives often do not reflect the opinions of the student body as a whole. Furthermore, students must participate when administration asks for our advice. Attend UCS meetings if you can. Spread awareness when you stumble upon the inefficient or unjust. Fill out surveys. We must have both sides of the story in order to know what works and what doesnt. For example, I have a hard time believing that the person who cuts Keeney Quadrangle into three will be remembered fondly by current students, especially when its current layout already does much to foster community and inspire interaction. However, if someone put up some thin exit signs that lay flat against the wall, that man or woman just might be hailed as a genius. Adam Bouche 14 is not afraid to tell you what he thinks. He can be reached at adam_bouche@brown.edu.
The Corporations job is to impress donors and applicants, a necessity if we are to maintain a healthy endowment and a competitive student body. It does not monitor student concerns, so in the process, our interests and ideas can be inadvertently overlooked.
they marvel at vibrant colors and the sleek modern style flowing through the interior. Is it any coincidence tours start here? But to me, the Granoff Center for the Creative Arts typifies the conflict of interest between builders and every-day users. At first, I was ecstatic to hear that a new creative arts center was in the works. My biggest complaint about Brown was the lack of resources available to non-VISA-concentrating student artists. Nearly every college I visited had a craft room or some other edifice in which any student could use arts equipment and materials for a nominal fee. However, explorations at Brown indicatcupied at any given time, how useful is the addition of more empty space? After donor earmarks were accounted for, nothing was added to benefit Browns average student. It is questionable whether this building does anything for the majority of students that will never have class inside of it. Overall, when campus progress does not address long-standing student complaints, we can feel as though we have been overlooked in an attempt to make Brown more appealing to the public, parents and prospective students. Yet in reality, our dissatisfaction results from nothing more than a conflict of inter-
Someones faith commitment to a particular tradition does not and should not prohibit them from learning about other religious traditions or working with other religious communities.
who hold a range of beliefs regarding drugs, alcohol and hooking up. Besides the obvious judgment claim by Dorris regarding the aforementioned activities which would be interesting and useful to parse, though there isnt enough room here she is wrong in assuming the drunk kid in Jos is more likely to be spiritual rather than religious. As countless studies have shown, self-identifying as religious as Dorris would define it does not necessarily correlate with more puritanical lifestyle choices. Furthermore, Dorris implies that those who would identify as SBNR are unfaithful and shallow, and she denigrates spiritual moments experienced in any setting except commit atrocities in the name of religion. Dorris also seems to say that a Christian who, for example, practices yoga or attends Passover Seders is somehow less Christian. This may be her most dangerous, intolerant and religiously illiterate point. Someones faith commitment to a particular tradition does not and should not prohibit them from learning about other religious traditions or working with other religious communities. While Dorris seems to believe that interfaith engagement seeks to relativize all faiths and world views or divorce people from their closest convictions, in fact it oftentimes more firmly grounds people in their own faiths or systems of belief.
Music performed by the Brown Jazz Band accompanied by worldrenowned saxophonist Rick Margitza filled Salomon 101 Saturday night for the fourteenth annual concert in memory of Daniel Milano 93, a former Jazz Band member. The audience, which included students, parents and members of the community, looked lively as the 18 Jazz Band members took the stage. After the band played a few pieces, the conductor Matthew McGarrell, senior lecturer in music, introduced Margitza. Margitza has established his fame as a saxophonist, recording with Miles Davis and Tony Williams, among others. The band prepared for the concert for a month, but only met Margitza for the first time Saturday night. Prior to the concert, the members seemed eager for this meeting. Jamie Fried 14 said he was ridiculously excited to play with such a famous musician. But he was a little nervous because they had not rehearsed with him until a few hours before the concert began, and the band would have a lot to figure out in that time.
The lack of rehearsal was unnoticeable. The band expertly played four of Margitzas compositions along with some other charts. Fried also debuted his latest composition Sketches of Something. Jamie has premiered a few of his compositions with the band before, and theyre always incredible, said Dan Rome 13, a member of the band. I hope the audience will appreciate his immense level of talent both behind the kit and as a composer. Three of the charts by Margitza required two flutists an instrument previously played by only one band member, Jeff Herman 12. Rome had to learn the flute in three weeks with the help of Herman and managed to give an impressive performance. The concert closed with a bang, as the band and Margitza played Brace Yourself, a high-energy arrangement that highlighted the musicians skills. Its great to see that Brown students have an opportunity to perform with professional musicians. The level of the skill in the Jazz Band is consistently impressive, and the original composition from Jamie Fried was fantastic, said Caroline Seyler 15, an audience member, after the show.
If theres any one enemy to humans creating or making love or bouncing a basketball for that matter its self-consciousness, said author Andre Dubus to a crowd of about 25 people yesterday at a reading from his latest release, Townie: A Memoir. The reading and book signing, which were held at 4 p.m. in the English department building, were mostly attended by nonfiction writing students. In her introduction of Dubus, Marie Myung-Ok Lee, lecturer at the Center for the Study of Race and Ethnicity in America, told the audience she heard about Dubus memoir while it was still a work in progress during a 2009 conference and was immediately enthralled by the material. This is a memoir that has all the good elements of a memoir, she said. Its also one of those times where someone has the consummate talent to pull it off. The section Dubus read wove in brief anecdotes of his siblings and his aimless boyhood shaped by boredom and poverty. After witnessing the assault of his younger brother, Dubus said he spent his late teens getting in bar fights with men whom he perceived were hurting women or weaker men. He said he wrote his first story the day before training for a Golden Gloves competition in Lowell, Mass. Dubus realized writing made him feel more alive than any drug he had ever taken and helped him quell his anger, he said. But Dubus waited until after he was 50 years old to try writing a mem-
oir that recounted his youth. He said the scandal of James Freys faked memoir A Million Little Pieces initially scared him away from the genre. Thats unethical to me, he said. The contract when you see the title memoir between the reader and the writer is that its factually accurate, at least through the emotions of the writer. After deciding to make his memoir address the life of a bullied child dealing with poverty and an absent father, he let the story shape the arch of the narrative, he said. Dubus warned writers against creating a strict outline before beginning to write. You send a message to your subconscious that you dont trust it, he explained. Dubus also said memoirs allow writers to skip questioning the actions in a story and spend more time asking, Whats it like? I wanted it to read like a novel, Dubus said. Dubus, a New England native, played up his loud Massachusetts accent both for the entertainment of the audience and to portray the characters in his tale of growing up in a poor town in Merrimack Valley. He told the audience members, who asked insightful questions about his writing process, that they were wicked smart. Citing Faulkner as an influence, Dubus said that curiosity makes the best writing, not necessarily raw talent. He told the audience to focus on writing with the greatest depth possible, which he promised would transcend issues of cliches or publishing trends.
Renowned academics, businessmen, journalists and politicians from around the world gathered on campus yesterday to exchange ideas, concerns and analyses of the euro crisis in a conference entitled The Failure of the Euro? Causes and Consequences for Europe and Beyond. Co-sponsored by the Watson Institute for International Studies and the William R. Rhodes Center for International Economics and Finance, the conference consisted of five panels and a keynote speaker. Professor of Political Science Mark Blyth, who organized the conference, emphasized that its unusual structure and departure from pure academia set it apart from most academic conferences. Very few academics get on board with people who do policy or people who do financial markets to talk about an issue that is very contemporary, he told The Herald. Its what the Watson Institute is for, Blyth added. Its a place that has a policy relevance angle but is based in the University. Professor of Economics Ross Levine, who assisted Blyth in organizing the conference, said the conversation is vital because the crisis affects the global economy, not just Europe. While many of the U.S. newspapers are focused on the presidential elections right now, developments in Europe are a big deal for the U.S. and other countries around the world, Levine told The Herald. There are disagreements among the European powers about how to proceed and fears that whats going on will cause a depression in Europe with reverberations in the U.S. and elsewhere. We have to wonder why did this happen and what can be done, Levine added. After a morning dominated by three distinct interdisciplinary panels, Martin Wolf, associate editor and chief economic commentator for the Financial Times, gave the keynote address to a crowded auditorium of conference attendees and students. Were very lucky to have him, Blyth told The Herald of Wolf. Right from the start, when the financial crisis kicked off, hes been a voice of reason emanating from the Financial Times. Even if you disagree with some of his conclusions or some of his analysis, hes always someone to contend with, Blyth added. In his speech, Wolf outlined seven points to summarize his view on the potential for the euro to survive. Calling himself a euro-skeptic, he began by saying that the creation of the euro was a bad idea in the first place. He warned conference participants against the dangers of being too brave, advising that it is far better not to be heroic in economic policy. That said, he went on to advocate against dismantling the euro system. Foreseeing serious problems in any attempt to do so, he likened the euro to an economic omelet.
Financial Times economist Martin Wolf gave the euros survival 50-50 odds.
Unmaking omelets is really quite hard to do, he added. Wolf spent the bulk of his speech giving technical explanations of what he believes the Euro Zone needs to achieve, why understanding the crisis will be the basis for success and what the crisis actually entails. He offered a brief blueprint of how the Euro Zone needs to be reformed, expressing concerns about ideological, political and economic obstacles. Will it survive? Id give it 5050, Wolf concluded. Wolf added that he might be shot from all sides after giving his opinion, a reference to the wide range of diverging and conflicting perspectives presented in various panels throughout the day including Professor-at-Large Romano Prodi, the former prime minister of Italy who was one of the key architects of the euro. During the first panel, three prominent economists Stephen Kinsella, economics lecturer at University of Limerick, Simon Tilford, chief economist at the Center for European Reform, and Amar Bhide, professor at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University explained the origins of the crisis from three different angles. The days second panel juxtaposed the opinions and experiences of members of the private sector, politicians and representatives of the media. Douglas Borthwick, managing director and head of trading at Faros Trading, James Kiernan 74 from Cornerstone Capital, Alfred Gusenbauer, former chancellor of Austria and professor emeritus, David Brancaccio from American Public Media and Bethany McLean, a contributing editor at Vanity Fair, discussed reactions to the crisis in the media and in the markets. Borthwick, a trader, broke the mold by offering an optimistic take on a crisis seen by many as unsolvable. Hes by far the most positive person (in his analysis of) the euro, Blyth told The Herald. Everyone is saying, The sky is falling, and hes saying, Ill sell you an umbrella. Borthwick attributed the varying opinions among panelists to the different sectors from which
participants hailed, specifically pointing to economists desire for media attention. Fear sells. An economist out there who just wrote a book wants press, Borthwick told The Herald. Theyre so wrapped up in fear sells that no one is learning about solutions. Discussing his unorthodox vantage point, he explained that empathy isnt taught in a trading course. A trader sees an opportunity and sees the way to take it, he said. An afternoon panel tackling the complex question of what else could have been done included Prodi and Gusenbauer, as well as Morgan Despres from Banque de France and several academics. Blyth told The Herald Prodi and Gusenbauer were part of the original inspirational for the conference. Heres a guy who used to run Italy, and heres a guy who used to run Austria, Blyth said. Maybe we should talk to them about whats going on in Europe. Experts on another panel compared the current crisis to previous ones to give it historical context and perspective, and during the final panel of the day respected scholars questioned whether Europe will be able to survive the euro. Though the lack of consensus was often evident, panelists and respondents agreed that the format and structure of the conference were effective. Borthwick said he appreciated the uncommon decision to include members of the media in the conference. For the media, its a great event because they get more than they do from a headline from the (Wall Street) Journal, he told The Herald. Wolf said he was impressed by the imaginative structure of the conference. Its been a wide range of opinions, lots of expertise. Ive enjoyed it, he added. Wolf also commented on the conferences limitations. You can learn from different people and that shapes your thinking, helps future writing, Wolf said. It may very slowly influence things, but no one conference really changes things in a profound way. Certainly not one on the euro in the United States.