Volume 72, Issue 5 www.themclabeacon.com Thursday, October 28, 2010

The Beacon- Student Newspaper of Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts, North Adams, Mass. -

Paintings missing in Mark Hopkins Hall

By Andrea Whitney and Mark Burridge

Sta� Writer and Editor-in-Chief

ree paintings are missing from Mark Hopkins Hall, accord-ing to Joseph Charon, director of Public Safety.

e rst, belonging to Eng-lish/Communications professor Benjamin Jacques, was a framed print of Norman Rockwell’s “ e Country Editor.” It had an esti-

mated value of $500. is print had been hanging in

the hallway outside Mark Hop-kins 109 for several years with-out drawing previous attention, Charon said.

I noticed it missing when I came in to my o� ce on Tuesday, Oct. 12,” Jacques said. “Of course I re-ported it to Public Safety. I also put a notice on email to faculty, sta� , and our English/Communi-cations students.”

Charon stated that Public Safety did some follow-up with facili-ties to see if they had moved the painting while doing work, but there was no reported work being done in that area.

Charon also stated that the painting could have been stolen between Oct. 7, which was the last time it was seen, and Oct. 13 when it was reported missing.

“We have no leads yet,” Charon said, “but the case will remain open if any new information comes up.”

According to English depart-ment secretary Paula Roy, two other paintings went missing from outside of her o� ce.

“ ey were pictures of two dif-ferent � owers,” she said. “I no-ticed they had gone missing at the end of last summer.”

Roy didn’t report the missing paintings because she believed they belonged to either retiring professor Robert Bisho� or pro-fessor David Langston. However, the two paintings did not belong to either.

According to Langston, the paintings were a gi� to the de-partment by then-retiring profes-sor Arnold Bartini in the mid to late nineties.

If anyone has any information about the location of any of the missing paintings, contact public safety immediately.

Refunds returned recentlyBy Andrew Roiter

Managing Editor

is is the rst year incoming MCLA students are required to take a course which will educate them about adjusting to college.

Starting tomorrow the students of business profes-sor Paulette Remilard’s First Year Experience course will begin a nancial literacy program to help them un-derstand their loans and personal nances.

But Jennifer Ethier, direc-tor of Student Accounts, would like all students to learn about the subject.

“Students need to educate themselves and then come in [to Financial Aid] and see us about what they don’t understand,” Ethier said.

One of the primary issues that Ethier cautioned students about was the refund checks. e checks contain the spillover from stu-dent’s loans a� er the tuition, room, board and fees are deducted. Many students then keep the money from these checks.

“For a lot of students the reality that this is money you will have to pay back doesn’t register,” Director of Financial Aid Elizabeth Petri said. She added that the money will still accrue the same interest.

Petri and Ethier were concerned that students aren’t receiving

proper education about their loans despite having access to the infor-mation.

“We want students to come in and see us. When they need in-dividual counseling [on their ac-counts] we’re here,” Ethier said.

Each year students receive their

nancial aid packages that show them how much money they can take out in loans. Later they receive their bill from the college with the option to reduce their loans if the bill came out to less than expected. Many students then ignore this op-tion and thus receive a refund.

ere does exist tools for students to nd out how much more they will have to pay if they hang on to their refunds instead of return-ing it to their lender. Petri advised students to go to studentloans.gov and uti-lize the total cost calculator under the Repayment Plans section. e calculator nds out how much the student will pay over the course of 10 years based on the type of loan they have and the amount owed.

Ethier encouraged students to speak with their parents about the loan process so that they can be a part of it.

“You really need to read your -nancial award letter,” she stressed, “not just sign it.”

Cara Sheedy/Beacon Sta� A decrepit building just o� campus.

Photo illustration by Ali Johnston/Beacon Sta� Three paintings have gone missing since the summer in Mark Hopkins Hall.

Cara Sheedy/Beacon Sta� An abandoned stone wall near campus.

Duke Professor to speak on campus

By Mark BurridgeEditor-in-Chief

Duke Professor Marianna Tor-govnick will speak about the use of “empty cities,” today in Mur-dock room 218 at 4 p.m.

“My talk will be on the use of what I call ‘empty cities,’ in mov-ies” Torgovnick said. “Every building is there, every blade of grass is there, but there are no people in [the city.]”

Torgovncik said she has given the talk at other colleges before including New York Graduate schools, and Wesleyan University.

She said that the use of this technique can be found in many

lms, most recently in “I AM LEGEND.”

Torgovnick teaches a class at Duke on lm called “America Dreams: American Movies,” where she discusses lm with her students. e class, which is pop-ular and usually gets around 160 students also features discussion of the ‘empty cities’ topic.

“She is interested in asking; what does it mean?” Professor David Langston said about Tor-govnick’s talk. “Whether it is a Robinson Crusoe situation or a wish, looking at it as an issue of legacy or as a problem, there are many ways to look at the ‘empty city.’”

Korinna Dennehey/Beacon Sta� Many students have received refund checks.

DUKE continued on page 13