Brown President is the first black
person to lead Ivy League campus
by Linda Borg
Knight-Ridder Tribune
November 10, 2000
PROVIDENCE, R.I. - Ruth Simmons’
journey from sharecropper's daughter
to the president of Brown University
began the moment she walked into her
first classroom.
“That first day of school was very
magical,” she said Thursday. “Some
thing terrific happened. I had books to
read. I had paper and pencils. That was
the beginning of my odyssey."
Fifty years later, that former young
child in hand-me-down clothes found
herself speaking to a standing-room
only crowd at Sayles Hall, where she
was surrounded by the portraits of
former Brown presidents, all of them
white men.
Simmons, the current president of
Smith College, became the 18th
president of Brown University on
Thursday. In the process, both she and
Brown made history.
She is the first black person to head
an Ivy League institution, and she
also is the first woman to head
Brown, the second to lead an Ivy
school.
Her election marks the end of a
nine-month search that began shortly
after E. Gordon Gee announced last
winter that he was leaving for
Vanderbilt University, a move that
stunned the Brown community.
“It's not only magnificent for
Brown but also for the Ivies and all
of higher education,” said Stanley
Ikenberry, president of the American
Council on Education. “Yes. it is a
bold move in some respects, but in
others it is delightfully predictable.
She has all of the strengths one would
expect to find in a college president.”
Simmons seemed a bit taken aback
by the lovefest that greeted her in
Sayles Hall, where she received four
standing ovations from a crowd of
500 faculty, students and staff.
“It is impossible for me to stand
before you without remembering that
I have arrived at this place through
the brutally hard and sometimes de
meaning labor of humble parents,”
said Simmons, who was born into ru
ral poverty in Grapeland, Texas, the
youngest of 12 children.
Simmons, 55, also said she has suc
ceeded thanks to the kindness of strang
ers, those donors who enabled her to
afford a first-rate college education.
“They helped me understand that
poverty is not a state of mind nor a defi
nition of one's character but merely the
condition of one's purse,” she told the
Brown assembly.
Then, Simmons delivered the kicker:
Universities, she said, exist not to amass
wealth but to amass knowledge.
“I hope that Brown will play a lead
No more flipping burgers
by William Lee
TMS Campus
Campus Correspondent
Western Illinois University
November 09, 2000
Twenty-year-old Mike Alexander
leads a pretty full life. He's a full-time
college student at Golden West College
in Huntington Beach, Calif. He works
with his dad at a warehouse, which he
owns. But that's just his day job.
Mike owns and operates several Web
sites sex Web sites. He serves as a
webmaster for www.surfboys.com,
gaypiczone.com and girlypictures.com.
Mike is just one of the many college
students who have taken to the World
Wide Web not just to make money in
the sex field, but also for self expres
sion, which is the case with “Abby.”
She’s the subject of AbbyTV.com, a site
devised with the purpose of showing
real-life via a Web cam.
College Web cams that is, Web
cams featuring the home lives of real
college students - are becoming increas
ingly popular and are bringing Internet
voyeurism to the mainstream.
So what would webheads see as a part
of Abby's real life?
“ Probably at least half [of AbbyTV
subscribers] watch hoping to see me
take a bath, and that's okay, too. What
ever brightens people's days, I sup
pose," the 20-year-old California State
social work major said.
ership role in insisting that elite uni
versities remain steadfastly and reso
lutely the province of excellent minds
and not fat purses.”
Simmons didn't pull any punches
Thursday.
She acknowledged that the univer
sity has been grappling with the con
tentious issue of diversity, from how
to make Brown more affordable to all
students to how to make the campus
more welcoming to minorities.
This is an area about which
Simmons feels especially passionate,
and she promised to play a direct role
in how the university implements the
report of the visiting committee on di
versity.
During an interview later in the day.
Simmons was frank about how race
Chancellor Stephen Robert hugs Brown's new president Dr. Ruth J. Simmons at the start of a news confer
ence at Maddock Alumni Center on Thursday, November 9, 2000. Simmons came to Brown from Smith
College in Massachusetts.
and racism have shadowed her child
hood and her career.
“I grew up under Jim Crow segre
gation," she said. “The result was that
I know how to deal with bigotry.
Young people today have not grown
up with that. It's a shattering experi
ence for them. It was never a shatter
ing experience for me."
Racism was a fact of life in rural
Texas and in Houston, w here Simmons
moved when she was 7. It continued
when she went to Harvard, where she
received both her master's and her doc
torate degrees in Romance languages.
"When I first went to Harvard. 1 had
Web cams are stationed strategically
throughout Abby's apartment: The liv
ing room couch, the bedroom (focused
on the bed) and yes, the bathtub. Some
of the spicier scenes Abby has given
her audience are Abby having sex with
her boyfriend in her bedroom, taking a
long explorative bath, or having fun
with her vibrator on her living room
couch. So what's Abby's angle? Is she
satisfying her exhibitionist side? Per
haps, but Abby says there's a deeper
meaning behind what she does.
“1 don't do it to get people off or any
thing,” Abby said. "We show real life.
When you watch TV you see all ot
these perfect, happy people and happy
families and people feel bad about
themselves because they're like, “Oh!
I'm not that thin," or “I'm not that happy
with my husband,” ... we're just trying
to show that real people don't live like
that real life is messy, you have bad
hair days.”
She adds that she's not an exhibitionist
all.
But for Mike, his Web sites are not
just a lucrative business, but also a way
for him to explore his sexuality in the
most public setting.
“It's not just to make the money, but
it was a way to sexually please myself
by putting pictures of nice-looking
guys on a Web site that I sort of lusted
for myself and who are my friends. We
just have fun doing it. It peaked my
sexual arousal. In fact, I do my best
NATIONAL CAMPUS NEWS
a professor who hated me,” she said.
“I think he hated me because I was the
best student in his class. He refused to
speak to me. That's what people like
me faced all the time.”
Simmons tells her students that they
have to sort out pure human meanness
from classic bigotry. Then, she tells
them, you have to learn not to expect
more from people than they can real
istically give.
Brown had to persuade Simmons to
leave Smith, an elite women's college
in Northampton, Mass., where she had
a big impact, doubling the endowment,
increasing minority applications and
creating the first engineering depart
ment in a women’s college.
“I didn’t think it could get any bet
ter than Smith,” she said at a news con
ference. “College presidents and their
universities are not always happy af
fairs. At Smith, I loved them and they
loved me.”
Simmons said there was no ques
tion about the desirability of the Brown
presidency: "The important piece was
whether I could make a difference at
Brown. I was persuaded that I could.”
Simmons dismissed the notion that
she might have trouble moving from
a small women's college to a large re
search university, noting that she has
worked at Princeton University, an
other Ivy institution, as well as
Spelman College, a historically black
College kids cash in on internet porn
updates when I'm aroused,” he laughs.
“To go to work everyday aroused, I
think that's cool.”
Mike's buddy, Debbie Perez, 19, un
derstands. With Mike's help, Debbie
runs girlypictures.com, a collection of
what else -- girly pictures.
Debbie, a Cal State-Fullerton stu-
We just have fun doing it. It peaked my sexual
arousal. In fact, I do my best updates when I'm
aroused,” he laughs. “To go to work everyday
aroused, I think that's cool.”
dent and part-time exotic dancer says
that she became interested in her own
Web site after surfing the Web and see
ing the large number of opportunities.
She calls it destiny. Debbie also says
that her site, which has pictures of her
self and her friends, lets her explore
her uninhibited sexual side. “I guess
I've been somewhat of an exhibition
ist for a long time (laughs). And I get
to meet a lot of interesting people.”
Art, schmart. What about the cash?
It's no secret that Web jobs, sex related
and otherwise can be quite lucrative.
women's college in Atlanta.
Simmons is passionate about the value
of a liberal-arts education for everyone,
rich and poor. Unlike so many children
from impoverished backgrounds, she
said she was never trapped in a narrow
curriculum.
“I didn't go to theaters, restaurants and
museums when I was young,” she said.
“I had to do a lot of catching up in col
lege. Today, I'm as comfortable talking
to the queen of England as I am to you.
That's what a liberal-arts education did
for me.”
Simmons recalled asking her mother
if she could go to college. Her mother
said yes. if she could get a scholarship.
“But her eyes said she didn't think it
could happen," Simmons said, tearing.
“My mother would have been so
happy.”
During her ascension through the
ranks of higher education, a number of
people told Simmons that she had the
makings of a college president. But one
mentor said she would never become
president of an Ivy League school.
Not Ida Mae Henderson, her kindergar
ten teacher in Texas.
“Never, in her vision, did she say, ‘You
can't do this but you can do that,'"
Simmons said. “If I’m here today, it's
because I grew up believing that I could
do it.”
And as a testament to this Abby said she
made between $1,200 and $1,300 a
week, Debbie about $75,000 last year
and Mike pulls in about $ 12,000 a month
and that is just from his Surfboys.com
site. The money definitely beats other
jobs your average college student may
hold down.
-Twenty-year-old Mike Alexander,
webmaster for www.surfboys.com,
gaypiczone.com and girlypictures.com
“Waitressing just doesn't pay very well,
and I am making fairly good money from
the Web site,” Abby said. “I'm not get
ting rich or anything, but I'm living a lot
more comfortably now than I was be
fore.”
For Debbie, the need was direr.
“I was running low on funds to go to
college, books ...just everything that was
needed, so I got into the exotic dancing
and the Web site is just kind of part of
that.” Despite the success of
Girlypictures.com, Debbie continues to
dance, but primarily for private parties.
CEO of Amazon.com meets
with students, addresses
Boulder, Colo., audience
by Erika Stutzman
Knight-Ridder Tribune
November 09, 2000
Espousing such old-economy
advice as "follow your passion”
and “work for a best-practices
company," Internet retailing pio
neer Jeff Bezos met with a hand
ful of Boulder students Tuesday.
The meeting between the chief
executive and founder of
Amazon.com and about 20 Uni
versity of Colorado students pre
ceded a public address at Macky
Auditorium.
Undergraduate engineering and
graduate business students pep
pered Bezos with questions about
business and his company in a very
informal round-table discussion.
Bezos offered frank-yet-optimis
tic talk about some of the contro
versy dogging his firm, and a sur
prising take on working for
startups and dot-coms.
"It is too risky to start a com
pany straight out of school,” Bezos
advised.
Presenting himself more as a
"granddaddy" of e-commerce than
the dot-com entrepreneur he was,
Bezos said the odds of a startup
succeeding are "very low, even in
the best of circumstances.”
Students' best bet, according to
Bezos: “You should try to work for
a best-practices company. Your
first job out of school should be
90 percent a learning experience."
When budding entrepreneurs
are ready to launch their own com
panies, Bezos says they should
avoid the "hot flavor of the
month."
"Do something that you have a
passion for, and something that
will fulfill a real need. If you're
trying to ride a hot wave, you’re
going to fail. To catch that wave
before it's past, you have to have
passion,” he said
The Macky address and Boul
der visit were part of an event put
on by the Robert H. and Beverly
A. Denting Center for Entrepre
neurship at CU.
The Denting Center awarded
Bezos its annual Entrepreneur of
the Year Award, and co-hosted his
she savs
What works for Abby, doesn't for
other college students. Many don't
have the courage be seen in compro
mising positions on the Internet. Ironi
cally, both Abby and Debbie plan on
careers in the childcare field Abby
a social worker and Debbie an el
ementary school teacher, but neither
one see their sexy jobs as affecting
their plans.
Mike, who's been the object of
stalkers, knows that being on the
Internet has its risks.
“I've had people email me back and
describe my car, describe my home,
where I live with my parents - the
whole nine yards. Obviously they had
been following me,” Mike said. “One
guy from Chicago followed me all the
way to Los Angeles, where I live. He
started renting hotel rooms, which
were very close to my home, and he
started writing emails from his laptop.
Everyday, he would describe some
thing different about what I was do
ing.” Still wanna be a Web/porn star?
Despite this scary episode and others
like it, Mike said that he would keep
doing the site.
“When the threats started to arrive
three months into the (creation of the
Web site) it would not have been fair
to just disband the Web site for the
many members who had signed up, I
just took other precautions and started
listing my addresses different.”
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 17, 2000
public speech Tuesday night with
corporate sponsor Ernst & Young.
Though Amazon had sales of
$1.64 billion in 1999 - a 169 per
cent increase over 1999 - it posted
a $720 million loss. It has never
posted a profit, a fact Bezos both
jokes about and defends.
“At first, we wanted to build a
small, profitable company. Instead,
we built a large, unprofitable com-
pany,” he said.
But he also argues that the com
pany should be considered in seg
ments: There was a $25 million gain
in Amazon's original business of
books, music and videos. The seg
ments racking up losses electron
ics, kitchen, international networks
and others are still in the invest
ment stage, Bezos argues.
Second-year masters of business
administration student Adam Moise
particularly liked Bezos' answer-any
thing style.
“He is so candid and laid back, and
he was never defensive about his
company's path,” Moise said.
Moise, incidentally, still plans on
launching his own business after
graduation, despite what Bezos had
to say.
Bezos also answered questions
about the dot-com shakeup this year.
Business partner Pets.com shut ear
lier Tuesday students wanted to
know how that made Amazon work
ers feel.
“They're glad they're not working
for Pets.com,” Bezos said.
Susanna Peters, an MBA student
who attended the student session,
said she found the talk interesting,
but largely predictable.
“I liked how he discussed his phi
losophy on keeping good people,”
Peters said.
Before the talk, Bezos also ad
dressed how he gets good people.
"I actually talk to young people
quite a bit this is my twelfth time
this year,” he said. “I like the ques
tions they ask, whether it's about
Amazon, e-commerce, or if they
want advice on how to start their own
business.
“And for us, this is a great recruit
ing tool. It's an opportunity for us to
tell the brightest and the best to come
work for us,” Bezos said.
California court
upholds damage
award in college’s
reverse-discrimi
nation case
Knight-Ridder Newspapers
November 10, 2000
A state appeals court upheld a $ 1.9
million damage award to a white San
Francisco State University lecturer
who claimed he was a victim of ra
cial discrimination.
Howard McNier, 52, a lecturer at
the university's College of Business,
sued California State University trust
ees in 1997 after he was denied a ten
ure-track position in the college's hos
pitality management department and
had his teaching load cut back.
McNier, who had received excel
lent evaluations from students and
fellow teachers, claimed he was dis
criminated against because he was
white. An Asian immigrant eventually
won the teaching position.
A San Francisco Superior Court
jury originally awarded McNier $2.7
million in compensation last year. But
the trial judge reduced the amount to
$1.9 million, including $645,116 for
lost pay through age 70 and $1.3 mil
lion for physical and psychological in
jury.
The university contested the award,
but a three-judge panel of the state
Court of Appeal unanimously upheld
the judgment, citing “substantial evi
dence that the university caused
McNier to suffer serious and ongo
ing physical and psychological inju
ries.”