A Discussion on Lady Gaga Tomorrow Evening

Once there was a time when Pomona performed The Mikado, now, we are apparently gaga for Gaga. I won't quite date the fall of the Republic to voluptuous vixens on a gyrating jive, but I suspect its a step in that general direction.

I direct you, dear reader, to an advertisement for a Pomona Student Union discussion on the femme fatale that has more Facebook fans than the One. Groan.

Love her or hate her, you know her.

Lady Gaga has been described as everything from “groundbreaking” to “bizarre” and her music frequently takes a backseat to her persona. She identifies herself as a representative for “sexual, strong women who speak their mind" and critiques the typical body-image that women are made to conform to. Yet, she herself embodies this image, with her thin, scantily-clad body and sexually-charged music... videos. As she told journalist Ann Powers, “Me embodying the position that I’m analyzing is the very thing that makes it so powerful.”

Is this power? Or is it self-objectification? Is Lady Gaga redefining sexual dynamics or just examining and championing existing norms? Is Gaga's representation different than previous pop artists or is she just the next step in the evolution of female pop singers? Moreover, what about Gaga has Americans of all genders so enthralled? And what does our fascination with her say about our perceptions of sex and power?

Discussing the (in)famous lady and her legacy will be Pomona professors, Kevin Dettmar, Susan McWilliams, and Kyla Tompkins.

Join the PSU in Edmunds Ballroom at 8pm on Thursday, December 2.

Open to the 5Cs and completely free!

A Window into Pitzer's Admissions Process?

At its root, admissions department is the window into a college's soul. Lacking Harry Potter-style Sorting Hats, we rely on the doyens of admissions, who decide who is in or who is out. Often this is a cliquish bunch, which is as it is at most of our supposed elite institutions.

Pitzer College, as we know, has plotted to give up on objective admission metrics, for at least a portion of its class. Pitzer's president, Laura Skandera-Trombley, is known to be opposed to the SATs and it would take a lot to believe that that view doesn't trickle down.

That's Pitzer's right, of course, but given this focus on subjective metrics, it's worth examining any statements made by its officials to the press. Take, for instance, Arnaldo Rodriguez's statement to Diverse: Issues in Higher Education. (He is being profiled as part of a story on father-children pairs who have gone off into the business of admissions.)

... Dr. Arnaldo Rodriguez, vice president for admissions and financial aid at Pitzer College in Los Angeles, has developed longstanding friendships with numerous high school counselors in his 35-year career. But only with daughter Elise, who’s co-director of college counseling at a private Los Angeles high school, does Arnaldo sometimes review applications after-the-fact in order to analyze why seniors were denied university admission. “That’s when I’m trying to help Elise understand what an admissions officer might have been thinking. Yet even with my closest friends in this business, we don’t do that for each other.”

Spirited talks can become disagreements, Arnaldo says. “It gets delicate. Just because a kid attends private school doesn’t mean he’s a stronger college applicant than high-performing students from public schools, especially if those publics have few resources. I mean, if the private schools truly are better, why aren’t some of the students performing better academically?”

There's something to be said for the old maxim "to whom much is given much is expected," but isn't it also true that sometimes the worst student at a prep school is better than a top performing public school student? A grade comparison across schools is approaching impossibility sometimes (which, incidentally, was the whole reason for the SATs in the first place.)

I am thinking, of course, of the public schools that produce top performing students who are illiterate and the private schools where a student may very well be brilliant, but he is the least brilliant among his student body. Things to ponder, I think...

News from Downtown

This blog is becoming fairly Town of Claremont heavy these days, but alas, our fair city of Phds and trees is in the news a lot of late.

First we had a blog post about a doughnut shop owner who likes to purchase harvested elephants. 
Now it seems we have a commission that seeks to turn hitherto GOP districts into elephant grave yards. Plus ca change, plus c'est le meme chose. Anyways, Peter Yao, formerly Claremont City Council member was elected temporary chairman of said commission.  (Courtesy of The L.A. Times.)

And to cap it all off, the Claremont City Council is discussing what's to be done with his seat, whilst the Claremont City Council plans still more strict regulation of smokers. Your city government at work.