In November, a friend jokingly told me the apocalypse was coming. Now just a few months later, that joke feels all too real. While there are no zombies, our new normal is unsettling. As we struggle to figure out a new routine for ourselves and our housebound families, the big question floating around is “What now?”
“A fine new roof is going on Mr. F. Sauter’s house on Dickinson Avenue.” That quote comes from the News Notes section of a 1920 issue of the Swarthmorean. Back then, News Notes consisted of seemingly mundane details about the lives of people in Swarthmore. In other words, the “News Notes” section — or the “Personals” as it would be called by the 1940s — looked a bit like a Facebook or Instagram feed does today.
This aspirational edition of the community calendar comprises a collection of events we wish were happening this week.
The Swarthmore Centennial Foundation is extending the deadline for applications for its Edmund Jones Scholarship until April 15. This $6,000 scholarship is awarded every year to a high school senior who resides in Swarthmore. It is awarded based on scholarship, community service, and citizenship.
March 8 seemed to mark the official wake-from-hibernation day for reptiles and amphibians, as Greg Hoy and Marie Koethe, both of Swarthmore, submitted photographs of an eastern ribbon snake and three wood frogs, respectively. Marie reports that her frogs had already deposited egg sacs!
This article was written to coincide with the opening of “Gin Game” at the Hedgerow Theatre — an opening that has been indefinitely postponed because of the COVID-19 outbreak. However, the actors, Penelope Reed and Zoran Kovcic, are still rehearsing. Here is the story of their preparation.
Just three months ago, I sat at my desk brainstorming potential topics for my junior paper, a notorious ten-page history paper written by every eleventh grader at my school. I sifted through various possibilities, such as Roosevelt’s New Deal and 1940s internment camps for Americans of Japanese descent, but it did not take me long to settle on the influenza epidemic of 1918. I was immediately drawn in by the strangeness of the situation, how the entire world shut down in a matter of days. As I read old newspaper articles, listing school closure after school closure, I thought, “Wow, that’s crazy.” I never imagined that I would be experiencing something like it just three months later.
The day after the two boys were shot and killed playing basketball on Broomall street a couple weeks ago, I was sitting on my front porch chillin. The phone rang. It was Brownelle. The first thing out her mouth was, “Why you sittin on the porch like that? You think you’re bulletproof?” I was at CVS in Brookhaven and she drove by with a car full of people with the window down, talking loud like she did. I texted her, telling her to slow down or I’d call the cops. She replied, “I’m sorry.” That was our last contact.
Not long after the coronavirus closed Wallingford-Swarthmore school doors on March 13, families began asking Micah Knapp, president of the Nether Providence Board of Commissioners, about plans for feeding kids with the schools closed. Hundreds of students in its five public schools qualify for free or reduced-price lunches. With school out for the indefinite future and businesses shutting their doors, families are worried. On March 14, Knapp discussed the situation with WSSD superintendent Lisa Palmer.
Head coach Landry Kosmalski of Swarthmore College number one-ranked men’s basketball team has been named the 2019-20 National Coach of the Year, the National Association of Basketball Coaches announced on March 20.
Kinsa Inc., a health-technology company based in San Francisco, makes a digital “smart” thermometer that collects data from its several thousand customers via an app, and uses the data to predict flu outbreaks.
Our president has said that everything the government can do to keep us as safe as possible from the novel coronavirus has been done. No one I know believes him. The opposite is happening here at Plush Mills. Management has closed us down. Every day they tell us what they are doing and what aspects of our life here need to change. I applaud them.
Last summer, I found out that my congresswoman, Mary Gay Scanlon (PA-5), was starting a Congressional Youth Cabinet. These non-partisan groups allow members of congress to connect with young people in their districts to discuss policy and work together to solve pressing issues in their communities. I was beyond excited by the opportunity and decided to apply.
TimeBank uses a website to pair folks who need help with those who are willing to do some helping. Members can post an “Offer” if they have a particular skill they think could benefit another. People who need help with a task can post a “Request.” People respond according to their need, or their ability to help. The goal is to strengthen the fabric of the community through the exchange of skills and services.
Swarthmore United Methodist Church Pastor Lydia Munoz hopes her parishioners might find a way to transform their fear and anxiety, at least a bit, by trying to change their narrative of the present moment.
Last week, the Swarthmorean published several statements given by district parents and students during the public comment section of the March 9 Wallingford-Swarthmore school board meeting. The speakers were responding to the removal of three books on LGBTQ+ subjects from a fifth-grade classroom library. These two statements, given by seniors at Strath Haven High School, were not prepared in advance, but were offered on the spur of the moment.
Here are some online resources for kids and adults — some educational and some not. This is just the tip of the iceberg, of course.
David Pollack, MD, is a senior physician in Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP)’s primary care network at three Delaware County locations. The Swarthmorean called him for some perspective on kids and COVID-19.
Kabeera Weissman, who founded the Delaware County Coalition for Prison Reform (Delco CPR), expressed concerns at a 2017 phone-banking event about the George W. Hill Correctional Facility — the only private prison in Pennsylvania — to Delaware County Council members. The county payed GEO Group, the organization that manages the prison, approximately $50 million a year — about a sixth of the county’s total operating budget. At the time, she didn’t know much about private prisons, but she knew she didn’t believe in companies making profits by incarcerating people. That was the moment that sparked a movement.
Swarthmore College President Valerie Smith contacted faculty, staff, students, and families on March 17 to announce that the college would continue educating its students remotely, through online classes, through the end of the semester. Commencement, too, will be affected. “All of us were looking forward to gathering together under the canopy of tulip and white oak trees,” Smith wrote. A planning committee will develop a “creative virtual alternative” to be held, in all likelihood, on the already scheduled date of Sunday, May 24. All campus activities will be canceled through at least May 31.
