PRIDE

We looked . . . we just didn't have much luck uncovering the kind of excessive, damaging, mean-spirited pride that appeared as superbia in Pope Gregory's list of deadly sins. Then again, we did find plenty of things to be proud of — but this is Johns Hopkins. (Were we not supposed to say that?)

The Oprah Effect
Green with Pride
We've Got Spirit, Yes We Do
The Cult of Theseus
Empowering Environment
Look Good, Feel Good
For the Love of Sport

 

The Oprah Effect
Katrina Bell McDonald's latest book, Embracing Oprah: The Contemporary Challenges of Black Sisterhood (Rowman & Littlefield), was inspired in part by a car repair shop conversation she had with a stranger. The woman, African-American like McDonald, saw a commercial for Oprah on TV and dismissed Oprah Winfrey as a sellout, saying, "She's not even black anymore. You know what I mean."

Where was the sisterhood? wondered McDonald, whose previous work has focused on African-American women and families; intersections of race, class, and gender; and the sociology of the family. Theories about the growing African-American middle class suggested a divide in the African-American community between the haves and the have-nots. How was this affecting black women in particular? And what, if anything, did these sisters have in common?

What McDonald found surprised her. Regardless of age, income, educational attainment, or racial identity, the 88 Baltimore-area women she surveyed shared a major trait: pride. No matter what kind of academic degrees they held, where they lived, or how much money they made, the overwhelming majority of women McDonald surveyed — some 94 percent — said they took "great pride" in being black women.

"This is not an egotistical pride, it's community pride," McDonald explains. "It's pride in collective survival. Most black folks will say we shouldn't be here. We never should have made it through slavery. All you have to do is see a black woman walking down the street and you can see her pride."

Why Oprah? "Everyone talks about Oprah — whether they like her or not," says McDonald. "She is a contemporary test for so many people — can one 'remain black' in spite of one's success? To embrace Oprah is to recognize and accept the broad spectrum of black womanhood and what authenticity can mean for different women — and still recognize that which the vast majority of black women share." —MB

 

Green with Pride
Anyone who admires the blossoming magnolia trees on the Lower Quad or appreciates neatly trimmed grass hugging the brick pathways can see that Homewood's groundskeepers take pride in what they do.

But a daily dose of humility keeps their pride from turning into hubris: Early morning trash removal tops their to-do list. It is an unglamorous bullet dotting a groundskeeper's job description. But journeyman Tom Price, who marked 17 years on the job this summer, gives the impression that he and the other nine guys on the ground take garbage patrol in stride.

"I like picking up trash," Price shrugs. "It makes everything look nicer."

"We're working whether it's raining, snowing, cold, hot, or nice outside," Sherburne says. "We can't help what the weather brings or what events are happening on campus, but we have to turn things around quickly no matter what."

A daily ritual for Sherburne is checking the university's online calendar to ensure the crew won't be using noisy machines where they could overpower events.

"The last thing I want is to get a call saying that Al Gore is speaking and there is a mower driving by," Sherburne says. "The recreational aspect is a big thing here as well — campus has to look just as good for a lacrosse game as it does for commencement. We'll get lots of people for both."

Sherburne and the crew stay on top of things using zone coverage, with each groundskeeper maintaining his own specific area of campus. Zone coverage seems to pique the crew's sense of pride.

"Zone coverage gives everybody a sense of ownership," Sherburne says. "No one wants to have their area look worse than anyone else's."

George Martinez, who covers the area of campus near Remington Avenue, the front and back of Olin Hall and both sides of Wyman Park Drive, has even received unexpected kudos. "I had some students come up to me once to give me a flower," he says. "They said, 'Here, you have done a good job here. Thank you.' It was really nice and it made me feel proud."

Affiliates and visitors aren't the only ones noticing that Homewood's grass is greener. For its design work on the Homewood campus, Baltimore-based landscape contractor Outside Unlimited Inc. earned the 2004 Excellence in Landscaping Grand Award for the mid-Atlantic region from the Landscape Contractors Association. The award is also a nod to the Homewood groundskeepers, who carried out the maintenance of Outside Unlimited's plan. And the Baltimore metro chapter of the American Builders Congress gave Homewood its 2005 Award of Excellence for design, installation, and ongoing care and maintenance.

Sherburne says that keeping the campus beautiful helps the university in its effort to recruit the best students, faculty, and staff. "We really need to give you a good first impression," he says. "And when you come back for your five-year reunion, we want this campus to look even better than when you were a freshman." —AC

 

We've Got Spirit, Yes We Do...
As a Johns Hopkins undergraduate, Jason Fodeman, A&S '05, was a diehard Blue Jays fan, proud of his school and its athletes. But when he surveyed the stands, he was disappointed by how few fellow classmates he found. "Community and school spirit was lacking," he says.

So the economics major decided to do something about it. Together with friends Dan Hislop and Michael Poli, both freshmen, he founded the Hopkins Student Booster Club. Their most visible accomplishment: establishing a student seating section at Homewood Field dubbed the Nest.

The idea quickly caught on during the men's lacrosse season this past spring. Thanks to free blue T-shirts and a liberal use of blue body paint, the stands on the home side of the field were transformed into a sea of cheering, chanting fans. "At the Duke game, everyone [in the Nest] stood the whole game," Fodeman says. "It was really impressive."

The effect wasn't lost on the players. "To have thousands of people cheering for you, particularly friends and students sitting in their own section, it just took the experience of game day to a whole other level," says co-captain Chris Watson.

Fodeman et al. have plans for generating more school spirit at Hopkins — like sending out e-mail reminders and posting fliers about upcoming games, and branching out to promote football and basketball. "Every part of the school benefits when kids feel like they are a part of something," Fodeman says. —MB

 

The Cult of Theseus
In Greek mythology, excessive pride brought down even the mightiest of mortals. Take Bellerophon, who was undone by hubris when he claimed that his winged horse, Pegasus, could fly him to Mount Olympus. The gods sent a fly to sting the horse, which stumbled, and Bellerophon fell to his death.

"The civic identity and civic pride of Athenians particularly is shaped by their worship of a number of heroes, including Theseus," says Shapiro, who is writing a book on the topic. The Athenian king was strong, brave, and resourceful. "Theseus was considered the national hero of Athens," Shapiro says. People built shrines to honor him, held festivals in his name, and painted his image on pottery.

Shapiro has studied hundreds of those images to understand Theseus' place in Athenian society. The people's pride in Theseus was a great unifier, he explains. Worshiping the king "was a way to help bring everyone together — like we might have in the Orioles or in Cal Ripken today." —MB

 

An Empowering Environment
Alan Green trains students to counsel teens in Baltimore City's poorest neighborhoods, where many parents are absent, the drug trade flourishes, and violence is endemic. The mindset shared by many of these teens? I deserve this. This is the way life's supposed to be.

Green's goal is to counter this debilitating world view in the school guidance counselor's office through an approach known as "urban school counseling." Its central premise: that students in disadvantaged neighborhoods must be given an accurate view of the historical and socioeconomic antecedents that led to the way things are today. Such knowledge, the thinking goes, will help them to find a better way for themselves.

Green offers the example of a Baltimore City high school student who had been flagged by his principal for excessive aggressiveness and absenteeism. The boy's father had recently been arrested for killing his girlfriend and was in jail, and his mother was out of the picture, either dead or in prison. The boy's aunt had grudgingly allowed him to live with her, but offered no food or financial support. A recent graduate of the urban school counseling program began working closely with the young man. He offered traditional bereavement support, and also covered the history of drug use and violence in the city, exposing the teen to books, newspaper articles, and other sources of information. The young man grew to understand how his father had gotten caught up in drugs, and why his neighborhood was so dangerous. "The kid really grabbed hold of this," Green recalls. "Rather than sinking further into depression, [he was] motivated to get a part-time job — to take some responsibility and not feel sorry for himself."

Green recalls another instance, when he was working with some teenage boys at an East Baltimore school. The group was talking about rap music and the factors that influenced it when the conversation turned to reading. Green made the point that it was once illegal for slaves to read and that Frederick Douglass risked his life to learn how. The informal history lesson made a particular impact on one teen, Green says. "This really fired this kid up. It motivated him. It made a difference in how he approached school."

Many aspiring counselors who come to the program are former classroom teachers who find themselves stymied by the serious social and emotional issues their students face. "They spend most of their time dealing with crises — they see their task as being teachers seriously impeded," Green says.

Veronique Gugliucciello, who completed her master's in Urban School Counseling in May 2004, had taught at Gardenville Elementary in Baltimore for several years before moving to counseling. "I felt I needed to touch my students on a different level," she says, adding that she's found value in the urban counseling approach. "It's empowering for students to know about the environment they are living in and why things are the way they are." —SD

 

Look Good, Feel Good
It was quite a surprise to some when, in 2003, Johns Hopkins opened its Cosmetic Center at Green Spring Station. After all, since when does a venerable institution renowned for its serious medicine concern itself with making boobs bigger and skin smoother?

A Washington Post article from January 2004 put it this way: "Long one of the most revered names in academic medicine — and for more than a dozen years ranked the nation's best hospital by U.S. News & World Report — Hopkins has embarked on a new and potentially lucrative venture so at variance with its international reputation for gravitas that it would have been unthinkable a decade ago."

But Craig Vander Kolk, a professor of plastic surgery at the School of Medicine who was instrumental in founding the center, is proud of the work he does there — because it enables him to help instill a little pride in others: "We're interested in helping people feel good about themselves," he says.

Vander Kolk, now one of the center's directors, has specialized in treating kids with cleft lips and cleft palates, and is recognized internationally for his research in craniofacial surgery. He brings his experience and skills from that work to cosmetic surgery. "I approach cosmetic patients the same way as cleft palate or cleft lip kids — I approach them as a person," Vander Kolk says. "I help get them feeling like their outside is the same as their inside."

The center is staffed by Hopkins docs whose specialties range from otolaryngology and oculoplasty to vascular surgery and interventional radiology. Combined, they have about 2,000 patient visits a year; Vander Kolk alone performs more than 300 procedures per year on patients ranging in age from 35 to 75. Younger women most often have less invasive procedures like eyelid surgery (called blepharoplasty) and Botox or Restylane injections (both treat wrinkles and folds; the former does so by weakening the muscles, the latter fills the areas in), while older women may also have some type of facelift. The most common procedures for men include blepharoplasty, botox, and neck lifts.

Prices for these procedures — which depend on a patient's age; his or her individual anatomy, needs, and goals; and the surgeon who does the work — can run from a few hundred dollars (for Botox or Restylane) to several thousand (for blepharoplasty or a facelift). According to Vander Kolk, eyelid surgery can cost anywhere from $3,000 to $7,500, and a facelift — including the neck, cheeks, and jawline — can cost up to $12,000.

With shows like Extreme Makeover and The Swan out there, cosmetic surgery is a fact of life. (Maybe too much of one. At cocktail parties, says Vander Kolk, "everybody thinks that, as a plastic surgeon, I'm on Nip/Tuck.") His goal is to make Green Spring Station a center of excellence for cosmetic surgery, focusing on education, outcomes research, and patient safety. And he thinks that Hopkins is the right institution for the job. "It's out there. It's medicine. We should be leading the way," he says. —CP

 

For the Love of Sport
Last March 5, Hopkins men's lacrosse played its season opener at Princeton. The crowd of 6,325 was the largest in the history of Princeton's lacrosse stadium, and almost every one of them walked out at the end of the game — just as the Hopkins women's team was filing in for its game. Watching everyone leave just before your game starts is not easy, admits Hopkins women's lacrosse coach Janine Tucker. She recalls, "The girls joked about it and said, 'Oh, everybody's just going to get something to eat. They'll be right back.'"

"You know, it was interesting: The group of fans, other than parents, that ended up staying [for the Princeton game] was our men's team. As all the thousands left after watching our boys play, it was very cool for our girls to look up in the stands and see that our men's team had delayed [going] home and stayed. It meant a lot and was very touching." —DK

 
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