Yesterday, the University joined over 1,550 colleges, schools, businesses and places of worship in hosting “Focus the Nation,” a national environmental teach-in that explores solutions to global climate change. The day was filled with lectures, panels and presentations intended to incite discussion on one of the most pressing issues facing the country.
Residents, city officials and state representatives are at odds with the U.S. Army’s plans to build a vast new training center in Middletown. At the heart of the issue is the Army’s choice of site: an area of woods and grassland along Freeman Road, which residents and environmental advocates say would mean the end of one of the last remaining parcels of rural land in Middletown.
Somewhere in almost every woodframe house on campus, there’s a little sticker on a locked door that reads “BASEMENT or ATTIC ACCESS PROHIBITED.” Many students believe the restriction is an attempt to prevent students from throwing parties underground, out of Public Safety’s sight. Not true, says Associate Director of Facilities Management Jeff Miller.
On Tuesday Feb. 5, voters in 24 states (Connecticut included) will cast ballots for the Republican and Democratic presidential nominees. The Argus Editorial Board hopes voters choose Senator John McCain and Senator Barack Obama, respectively.
I’m absolutely, positively, 100 percent supporting Barack Obama, and I would encourage you to as well. I could make a very strong case that his policies, character, record, intellect, etc. make him a better candidate than Hillary Clinton. But that is for you to find out for yourself, and hopefully not in The Argus.
After a weekend of interrupted music (thanks PSafe) and a rather jargon-filled Monday night lecture titled “Does Music Translate Anything?” I stumbled into the Memorial Chapel on Tuesday with low expectations for Dr. Bernice Johnson Reagon, creator of “Sweet Honey in the Rock.” To be honest, I had never heard of her before.
This semester, The Argus will print Op-Ed series that will run in consecutive issues. In this new feature, the editorial board will select issues of importance to the community and will invite students and faculty to submit Wespeaks reflecting on these topics. This will continue to establish the Wespeaks page as a key forum for conversation about University, national and international issues.
I generally try to avoid responding to Wespeaks, as such responses often devolve into mere personal attacks in which grammatical and semantic errors take precedence over the real facts of the argument. I also believe that disagreements are best worked out face-to-face. However, I feel personally compelled, as a student of the history and politics of the Islamic world, to disagree with much of your Wespeak.
Forty years after the death of Martin Luther King, Jr., the University community along with several distinguished guests celebrated the civil rights leader’s life and legacy. In a keynote address on Tuesday, Dr. Bernice Johnson Reagon, founder of the noted a cappella group “Sweet Honey in the Rock” and Curator of the Smithsonian National Museum of American History, urged young people to apply their energy towards the issues of their time rather than continuing to fight the battles of the 1960s.
On Sunday, the Wesleyan Student Assembly (WSA) will release its Annual Mid-Year Report, a document that highlights the accomplishments and progress of the Assembly’s various committees. The report touches upon everything from the WSA’s new office in Usdan to its new Organization and External Affairs Committee.
In February, the Connecticut Humanities Council will be moving its offices from South Main Street to the building next to Broad Street Books, a change that will promote business, provide jobs, and clean up a vacant building.
According to a list of items approved for maintenance during fiscal year 2008-2009, Physical Plant will make $1.5 million in improvements to residence halls and program housing. Over $1 million has been allocated for repairs to senior woodframe houses.
At the peak of lunch crowds on Thursday at about 12:10 p.m., the Usdan University Center was evacuated when the smoke alarm went off. The problem had to do with an over-grill hood, the piece of stainless steel that sucks greasy air away from the grills.
The excitement of the 2008 Presidential race swooped down on Middletown last weekend, as partisan voters and dignitaries flocked here from across the state to participate in a straw poll. Most of the votes were cast online prior to the event, which was marked by speakers battling for their respective candidates. The poll yielded some surprising as well as unsurprising results.
The University’s Catholic community is well into its second year as a flock without a shepherd. The Catholic chaplaincy has been vacant since the retirement of Father Louis Manzo in the spring of 2006. As the University searches for his replacement, Catholic students have endeavored to maintain a lively spiritual community on campus. But the struggle has been taxing.
The University will likely see more political activity now that a new policy makes it possible for candidates to speak on campus. The policy was changed in response to complaints that the old one made it impractical for political speakers to come to campus.
One University student has contracted Chicken Pox (Varicella) according to an all-campus e-mail sent by the Davison Health Center on Thursday. Medical Director Dr. Davis Smith stressed that there are very few people on campus who are at risk for catching it.
Paz, Libertad, y Fraternidad is the motto of Fort Benning’s combat training school, emblazoned on its official website over a watermark of blue sky and pristine, puffy clouds. Peace, Liberty, and Brotherhood: a lovely set of values, but it is hard to believe that the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security for Cooperation (WHINSEC)"as Congress strategically renamed the School of Americas in 2001"could really be upholding these utopian tenets.
When Saul Carlin ’09, Campus Organizer of Democracy Matters, began registering students to vote in Connecticut’s Feb. 5 primary, he was skeptical about the outcome. “We began as a coalition of student groups with two goals in mind: to educate the campus and give its students the opportunity to register and vote,” Carlin said.
The iPod Touch ($299, 8GB; $399, 16GB) is like a middle child. Sure, the parents love it (Steve Jobs loves all his electronic children), and it’s got all the god-given beauty of its older and younger siblings (we’ll get to those). But, somehow, it just doesn’t measure up to its brothers and sisters.
Pay a visit to the bottom floor of Broad Street Books during Drop/Add and there will most likely be at least one student paused in front of a given title, contemplating whether to buy the book in the store or to research prices on the Internet.
With the high turnover of restaurants occupying the space of 129 Church St. (also known as the building on the corner across from High Rise), we were not expecting much from Café Ology, the location’s third incarnation since our freshman year.
This spring’s student forums will come as a breath of fresh air to those who long for untraditional courses taught entirely by undergraduate students. From tap dance to collaborative college farming, these courses explore a wide range of fascinating and relevant topics. Just a few of them are described here.
Austin Purnell ’08 is a man of many talents. If you haven’t seen him in the Science Center lobby for a Gag Reflex show, then perhaps you’ve seen him running down the streets of Middletown wearing little more than a fur coat, or maybe even playing a gay crack whore on the stage of the ’92 Theater.
I disagree that the demand by Students for Ending the War in Iraq (SEWI) for immediate U.S. troop withdrawal from Iraq and Afghanistan — a demand echoed by the peace movement nationally and internationally — is irresponsible. Killing is irresponsible, and that is what the U.S. is doing there. It’s war. Pushing for the end of the military’s involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan is the opposite of irresponsible; in fact, it is the only responsible, loving thing we can do.
After a strong winter break, including seven wins in their last 10 contests, the women basketball players find themselves looking down at all others from the top of the NESCAC standings. With their conference schedule just getting underway, the female ballers boast a 3-0 record, putting them in the first spot in the conference. The Cards are 13-5 overall this season, with two huge NESCAC wins this past weekend in Maine.
After a trip to Puerto Rico during winter break, the women’s swimming and diving team continues its strong season in 2008. The team trained intensively at the University of Puerto Rico for 10 days, interspersed with trips to the beach. Members said that the trip built team stamina.
The New York Giants have put themselves in an extremely tough situation. It is the only team left in the NFL with a chance to derail history and end the New England Patriots’ quest for perfection. With Vegas heavily stacking the odds against the Giants, currently 12 point underdogs, and league MVP Tom Brady quarterbacking the opposing team’s offense, New York must play a perfect game to overthrow the powerful Patriots.
The Playbill cover from “August: Osage County,” a production by Chicago’s Steppenwolf Theatre Company that opened on Broadway at the Imperial Theater in December, sports the silhouette of a standard-looking house balanced on the “T” of “August.” The house holds its position as if working to find a sense of center, in danger either of inverting itself and falling over the edge of the title, or slamming down on the surface of the letter.
Lucian Freud—grandson of Sigmund—is a painter who deals in human imperfection. In the “Lucian Freud: The Painter’s Etchings” exhibition, on display at Manhattan’s Museum of Modern Art until March 13th, the artist’s consummate skill and lifelong devotion to the human body are obvious.
First translated and published in English in mid-2006, Haruki Murakami’s latest book of short stories, “Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman” is a stellar collection of twenty-five tales written between 1981 and 2005. With an incredible cast of characters, including a thieving monkey, corporate decision-making crows and a literal Ice Man with “a slight coating of unmelted white frost on his fingers,” Murakami effortlessly blurs the lines between reality and fantasy, dreams and daily life.
The Center for Humanities commenced its Spring Lecture Series, “Revision and Translation,” on Monday, Jan. 23 with Harvard University’s Ernest Bernbaum Professor of Literature Daniel Albright. Albright, who teaches in the Department of English and American Literature and Language explored the question, “Can Music Translate Anything?”
From television producer J.J Abrams, television director Matt Reeves and television writer Drew Godard comes the fairly hair-raising monster mash “Cloverfield.” Told from the perspective of one unknowing partygoer’s handheld camera, the action of “Cloverfield” plays out like the scariest episode of “America’s Home Videos” ever.
It’s a small underground room guarded by an ancient stuffed animal of ambiguous species (wild boar, perhaps?). The sound-proof doors are almost always locked. However, every now and again the public can catch a glimpse of what goes on in the subterranean lair known as the Second Stage Meeting Room, where the self-proclaimed “Young, Friendly and Attractive” thespians of Wesleyan decide what theater gets produced, and make it happen.
This week in the film series.
In addition to the current RIDE and New Haven shuttle service, students may soon have the option to zip down to Boston for the weekend using the Prius hybrids provided by Zipcar, a car sharing company that would allow students to rent fuel-efficient cars by the hour for up to 24 hours.