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The Office of International Programs at Princeton University posts lots of post-graduate fellowships. 54 to be exact. The fellowships provide potential opportunities for Princeton students to continue their education in the US or abroad in a wide range of topics, from studying the Senegalese language of Wolof to atmospheric sciences, oceanography or hydrology.
This past year,the most prevalent statistic for college campuses across the country was the suicide rate — a number that has been re-calculated time and time again.In the past week alone, the LA Times, the Boston Globe and campus newspapers across thecountry have reported increasing rates of student suicides and the accompanying demand for more psychological services. The University and the Princeton student body have similarly voiced concerns about the culture around stress, depression and suicide on campus, along with the establishment of student organizations such as the Mental Health Initiative and the in-development Peer Connections program. It’s clear that students want to be more sensitive to this issue — after all, no one wants to be unhelpful or unsympathetic to friends who reach out for help. However, few of us are equipped to help in the correct way.
Do you remember that film “Good Will Hunting”? Where Matt Damon’s character calls out this guy in a Harvard bar for regurgitating some advanced textbook just to impress a girl? At one point, he’s sitting on a park bench with Robin Williams and Robin says, “you’re just a kid, you don’t have the faintest idea what you’re talking about.” Matt’s supposed to be playing a young genius that has gone unrecognized by the world. As a student on Princeton’s campus — as a part of the Ivy League community — I’m pretty sure I’ve met a couple of geniuses and probably a lot more who could almost qualify. We all talk about this top-class education, where the students are reading all the time. We’re busy taking advantage of all the information that’s out there. After hearing Monica Lewinsky’s TED Talk, I've begun to wonder if that’s actually a good thing. Should we be striving to know everything, to pass judgement on everything?
There really aren’t any shortcuts on Princeton campus. For a student body whose day-to-day activity involves quite a lot of walking and biking, it seems like there’s never enough time for the trek from Frick Chemistry Laboratory to East Pyne. The new construction and renovation projects scattered around campus certainly don’t make those ten minutes between classes any easier. What many students don’t know is that these new buildings represent something that we should be proud of — the University’s commitment to sustainability.
“I swear I’m not homophobic,” a student said defensively at dinner the other day. “I mean, some of my best friends are gay,” he continued. Having just heard the insensitive remark he had made moments before, I didn’t know what to believe.
“Don’t bother befriending any visiting students,” says Creative Director and Deputy Arts & Lit Editor of The Oxford Student, Natalie Harney. “Yes, they’re unbelievably exotic, but too late will you realize that they aren’t in it for the long haul, and before you know it, they’ll have abandoned you for their ‘real’ friends back home.”
With the revamping of its sexual harassment policy, the University has approved changes to how it investigates sexual assault on campus. In many instances, students, faculty and administrators have stood up in town hall meetings, committee hearings and in writing to discuss these policy change recommendations. The participants in these discussions often bring up the topic of a victim’s choice to report. When this topic arises, debate seems to attend more to the ethics and societal responsibility of reporting, rather than the personal impact the process of reporting may have on the victim.
Institutions of higher education are no strangers to high-profile gifts from their successful alumni. In particular, Cornell University is the recent recipient of a $50 million gift from alumnus and billionaire hedge fund manager David Einhorn. This $50 million donation, which will be supplemented by another $100 million from outside donors, will fund the university’s new 10-year initiative called Engaged Cornell, which will encourage students to go beyond the classroom and have hands-on experiences through community-university partnerships. The goal of expanding the percentage of student engagement in communities to 100 percent is certainly noble and inspiring. However, the initiative’s goal to enable departments to offer these community-integrated courses at all levels of expertise, including introductory-level classes, can be troubling.
As the University faces an investigation for possible violations of federal law under Title IX, it has directed some of its attention to the role of residential college advisers in new policy changes. In the past, RCAs were not required to report sexual misconduct cases to the directors of student life. However, under the new regulations, RCAs now have to report every case of which they are made aware, even if the victim isn’t one of their advisees. Once a case is reported, the University will conduct a mandatory investigation. While the University’s intended goal is to address sexual violence and harassment on campus, the policy change involving RCAs may discourage sexual assault victims from reporting their cases.
As of Aug. 29, 2014, the ALS Association proudly reported having received $100.9 million from over three million donors within a month, thanks to this summer’s viral Ice Bucket Challenge. Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, also known as Lou Gehrig’s Disease, is a disease in which the progressive degeneration of motor neurons in the brain and spinal cord results in muscle weakness and atrophy. This often leads to total paralysis and death within two to five years. In the campaign to find a cure, many non-profits, such as Project A.L.S., have adopted the Ice Bucket Challenge, posting it onto their front pages and turning it into a trending social media phenomenon that gathers more supporters each day. However, despite having had an impressive run with no signs of slowing down any time soon, the Ice Bucket Challenge has its critics — and rightfully so.
In her Aug. 18 column in the New York Post, Doree Lewak discusses how she views the act of “catcalling” to be an innocuous form of “self-empowerment" for women, saying that it should deliver a “drive-by dose of confidence” rather than being considered something as negative as street harassment. After reading Lewak’s column, I wondered just how common it was for professional or amateur writers as well as online commentators to pass off unacceptable social behavior by saying that it was merely “primal” and has probably existed for centuries, as Lewak did.
Around the time when sophomores were supposed to begin declaring their majors, I was talking to a female student at dinner about a friend of mine who was seriously considering Classics as his department of choice. He had taken classes in the department and excelled within this incredibly intellectual field of study. In consideration of the “white privilege” conversation that has been circulating, I will say that my friend is a white, heterosexual male from a fairly well off background — a legacy no less — but keep in mind that the student at dinner didn’t know that. Despite knowing nothing about my friend’s background except for his race and gender, as well as making false assumptions regarding the difficulty of certain humanities departments such as Classics, the girl at dinner said “it’s probably because he can afford to be a Classics major.” And I wondered what this meant.
In her April 11column “Ordinary people,” Morgan Jerkins tries to remind us that in spite of the distractions of an overwhelming workload, extracurriculars and the general stress that comes with being a Princeton student, the University allows us the chance to interact with world-renowned scholars and academic legends. She reminds us that while we are hustling to the next place we have to be, we often forget that we’re here — if only for just four years — at an incredible university.
My mother was an artist. She went into college as an artist and came out of it as one. At no point did she second-guess this career because of dips in the economy, cautionary tales of the struggling artist or the expansion of departments in “usable” majors. At no point did she doubt herself and acquire a backup. However, I grew up always making sure I had a safety net, as if I were afraid of the next fall. Regrettably enough, I’ve found that this is the case for many Princeton students. Why is it that so many students fear the “no-guarantee” pathway even if that risk might be right for them? Why is it that so many Princeton students shy away from visual arts, music, philosophy and creative writing or at best, say they’d only pursue these subjects through extracurricular activities, rather than more professional means? Can we really consider it wise and advisable for students to make their passions their backups if their “real” jobs don’t pan out?
While at Princeton, students are expected to talk about their experiences struggling to get here, their stories of trying to stay here — and stay sane, for that matter — and most of all, what helped them make it into this institution. Sometimes it seems like there is never a moment when we’re not trying to establish our merit whether to our peers or even to ourselves. Whether confronted with professors, preceptors, classmates or friends, we have to mark out what makes us special and remarkable, because in this case, “being special” sometimes seems to be as close as we can get to “belonging.” But what happens when your appearance and your stereotype dictate a false image or a misrepresentation of what really makes you special?
The Princeton University Library system holds almost 60,000 theses, written by senior students from 1926 to 2013. But, other than living trapped in Mudd Library, where do these theses ever really go? Your words or calculations will represent a space of the world that has previously gone unexplored. Your thesis will entail collaboration with sleepless nights,extraordinary professors and, most likely, a great deal of funding. But the bulky senior thesis, with its unnerving deadlines and demands, might not be the best way to get the most out of our education or prepare us for our future careers, whether we find ourselves thrust into the workforce or tethered to another academic institution.
When Princeton students try to show their school spirit to non-Princeton students, it seems the line between engaging in genuine school appreciation and inter-university comparisons isn’t always clear. School appreciation isn’t reliant on what another university has — it is more centered on liking Princeton for Princeton’s sake, while inter-university comparisons often seem to make reference to Princeton being better than other institutions.
During my internship at an HIV/AIDS research center in South Africa, a clinician recalled to me one of her earliest experiences with an HIV patient from a township in the Western Cape. The patient was a middle-aged woman who worked during the day and, when her children came home, took care of them and her husband. She was a provider, a mother and a wife —an entire support system within one individual. This woman had already completed a significant portion of the HIV treatment by the time she spoke to the clinician. However, during this particular meeting, the patient said quite simply that she wasn’t going to come back to finish the rest of the treatment. The clinician couldn’t understand it. Frankly, neither could I.
Princeton students never seem to fail to dazzle board members of clubs or job interviewers with their impressive resumes and laundry lists of commitments. However, once asked to discuss their interests in the field and to showcase what they know about current national and global events relevant to the position or organization they’re interested in, many students seem to struggle. In an interview for a public health-related club on campus, I found that my interviewees often managed to find some new health policy, a medical society census or national health concern to name-drop. However, when it came time for the interviewee to demonstrate their understanding of the implications of the policy or what their opinions were, I found myself in the midst of a lot of awkward standstills.
In her Nov. 13column, “Pursuing our passions,” Prianka Misra proposes that classes should “adopt a more applied philosophy and utilize an involved approach to assignments and activities, teaching students the problem-solving strategies that are reflected in the real world.” Misra discusses her experience in Professor John Danner’s interactive and application-heavy class, “Special Topics in Social Entrepreneurship: Ventures to Address Global Challenges.” The class allows students to delve into a “pre-professional realm of academics” by letting them apply the concepts they learn to their own venture ideas. While classes like Danner’s certainly offer students a new approach to learning about real-world subjects such as economic sustainability and entrepreneurship, Misra’s vision of the ideal course is not easily applicable to courses in other concentrations and could even be detrimental to the learning process of students in STEM fields.
