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(12/04/14 6:53pm)
Last year, the Undergraduate Student Government organized Wintersession, a new program during Intersession in which students can take courses taught by other students and representatives from certain University resource centers, such as Career Services, with topics ranging from “Rubik’s Cube for Beginners” to “Intro Bulgarian.” The program was immensely popular, with over 1,300 students participating in 69 different courses. USG will be offering it again this Intersession. However, despite the success of Wintersession last year, the University lags behind some of our peer institutions in offerings during similar breaks in their academic calendars. The Editorial Board recommends that the University, particularly the Office of the Dean of Undergraduate Students, take a larger role in the administration of Wintersession to build on USG’s success and create a more robust Intersession program that is expanded to include courses and trips with University faculty and alumni.
(10/23/14 6:49pm)
The University offers many dining options for students, ranging from meal plans for underclassmen to options such as eating clubs for upperclassmen. Dining is essential to community building, as it gives students the opportunity to interact with others outside of their classes and residential colleges. It is for this reason that the University provides some dining hall swipes for upperclassmen and that eating clubs offer meal exchange programs. Burdensome restrictions, however, make these options inconvenient to use, and more can be done to increase the flexibility of dining options for all students. By making dining more flexible, students will be given more opportunities to interact with others outside of their set dining plans. For this reason, the Editorial Board believes that the University should replace Late Meal swipes with a system of flex dollars, a form of cash credit that can be used at on-campus dining locations. Furthermore, the Board encourages eating clubs to adopt an electronic system for meal swipes.
(10/16/14 6:45pm)
No liberal arts education is complete without a solid grounding in the Western intellectual tradition. In the past, students were assured a rigorous foundation in the humanities via a core curriculum; today, with the core curriculum replaced by malleable distribution requirements, students who yearn to drink deeply from the Pierian Spring must cobble together their own curriculum. Fortunately for such Princetonians, each year the University offers HUM 216-217 and HUM 218-219: Interdisciplinary Approaches to Western Culture from Antiquity to the Middle Ages, commonly known as the Humanities Sequence. Unfortunately, this renowned course comes with an application and an enrollment cap. We humbly propose the application and enrollment procedure be reformed in hopes of expanding the program.
(02/18/14 9:21pm)
One in nine people are victims of sexual harassment, sexual assault, domestic violence and stalking, defined by Sexual Harassment/Assault Advising Resources & Education as Power-Based Personal Violence, each year. The Board believes that in order to prevent PBPV on campus, assault prevention programs must emphasize “bystander intervention” to overcome the bystander effect. The bystander effect is the phenomenon of individuals not offering help to a victim when others are present. In fact, the probability of help is inversely related to the number of bystanders. Bystander intervention training aims to combat the bystander effect by giving students specific tools to act and prevent potential and occurring instances of sexual assault. In addition to being particularly useful in combating PBPV, bystander intervention training can also involve students, such as males, who have previously resisted involvement in PBPV issues on campus due to the perception that they are not potential victims. Since “bystander intervention” opens up the conversation to all students, the Board supports and encourages the presence of “bystander intervention” programs on campus.
(11/19/13 10:50pm)
The Editorial Board strongly supports ongoing efforts to provide students with information about the current cases of infection with theN. meningitidisbacteria on our campus and to continue to promote cautious behavior. In view of recent events, the Board recommends that students strongly consider receiving the vaccine against serogroup B to be made available next month.
(10/24/13 7:13pm)
As exams come to a close and many of us head off campus for fall break, the Board would like to take the opportunity to reflect on the structure of this chaotic week that we call midterms. Midterms week is unique, as students carry the burden of exams along with their regular course loads. Currently, there are few policies in place that regulate how midterm exams are scheduled and administered. With a few simple changes, midterms would be more standardized and thus fairer for all students.
(01/08/12 11:00pm)
Michael Yaroshefsky ’12 was just a sophomore when he ran for his first term as USG president. He had a proven record of accomplishment as IT chair of the USG and a desire to serve Princeton students. This experience, combined with his realistic policy proposals and a well-thought-out platform, led this board to endorse him in both of his campaigns. Now, two years later, we reflect on how he carried out those goals and the impact that he has had as president.
(12/15/11 11:00pm)
In a recent email to residents of certain dorms on campus, the University announced plans to update security throughout campus by replacing the traditional locks on dormitory doors with keypads. Beginning in the fall, this new system will allow students to open their doors with a prox along with a PIN. These doors would also automatically lock when closed and sound an alarm if the door is taped open.
(12/13/11 11:00pm)
With fall semester final examinations approaching, a review of current final examination policies is in order. In particular, the policy concerning the rescheduling of final examinations — which permits rescheduling for athletic conflicts but not for any other conflicts with University-sponsored extracurricular activities — needs revising. This policy must be changed to ensure uniformity and fairness.
(12/11/11 11:00pm)
As was reported last month in the 'Prince,' Princeton is a primary investor in HEI Hospitality, LLC, a group that owns luxury hotels and resorts around the country. The company has come under fire for numerous abuses against employees, including allegations of denying breaks to workers, retaliating against workers who have attempted to unionize or have tried to bring the company’s abuses to light and discriminating against workers on the basis of age. Princeton is not alone in its dealings with HEI Hospitality — Yale, Harvard, Brown, the University of Pennsylvania, Notre Dame and the University of Chicago all are major investors — but while some of our peer institutions have made pledges not to reinvest with the company in light of these allegations, Princeton has made no such commitment. We believe that they have a responsibility to do so.
(12/08/11 11:00pm)
Cannon Dial Elm Club opened its doors to 138 new members last Saturday, increasing the number of eating clubs on Prospect Avenue to 11. Cannon, as the new club is informally called, has reopened as a bicker club: Each year, new members are selected in a competitive process by the existing body of members. While Bicker has traditionally been held at the start of the spring semester, Cannon chose to hold it partway through the fall semester instead, thereby selecting its new class before other selective clubs have even held their Bicker processes.
(12/06/11 11:00pm)
Princeton has a reputation for political apathy that is perhaps unique among our peer universities. While elsewhere our fellow college students spend much of their time politically engaged with the wider world, we pass our years within our Orange Bubble, part of a campus culture that largely insulates us from involvement with the political issues that grip the nation. Recently, as part of a movement sweeping college campuses across the country, a group of Princetonians founded a local chapter of Occupy Wall Street, called Occupy Princeton. We applaud a shift away from the apathy that currently reigns on campus, and — regardless of our views on Occupy Princeton’s political goals — we are hopeful that its presence may help contribute to that shift.
(12/04/11 11:00pm)
The Peer Tutoring Program offered by the residential colleges constitutes an invaluable academic resource at Princeton. While not all students employ it, those who do consult with an academic tutor stand to benefit considerably in their studies. Princeton should indeed be commended for the strength of its program and for freely providing these services to students. Currently, however, the University prohibits tutoring during finals week because “tutors need to study, too.” We believe that this limitation is misguided and that tutoring services should be offered even during finals week.
(12/01/11 11:00pm)
Recently, the University has announced and begun implementing a new open-access policy for faculty publications, in which the University and faculty members reserve the right to republish scholarly articles after submitting them to journals. The Editorial Board applauds the decision, as we believe it will lead to a wider dissemination of important scholarly work, and urges the University to follow through on this plan by establishing a free online journal to facilitate distribution of faculty scholarship.
(11/29/11 11:00pm)
Upon their introduction in September 2007, the University promoted the four-year residential colleges on the grounds that they would unite undergraduates from all four classes in vibrant and cohesive communities. Following the long-established model of other universities, most notably Yale, the University financed new renovations to dormitories and residential college facilities, appointed staff members to oversee student programming and redoubled the institutional emphasis on intra-college spirit and camaraderie. As this paper reported at the time, such changes sought to increase social, cultural, intellectual, recreational and civic participation not only among newly integrated upperclassmen but also within the college communities overall.
(11/27/11 11:00pm)
In 2009, Princeton University introduced the Bridge Year Program, allowing incoming freshmen to spend a year abroad volunteering prior to starting their academic careers. This experience adds depth to their scholarship and surely markedly increases the maturity and international awareness of Princeton students. Unfortunately, the current Bridge Year Program is limited to incoming freshmen. Opening up the Bridge Year Program or instituting a comparable program for rising sophomores, juniors and seniors would expand the tested benefit to the whole campus, making a huge leap in Princeton’s dedication to “the service of all nations.”
(11/22/11 11:00pm)
The opening scene of “A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving” says it all. After convincing Charlie Brown that kicking a football is a Thanksgiving tradition, Lucy pulls away the pigskin at the last second, and poor Charlie ends up on his back. Standing over her prone friend, she questions him, “Isn’t it peculiar, Charlie Brown, how some traditions just slowly fade away?” Sadly, some don’t.
(11/20/11 11:00pm)
Today, students begin voting for their representatives to the Undergraduate Student Government, including, among others, the USG president and vice president. Three candidates are running for president: Catherine Ettman ’13, Bruce Easop ’13 and Shikha Uberoi ’13. Two candidates are running for vice president: Merik Mulcahy ’13 and Stephen Stolzenberg ’13. Though all of the candidates have much to offer the student body, the Editorial Board endorses Ettman for president and Mulcahy for vice president.
(11/17/11 11:00pm)
Despite princeton’s recognized commitment to nationally accepted standards and rules regulating the conduct of research, The University has recently displayed an indefensible neglect of animal rights in its research on primates. As the Daily Princetonian reported on Wednesday, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the body responsible for monitoring research upon animals, cited the University for 11 violations in 2011 and six violations in 2010. Furthermore, as was reported earlier this semester, the University was given the second-worst Research Misconduct Score in the Ivy League by the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine. Princeton’s violations range from procedural inconsistencies to more substantive complaints, including the failure to provide sufficient water or anesthesia to research animals. The University ought to undertake a concerted effort to immediately address these violations, as they are both morally reprehensible and an anathema to Princeton’s tradition of excellence in research.
(11/15/11 11:00pm)
In the fiscal year that ended on June 30, 2011, Princeton University reported a 21.9 percent annual return on its investments, valued at $17.1 billion. The growth was in the top percentile of over 400 institutions reporting to the Trust Universe Comparison Service. These numbers demonstrate healthy finances for the University: A steady growth of endowment investments allows the University to fund study abroad programs, research opportunities and large initiatives such as the no-loan financial aid program. However, we release relatively little information about how we invest our endowment. In fact, a recent College Sustainability Report Card survey grades Princeton’s endowment transparency a D — one of the worst in the country. While information on endowment holdings is made available to trustees and senior administrators, we provide no information to the broader school community or the general public unlike the majority of our peer institutions.