Welcome, freshman rubes: I am the Weather Guy (in West Virginia, legally known as the Robert C. Byrd Memorial Weather Guy), and I possess the skillz to pay this campus' weather billz.
At first glance, Princeton's newly established four-year residential colleges resemble those that have existed for years at Oxford, Cambridge, Harvard, Yale and scores of other institutions.But, in trying to replicate its peer schools' systems, the University faced a unique challenge: the 10 eating clubs clustered near Prospect Avenue.Almost as long as the clubs have existed, the University has periodically tried to replace them with a residential college system.
Cost: $136 million Size: 250,000 sq. ft. Buildings: 10 Residents: 500 undergraduates, 10 graduate students, one faculty fellow Bedrooms: 405 (301 single bedrooms and 104 double bedrooms) Dining rooms: One main hall and two semiprivate halls Building materials: 6,000 tons of fieldstone and limestone (175,000 pieces of fieldstone and 38,000 pieces of limestone) Trees: 219
Though its Gothic spires have drastically transformed the campus landscape, Whitman College is uncharted territory for many members of the University community.Composed of 10 buildings and spanning 250,000 sq.
It took two years to plan, three years to construct and $136 million to fund. Now Whitman College ? equipped with a state-of-the-art dining hall, a digital photo lab and plentiful greenery ? is finally open.Two hundred freshmen, 100 sophomores, 200 upperclassmen and 10 graduate students have moved into the college that promises to transform life at Princeton by kicking off the four-year residential college system.Despite Whitman's 10 buildings and impressive facilities, two challenges still face its incoming residents."At Whitman, we have been blessed with a fabulous infrastructure," said economics professor Harvey Rosen, who will serve as the first master of Whitman."On the other hand, we have no shared history or traditions.
Move-in, 2007: I parked in Lot 23 and walked up the familiar slope of Elm Drive. I could see piles of rubble from the destruction of the Butler Quad from far away, and I immediately felt a sense of loss, of sadness.
In 2002, eBay president and CEO Meg Whitman '77 donated $30 million to the University, putting her name on the residential college that opened this fall following five years of planning and construction."Princeton had an enormous impact on my life, helping to define the person I am today," Whitman said in a recent email to The Daily Princetonian.
When Whitman College holds its official grand opening Sept. 26 and 27, students and administrators will pay tribute to the dozens of University alumni who contributed more than $136 million toward the creation of the newest residential college.
With massive Gothic towers, mottled stone and gleaming sod, students returning to campus this fall have found it all but impossible not to notice that the construction site at the south end of Elm Drive has been transformed into the mammoth Whitman College.Awed by seeing the project finally completed, excited about living there or envious of those who do, students may overlook the overall transformation of the residential college system.Common spaces and dining halls in Forbes, Mathey and Rockefeller Colleges have been renovated in the last few months, the dorms of the Butler College quad have been demolished and some undergraduate rooms in each college have been converted into as many as 10 graduate student suites.But the changes to the system run much deeper, allowing each college to specialize and develop its own identity, from updated college shields to new menus unique to each college's dining hall.
Lindsay Jacob '08, a comparative literature concentrator, died June 15 in Philadelphia after a long battle with Ewing's sarcoma, a rare form of bone cancer.
U.S.News ranks U. first for eighth consecutive yearFor the eighth consecutive year, Princeton took first place in U.S.
The University received two anonymous bomb threats on Aug. 27 and Sept. 1, and both were determined to be hoaxes.Princeton was one of a slew of schools across the country to receive e-mailed bomb threats in recent weeks, prompting security concerns, especially in light of the sixth anniversary of Sept.
Former Princeton lecturer Haleh Esfandiari was allowed to leave Iran and reunite with her family in the United States last week after eight months of detainment in Iran, including four months of solitary confinement in the country's notorious Evin prison."I'm really disappointed that this happened to me," Esfandiari, who taught Persian language and literature at the University from 1980 to 1994, said at a press conference yesterday.
Less than a year after beginning "a sabbatical from public life," former Tennessee senator Bill Frist '74 will join the University as a visiting professor in the Wilson School.Frist, the first practicing doctor to serve in the Senate since the 1920s, will teach a course on health policy during both of his semesters at the University, one in the fall for graduate students and one in the spring for undergraduates.Nolan McCarty, interim dean of the Wilson School, said in an e-mail that he believes that students "will benefit from [Frist's] real-world experience," adding that Frist's time spent as a practicing physician, heart surgeon and Senate majority leader have informed his views on "important matters [such as] domestic healthcare policy and global health issues."Frist said that he wants to use his experience in politics to highlight what he views as the incalculable benefits of engaging in public service.
When fans attend the first football game in Princeton Stadium on Saturday, they will be greeted by a redesigned Princeton Tiger mascot.But because of alumni and student opposition to an athletic department contest to rename the costumed cat, the mascot will remain known as just "The Tiger.""For the past couple of years we have been trying to create a new mascot that would take people by surprise," said Jamie Zaninovich, senior associate athletic director, who called the old costume "neither fierce nor cute."The athletics department began its search for a name for the traditionally nameless tiger this summer.
The clanging of a live construction site in the former Butler College quad greeted students upon their return to campus this week, bringing emotions of shock and nostalgia.A demolition team razed the quad's 43-year-old buildings, which included Lourie-Love, 1922, 1940, 1941 and 1942 halls."It was a shock to see the buildings come down," Dean of Butler College David Stirk said.Students came forward to express nostalgic sentiments and reminisce over the time they enjoyed in the Butler quad.Kathleen Li '10 said Butler "was the place where I made all of my freshman year memories ... It's all gone."Construction of new buildings will commence in mid-September and is scheduled to be completed by fall 2009, at which point Butler College will become a four-year residential college to be paired with the two-year Wilson College.But students are worried about the effect the demolition will have on the Butler community.
Alternative rock band Everclear will headline the fall Lawnparties concert on Sept. 23 at Quadrangle Club, the USG announced last week.Everclear, which began recording in a Portland, Ore., basement 15 years ago, enjoyed a string of hits throughout the 1990s, including the Grammy-nominated 1997 album "So Much for the Afterglow." Their most recent album ? 2006's "Welcome to the Drama Club" ? is the first to be released since the five-member group reunited in 2004.Though it's been more than a decade since the group's biggest hits, USG social chair Christian Husby '08 said he listened to students' requests in choosing a performer.
Former U.S. senator and University emeritus trustee Bill Frist '74 will join the Wilson School faculty this fall for a one-year appointment.More to come...
Almost 2,000 newly minted graduates walked out FitzRandolph Gate at the University's 260th Commencement today after 1,127 undergraduate and 716 graduate members of the Class of 2007 were awarded degrees.About 7,000 spectators were in attendance to watch the ceremony, which included several speeches, the awarding of honorary degrees and the presentation of degrees to graduates.President Tilghman, whose speech was the traditional keynote address, urged the class to "serve this nation and all nations, and make the world a better place for us all.""I hope that you, the Class of 2007, will ... use your Princeton educations to lead well-considered lives in service to the common good," she said, adding that the success of their education could be measured retrospectively in 25 years.
