Opinion

Many academic awards select winners using predetermined criteria. Committees evaluate students’ accomplishments on the same abstract scale. This approach seems egalitarian: everyone plays on the same field. In practice, though, it ignores substantial cultural divides between fields of study that affect class arrangements, study habits, relationships with professors, the amount of free time they have, and how they spend it.

OPINION | 04/16/2020

Communalism: What the U.S. is lacking to fight the coronavirus

Communalism: What the U.S. is lacking to fight the coronavirus

Kate Lee

We must learn to see each other, all of us, as people whose lives could just as easily be our own, whose destinies are linked together. We must be willing to cease prejudice toward other cultures and countries. We must learn to see “communalism” as separate from Communism.

OPINION | 04/16/2020

Pencils down: Princeton should drop its testing requirement

Pencils down: Princeton should drop its testing requirement

Daily Princetonian Editorial Board

This Board not only recommends a move away from requiring standardized testing for the 2020–21 admissions cycle, but urges a permanent shift beyond the coronavirus pandemic.

OPINION | 04/15/2020

Black Lives Matter: It must be said

Black Lives Matter: It must be said

Rachel Kennedy

As I think of the thousands of black people mourning loved ones now, I doubt pointing to institutional disregard and devaluation provides them with any solace. But by addressing and changing those systemic patterns, we can help prevent others from enduring the same treatment.

OPINION | 04/15/2020

The GPA debacle

Engineers’ Increased Time Studying and Discrepancies with Rhodes Scholarship Awards.png

The GPA debacle

Liam O'Connor

It’s high time to stop using GPAs as a rigid measure of undergraduates’ talents.

OPINION | 04/15/2020

COVID-19 and student athletes: Response from President Eisgruber

COVID-19 and student athletes: Response from President Eisgruber

Christopher L. Eisgruber

This public health crisis has required us to ask all Princeton undergraduates to do a difficult thing: to complete their semesters online, and, in the case of our seniors, to forgo experiences that they had anticipated throughout their time here.

OPINION | 04/14/2020

COVID-19 and student athletes: An open letter to President Eisgruber

Guest Contributors

We hesitated to write you because we feel you've done an outstanding job leading the University, and with the gravity of the pandemic backdrop, because you obviously are facing many unforeseen and serious challenges every day. However, we feel compelled to reach out to you on this issue because we feel strongly that Princeton has made the wrong decision on not permitting its students to withdraw and come back next spring.

OPINION | 04/14/2020

COVID-19: An Asian American Perspective

COVID-19: An Asian American Perspective

Guest Contributors

We, the Princeton University AASA E-Board, strongly believe that unity and community is the need of this hour of crisis. As such, we cannot sit idly and watch as racist attacks continue to threaten and divide our country.

OPINION | 04/14/2020

Princeton’s award paradox

National Statistics on Rhodes Scholars from STEM Fields.png

Princeton’s award paradox

Liam O'Connor

Teaching styles, grading disparities, high school backgrounds, and departmental politics all play roles in who’s crowned Old Nassau’s top students. I will explore each of these factors in depth for subsequent columns. But first, I’ll give a brief overview of who at Princeton is winning the nine prestigious academic awards to show why their results are so baffling.

OPINION | 04/13/2020

Extend the P/D/F deadline

Extend the P/D/F deadline

Claire Wayner

Like it or not, grades are a way by which society evaluates us, but Princeton can alleviate the burden in this unusual semester by giving us the full ability, through an extended PDF deadline, to choose which grades we reveal while navigating the challenges of online learning.

OPINION | 04/12/2020

Patterns in the pandemic: What racial data tells us and why we need more

Patterns in the pandemic: What racial data tells us and why we need more

Shannon Chaffers and Julia Chaffers

As we eventually negotiate the aftermath of this crisis, this data should be a moment of reckoning that motivates reparative and preventative measures to support the health of people of color, pandemic or not.

OPINION | 04/09/2020

Hope isn’t cancelled

A building with trees and a lamppost in the foreground.

Hope isn’t cancelled

Guest Contributor

This year, when we are all restricted from leaving our homes and passing through the threshold of our doorways into the world, let us stand up despite our isolation, anxiety and despair, and open our doors and our hearts with singing.

OPINION | 04/08/2020

Bernie drops out, leaving only one path forward

Bernie drops out, leaving only one path forward

Richard Ma

The responsibility is sole and simple, and that is to vote for Joe Biden. It is not only your duty as an American, but also your duty to the future.

OPINION | 04/08/2020

How to interpret the big numbers in the news

Ollie Thakar

In an effort to comprehend the exponential growth and the resulting large numbers associated with coronavirus, I have furnished some heuristic analogies that I hope will help display the full expanse of the disease more concretely. If we take the time to comprehend the intuition-defying numbers of confirmed and new cases of the coronavirus, these numbers, while terribly disheartening, should become more manageable.

OPINION | 04/07/2020

The solution to coronavirus is political

Braden Flax

We must remember that the crisis we face is societal, not biological. Its solution lies not in moral principles, but in political struggle.

OPINION | 04/06/2020

How to stay happy during social distancing

How to stay happy during social distancing

Richard Ma

The compromises we need to make aren’t always optimal. But ultimately, by living the way we are now and through the sacrifices that others are making, we can keep things bright for the future.

OPINION | 04/05/2020

An open letter to the Dean of the College

A photo of a gothic building in springtime on an overcast day. The building has a dozen windows, and trees with pink flowers surround the building.

An open letter to the Dean of the College

Juan José López Haddad

Adopting the universal PDF measure will demonstrate Princeton’s commitment to not just creating smart leaders, but empathetic leaders, who prioritize their communities and vulnerable populations in times of need.

OPINION | 03/31/2020