Tag Archives: brown

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Brown Student Tells NBC 10 Hurricane Isn’t Real

“I mean, think about it, the earth rotates very quickly…”

As recovery efforts continue in Sandy’s wake, here’s something to lighten the mood: a Brown student who has finally realized the truth about the government conspiracy we’ve been calling Hurricane Sandy.

Meet “Daniel,” identified as a student at Brown University. In one of the noblest trolling endeavors since the Wesleyan Class of 2005 hijacked the Class of 2000’s Twitter account, Daniel was interviewed on NBC 10 and bravely expressed skepticism over the hurricane’s existence. “I mean, I don’t really believe that there’s a hurricane,” he tells the reporter in an amazing video clip that has made the rounds on New York Mag and Buzzfeed. “I know the government wants us to think that. But, I mean, think about it—the earth rotates very quickly.”

When the reporter impatiently interjects to ask whether or not class is cancelled at Brown, Daniel replies: “Well, the government definitely wants you to think classes have been cancelled. I’m not so sure.”

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Laying it Bare: Brown Hosts Nude Art Series

For better or for worse, we seem to be living in a clothed era here at Wesleyan. Gone are the days of Art House naked parties (and Art House, for that matter).  Gone, too, is the infamous annual Eclectic sex party.  There are still whispers about WestCo being clothing-optional, but aside from the occasional streakers or Olin prank, people aren’t exactly running around campus in the nude.  Our reputation precedes us.

Is there a stigma around nudity here? Possibly.  For those of us who want to combat that stigma, maybe naked parties aren’t the way to go.  We can derive inspiration from Brown, where a nude art series called “Nudity in the Upspace” took the stage this week.  According to a Brown Daily Herald article, Brown juniors Becca Wolinsky and Camila Pacheco-Fores designed the series to feature “an array of events including yoga, body painting and scenes from Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing, all conducted entirely in the nude.”

In the article, the creators of the series explained that they hoped to foster appreciation for all body types and to  “help themselves and others become more comfortable with their own bodies.”  There were also discussions about the “power dynamics of being clothed versus being naked” and the creators’ inspiration for the series.

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Brown President Simmons to Step Down After Year

Breaking news from the college blogosphere: beloved Brown University president and all-around superstar Ruth Simmons will step down at the end of the academic year, with plans to “take up projects that have been on hold far too long.” Whoah—whether or not you got into Brown, this one will be missed.

Simmons is the first female president of Brown and the first African-American president of any Ivy League school. Since assuming office in 2001, Ruth, as she’s affectionately known at Brown, has

implemented need-blind admission standards, raised over $1.6 billion, opened a new med school building in the Jewelry District, and enjoyed the revival of Brown University’s positioning in the national eye. Ruth has enjoyed a cult-like support for her position, often holding astronomical approval ratings due to her open office hours, her willingness to interact with students on a personal basis, and her general charisma. [MORE LINKS AND A LIL BIT O’ WESLEYAN PRESIDENTIAL HISTORY AFTER THE JUMP]

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Oh Snap: EduHookup

Once again the Interwebz throws from left field something so strange yet so inconceivably ingenious that I can’t decide whether I want to applaud the human audacity of it all or just feel a little dirty, sticky, and dead inside while holding myself in the corner of my Hi-Rise bathtub.

A couple of days ago Brown University’s Blog Daily Herald announced that “EduHookups” – a new online social platform that is something like a classifieds-esque webhub that provides a base for people to seek out or offer hookups – is hitting their shores. As they describe it,

The purpose of the site is simple: to give college students an easy (no pun intended) place to seek out sexual encounters. For both the cripplingly shy and the passionately deviant, eduHookups should represent a welcome addition to the college student’s casual sex utility belt (apparently the old-fashioned kind of social lubricant just doesn’t do it anymore).

The site has been considered a “relative success” so far, with around 800 registered members and media coverage from the Huffington Post, the Chicago Maroon, and the Daily Mail over in the UK (with the hilarious header: “Chastity is Curable”). Heck, it even earned a mention by Jay Leno (you can see the clip of the monologue by following through the Blog Daily Herald link).

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Meanwhile, at the Other Ivies . . .

Earlier today we reported on a disturbing shooting on Cornell’s campus, in which, thankfully, no students were harmed. Because it’s good to step outside the Wesleyan bubble every once in a while and remember that ridiculous shit happens at other schools too, here are two eye-raising headlines from our other peers in the Ivy League. Enjoy.

—Five Columbia Students Arrested for Dealing LSD, Coke, Weed: “How not to make up for that gap in financial aid,” quips an anonymous Wesleyan professor who sent us the tip. Five students at the prestigious Manhattan university—Chris Coles, Harrison David, Adam Klein, Jose Stephan Perez (also known as Stephan Vincenzo) and Michael Wymbs—had unknowingly been selling drugs to undercover cops for five months, in a probe cutely dubbed “Operation Ivy League.” Arrested Tuesday, the five remain in custody until they can muster bail. Their excuse? “I just sell it to pay tuition.” Responded Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly: “This is no way to work your way through college.” And, of course, frats are involved:

The police found a list of “10 agenda items” on a wall at Psi U last night, including an eleventh that read “Don’t sell drugs out of the frat house” with a note that read “Adam should have followed this rule.”

Read the full Times article here, or, for a snarkier glimpse at the students’ Facebook profiles, the Gawker take here.

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Top Ten Freshmen First-Week Facebook Statuses

Given Wes students’ seeming general ambivalence towards Twitter (you mean you don’t Tweet  your hall’s daily adventures traveling through time, space, and residential life?), there’s nothing like a 200-character Facebook status to sum up the excitement, anxiety, and—okay—semi-obligatory gender-bending that accompanies a freshman’s introduction to Wes.

From our arch-rivals dear friends over at Brown’s Blog Daily Herald comes a helpful little Freshman Guide to Facebook at Brown, complete with helpful guidelines on friending (“I know you thought you were too cool to request friends in high school, but if that special someone from Fish Co means enough to you, you can swallow your pride and hit that ‘Add as Friend’ button.”), statusing (“not for letting your friends know how you just did your “first _______” ever at college.”), and more. It also includes, almost as an afterthought, a rundown of amusing Facebook statuses from freshmen from the week at Brown. Without further adieu, the Wes edition:

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More Rankings: Wesleyan #15 according to Forbes

As much as it pains me to do a rankings post, it’s the summer and well, rankings are rankings. Forbes has released its own top Colleges and Universities list. Williams, Princeton, and Amherst make up the top three, and Wesleyan falls in line at #15, right between Haverford and Whitman College. Forbes describes the idea behind its rankings as:

To our way of thinking, a good college is one that meets student needs. While other college rankings are based in large part on school reputation as evaluated by college administrators, we focus on factors that directly concern incoming students: Will my courses be interesting? Is it likely I will graduate in four years? Will I incur a ton of debt getting my degree? And once I get out of school, will I get a good job?

As always, the rankings seem fairly controversial (Cornell is at #70, John Hopkins is at #88, and NYU is all the way down at #173). To see the full list, click here; the full methodology is here.

Enjoy another way to re-live that college search process and feel good about your decision (or if it wasn’t your decision – feel good that Brown was 30 spots behind at #45). Or, you know, just ignore it all (Forbes is mainstream after all). Enjoy your last month of summer (sorry alums!).

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Nietzsch Factor wins sectionals

sectionalschampsThis weekend Wesleyan hosted the Southern New England Ultimate Frisbee Sectionals Tournament – the weather was beautiful and Nietzsch Factor dominated the tournament, beating Brown in the finals by a score of 14 to 9.

Other than Brown, the only team to score more than 4 points against Wesleyan was the University of Rhode Island, who scored 8. Nietzsch Factor was led by strong performances from captains, Phil Benjamin ’09 and Gus Seixas ’10. Many team members are graduating this year, but the underclassmen have been playing well this season and give hope for the future.

sectionalsgus

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Nietzsch Factor will be going to regionals in two weeks to play teams such as Harvard, Tufts, Middlebury, and others. Good luck!

[Photos courtesy of Marianna Foos ’08 and  Amit Bob ’10]

Thomas L. Friedman Pied by Brown Radical

Week-old news, but at an Earth Day lecture at Brown, NYTimes globalization-happy Op-Ed columnist Thomas L. Friedman was pied in the face by what turned out to be radical leftist students with an agenda:

What a trooper!

Margaree Little, the offending pie artist, said she “wanted to open up a dialogue about what it really means to have free speech on an elite college campus like Brown”:

She said they considered passing out fliers or preparing questions to ask Friedman during a question-and-answer session, but ultimately decided to take a more significant step.

“I think it was successful in that those conversations are happening now in a pretty engaged way,” she said.

And how!

Yahoo News: Times Columnist Friedman Pied at Brown