In her March 3 opinion piece, Rachel Lisker misrepresents many Rice students and provides inaccurate information about the Doerr Institute.
On Monday, Feb. 17, the Student Association passed Resolution #8, calling on the Rice Management Company to make the Houston Coalition for Equitable Development without Displacement an equal decision-maker in the negotiation of a Community Benefits Agreement for the South Main Innovation District. The resolution also urges Rice Management Company to publicly release updates and information on their progress with developing and signing the CBA.
Does anyone really know what the Doerr Institute is? Its website describes it as “a large-scale leader development enterprise at Rice University” that is “committed to the early development of leader abilities in young people,” but what does this actually mean?
Since the 2016 presidential election, one thing has become remarkably clear: Russia knows how to make a movie. Featuring then-candidate Donald Trump, Russia churned out massive amounts of disinformation available free of charge on social media that idolized Trump and denigrated his foes.
Basmati Beats, one of the a cappella groups on campus, recently won first place at a national competition, an already impressive feat made only more difficult by the lack of funding received from the university. They’re not alone: most clubs are not consistently funded by the university on a yearly basis except for some club sports and blanket tax organizations, which include the Student Association, the Thresher, Rice Program Council and eight other organizations.
Sometimes, I don’t want to be a Republican. This has nothing to do with my personal beliefs: I am someone who is conservative, I am the secretary for the Rice University College Republicans and I volunteer on the Dan Crenshaw campaign. I’m even voting in the Republican primary this spring. Before I go any further, let me clear a few things up. Despite the stereotypes I often hear, I am not racist, I don’t hate poor people and I don’t believe Russia should pick our next president.
Two weeks ago, for a Thresher news story, I read a resignation letter from a former custodian at Rice who was employed for just six months. What I read made me contemplate the working conditions of the Rice staff I see on a daily basis, but it would never end up getting published due to the Rice administration.
When you’re the only media organization in a given space, you have a lot of power. We appreciate the platform the Thresher has given stories like “Black at Rice” and “In Their Own Words” this year — and recognize their meaningful contribution to the campus dialogue. However, speaking from our individual experiences in the Student Association Senate, we think it is important to note that the Thresher presents information in an environment in which there are few external checks on the narratives that it creates.
Early voting ends this Friday, Feb. 28 and Election Day is next Tuesday, March 3. If you have the privilege of being registered to vote, get out the vote on behalf of yourself, your communities and everyone who is institutionally excluded from our election processes. Political apathy is rampant in this country and on our campus with only 42 percent voter turnout last year.
Being a former Student Association parliamentarian on a year abroad during election season has felt like watching a car crash in slow motion, my eyes glued to the Thresher’s feed as the student government once again makes a circus out of its yearly duty to choose its leadership.
In fact, instead of being open to “constructive criticism” (as they claim in their opinion), in response to the changes presented by my campaign and the prospect of me winning the election, members of the RPC executive council threatened to impeach me upon my election at Monday’s meeting of the Student Association Senate. For the record, the RPC constitution has no method for impeaching the president.
It’s hard to think of a time when Shanghai, the city I called home for seven years, was completely still. But now, my parents tell me the streets are silent.
Who can deny the first thought that comes to mind most often when one hears the term “giving back to one’s alma mater” is the opening of your checkbook. One might also think of donating one’s time, be it through volunteering to serve on the Association of Rice Alumni board of directors, interviewing prospective students via Rice Alumni Volunteers for Admission or spearheading a committee in a regional alumni group.
“At this point we are beating a dead horse,” the Thresher Editorial Board wrote in 2017. “If the [Student Association] cares so deeply about the constitution … then why do they continue to completely disregard it?”
Last Sunday, Ashley Fitzpatrick began a write-in campaign against the previously uncontested internal vice president candidate Kendall Vining. While the Thresher’s editorial board normally endorses candidates in contested races, we were unable to reach a consensus on endorsement for the IVP role of either Vining, a Martel College sophomore and former new student representative, or Fitzpatrick, a Martel sophomore and current senator.
Donald Trump is an innocent man, at least according to the United States Senate. Congress has decided that Trump didn’t abuse his power to solicit derogatory information about his political opponents, bribe Volodymyr Zelensky with the withholding of nearly $400 million in crucial foreign aid necessary for Ukraine to defend itself against Russian aggression or obstruct Congress by defying mandatory subpoenas and covering up the aftermath of his misguided dealings.
In light of recent claims made about Rice Program Council, we would like to take the opportunity to clarify some misconceptions about the organization.
We, as active participants in the Student Association Senate, feel that the SA is currently operating by a top-down model, with the chain of communication beginning with Rice administration and ending with the students. But the intent of an organization like the SA should be the opposite.
Saturday night, hundreds of Rice students paid $2 to stand in line for one of the most popular publics of the year, Y2K, with some waiting over two hours only to not get in. Despite claiming that they based the number of wristband sales on statistical “models” that would allow entry to everyone, McMurtry College refused to release this data publicly, leaving the logic and intent behind this new system unclear.
With the start of a new election season, there are only a few weeks remaining for the current Student Association Executive Council to meet goals set at the beginning of their terms. Given the Thresher Editorial Board’s previous endorsement of Grace Wickerson for SA president on the basis of promises they made at the time, we were particularly interested in progress made on those promises.