Special Projects

Rice hires NC State’s Edmonds as new women’s basketball head coach

Rice has hired former North Carolina State University associate head coach Lindsay Edmonds to take over the women’s basketball program, the school announced on Friday. The hiring of Edmonds ends Rice’s search to replace former head coach Tina Langley, who left the Owls earlier this month to take the head coaching job at the University of Washington. According to Athletic Director Joe Karlgaard, Edmonds is exactly the kind of coach the program needs right now. 

Weekly Scenes and Screens: Apr. 28

Refocus STRIVE to fulfill its original purpose

As a Students Turning Rice Into a Violence-Free Environment liaison, the organization and its mission are incredibly important to me. I originally joined because, as a survivor myself, I wanted to be a part of facilitating safe spaces on campus through educating my peers and acting as a resource to provide support. STRIVE cares a lot about the student body and puts an extreme number of hours into raising awareness and making themselves accessible, as we have seen with the recent survivor panels, college-specific events throughout the year and their response to an anonymous 2019 Thresher opinion. However, we need to readjust how STRIVE is not only viewed and utilized by the student body but also how it is run. The place the organization holds now oversteps into the lives of liaisons and other students and goes beyond what they set out to do with their mission statement. 

Capturing the Rise of Rice RAW.photography

This past month, RAW originally intended on collaborating with Rice Campanile to hold another photography competition open to all Rice students. However, the competition is currently placed on hold in order to give students more time to send in their submissions, as the organization is conscious of student’s workloads and adjusts its events to allow as many people as possible to submit.     

Looking back and looking forward: lessons from the pandemic

The Rice community is eagerly anticipating a return to some kind of normal in the fall semester. Still, it’s clear that not everything will be the same as before the pandemic — but maybe for good reason. While the past year has been undeniably difficult, the Rice community can leave it with important takeaways. We asked administrators, faculty and student leaders what they have learned and what they envision for Rice when distancing, masking and virtual interactions are not the default procedures of the campus experience.

Abercrombye: Engineering Laboratory Building to be replaced by new engineering and science facility

The Abercrombie Engineering Laboratory will be demolished and replaced by a new engineering and science building beginning this May. Demolition will start mid-May and construction of the new building will be substantially complete in January 2023, according to Associate Vice President for Facilities Engineering and Planning Kathy Jones.

The state of energy in Texas: A conversation with Daniel Cohan following ERCOT’s energy conservation appeal

On April 13, a mild spring afternoon, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas announced they may begin emergency operations and called for energy conservation from Texans. Four hours later, ERCOT ended the appeal, but questions about Texas’s energy situation remain. Since extreme weather and an ensuing power crisis struck the state over two months ago, many media outlets, including the Thresher, have gone to Rice civil and environmental engineering professor Daniel Cohan for an expert explanation. The Thresher caught up with Cohan for a follow-up conversation.

Muslim students talk observing Ramadan amid classes and finals

During the month of Ramadan in the Islamic calendar, Muslims fast for 30 days, eating and drinking only before sunrise and after sunset. Since the Islamic calendar is lunar-based, the month of Ramadan falls earlier every year. This year, Ramadan, which lasts from April 12 to May 12, lands in the midst of midterm season and continues through finals. The Thresher caught up with students observing Ramadan right now to find out how they’re navigating the fast during school. 

SA Task Force pursues initiatives for trans and gender nonconforming students

The Student Association’s transgender and gender nonconforming student support task force plans to update a map of bathrooms across campus as a part of their efforts to advocate for increased facilities accessibility. According to task force co-chair Gabriel Saenz, part of this project includes making the map available online for all students.

Practicing polyglots: Rice students talk speaking multiple languages

Learning a second language is never easy, let alone learning a third, fourth or beyond — especially in the United States. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, only 20 percent of Americans can speak two or more languages — but some Rice students are up for the challenge. The Thresher spoke with four Rice students who speak four or more languages to learn their secrets for success. 

Senior Spotlight: Adulfo Amador talks passion for engineering and mentoring

Ever since Adulfo Amador, a McMurtry College senior, was a young child, he knew he wanted to attend Rice. As a native Houstonian, Amador visited campus often with his family, and when the time came, he applied early. The day he received his acceptance was a memorable one — it quite literally took his breath away. 

Rice rescinds outdoor mask requirement, changes testing policy

Rice has rescinded its mask requirement in outdoor spaces and no longer requires that fully vaccinated individuals take weekly COVID-19 tests. The announcement follows the results of a community survey of vaccination status that revealed 74 percent of the Rice community members have received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. 

Lee leads soccer into NCAA tourney in second season

Two years ago, Brian Lee was celebrating a Southeastern Conference soccer title with his team at Louisiana State University. Lee was coming off of his 14th season in Baton Rouge, where he had led LSU’s women’s soccer team to six NCAA tournament appearances and had just been named a finalist for National Coach of the Year. 

Rice rescinds outdoor mask requirement, testing no longer required for fully vaccinated community members

Rice announced today that there will no longer be a mask requirement in outdoor spaces and that fully vaccinated individuals will not be required to take weekly COVID-19 tests, in an email sent to the Rice community by Kevin Kirby, chair of the Crisis Management Advisory Committee. The announcement follows the results of a community survey of vaccination status, which revealed that 74 percent of the Rice community members have received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. 

Backpage Spotlight: Unconventional Students

Students respond to RUPD messages regarding unhoused persons on campus

The Rice University Police Department has responded to several reports of unhoused persons seen on campus, with some of these instances involving the same individual, according to RUPD Chief of Clemente Rodriguez. Since late March, people who are homeless have been reported at Baker College, in the Wiess College alcoves, in Will Rice College commons and entering Herman Brown Hall and George R. Brown Hall, according to emails sent by RUPD to Baker College residents and a message sent by a Wiess College residential associate to Wiess College residents. 

‘Yoga is not going to solve my problems’: Students discuss mental health at Rice

In November 2019, the Thresher spoke to students about their mental health challenges in the wake of students speaking up about negative experiences. Over a year later, in April 2021, the Student Association passed a resolution calling for improved support for students with mental health concerns. 

Updated Beer Bike results cause controversial first-place tie in men’s race, second-place tie in women’s

Hanszen College tied with Jones College for first place in the men’s race while also tying with Jones for second place in the women’s race, according to updated Beer Bike 2021 results posted by Rice Program Council. These times were adjusted following a petition submitted by Hanszen due to discrepancies in their own recorded time versus RPC’s time. McMurtry College won the women’s race by almost 40 seconds.

We can’t ignore the headlines, so don’t ignore students’ mental health

For over a year now, it seems like each week has brought with it a new form of trauma and disaster for us to deal with as a society. We have gone through (but not really past) COVID-19, an election, an insurrection and now extreme gun violence has reemerged center stage of the never-ending news cycle that this decade has become.  

Rice approves new undergraduate Operations Research major

The Rice Faculty Senate has recently approved a new undergraduate major and B.A. degree in Operations Research within the Department of Computational and Applied Mathematics. All undergraduate students now are eligible to declare the new major.