The new ServeryApp will help keep Rice University students informed about available food options at Rice’s six serveries, according to developer and Rice Apps member Ethan Steinberg. The app joins Owlections and Atlas as Rice App’s third product.
The Rice Environmental Club began its plans for the new year beginning in Orientation Week, according to club President Hutson Chilton.
After reviewing details over the summer, the Rice University Emergency Medical Services presented a revised version of legislation guaranteeing on-campus housing for In-Charges/In-Charge Trainees at the Student Association meeting on Sept. 3.
Last semester, Rice University’s undergraduate scientific research journal, Catalyst, teamed up with undergraduate science journals from eight other universities across the globe to produce the world’s first intercollegiate science publication organization, the International Collegiate Science Journal. The first issue will be released this November.
After reviewing details over the summer, the Rice University Emergency Medical Services presented a revised version of legislation guaranteeing on-campus housing for In-Charges/In-Charge Trainees at the Student Association meeting on Sept. 3.According to Baker College Senator Nitin Agrawal, he and former EMS captain Patrick McCarthy first proposed the legislation in April, but the SA rejected it over concerns that EMS IC/ICTs might not be able to get housing in their own residential colleges.“The main difference [between the new plan and the original] is the removal of the rotation system in which two IC/ICTs stay at their original college, and the other IC/ICTs from that college are assigned to the next available college,” Agrawal said. “The problem was that college student bodies didn’t want their residents to have to live at another college.”Since the SA tabled the original proposal last semester, two IC/ICTs are currently living off campus. EMS captain Mollie Ahn reiterated the need for IC/ICTs to be constantly available on campus in order to maximize EMS’s capacity to respond in an emergency.“EMS can’t reach a medical emergency from outside of Rice,” Ahn, a Brown College senior, said. “EMS response time is usually around three to five minutes, while [the Houston Fire Department] response time is around 15 minutes.”Ahn said, since the nature of IC/ICT involves a large time commitment, having fellow IC/ICTs present on campus is necessary for the delegation of duties.“For six to seven times a month, IC/ICTs have to be available 24 hours, from noon to noon,” Ahn said. “[But they also have a] functionary role; IC/ICTs usually spend around 25 to 27 hours a week maintaining equipment and EMS education classes. If we get a call, all of the available IC/ICTs may already be [involved with] another medical emergency, so we need IC/ICTs to be able to pass the job to each other.”According to Agrawal, the legislation would also serve to provide a more unified housing system for IC/ICTs, as not all of the residential colleges have had a history of housing IC/ICTs.“In the past, each residential college had their own system in dealing with IC/ICT housing,” Agrawal said. “Some colleges did not have a policy, while the policies of those that did were varied. This legislation creates a unified policy that allows everyone to be on the same page.”Agrawal said the legislation would not impact or take away others’ ability to obtain on-campus housing.“The guaranteed housing works in the same manner by which members of the college cabinet receive guaranteed housing,” Agrawal said. “Rice EMS will notify each respective college early enough so that proper accommodations can be made.”Agrawal said the SA will make its decision on implementing the legislation on Sept. 17 and that the proposal in its current form will likely receive agreement this time.“There hasn’t really been any pushback,” Agrawal said. “We will likely have the on-campus housing next school year.”To accompany the article discussing the original proposal, The Thresher wrote an editorial in support of the legislation.
Electrical and Computer Engineering Professor Richard Baraniuk founded Connexions in 1999 as a platform for a customizable textbook for his Signals and Systems class at Rice.
How many courtyards are in Alice Pratt Brown Hall (Shepherd’s building)?
As a student at Rice University, I have read message after message regarding sexual assault. It’s one of the most pervasive issues at this time in our lives and deserves every bit of the attention it is receiving. The federal government, Rice’s administration, and the students and colleges have all made efforts to discuss and educate upon preventative measures, consequences and expectations, and make environments more hospitable to reporting and assessing sexual assault incidents. However, almost every discussion (and commentary on these discussions) presented has been handled with negative connotations regarding the solution to the problem. There is a clear leaning in the language used and solutions called for which suggests perpetrators of sexual assault are always going to do so and cannot be reasoned with. To combat the perceived onslaught of potential perpetrators, continual attention is given to the repercussions of sexual assault, with little consideration to the plethora of circumstances that lead up to assaults making their way into discussions on how to handle the problem.
As Rice University students begin to make plans for a day trip to College Station, the Rice football team is taking advantage of their bye week to prepare for an in-state showdown. The game against the Associated Press no. 7-ranked Texas A&M University Aggies is on Saturday, Sept. 13 at 8 p.m. After the 48-17 loss at Notre Dame, the Owls are returning to the field against another high-profile opponent.
The Rice University soccer team returned home to Holloway Field after winning back-to-back games on the road last week. On Friday, Sept. 5, the Owls played their second straight Southeastern Conference opponent, the Vanderbilt University Commodores. Rice shocked Vanderbilt by tying the game in the 90th minute of play and then won the game in the first minute of overtime with a header off a corner, resulting in a final score of 2-1.
The Rice University men’s club soccer team, commonly known as the Lads, recently assembled their 2014-15 team. More than forty aspiring Lads tried out for the team last Monday through Wednesday, and returning upperclassmen chose eight to join the team.
If rockstars can have tour buses, so can visual artists. Cargo Space, the brainchild of Christopher Sperandio, an assistant professor in the Rice University Visual and Dramatic Arts Department, and Simon Grennan, who Sperandio has worked with since 1989, is a Rice inner-loop bus turned mobile arts phenomenon.With teeth, eyes and cartoon designs plastering its exterior, the converted diesel bus looks like any other hippie platform on the outside. But instead of old guitars, smoke and Bob Marley posters, the inside boasts up to five visual artists at any given time. “Cargo Space itself is a living space, but it’s a lot of other things too,” Sperandio said. “It’s an experiment in alternate living schemes.”For the past month and a half, Cargo Space has been touring the Midwest, spanning the 90 miles between the cities of Chicago and Milwaukee. In addition to transporting art back and forth between the cities, Cargo Space engages artists at both the Institute of Visual Arts in Milwaukee and the A+D Gallery in Chicago. “They are distinct cities with distinct histories, yet they don’t interact as much as you think they would,” Sperandio said. “I thought it would be interesting for the artists to play host to each other and develop exhibitions simultaneously.”Although its exhibitions encompass strictly visual art, Cargo Space is anything but your run-of-the-mill gallery. Sperandio said current projects range from an underground poker tournament, whose champion donates all of his winnings to an artist, to a weekly tea party to a bulletin board that, according to Sperandio, resembles a pushpin collage. Cargo Space is many experiments, but its larger purpose is to connect artists and provide them with residency, an important key to success in today’s art world, according to Sperandio. “A big part of being an artist now is involving yourself in these residencies,” Sperandio said. “I wanted to develop my own facility where I could invite artists to come and spend time with me, to connect with artists across the county.”Sperandio said the trip for such a unique artistic experiment has not been an easy one, but its success over the past year assures its vitality. “I know that sounds maybe a little ego-maniacal, but it’s a very good artwork,” Sperando said. “And it’s [been] a very difficult project – from generating enthusiasm and support, to just the little day to day physical work that has to be done on the bus in order to make it what it is.”But his work has not gone unnoticed and, in addition to being embraced by formal art institutions across the country, Sperandio said his project is also a “selfie magnet.”When its Midwest exhibition ends on Sept. 20, Cargo Space will pack its bags and return to Houston to begin another journey. “I’m going to be on the road for another three weeks or so, and then I’ll be back in Houston with a lot of stories to tell,” Sperandio said. Cargo Space’s near future is still undecided, but Sperandio said he hopes to send it south. “We’re next door neighbors to a foreign country,” Sperandio said. “I would love to take the bus to Mexico City. That would be the next great step for the project.”
As an only child of two working parents, it’s safe to say I have spent a fair portion of my life, or at least childhood, alone. Although I often joke about this to friends (which, by the way, I definitely do have), I think learning to be alone has its merits. As I’ve gotten older and, through a combination of circumstance and conscious choice, spent more and more time around peers, I have begun to lament the fact that I am growing less fond of doing things by myself. To counteract this apparent transformation of my social needs, I sometimes purposely plan activities alone. Movies, music and even dining out are often characterized as strictly social outings, but here I plan to tell you why they don’t have to be. I am not telling anyone to ditch their social lives, or embrace the stereotype of the weird loner (although I am not advocating against these choices either); I am simply saying that there are real reasons why going out alone doesn’t have to be a sad occasion. 1. You can do whatever you want. When you go out with friends, you are subject to the will of the majority in terms of plans. Everyone wants to go see that Jennifer Aniston rom-com that got 23 percent on Rotten Tomatoes? I guess you’re going. They are dying to see a heavy metal band that’s so alternative, they aren’t even really a band? Buy some earplugs. But, alone, the world is full of options. You can even do embarrassing activities secretly, like go to a live viewing of Antiques Roadshow (is this possible?) or a Transformers convention. 2. You set your own schedule. Not only do you have ultimate freedom of activity choice but also freedom of activity time. Treat yourself to a Sunday afternoon by visiting a Texans game without your overly inquisitive girlfriend being overly inquisitive. Maybe you are 90 percent sure that you just failed your intro econ test for the second time, and the only cure to your depression is immediate frozen yogurt consumption. Don’t wait for anyone. Get your butt to Red Mango pronto. Pile on all of the toppings. Eat only toppings. Go twice in one day. No one is judging you. 3. You have better control of your environment. So there’s this movie you’ve been dying to see for months, and it turns out all your friends are dying to see it too. Yay! You get early tickets, wait excitedly in line, buy your $14 popcorn and sit down to enjoy the show. The problem? It turns out your friends have so much enthusiasm they can’t seem to contain their excitement until after the film. Instead of listening to Javier Bardem’s beautiful words, you are hearing those of your seatmate. The fix? Go solo! I promise, it’s not weird. Not only will you catch all of the movie’s nuances, plot twists and action montages, but you also don’t have to worry about finding 17 seats in a row in a crowded theater. 4. You can people watch. Your friends are cool, but you also see them all the time. Like always. And it’s not your friends, it’s other Rice students (who are basically also like your friends). So when do you get a chance to see, you know, the mysterious others lurking just outside the hedges? When you go out with your friends, there’s basically a veil of conversation that keeps you from paying them any mind. Imagine, instead of sitting at a crowded table with your crew, picking a window seat at the bar and watching the passersby. There are so many interesting weirdos to be seen and maybe, if you look pensive and intriguing enough, even talk to. Who knows, you may even inadvertently expand your social circle. Going out alone doesn’t mean you’re a loner; it just means that you are taking advantage of your time, free will and the world of culture at your fingertips.
As Sept. 11 approaches, I am forced to recall the day when the Twin Towers came down. I was six, walking in line in elementary school back to my classroom when I noticed a group of other children crowded around the slit in the TV studio door. I walked over and followed their collective gaze to the television in the corner, displaying what I recognized as a flaming airplane smashing into a building. When I think back on that moment, knowing the details of the event like I do now, I am filled with tremendous sadness. Yet, at the time, instead of bursting into tears of distress like the adults around me, all I recall feeling was mild indifference. ‘Another bad thing,’ I thought, my face blank.All I can attribute this reaction to, besides being young, was that I had spent every morning and many evenings watching CNN with my parents. Perhaps, I now think, the cascade of death, sadness and pain I witnessed in quick succession everyday had desensitized me to the point where experiencing real horror lost its shock value. And perhaps this is a colossal tragedy in itself.I am not attempting to say the world is an inherently more dangerous or violent place. In fact, Steven Pinker, a renowned professor at Harvard University, recently made a convincing case in his book The Better Angels of Our Nature the world is actually at its most peaceful point in human history. Rather, I am claiming the media, instead of informing us about the pain and suffering in the world in a comprehensive, humanistic way, is making us numb to it. The bombardment of disorganized and largely violent imagery overwhelms us everyday, until we cannot feel it the same way anymore. In a media market where ‘clicks’ and ‘views’ are fought over mercilessly, news services throw up and promote stories based on their ability to capture viewers’ attention, not to promote an accurate and comprehensive narrative of the world. News has become violent, fast and confrontational. Beheadings are advertised on the front pages of newspapers, morning news anchors describe cases of small children shooting their instructors and websites flash news of police brutalizing innocent youths. It’s not that these stories aren’t important — they certainly are. However, presented as quick, piecemeal flashes, often absent of explanations or significance (either because it’s not presented or we don’t read beyond the headlines), these clips and images cloud our conception of the world into a muddy, violent mess devoid of intelligent or empathetic reaction.To further explain this phenomena, juxtapose our current media with that of 100 years ago, when print dominated. At that time, news came once per day in the form of a carefully constructed newspaper. An editorial board sorted through the abundant news of the day, chose a “most important” story for the cover, and had time to write full, analysis-heavy stories about each event that readers, well, typically read. Today, in the era of the 24-hour news cycle, reporters want to be the first to get the story out, and so information is released in so many incomplete little parcels that viewers hardly know where to start reading. It is often convenient just to click through, only taking in headlines. Further, advertising profits are linked with those stories that get the most clicks — usually those which contain the most violent, disturbing or stupidly exciting titles or descriptions. While traditional print sources used to provide us with a censored, carefully delivered narrative to respond to, today’s news outlets often flood us with trash that we cannot possibly adequately sort out in order to appropriately respond to the events we’re reading about or to construct into a relatable narrative about the world. These features contribute to a collective conception of current events in which actual knowledge, emotion and content is low, and violence is consumed like porn with similar effect — the more we watch it, the more we’re numb to the emotional significance of the actual events.A few weeks ago, when I heard about the beheading of John Foley, was the first time in a long time I read a tragic story and just stopped to take it in. I sat down, paused my busy life and took the time to think about the pain and fear he and his family must have felt and how terrifying ISIS truly is. As odd as it sounds, it took this much effort to really feel something, to completely comprehend that this was not a blurb about a fantastical event in a faraway place; it is a real, horrific incident in my world, during the time when I’m alive. I do not believe I am alone in this, and that is the tragedy of the decentralized news cycle — we must not let it dehumanize us.
City of Houston Mayor Annise Parker (Jones College, ‘78) spoke to Rice University students about her experiences in politics at a Young Democrats-sponsored event on campus Wednesday night.
The Center for Undergraduate Curriculum proposed in April that students be limited to four dropped classes between weeks two and seven during their four years at Rice, with any extra drops being indicated by a ‘W’ on their transcript.
On August 8, a federal judge handed down a landmark decision that could drastically impact the future of collegiate athletics. U.S. District Judge Claudia Wilken ruled the National Collegiate Athletic Association must allow colleges to pay athletes.
