Houston Mayor Annise Parker (Jones '78) greets members of the audience who were assembled for what turned out to be a jack by Jones.
Fresh off their victory at KTRU's Battle of the Bands last month and in the midst of preparations for their slot in the 2010 KTRU Outdoor Show on April 10, Jones sophomores Shawdon Molavi, Ryan Oringer and Jesus Cortez, and freshman Daniel Sprinkle took a moment from their busy schedules to sit with the Thresher and talk about important topics ranging from eagles to dinosaurs to chinchillas while still leaving time to ponder the band's future.Rice Thresher: So how did you guys form up?
Rice rolled out the red carpet Tuesday to honor the first recipient of the Houston Enriches Rice Education Project Legacy Award. Students, professors and Houston rappers gathered March 23 in Keck 100 for the ceremony, where a panel discussed the significance and contribution of hip hop in Houston over the last 25 years. Houston Enriches Rice Education, known as the HERE Project, began in 2007 as an effort to help immerse students in culture under the direction of Humanities Professor Anthony Pinn.
The biggest player at this year's Beer Bike was not a college, a biker or even one of the coordinators - rather, nature has dominated this year's parade and races. Thanks to Saturday's inclement weather, all of the races but the alumni race have been rescheduled for 2 p.m. Sunday.Beer Bike Coordinator Brian Henderson said he and the other Beer Bike coordinators made the decision to postpone the student races because of concerns about safety and how enjoyable the event would be.
The baseball team traveled to the University of San Diego this past weekend in hopes of extending its three-game winning streak. But the Owls (12-10) were unable to continue their winning ways, dropping the first two games before winning the finale thanks to a late-inning rally on Sunday. However, the biggest result of the week for Rice cannot be found in the standings. Senior pitcher Mike Ojala made a successful pitching return on Friday afternoon, almost exactly nine months after undergoing Tommy John surgery on his pitching elbow.
While most of Rice's student body was still in their beds last Sunday, recovering from Beer Bike the day before, the No. 44 women's tennis team had to be up and ready to face old rival Western Michigan University. After a bump in their season last week versus Wichita State University (5-8) and No. 33 University of Tulsa (12-5), the team worked on problems that showed the week before in practice and met to revisit team goals in order to focus the team for the rest of the season.
Thanks to last Saturday's inclement weather, most students participating in this year's Beer Bike parade were soaked even before balloons started flying. Although all of the student races were rescheduled for this Sunday (see adjacent story), the alumni participated in a beer run, which Will Rice College won. Will Rice finished just seconds ahead of Brown College, whose penalties put them behind 16 seconds.
A social life, good grades or sleep: The joke is that in college, you can only pick two out of three, or you'd exhaust yourself trying to achieve it all. To a college student, sleep is one of the most precious commodities and at times, a temporarily unnecessary luxury.One of the most important things to learn in college is how to manage time effectively. There are so many opportunities that are thrust your way: research opportunities, internships, athletics, being a part of the dozens of clubs on campus or just making the most of the classes you take at Rice with faculty who are at the top of their field. If you are one of those people who want to do it all, you need to know how much you can take on and to what capacity. But in the midst of all your efforts, you need to find time to sleep.
There are many reasons people may choose to become vegetarian. They may become vegetarian for health-related reasons, for animal rights, to protest practices in the farming business or simply to try something new. This week, we'll focus on whether or not being a vegetarian is healthier than an omnivore's diet. Although there are different types of vegetarians - pescatarians eat fish, pollo-vegetarians eat chicken, and even so-called "flexitarians" occasionally eat meat - the most common form of vegetarianism is lacto-ovo-vegetarianism, which allows eating eggs and dairy, but no animal protein. This type of vegetarianism will be our focus.
Rice dug itself into an early hole tonight that it could not crawl out of, and the team fell to Dallas Baptist University 7-6.Sophomore Matthew Reckling (1-1) notched his first start for the Owls (17-13, 4-2 Conference USA) this evening at Reckling Park but could not find control of his pitches, walking three and forcing in a run via a hit batter before being pulled in the first inning.
I have always felt strange about having Housing and Dining staff clean up after me. H&D staff members take out my trash each day and clean my bathroom on a weekly basis. As someone who was raised with her fair share of chores, I found it odd to shed the responsibility of cleaning up after myself just as I was finally approaching the point of maturity and self-sufficiency. But, realizing there are probably dozens of reasons why the administration rightly employs staff members to maintain students' personal facilities - among them allowing students to focus on their studies - I accepted it.
Jones College sophomore Ellie Grebowski takes part in Jones' jack last Thursday in which Houston mayor Annise Parker's (Jones '78) visit to campus ended with Jones students from the crowd and nearby buildings spraying the other attendees with silly string. See the online update from last Friday and see another photo from the event as well.
After a season of more valleys than peaks, more struggles and strains than growth and gains, last weekend may have been a sign of changing times for the men's tennis team. Playing host at the 52nd Annual Rice Intercollegiate Tournament, the Owls (9-8) swept the three-match weekend to right a season that had wobbled to the brink. Before the weekend began, Assistant Coach Efe Ustundag (Baker '99) had said he wouldn't be pleased with anything but a sweep. With his wish granted, Ustundag was as satisfied as expected.
Coming off a mediocre 3-5 road trip, the Rice baseball team found its way home to Reckling Park tonight and toppled crosstown rival Houston 6-0. This game, the first in the season series for the coveted Silver Glove Trophy, was the third win in a row for the Owls (15-12, 2-2 Conference USA), who this week dropped out of Baseball America's Top 25 rankings for the first time this season.Sophomore starter Taylor Wall (1-4) got the ball tonight looking for his first win of the season, and he delivered in pristine fashion. The southpaw tossed a complete game-the first of any pitcher for the Owls this season-and surrendered only one hit and two walks with seven strikeouts. The lone Cougar hit came in the first inning.
Even the best-laid plans for outdoor events can be derailed by weather. However, plans for Beer Bike were not as well-laid as they could have been, and on Saturday a day of frigid showers threw the event into chaos.Although weather forecasts days in advance all but guaranteed rain for the event, as of Saturday morning, Beer Bike was scheduled to occur as planned. It was not until thousands of drunken, shivering college students arrived at the Beer Bike track that the campus-wide coordinators announced that the men's, women's and exhibition races would be rescheduled. Massive supplies of food that were ordered in advance had to be reshuffled, and hundreds of pizzas were left unclaimed, advertised only by some e-mail listservs, in the Rice Memorial Center that afternoon while students at the tracks and at their colleges went hungry. Why not leave the food at the tracks for the duration of the event or at the colleges?
James Surls, whose seven art pieces were installed on campus last month, enlightened the crowd about his art philosophy and the ideas behind his plant-like sculptures in a lecture Tuesday at Herring 100 . The seven pieces in the exhibit, which arrived Feb. 21, are entitled "Magnficent Seven: Houston Celebrates Surls" and reflect a connection with nature, featuring titles like "All Diamond," "Ten Big Standing Bronze Flowers" and "Standing Vase With Five Flowers." Before their appearance in Houston, five of the seven pieces on display were exhibited on Park Avenue in New York City.
