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Rachel Carlson

NEWS 9/25/08 7:00pm

SAC makes changes to tours

By Rachel Carlson

Love it or hate it, most students remember their Rice campus tour. Due to a series of changes to the Student Admissions Council this year, hundreds of students may now experience essentially the same tour regardless of the tour guide. Guides will now be paid, follow a script and dress code and will be hired by faculty rather than by a student panel. Changes to the SAC most significantly affect the campus tour program, in which current Rice students guide visitors on an informative walk around campus. Associate Director of Admission Fitima Jackson said tour guides will now be paid per hour, instead of volunteering for the activity. Aesthetic changes have occurred as well. Instead of blue t-shirts bearing the SAC logo, guides will wear a more professional polo with "tour guide" on the breast pocket. Additionally, tour guides are provided with a training handbook to prime them on features of the developing campus.

NEWS 9/18/08 7:00pm

GoCrossCampus back for more virtual battles

By Rachel Carlson

This Monday, the residential colleges will form armies and the campus itself will become a battlefield as GoCrossCampus, a virtual war game analogous to the board game Risk, launches into its second year at Rice. In GXC, student players log on to a Web site and acquire virtual armies, which they build and direct strategically in a campus-wide war lasting several months. Founded by Yale University students and piloted at Rice last year, the game serves as a new channel for college system rivalries. The game's Web site includes a detailed map of the Rice campus, upon which students place armies in accordance with instructions from college commanders. Each day, players read a posted battle plan from their commanders and are granted one turn for deploying armies. Colleges compete for campus territories and alternatively form alliances and mobilize against each other, stoking inter-college competition.

NEWS 8/28/08 7:00pm

Career Services Center changes name, Web site

By Rachel Carlson

Along with new faces and new buildings around campus come revamped services for students looking beyond their Rice years. The Career Services Center, which counsels students on how to position themselves in the graduate and professional world, changed its name this year to the Rice Center for Student Professional Development. The first version of its new Web site, which will launch in Sept., will show this year's changes in the mission and structure of career services. Future versions of the site will include innovative software for job and internship exploration. CSPD Director Erik Larsen said the changes in career services will chiefly involve an online networking system that promotes meaningful exchange with potential employers. The Web site is planned to go beyond brief job listings and instead serve as an interactive career research forum. New software, which is being developed exclusively for Rice students by an external firm, will offer a chance for personal dialogue between students and employers.

NEWS 8/21/08 7:00pm

Harlow appointed director of Chao Center for Asian Studies

By Rachel Carlson

Tani Barlow, a professor of history and women's studies from the University of Washington, was appointed in May to be the director of the Chao Center for Asian Studies and the Ting Tsung and Wei Fong Chao Professor of Asian Studies. Due to a previous commitment, Barlow will spend the fall semester at the National University of Singapore and begin her official duties as director Jan. 1. Barlow's scholarly journal, Positions, which addresses East Asian culture, was transferred to Rice in early June.In addition to providing intellectual leadership, Barlow will report directly to the office of Provost Eugene Levy and oversee 26 full-time faculty members and the department's administrative structure. Richard Smith, the interim director of the Chao Center, said Barlow was chosen for her interest and background in transnational circulations and cross-cultural comparative studies.

NEWS 8/21/08 7:00pm

Buildings to sport plants on roofs to improve sustainability

By Rachel Carlson

Students and faculty are accustomed to seeing flora and fauna around campus, but green roofing on four Rice buildings will give landscaping an entirely new dimension. Rooftop gardens, designed to improve buildings' sustainability and expand roof lifespan, will be installed on Duncan College, the Collaborative Research Center, the Oshman Engineering Design Kitchen and the South Utility Plant.Rice Sustainability Director Richard Johnson (Will Rice '92) said green roofing provides a variety of sustainable and economic advantages.

NEWS 5/15/08 7:00pm

New Owl Days host 500 prospective students, up from previous years

By Rachel Carlson

The Rice campus played host to prospective students last month as the Student Admission Council directed three sessions of Owl Days. The new program for admitted student visitation, which replaces previous years' Owl Weekend, took place in three Monday-through-Tuesday sessions, from April 7-8, April 14-15 and April 21-22.SAC Director Claire Shorall said Rice students collectively facilitated Owl Days.

NEWS 4/17/08 7:00pm

Backup server brought online after crash

By Rachel Carlson

One of Rice's three e-mail servers suffered a hardware failure and a subsequent operating system collapse at 10 a.m. Monday. The failure severely slowed e-mail access for about 50 percent of users until after 2 p.m. Director of System Architecture and Infrastructure Barry Ribbeck said a replicate mail service was implemented in lieu of the failed server and functions exactly like the original system.Ribbeck said the failure at 10 a.m. was repaired with a replacement part within 30 minutes, but a flood of recovered information led to the corruption of the operating system software at 2 p.m. E-mail access was restored at 2:30 pm. Ribbeck said the replicate e-mail service used to restore services was installed during Winter Break in response to previous e-mail outages in the fall semester.

NEWS 4/10/08 7:00pm

ESTHER changes to prevent overscheduling

By Rachel Carlson

A series of registration changes began taking effect this week as ESTHER was modified to reduce schedule overlap. Alana Lemay-Gibson, associate registrar for technology, said when students add courses that are scheduled at the same time, ESTHER now notifies them of the conflict. Next fall, ESTHER will be further modified so that it not only warns students, but bars them from enrolling in overlapping courses. The former version of ESTHER was not equipped with this feature, Gibson said.The aim of the new ESTHER feature is to reduce the incidence of accidental schedule conflict, she said.

NEWS 3/27/08 7:00pm

Brown to receive new masters at semester's end

By Rachel Carlson

Like its 2008 Beer-Bike theme proclaimed, this semester marks Brown College's last round with their masters, the Hutchinsons. Chemistry professor John Hutchinson and Paula Hutchinson have completed their five-year term as Brown masters. They will be replaced by mathematics professor Steve Cox and Laura Cox. The Coxes served as Sid Richardson College masters from 2000-2005.Chair of the Masters Search Committee Jessica Simon said she will miss the Hutchinsons but is eager to welcome the new masters.

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