The College Newspaper Round-Up is a weekly look at various stories published in Boston-area student newspapers, plucking out the most interesting pieces that are important to communities across the Commonwealth: the students, the faculty, and the residents of neighborhoods that house them all.
Suffolk’s Resistance to Outdated ‘Blood’ Laws:
- Suffolk University’s Student Government Association has backed a petition by student Wyatt Costello which aims to suspend on-campus blood drives, according to James MacDonald of the Suffolk Journal. The petition, which had over 400 physical and 100 digital signatures, aims to suspend drives “until such a time that the FDA law banning gay and bisexual men from donating blood is repealed,” according to the article. Costello tells the Journal that he considers the law to be homophobic, as it was enacted through panic during the height of the AIDS epidemic in the early ’80s, but it has since remained a law for three decades. From the article, “Costello eagerly awaits a response from the Suffolk administration and the FDA, both of which have been silent until this point. He hopes his efforts at Suffolk will be the start of a larger discussion on the issue of donor screening.”
MIT Students Speak Up About Online Courses:
- In an article written by Sanjana Srivastava of The Tech, students and professors at M.I.T. give feedback about MITx, the online platform the school uses for online learning. With more colleges and universities offering online classes, students are experiencing the early stages of what some see as the next great break in higher education. While online classes give the student flexibility to learn at their own pace, some students are wondering if less interaction with peers and professors actually stunts learning. The article interviews students who feel that online classes may be good in areas that are straight-forward, but when it comes to ideas and concepts — it is much harder to develop an understanding. The article also talks about hybrid classes, in which part of class-time is online while part is traditionally in-person. While students and faculty continue to use varying formats, the developers are surely learning a lot about user interaction and progress through feedback.
Emerson Takes a Step Forward in Anti-Violence:
- Emerson College has hired Greta Spoering as a survivor advocate within the school’s Violence Prevention and Response center, according to Dina Kleiner of the Berkeley Beacon. From the article: “I worked with folks of all different ages and genders, with hate crimes and power-based interpersonal violence,” Spoering said. “From helping folks get through civil cases to helping folks feel comfortable in their own skin again.” Emerson has recently been under fire after the school’s lawyers filed a motion to dismiss a federal lawsuit by a former student, and was also featured on a list of schools being investigated by the Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights for suspected violation of Title IX.
BC Student Makes a Pitch for Millennials:
- Alex Gaynor of the BC Heights wrote in an editorial this week about Millennials being stereotyped by laziness and apathy in the current state of pop culture. From Gaynor’s editorial: “There still are people who pursue a higher ideal and common good even if it means putting their reputation or life on the line. While it may not be as prevalent in pop culture, perhaps we need to look beyond the TV screens and Facebook profiles to see what real people are accomplishing.”
BU Students Have an Eye on Loan Debt:
- Sekar Krisnauli of the Daily Free Press reports that millennials are becoming increasingly weary of student debt. The article cites a “Global Millennial Survey” by Telefonica which showed that two-thirds of the people surveyed thought that education cost was too high. Krisnauli suggests that students see the “cost might outweigh the benefits,” according to several BU students the Free Press consulted.
Harvard Student Calls Out Hasty Pudding:
- Hayden N. Joy of the Harvard Crimson this week writes about Harvard’s embrace of America’s oldest collegiate social club, the Hasty Pudding Club, founded in the late 1700s. Joy urges students not to “join this homogenous and elitist institution.” According to the piece, there is a large sense of elitism and favoritism towards inviting students who are a part of “Northeast prep school culture,” shutting out anyone who doesn’t fall within a “tiny slice of the larger Harvard population, creating an atmosphere nearly devoid of the diversity essential to the undergraduate experience.” Alumni of the club, known as “Guardians of the Sphinx,” help fund the university’s only co-ed club, although the character of many of these billionaires are called into question by Joy. If that’s not enough, Harvard seems to embrace the club. From Joy’s editorial: “It’s embarrassing that Harvard administrators associate with an organization whose unfair preference for elite Northeast prep school graduates is reminiscent of a bygone era. What does it say to tomorrow’s leaders when one regional and socio-economic group has Harvard’s stamp of approval to socialize in luxury to the exclusion of the rest of the university?”
Emerson on Music Media in the Digital Age:
- Dillon Riley of the Berkeley Beacon writes a fantastic editorial about how music coverage and artists’ relationships with publications have changed in the Internet age. One such example he uses is the success of Frankie Cosmos’ “Zentropy” after having it pre-streamed on Pitchfork.