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The Step Back
Columns

The Step Back: The heart of a champion

What defines an NBA champion? Domination? The hard road? Historical impact? With each season ending in a new coronation, how do we compare championships over time, and determine which teams are truly the best in NBA history?


graphic for Justin Hong's column "the budget line"
Column

The Budget Line: Boston under 30 bucks

We finally made it.Fall break officially starts on Wednesday, though for some, perhaps, it started as early as last Thursday. For many, it means heading home and catching up with family or friends from high school.


Graphic by Charlene Tsai
Column

The Policy Perspective: The importance of climate policy

Over the past few years, Tufts has made it easier and easier for students to act in environmentally conscious ways. One only needs to walk a few steps into the Joyce Cummings Center to see the carefully separated trash, recycling and compost bins with useful labels to help students dispose of their waste sustainably. These steps aren’t insignificant, but they’re often less significant than we are told or may assume. 


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Columns

Compost in the Daylight: The wishing tower

Once upon a time, I traveled to a small country in Eastern Europe with two friends. We signed up for a road trip of sorts with a talkative tour guide and one other tourist: a middle-aged man who consistently cradled a small camera. Our first stop was a town with a wishing tower.



extra innings-henry blickenstaff
Columns

Extra Innings: The two sweepstakes

There are two players that teams looking for a superstar this offseason will be all-in on. The first is, of course, Shohei Ohtani. We’ve been waiting all year to see where the two-time American League MVP plays next. The other is Juan Soto, who no one thought would be available this offseason, and who still might not be (it’s complicated). Here are my thoughts on where these two end up.




Column graphic for Claire woods “inside the MFA”
Columns

Inside the MFA: What not to miss

It would be impossible to see all of the nearly 500,000 pieces at the Museum of Fine Arts in one visit. You can check items off your MFA bucket list over time, but you can only see and appreciate so many pieces in one visit.


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Columns

Weekly Wellness: What supplements should you actually take

Vitamin B-12? Omega-3s? Calcium? Here’s a rundown of the supplements that you might want to implement into your routine to actually benefit your overall health. There’s no question that the supplement section is a daunting place to shop. From Flinstones gummy vitamins to sketchy-looking ‘magic’ pills, the shelves are stocked in an anxiety-inducing way that leaves shoppers, or at least myself, overwhelmed and settling for the first multivitamin on the shelf to avoid the whole fiasco in itself.


Graphic for Reese Christian’s Column “the hard count”
Columns

The Hard Count: The Deshaun Watson Problem

In last week’s column, I wrote about the success of the Houston Texans with CJ Stroud at quarterback, and I stated that the Texans had ‘finally’ found their franchise quarterback. This ignored a wrinkle in the Texans’ history, that being the promise of 2017 draft pick Deshaun Watson during four seasons in Houston.


graphic for Odessa Gaine's column "The Power of the Pen"
Columns

The Power of the Pen: The actors strike is over

The 2023 actors strike officially ended at 12:01 a.m on Nov. 9. PT. After 118 days, a deal was finally struck between SAG-AFTRA and major Hollywood studios. A unanimous agreement was made following negotiations on Nov. 8 that led to significant wins for the actors union. 


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Columns

Sports and Society: Ban bandwagons

We need some standardization for sports fans, and I’m declaring bandwagoning illegal. You heard me. There are all sorts of rules governing player and team movement across professional sports in America. Players sign contracts and can be traded without their consent. Teams can’t just move to Barbados without running things through the proper channels. The NFL even has a borderline-authoritarian policy called the franchise tag, which can just force a superstar player to stay put regardless of their wishes.


Confessions of a Cooking Fanatic
Columns

Confessions of a Cooking Fanatic: Thanksgiving for the project manager

I must confess that while I adore cooking, I am a computer science major. I don’t see cooking as a future career. I do, however, see a career with enough of a work-life balance and extraneous funds for exploring cooking as a hobby. But I argue that there is much overlap between these two interests. As a software engineer, I am constantly breaking down big problems into smaller, more manageable problems. As a project manager, I perform the same tasks but further consider timelines and resource allocation. And as an amateur cook, I am breaking down the most notable meal of the year in the same way.


Graphic for deeksha bathini article “from classroom to clinic”
Column

From Classroom to Clinic: Navigating reproductive rights in the wake of Ohio’s Issue 1

As a native Ohioan, the recent statewide referendum that included Issue 1, formally titled “The Right to Reproductive Freedom with Protections for Health Safety,” has been on my mind. The citizen-initiated amendment that passed on Nov. 7 provides the “right to make and carry out one’s own reproductive decisions, including but not limited to decisions” on abortion, contraception, continuing one’s own pregnancy, miscarriage care and fertility treatment.


graphic for Jeremy Gramson's "T Time" column
Columns

T Time: Back Bay

Last weekend, I took the T to Back Bay station to visit a friend in the South End, so I thought it would be a perfect time to review the station! For anyone interested in going to Back Bay, you can take the Green Line from Medford/Tufts to North Station then transfer to a Forest Hills-bound Orange Line train. Back Bay is six stops away from North Station, and it took me a little more than 25 minutes to get there from Tufts.



The Step Back
Columns

The Step Back: Why the NBA needs expansion now more than ever

For almost twenty years, the NBA has comprised 30 teams. With vastly increasing league popularity and a treasure trove of player talent, team expansion has become a tantalizing idea for fans and executives alike. As other major sports leagues like the NHL have expanded in recent years, the NBA board has yet to budge on the topic of expansion. It was only this past summer that NBA Commissioner Adam Silver finally acknowledged the possibility of expansion following the end of the league’s media rights deal in 2025. What Silver fails to realize, however, is that NBA expansion is not a luxury – it’s a necessity.


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Columns

Tok the Talk: TikTok’s influence on the fashion industry

“Is that Shein?” I found myself asking that on a Sunday afternoon, holding an overpriced coffee in one hand and two shopping bags from the two previous thrift stores my friends and I had just hit up in the other. We had spontaneously decided to stop at a nearby Goodwill to try our luck one last time. I was right: Behind a vintage, very heavily worn camisole lay a Shein bolero (a fancy name for a cropped jacket). 


Image depicts a double decker bus with the words "double decker diary" in front.
Columns

Double Decker Diary: Entry No. 1

Dear Diary, We are not taking the tube today, so let’s take a walk to school. Every day, I repeat a 25-minute walk to campus. I hold my breath as I break into the crisp, cold air that smells of fresh rain, confirmed by the patches of puddles ahead. My chest tightens as I realize that I’ve forgotten my umbrella, and releases when I remember that some bastard from the movies took it when I fell asleep to a two-hour black-and-white nonsense.