Opinion

Opinion

Honoring 2010: Continue what they started

May 22

When I was asked to write an op-ed for this year's Commencement issue of The Tufts Daily, it hit me for the first time that this graduating class will no longer be on campus to provide the leadership, guidance and friendship that the underclassmen have come to take for granted. By choice or circumstance, the Class of 2010 has been in the middle of every major transition, both at Tufts and globally, and has handled these challenges in a manner that I only hope we can emulate. It is my goal next year to continue the work they've started on campus: of increasing opportunities and resources available to improve students' time on the Hill, and of creating a more unified Tufts community.

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Opinion

Time for the Class of 2010 to enter the 'real world'

May 22

The real world is a joke. How could it get any realer than this? At Tufts, we have grown as both a community and individuals by developing a core commitment to active citizenship and curiosity. At Tufts, we have been challenged both intellectually and personally by studying some of the world's most pressing problems. At Tufts, we have contributed as both students and the Class of 2010 by leaving a legacy of leadership and activism in activities throughout the school.

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Editorial

New university president has big shoes to fill

May 22

University President Lawrence Bacow will leave an impressive legacy when he steps down in 2011. Bacow has since joining Tufts in September 2001 dedicated himself to increasing aid to ensure that Tufts is financially accessible. He has also worked extensively to strengthen the alumni network and to raise the funds needed to ensure that Tufts continues to be an international leader in both education and research. Bacow's level-headed leadership helped Tufts navigate the recent global economic crisis without being drastically impacted by the difficult financial situation. On a more personal level, Bacow and his wife Adele Fleet Bacow's hospitality and openness to the Tufts community are worthy of thanks and celebration.

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Opinion

Thank you, Tufts University Dining Services

May 22

While I'm sure at some point during my Tufts career I've seen many of you — be it standing in line at "sundae night" in Dewick-Macphie, examining Carmichael's bountiful produce section for a choice orange, filling your reusable water bottle at one of Hodgdon Good-to-Go's many spouts or calmly sipping a beer at Hotung Café after feasting in The Commons Deli and Grill after a hard day's grind — I sometimes wonder how many of us know what goes on behind the scenes of Tufts University Dining Services (TUDS). Engaged in the continual hard work of providing varying (and might I say comparably damn good) options at the various eateries around campus, not to mention cleaning our dishes after many a meal, the staff members of TUDS provide us with an essential for our busy lives. And they manage to do all of this and more with the grace and determination of what Patti Klos, director of Dining and Business Services — in partnership with the Office of Sustainability — calls a "commitment as an institution to sustainable initiatives."

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Opinion

Elisha Sum | Our Genderation

May 22

Tori Amos once sang, "A few witches burning/ gets a little toasty here."

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Opinion

Teddy Minch | Off Mic

May 22

I was, for a while, unsure of what to put in this column. I could have expounded on the meaning of life, the merits of self-actualization or perhaps the importance of watching sunsets. I could have focused on something that has irked me throughout my time at Tufts and written a scathing condemnation of it for all the graduating class and its parents to see — yeah, that would've shown them, all right.

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Opinion

Paean to Spring Fling

May 22

A few times a year, at school-sanctioned events, much of the student body comes together to get down. All but one of those times, it's in the crowded darkness, and several things happen as a result. Don't get me wrong; the Bashes and Balls are a wild experience and a great way to unwind. The unavoidable way to participate in a giant indoor dance party, though, is as part of a faceless mass. Nighttime Quad Reception, though distinctly a non-orgiastic mass — weird — is largely faceless as well. The dark breeds a safe anonymity, whether one dances or struts the birthday suit. Meeting someone doesn't feel like meeting a real Tufts student, but rather a creature of the night who swam up into your view. The conversation gets lost in the pulsing beats, or innumerable rear-ends. Eventually they fade away at the end of the night, and you'll have to really work to reconnect the next day, having met in the surreal darkness.

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Opinion

Class of 2010 is ready to face what's next

May 22

Today's ceremony will not be the first Commencement that most graduating Jumbos will have participated in. Many seniors will remember feeling the anticipation of going to high school while standing awkwardly at their middle school graduation ceremonies. Most will remember their high school graduations, when they felt a mixture of relief and eagerness to finally have the promised land of college on the horizon. But none of these moving-up ceremonies have possessed quite the weight that graduating from college carries.

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Editorial

University's handling of water emergency laudable

May 2

This weekend's water main break in Weston couldn't have come at a worse time for many Tufts students. Not only did Saturday's Spring Fling leave worn−out Jumbos feeling thirsty after the concert, but the warm weather of the last few days has made it particularly difficult for students on and off campus to cope with the lack of clean water.

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Opinion

Raising issues of environmental justice

April 28

An important social−environmental movement that we don't hear about as much as the mainstream environmental movement is that of environmental justice (EJ). The EJ movement combines environmentalism and social justice into a single theory that calls for equality in the sharing of benefits and burdens of the environment. That is, no group should disproportionately bear the brunt of environmental harm while other groups reap all the benefits. Traditional environmentalism focuses much less on complex internal social issues, rather on ameliorating environmental problems as a whole.

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Opinion

Elisha Sum | Our Genderation

April 28

Tori Amos once sang, "Blood in the cherry zone when they pit [hu]man against feminist."

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Editorial

ECOM handled TCU election poorly

April 28

With the many criticisms and claims that Tufts Elections Commission (ECOM) has had against this spring's Tufts Community Union (TCU) presidential candidates' campaigns, ECOM has left a somewhat ugly trail of its own. While the Daily has supported some of the outcomes of controversial decisions made by ECOM this campaign season, we are unwilling to condone the processes by which these judgments came about.

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Opinion

Bacow's approach to TEMS commendable

April 27

Tufts' recent efforts to reform the drinking culture that appears to define undergraduate social life have been numerous. The university has instituted an online alcohol education course for incoming undergraduates to take before matriculation, replaced the warning that students previously received for a first drinking offense with automatic level−one disciplinary probation and most recently mandated that Spring Fling be a dry event, among other developments. However, one of the more effective and important of these efforts may be one of the least well−known — University President Lawrence Bacow's meetings with students who have required assistance from Tufts Emergency Medical Services (TEMS) for alcohol−related problems.

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Opinion

Letter to the Editor

April 27

Dear Editor,

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Editorial

Sam Wallis for TCU president

April 26

This year's campaign season for Tufts Community Union (TCU) president has seen a great deal of controversy surrounding the candidates' questionable campaign techniques and practices. Numerous students have criticized junior presidential candidate Sam Wallis' campaign for using spray chalk to advertise, as it resembles spray paint, and some believed that his campaign team had vandalized the campus. Meanwhile, members of junior candidate Lauren Levine's campaign have undergone criticism for using the TCU Treasury's signatory e-lists to promote her campaign, which would constitute a violation of Tufts Elections Commission's (ECOM) policies. Most recently, Wallis has also been engaged in an appeals process to contest ECOM's ruling that his decision to fly back from Israel — where he is studying abroad this semester — for the remainder of his campaign was a violation of spending limits.

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Opinion

To address the real issues, vote no on 3 and 4

April 25

You will be asked to vote next Monday on a couple of different proposals for changing the community representative system on the Tufts Community Union (TCU) Senate — the system that provides guaranteed representation to certain communities on campus. Currently, four minority communities, through certain student groups, have such representation.

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Opinion

Return to Title IX's original policies commendable

April 21

Vice President Joe Biden's speech at George Washington University on Tuesday announcing the repeal of former President George W. Bush's policies regarding Title IX was significant step forward by the federal government. Title IX, the federal gender−equity law enacted in 1972, monumentally impacted women's opportunities to play sports in schools, colleges and universities. In the years following the institution of Title IX, Americans watched schools make enormous leaps toward establishing gender equality in sports. The number of women in high school sports increased from 294,000 in 1972 to 2.8 million in 2001. Participation by women in intercollegiate sports has made similarly impressive strides: reports show a 456 percent increase from before Title IX to after its inception.

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Opinion

Elisha Sum | Our Genderation

April 21

Tori Amos once sang, "You can keep the house … and the bank accounts, 'cause boy, I bring home the bacon."

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Opinion

The future of the Democratic Party

April 21

With the recent passing of the health care bill, one might ask, what is next for the Democratic Party? In January 2009, President Barack Obama entered office with a large vision that went well beyond health care reform, including improving our nation's lagging economy, regulating Wall Street and big business, protecting the environment from the effects of global warming, empowering minorities and overall creating an America that will continue its strong leadership well into the future. There is no doubt that this is a huge task, so where is the Democratic Party focusing its efforts for the upcoming November elections and the future?

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Opinion

Potomac tokes and t'oughts

April 20

I've been in Washington, D.C. this semester and I could probably give some insight and perspective into what's going on down here. But really, I am so ridiculously tired of talking about Washington politics. So, I'm going to write about the legalization of weed. Where to begin? Oh man, I feel like so much is going on in the world of cannabis legalization that it's hard to catch you up. Rather, I would like to stress to you my confidence in a prediction that I made in the beginning of this school year. I had said that I thought cannabis will be legalized before 2010 is over. It seems clearer now than it ever did. Still skeptical? Well, read on.

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