Apathy wasn't the leading activity on campus this year. All I've ever heard about campus groups is "You'll never see that. Students are too apathetic." For a long time, that was true. Apathy and Orgo defined Hopkins.
Something, however, was different this year. One could sense it from the very beginning, when the MSE Symposium began the year with a controversy. It wasn't much, just some OLf members handing out flyers, but the whiff of controversy had been missing from this campus.
It smelled good. And it only got better.
New groups and activities started up. WJHU, the long-dormant Hopkins radio station, began broadcasting again. John Astin began a new theater company on campus, called the Hopkins Studio Players. Elise Roecker, chair of the Student Activities Commission (SAC), said that 20 new student groups, including some reactivated ones, joined the SAC this year.
Roecker pointed to her ledger book as a sign of the increased student activity. Last year, she said, funding requests filled three sheets. This year, funding requests nearly filled five.
Energy once cooped up inside the lab or the library seemed to explode out as supposedly disinterested students engaged the outside world. The fall elections brought a buzz to this campus I haven't seen in my four years here. College Republicans, College Democrats and other political groups organized and got people excited. Those who wanted to have a voice found it.
We actually had war protests this year, with people at them. Campus activism wasn't a joke called SLAC. It was a really good audience at an impromptu performance of Lysistrata, attended even by students with papers to write or finals to study for. We actually had students choosing politics over Orgo!
Dave Klein, president of the College Democrats, speculates that the political side of this campus has been there all along, and that previous lack of leadership, at least in his group, had been responsible for its absence from campus. He says more committed leaders provided an outlet for somewhat committed students.
More groups. More funding requests. Where's all this energy coming from?
People have their own theories. Roecker thinks its because admissions is doing its job. People who are coming here want to be here, and want to be a part of student life.
Reinforcing the idea that new blood may be largely responsible, Klein, the Democrats' president, points out that his organization is almost entirely freshmen and sophomores, with the only three juniors residing on the executive board.
New blood, though, I think is just one side of the story. Ravi Kavasery, president of the senior class, emphatically disagrees with the notion that new blood that is solely driving this new spirit. He points out that many student leaders are seniors and juniors.
Kavasery also points to a new attitude from the administration which he says invigorated students this year. He lavished praised on Jeff Groden-Thomas, the new Director of Student Involvement, calling him an "incredible asset." Roecker also described him as "hands-on." Both say he has brought new focus and dedication to his work. Kavasery points to Groden-Thomas's appointment, as well as the Committee for Undergraduate Education (CUE) report, as a sign that the administration as a whole has made a commitment to undergraduate life.
So the picture boils down to this. New people and invigorated student and administrative leadership made for an incredibly active campus. But I don't think that fully answers the question.
A spark existed this year that wasn't there before. The trauma that was Sept. 11 showed us an unavoidable world hungry for change. With characteristic Hopkins determination, students have worked through art, through technology and through politics. We want to make even a small difference, and this campus is much more alive as a result. It smells wonderful.
Please note All comments are eligible for publication in The News-Letter.