The opinions presented below are solely the views of the author and do not represent the views of The News-Letter. If you are a member of the Hopkins community looking to submit a piece or a letter to the editor, please email opinions@jhunewsletter.com.
For the past three weeks, the Student Government Association (SGA) has debated lending its support to a campus-wide smoking ban. The potential resolution has reignited debate on campus, pitching some smokers and civil liberties advocates against public health campaigners and anti-tobacco activists.
On April 20, The News-Letter ran a piece titled “Sexual assault at college: Confronting the rapists in our lives.” Although it is perfectly understandable where the author, a female senior undergraduate student studying International Studies, is coming from, there is a lack of some key points that provide the necessary context to fully comprehend the issue that King, the writer, brought forth.
A recent diplomatic spat between the German foreign ministry and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has once again thrust the Arab-Israeli conflict back into international prominence. Tensions between Israel and foreign governments and organizations seeking to ingratiate themselves with ostensibly “progressive” groups intent on, above all, the heavy-handed elimination of Zionism through brute-force methods (see: Boycott, Divest, Sanction) have soared over recent years.
No one should graduate with a degree in public health without having at least a basic understanding of how racism impacts health disparities.
Freddie Gray, a 25 year old black man, died two years ago on April 19, 2015 after sustaining a severe spinal cord injury while in the custody of the Baltimore Police Department (BPD). According to the state medical examiner’s office, he sustained the fatal injury during a “rough ride” in a BPD van that was transporting him from the scene of his arrest to the Western District police station. His death, one week after the arrest, sparked both peaceful and violent protests, garnering national attention.
In 2016 I tweeted: “concept: people at this fricken school actually respect each others’ majors,” and I hope to reiterate that argument more eloquently now. I’m a Writing Seminars major. You might hear that and think it’s pretty cool. I do, too. I love writing, with all its struggles. However, the reaction I get too often is one of almost-pity, disinterest and mild laughter.
Two weeks ago, in The News-Letter’s Identity Issue of the magazine, I published an article entitled “Finding the courage to come out in the social media era.” Since then, I have received some incredible responses from friends, family, strangers and estranged Facebook friends.
The American war machine has been ratcheting up since the election of Trump. Missiles attacking a Syrian government air base, the “mother of all bombs” in Afghanistan and the expansion of Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) on the Korean Peninsula. Underneath all these recent developments is the ever-present buzz of drones, flying under the radar.
Dean of Student Life Terry Martinez recently released the Interim Student Guidelines for the Protection of Public Expression, intended to provide resources for Hopkins students who might be new to protesting.
A group of student activists, Refuel Our Future, has been pressuring Hopkins for six years to remove its investments in fossil fuels from the University’s endowment. In response to Refuel’s recent formal proposal to the Public Interest Investment Advisory Committee (PIIAC), the Office of the Provost hosted the JHU Forum on Divestment from Fossil Fuels on Monday.
Ever take a campus tour? Even if you haven’t, you know what it’s like: your friends walking backwards, cutting quickly through Brody while ignoring the palpable malaise, telling you how many student-run groups there are — more than 400! It turns out that 20 hours per week on B-level isn’t too attractive to 11th graders, but the chance to lead monthly canoeing trips or work on the largest student-run fair in the country might be.
A study by the Bureau of Justice Statistics found that one in five undergraduate women will experience sexual assault while in college. That means you probably know someone who was raped at Hopkins. It also means you probably know a rapist.
The University administration released new “Guidelines for Free Expression” last week “to serve as a resource to you as you consider acts of public expression” on and around campus. While it is unclear which policies outlined in the document are new and which are compiled from old statutes, what is clear is that these “guidelines” are merely restrictions on our freedoms re-branded as “resources” and “support.”
Imagine coming to the United States as a baby, the adopted child of American parents. You grow up as an American. You never visit your birth country. You don’t speak any language besides English. Now imagine you’re adult trying to do something as routine as applying for a passport. Your application gets rejected. Why? Because it turns out you are not an American citizen. You never have been.
We need to bring back salons.
Student Government Association (SGA) Executive Board elections took place over the weekend and drew a noticeably larger voter turnout. Last year, 1,371 voters participated in executive board elections, triple that of the previous year’s turnout. This year, the trend away from apathy continued, and 1,421 undergraduates cast their vote.
Free Food at JHU, a new food waste initiative, recently launched a pilot version of its program on campus that informs Hopkins students about leftover food after events. The initiative, started by recent graduate Nemo Keller and the Office of Sustainability, sends email and text message alerts with the amount of food left over and its location.
On April 1, President Trump declared that April would be Sexual Assault Awareness and Prevention Month, eliciting a collective “Seriously?” from the greater population of Trump resisters. Not only has Trump been accused of sexual assault, but Sexual Assault Awareness Month was established in 2001.
Three of my classmates walked into class 15 minutes late this Monday. The cause of their atypical delay was a “too fun to resist” bouncy castle that was on the beach. While 15 minutes of instructional time was lost, one could potentially argue that the memory of missing class to jump on a bouncy castle will probably stick around longer than the content covered in the same time. This is in no way condoning skipping class, but surely many can agree that there’s something special in these small moments.
Student government at Hopkins needs to change. The Editorial Board has unfortunately seen the Student Government Association (SGA) stagnate, and students have undoubtedly lost respect for this critical institution. But because SGA is the only official representative of students, it must regain their respect.
