Voices

The long, yellow brick road to finding the right major at Hopkins

By KATHERINE LOGAN
August 28, 2018

Among the go-to questions that you’re bound to be asked, not only as a freshman but throughout your years at Hopkins, are the ever-daunting “What’s your major?” or “What are you interested in?”

Stand up, be heard: a spotlight on student activism at Hopkins

By EMILY MCDONALD | August 28, 2018

Clarissa Chen, president of Refuel our Future, explained that one thing she learned from her efforts to persuade Hopkins to divest from fossil fuels is the unique ability of Hopkins students to sway the University. She reminded future student activists to recognize and use this.

Why I joined The News-Letter, and why you should too

By MORGAN OME | August 28, 2018

People often say that love makes you do crazy things. During the winter break of my freshman year — still sad about the end of my first high school relationship — those crazy things included watching clips of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind on loop, crying in bed for hours and rereading old messages late at night. Needless to say, I was not the most fun person to be around.

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Mellisa Benoistst’s Kara Danvers is entitled to a fulfilling love life.

Supergirl continues to deserve a better love life

By CATHERINE PALMER | May 3, 2018

Around this time last year, I wrote about how Supergirl had never given Kara Danvers (Melissa Benoist) a good romantic storyline. This season, she has fortunately not been forced into another cringey relationship, but that’s only because she’s been hung up on her most recent ex, Mon-El (Chris Wood), who never deserved her in the first place.

Re-evaluating the meaning of “busy” and striving to stay present

By KELSEY KO | May 7, 2018

It hurts to exist in a constant state of holding my breath, precariously piling on commitments, hoping that everything doesn’t come crashing down. So I’ll revel in the quiet, attentive to what my body and mind try to tell me. Exhale.

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COURTESY OF EDA INCEKARA. 
Sam Fossum and Rollin Hu served as our fearless leaders this year.

What we learned in our year as Editors-in-Chief

By SAM FOSSUM and ROLLIN HU | May 3, 2018

Hey, Rollin and Sam here, just your friendly neighborhood Editors-in-Chief. As our time wraps up, we decided that it’s apt to reflect on and construct some notion of closure around the job that has consumed our lives for the past year.

The impact of the Pulse shooting on my poetry

By JACOB TOOK | May 7, 2018

Maybe for a long time I didn’t think too much about the trauma left by the Pulse shooting, but it came out when I tried to write poems.

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Tracee Ellis Ross gave a TED Talk that addressed the topic of female rage.

Holding men accountable and owning my anger

By LILY KAIRIS | May 3, 2018

It is about time that we stop making excuses for men’s misbehavior. No matter how small, sexual harassment is unacceptable, and I, for one, am done being sad about it. I am furious.

Grappling with what it means to be an activist

By GILLIAN LELCHUK and JACOB TOOK | April 30, 2018

As a queer person, I feel like I have an obligation to be an activist, but I’ve struggled with what that means for me. Is this column activism? Is writing a short story with a queer protagonist activism? Is educating my cisgender heterosexual peers about LGBTQ issues activism?

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The history behind the superhero movie genre

By ARIELLA SHUA | April 26, 2018

I’ve always had a vague interest in comic books but could never get into the superhero genre at all — until I began watching the movies that is. But superhero movies have been around for a while, and they’ve never been as popular as they are now. What caused the change?

Appreciating the beauty of natural phenomena

By BESSIE LIU | April 26, 2018

I’ve always loved both science and writing. During my senior year of high school, as I wrote my college essays, I tried to find a way to weave the two together into a feasible future for myself: to explain why I love poems that overflow with biological imagery; to try to articulate the parallels I saw in the processes of biology and creating literature. And then when I read the book The Lives of a Cell by Lewis Thomas, I felt like all my efforts were put to shame.

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How I’ve learned that it really does get better

By CARMEN SCHAFER | April 26, 2018

By the end of high school, everyone in my life, especially me, had accepted that I had a depressing personality. But a mood disorder is not a personality trait.

Taking the time to press pause and reflect this spring

By MORGAN OME | April 30, 2018

I’m grateful that junior year is coming to a close, thankful to be out of the mindset that every week is hell week and every day is a poor day. There is no sugarcoating reality: It’s grueling to be a college student, no matter how much you love your major or how much you enjoy studying.

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GAGE SKIDMORE/CC BY-SA 2.0
Chadwick Boseman starred in the most recent Marvel film, Black Panther.

My ranking of the top three Marvel Cinematic Universe movies

By CATHERINE PALMER | April 18, 2018

In honor of the seemingly next-level crossover event, Avengers: Infinity War, coming out next week, I’ve decided to reflect back on the preceding installments of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU). Launched in 2008 with the release of the game-changing Iron Man, the MCU currently includes 17 other films, the most recent being the 10th highest-grossing film of all time, Black Panther.

If you don’t want cheating, redesign your classes

By WILLA GRINSFELDER | April 18, 2018

Cheating has been on my mind a lot, lately. Classes have gotten harder; the material has gotten more theoretical; and the amount of time to do work hasn’t increased. In one class there was an email at the beginning of the year saying the instructor caught some students copying homework assignment answers from online, and since then I’ve seen my peers do the same. To some extent, I get it.

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Grinsfelder argues that the way the engineering department is structured allows for students to cheat.

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Katherine Heigl plays a woman who can’t say no in the movie 27 dresses.

Why I have a hard time saying no to my friends

By AMELIA ISAACS | April 18, 2018

The delightfully terrible rom-com 27 Dresses begins with Katherine Heigl’s character Jane acting as a bridesmaid in two of her friends’ weddings simultaneously, rushing between the two, changing dresses, accessories etc. in a cab en route to each venue.

My work towards being a happier, healthier me

By ALIZAY JALISI | April 23, 2018

I feel fragile, but ready to go,” she said. As a rule of group therapy, all patients being discharged share how they feel and their plans for continued healing beyond the program. I looked at her, then at the other hopeful faces sitting at the table beside me.

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Trying to come to terms with my eating disorder

By LILY KAIRIS | April 22, 2018

Let me tell you a secret, good friends: I have, for most of my life, dealt with an unhealthy relationship to food. This isn’t something I ever discuss.

My ongoing struggle with my survivors guilt

By Zubia Hasan | April 18, 2018

It’s 2 a.m. and my chest closes. Suddenly, I’m drowning in a sea. I can’t swim. I can’t breathe. I’m in physical pain that won’t stop. Pain that has no tangible symptoms but can only be described as a mental cage of thoughts that drive in over and over again with an unparalleled intensity.

DAVID W. CARMICHAEL/CC BY-SA 3.0
Rippon is an American figure skater and represented the US during the 2018 winter olympics.

How Adam Rippon became a source of inspiration for me

By KATHERINE LOGAN | April 11, 2018

Recently, I’d been feeling paralyzed. Anxiety and indecision clouded my thoughts in a way they never had before. Maybe it’s partly due to the fact that I’m only a couple of months away from entering a new decade, or maybe it’s that I’ve never been someone that thrives in times of uncertainty.

Published by the Students of Johns Hopkins since 1896