Letters to the Editor
Give UROPs Their Due
While I thought The Tech’s recent Year in Review issue did an outstanding job of representing the triumphs, controversies, and other stories that profoundly affected MIT over the past year, I am troubled that, in all of the issue’s 36 pages, not once does the word UROP appear. The student-driven research for which MIT is supposedly so highly regarded is barely mentioned, even while eight pages are dedicated to MIT’s athletics program. Although The Tech selected nine athletes to showcase as “Profiles of Dedication” — a title well deserved — that phrase could just as easily have been applied to any number of UROP students. To be sure, I do not mean to slight the student-athletes who devote so much of their time, energy, and passion to excelling in their chosen sport or sports. But I find it strange that even here at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, we still seem to value articles about athletics above stories about academics.
Editor’s Note: Baranay contributed an article to the Campus Life section of the Year in Review issue.