Undergraduate Enrollment Set To Increase by 300, Though Not Soon
For years, MIT has dreamed of increasing the number of undergraduates back to 4,500. That dream is still distant. Adding about 300 students means adding support staff, adding more sections of the General Institute Requirements and finding a place for all the students to stay. Adding students means finishing the renovation of the undergraduate dormitory W1, and untold other costs.
S^3 Dean Simonis Laid Off in Late June, Faculty Express Concern About Process
<i>This occasional feature follows up on news stories long past their prime. In this edition: the dismissal of long-time Student Support Services Dean Jacqueline Simonis and what caused the faculty uproar over her departure.</i>
Second Time’s the Charm For Students Looking to Fulfill Their MIT Dream
You don’t always get into the college you want, but some students get a second chance.
News Briefs
The death of Kabelo Zwane, a sophomore studying mechanical engineering, has been ruled a suicide, according to Terrel Harris of the Massachusetts Executive Office of Public Safety and Security.
Three MIT Students Win Rhodes, Setting An Institute Record
Three MIT students were named Rhodes Scholars last Sunday, setting a record for the number of MIT students awarded the prestigious Oxford fellowship in any one year.
Sounds During Sleep May Aid Memory, Study Says
<i>Science</i> has never given much credence to claims that you can learn Chinese or French by having the instruction CDs play while you sleep. If any learning happens that way, most scientists say, the language lesson is probably waking the sleeper up, not causing nouns and verbs to seep into a sound-asleep mind.
Autistic Runaway Youth Spent 11 Days On Subway
Day after day, night after night, Francisco Hernandez Jr., 13 years old, rode the subway. He had an electronic fare card, $10 in his pocket and a bookbag on his lap. As the human tide flowed and ebbed around him, he sat impassively, a gangly boy in glasses and a red hoodie, speaking to no one.
Proton Beams Are Back on Track at Collider
Physicists returned to their future on Friday. About 10 p.m. outside Geneva, scientists at CERN, the European Center for Nuclear Research, succeeded in sending beams of protons clockwise around the 17-mile underground magnetic racetrack known as the Large Hadron Collider, the world’s biggest and most expensive physics experiment.
The Gloves Come Off At Amazon and Wal-Mart
Ali had Frazier. Coke has Pepsi. The Yankees have the Red Sox.
Shorts (right)
Bernard Madoff’s enormous Ponzi scheme ended on Dec. 11, 2008, when he was arrested at his Manhattan penthouse. But for some early victims, the date his crime started could matter much more than when it stopped.
Shorts (left)
The particles that ferry cholesterol through the bloodstream are known as “bad” or “good”: bad if they deposit cholesterol on vessel walls, potentially clogging them; good if they carry the cholesterol on to the liver for excretion.
Iran Expanding Effort To Stifle the Opposition
After last summer’s disputed presidential election, Iran’s government relied largely on brute force — beatings, arrests and show trials — to stifle the country’s embattled opposition movement.
Happy Thanksgiving!
Thanksgiving is just a few days away, which means that winter is on the horizon. Thanks to El Niño, the National Weather Service is predicting a warmer-than-average winter across much of the western and central US, but a cooler-than-average winter across the Southeast and Mid-Atlantic.
Dining Reform Set to Repeat History
Dining at MIT has a long and contentious history of student distaste and quarrels with administrators. In lieu of these past protests, what’s surprising now is just how little discussion is occurring over current proposals.
Copenhagen Needs Obama
On December 7, world leaders will descend on Copenhagen for the United Nations Climate Change Conference to determine the future of planet Earth. Or at least they should. So far only 65 national leaders have actually committed to attending the talks. Notable absentees include president Hu Jintao of China and Barack Obama. These politicians, by waiting until the last moment to commit to attending the conference, hope to be portrayed in the media as the saviors of the planet, as the deal clinchers for a sustainable future. Unfortunately, they will be disappointed. Not only will the world not be saved in Copenhagen, because there will not be a treaty to sign, but also there is only one man who can truly salvage the process and play the hero: Barack Obama.
Questioning Capitalism
Why does anyone still question capitalism as the basic engine for economic growth? From what used to be the Soviet Union to China, capitalism has gained recognition as the best way to achieve broad-based economic success. However, individuals like Alexi Goranov, who wrote an article for the November 20 issue of <i>The Tech</i> (“Capitalism and Functioning Democracy Are At Odds”), believe that capitalism is inherently flawed. This is ignorance.
Corrections
An opinion piece last Friday by Alexi Goranov titled “Capitalism and Functioning Democracy Are at Odds” incorrectly stated “A study by IMS Health estimated that the new healthcare bill will bring the drug industry an increase in sales by $137 billion over the next four years.” In a letter to <i>The Tech</i>, Gary J. Gatyas, Jr., a communications director at IMS Health, wrote that the $137 billion increase from the April to the October 2009 forecasts is not all attributable to current healthcare reforms. Goranov cited a November 12, 2009 piece from “Democracy Now!” that, according to IMS Health, misinterpreted the organization’s report. According to Gatyas, “The direct impact of current U.S. healthcare reform measures embedded in the IMS forecast is less than one percent of projected total industry sales through 2013.”
MOVIE REVIEW ★★★ ‘Precious’ Will Leave You Speechless
Emotionally, physically, and sexually abused by both her mother and father, Clareece “Precious” Jones is born into a life that no one would ever want to be born into. As the terribly child-like and misspelled opening credits scrawl across the screen, it’s difficult not to gasp at the horror of her illiteracy. “Who let this happen?” you ask. “Who could possibly be so heartless?”
MOVIE REVIEW ★★ ½ Werewolves, Vampires, and Love Triangles, Oh My!
The Twilight scene is a cult. This is a fact. Granted, about 95 percent of the cult is female, so perhaps a “far-reaching fanbase” would be a more appropriate description. According to my friend, who did a headcount, out of the 196 viewers in my theater, there were only 12 male audience members.
CONCERT REVIEW BSO Presents Saint-Saëns and Stravinsky
An anxious group exited the Symphony T stop at the Green Line, bee lining to the greeters at the door of Symphony Hall. Exactly at 8:03 p.m., the symphony finished tuning and welcomed the rushed audience with a sweet poem: “Pastorale d’été,” a symphonic poem by Arthur Honegger. Honnegger’s style in “Pastorale d’été,” generally associated with the 1920s avant-garde, contrasts with his peers’ — coined the “Groupe des Six” — in that Honegger believed that the new era of music resulted from transitioning from the traditional, as opposed to cleanly breaking away. He embraced the value in balance and virtue, which is exhibited in “Pastorale d’été.” One flute, an oboe, a clarinet, a bassoon, a horn, and strings create a lyrical song of a pleasant summer day in the fields.
MOVIE REVIEW ★★★ A Cataclysmic Production Devoid of Emotion
It is the year 2012. The end of the world as we know is fast approaching. Due to a rare planetary alignment, an unprecedented solar flare is heating up the Earth’s core to the point that the crust will destabilize. The ensuing seismic and volcanic activity followed by gigantic tsunamis are bound to wipe out all life from Earth. There is no way to stop the cataclysm. But there may be a way to weather it out. Or is there?
Women’s Cross Country Places Fifth at NCAA Div. III Nationals
In its second straight appearance at the NCAA Division III Championship, the MIT women’s cross country team improved to a fifth-place showing at Saturday’s national meet, hosted by Baldwin-Wallace College in Berea, Ohio. Maria J. Monks ’10 and Jacqueline M. Wentz ’10 led the way for the Cardinal and Grey, as each earned All-American honors, the first such accolades for the program since 1998. Monks’ 13th-place finish marks the best individual effort at the NCAA Championship in school history.
Sports Shorts
MIT Men’s basketball improved to 3-0 this weekend with two wins in the Tip-Off Tournament at RPI. The Engineers blew out John Abbott College 78-38 in the first round, and edged host RPI 56-55 in the final.
