MIT’s vice president of communications to leave for Yale
Nate Nickerson, vice president for communications, will leave for Yale University after nearly 15 years at MIT. Nickerson will lead Yale’s Office of Public Affairs and Communications as the vice president for communications starting March 1.
Commencement could be moved a week earlier
Options include replacing the final day of IAP with spring registration day and reducing the finals period from five days to four.
Around half of first-year students took one fewer GIR in the fall
Academic exploration subjects to be offered include 5.001 (Frontiers in Molecular and Materials Science), 12.00 (Frontiers and Careers in Earth, Planets, Climate, and Life), and 21G.012 (Exploring Globalization through Chinese Food).
Dorm presidents respond to room assignment design exercise
As the process of reassessing dorms’ room assignment and move-in procedures continues, The Tech reached out to presidents and other leaders in each of MIT’s ten dorms to ask about their current procedures and how potential changes would affect their communities.
Barnhart, Nelson announce ‘design exercise’ for room assignment and move-in processes
Twenty-five percent of undergraduate students described their dorm’s room assignment process as “stressful” on the 2017 Quality of Life survey.
Spring pre-registration, UROP application deadline
The final deadline for spring pre-registration is today at 5 p.m. Students must also select preferences for spring CI-H/CI-HW subjects by this time.
Students want transparency and collaborative approach in new vice president of IS&T
“SIPB has not had opportunities to give input on recent IS&T decisions before they were finalized. In the future, we would love to work more closely with IS&T leadership and committees to provide student perspectives on decisions before they are finalized,” Angel Alvarez '20, SIPB chair, wrote to The Tech.
New spam quarantine system causes problem for MIT email users
Some outstanding issues are that messages forwarded to external accounts are flagged as spam, and external email providers may flag Microsoft Exchange Online Protection’s “Spam Notice” emails, according to IS&T’s knowledge base.
Student Center card-access hours cutoff is 9 p.m. over IAP
This IAP, the Student Center is card-access-only from 9 p.m. to 6 a.m. This is a pilot by the Campus Activities Complex that moves up the cutoff for card-access hours from 11 p.m. during the semester to 9 p.m. during holidays, breaks, and IAP, according to Michael Foley, director of the CAC, in a statement emailed to The Tech.
Old squash court in Walker to be remade into dedicated meditation, prayer, reflection space
The proposal noted that once the space is sufficiently publicized and well-known, it is expected to receive 30–60 users per day.
Athena lounge on fifth floor of Student Center closed for renovations
In the meantime, the Coffeehouse Lounge located on the third floor has new printers and is open to students as a study space (card access is required). The color printer that was in the Athena lounge is now on the first floor of the Student Center.
Chemical reaction leads to small fire in basement of Building 66
The lab where the fire occurred and MIT Environment, Health, and Safety are working together to investigate the root cause of the incident, as the reaction has been performed for many years without issues.
MIT removed Russian oligarch Viktor Vekselberg from Corporation in April 2018
“In April 2018, to comply with restrictions as a result of [the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control] adding Mr. Vekselberg to its specially designated nationals list, MIT suspended Mr. Vekselberg’s Corporation membership,” according to a statement from MIT.
IAP and spring pre-registration, UROP applications
The deadline for IAP pre-registration is this Friday, Jan. 11. The Add/Drop application will become available Jan. 14 at 9 a.m.
College of Computing headquarters to replace Building 44
Perhaps the most distinctive exterior feature of Building 44 is the “J” sign, which refers to the J particle discovered by Samuel C.C. Ting and his group in 1974.
Met warehouse to house SA+P and makerspace
“We [SA+P] do not own the ground floor anywhere on campus except at the Media Lab. This makes us invisible to anyone navigating through MIT, and almost impossible to find,” Dean Sarkis wrote.
MIT admits 7.4 percent of EA applicants
MIT offered 707 students early admission to the Class of 2023.
Associate Provost Richard Lester recommends against termination of existing relationships with Saudi Arabia
Lester's report argues that the cessation of MIT’s relationships with the Saudi organizations it currently engages with would probably fail to have a “meaningful ameliorative effect.”
Course evaluations, pre-registration, end of term
Course evaluations are now open and will remain open until 9 a.m. the first day of finals (Dec. 17).
Finally, some lasting sunny and dry weather
If anytime over the past 3 months you felt the sun had deserted Boston and run off to frolic in the tropics, you weren’t exactly wrong.