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Looking back: Reflections on a semester’s worth of Spectator opinion articles
May 4, 2017

At the beginning of the semester, the role of an Opinion Editor was foreign territory for us.The first task in taking on this new position was developing an understanding of what makes an effective opinion piece and how to communicate these standards to the eager writers whose minds are filled with ideas about issues ranging from politics to campus clothing trends. As the semester progressed, however, being an Opinion editor began to take on a new, more profound role as it became obvious that the material published in The Spectator impacts an audience larger than just Hamilton’s campus community. The task at hand demanded a deeper awareness of what makes college journalism effective, and how to foster successful communication and broadcast it to a body of diverse perspectives and backgrounds. More ...

Keeping it civil: Easy steps for improving the quality and quanity of discourse on campus
May 4, 2017

The end of a school year is a good time for reflection and crafting goals for the year to come, assuming you have another year of school ahead of you. In my first year at Hamilton, I have had the pleasure of writing two previous Op-Ed pieces for The Spectator and have largely been pleased with the articles and subsequent responses to them. I am, however, troubled. I have seen an issue with the student body of the College that I believe is demonstrated in the responses to my articles and represents a microcosm of a larger issue in the culture on campus. More ...

Thumbs Up, Thumbs Down
May 4, 2017

Thumbs Up: Finals Week; Thumbs Down: The Justice Department is prosecuting an activist for laughing at Jeff Sessions. More ...

Indiana University leads by example in sexual violence prevention measures
April 27, 2017

NPR published an article by Amy Held this past Saturday entitled “Indiana University Bars Applicants With Sexual Violence History From Competition.” In this piece, Held details Indiana University’s new policy, designed by Athletic Director Fred Glass, which prohibits perpetrators of sexual violence from competing in athletics at Indiana and requires coaches to perform thorough background checks on prospective student athletes at Indiana U. The policy is primarily an attempt to prevent students who might be sexually violent from ever enrolling at Indiana University in the first place. More ...

Thumbs Up, Thumbs Down
April 27, 2017

This week, the “Thumbs Up, Thumbs Down” columnists would like to honor Annalise Curtis. More ...

A summer full of possibilities (and free of judgement)
April 27, 2017

This summer I will be going back to Nobleboro, Maine to be a counselor at Camp Kieve, a three-and-a-half week wilderness tripping camp for boys and a place where I spent six years as a camper. It will be my second summer as a counselor and, following last year’s hijinks, adventures and numerous “full sends,” I am quite excited to return. What is the allure of spending an entire summer waking up at 8 in the morning, shepherding adolescents through the notoriously unpredictable mountains and waterways of Northern Maine and living largely outside of civilization? That is a query for another time. For the purpose of this article, the question is not “why” in the sense of “Why would you subject yourself to three months of that?” but rather, “Why would you subject yourself to three months of that in lieu of pursuing an internship or general resume builder while also enjoying the comforts of modern society?” More ...

All work and no pay: Lab requirements antithetical to open course curriculum
April 20, 2017

As a student at Hamilton college my GPA factors into my class rank, and class rank is used as a diagnostic tool for both personal and professional usage. At first blush there is no issue with how GPA and class rank are determined at Hamilton, indeed at colleges across the United States, but there are several factors I believe that should be discussed. More ...

Thumbs Up, Thumbs Down, Who Cares?
April 20, 2017

Thumbs Up: Artporn. Thumbs Down: Charlie Baker is the commencement speaker.  Who Cares?: Lupe Fiasco is the C&C Day performer.  More ...

Are you cool enough to Juul? What the new e-cig phenomenon tells us
April 20, 2017

Here’s some breaking news: you’re not slick. Yes, you. The one blowing Juul smoke inconspicuously into the hem of your shirt from the back of the class. Or you. Congratulations for cordoning off a KJ study space, but everyone can see the thin vapor clouds that appear intermittently over your computer screen like a wall of fog making its way across a coastal landscape. We see you, you purveyors of Juul, you demigods of vape, you nicotine fiends. Even though you might think it looks like you are casually sucking on a USB (why that is an acceptable alternative is unclear), the infamy of the Juul is now widespread enough to clue in the most vehement of non-smokers. Like it or not, the Juul revolution is here, and it looks like it’s going to stay. As cigarettes weaken their previously airtight grip on the “king of the party darts” tag, the Juul is poised to become the method of choice for smokers of all shapes and sizes here at Hamilton and around the country. The question now is: why? And, what can be gleaned from the Juul’s rapid ascent to the pinnacle of oral nicotine transport mechanisms?  More ...

Flawed but fixable: Small changes would make housing lottery a winning system
April 13, 2017

As the snow melts and rays of long anticipated sunlight break through the clouds, it becomes clear that spring has arrived at Hamilton, and with that comes the long anticipated campus horror—The Housing Lottery. A time of ceaseless group messages figuring out who is pulling whom, what your group’s average number will be if you’re blocking and, of course, the stray text from the desperate number 457 asking you what you received and…could you possibly pull them? The question remains—is it a fair system? And if not, how could it be changed? More ...

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