THUMBS UP to Students for Ecological and Environmental Development for presenting a fantastic speaker in spite of its earlier Rock-painting debacle. About a week ago, this eco-friendly student group attempted to advertise its upcoming speaker Bill McKibben by perching an adorable polar bear atop the Rock.
But while icebergs melted away at the North Pole and plunged fluffy residents into the Arctic sea, the metaphoric iceberg at NU melted away beneath the paintbrushes of another student group the next morning. SEED's polar bear was washed away into the sea of NU advertising.
Triumphantly, the small white fellow reappeared atop the Rock on Thursday as if to say, "Bill McKibben is still going to blow NU away, and I'm on this rock to stay."
McKibben, often referred to as the "King of American Environmentalism" drew a full crowd in Ryan Family Auditorium on Thursday night. His talk on "Climate, Oil and the Next Economy" inspired students to take part in environmental activism and to keep polar bears afloat everywhere.
THUMBS DOWN to NU applicants digging up dirt on their high school rivals and sending it to admissions. Evanston may also be the home of Mean Girls, but that doesn't mean NU takes kindly to underhanded teen-queen style tactics.
Yet every year admissions receives a pile of anonymous incriminating letters, presumably pointing fingers at their high school competitors also applying to attend NU.
Admissions officer should be commended for not considering who slept with whom or who may have been a huge pothead when they were 15 when accepting and denying applicants. The application already provides a space requiring students to disclose past criminal charges and convictions.
Students smart enough to attend NU should already have grown out of high-school-style backstabbing.
THUMBS UP to the 24 Northwestern students who received Fulbright Fellowships for 2008-2009, reaffirming our university's reputation for being a top producer of Fulbrights for the second year in a row.
With the combined talents of these bright Wildcats, NU now ranks fourth among major universities behind University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, Harvard University and Yale University. Their area of study ranges from musical instrument training to chemistry, and they will be spreading the name of NU as far as Senegal and Malaysia.
The lucky two dozen will essentially be paid to run around a foreign country on the government's dime. Congratulations and good luck to these brainy 'Cats!
THUMBS DOWN to students bitching and moaning about the price of ski trip. News flash: Skiing is expensive. There's a reason it's known as a sport for rich people. Forking out fat wads of cash is as much a part of the culture as it is for other country club sports like sailing, scuba diving and yachting. It come with the territory.
But even so, this is the cheapest ski trip to Breckenridge, Colo. that you will ever encounter in your life. The NU-subsidized package including luxurious condos and lift tickets costs $460 - an independent trip would easily cost four times as much. Cost-conscientious students can always find ways to save a few bucks on the trip. Our suggestion? Tap the Rockies a little less - cut back on the post-slopes parties at night.
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