Opinion

Thoughts from the Georgetown community.

Voices

Outdated data sweep poverty under the rug

Remember the 1960s? Hippies, free love, Vietnam, and civil rights? Our country’s current poverty measure was created during these distant and tumultuous years, with no adjustments since. Almost 50 years ago, economist Mollie Orshansky took the Department of Agriculture’s food plans and calculations of minimum need for different family types, and calculated the poverty threshold by multiplying the lowest, or “economy,” food plan by three, since it was determined that families spent approximately one third of their income on food.

By the April 29, 2010

Editorials

Shuttering Burleith’s cranky shutterbug

The contentious relationship between Georgetown neighbors and University students hit a new low this week with the rise of DrunkenGeorgetownStudents.com. The site is run by Stephen R. Brown, a cantankerous Burleith resident with a camera and limited website design skills and publishes damning photographs and commentary about the weekend partying habits of his student and “young professionall [sic]” neighbors.

By the April 29, 2010

Editorials

Weekend GUTS routes must continue

Tired of complaining about lengthened GUTS routes to Dupont Circle, sporadic weekend service, and no rides to the Verizon Center during basketball season? Don’t worry, Georgetown Univeristy Student Association and the Student Activities Commission have you covered—weekend GUTS routes might be gone for good on the Hilltop next year thanks to a lack of financial oversight from the two organizations.

By the April 29, 2010

Editorials

New culture of accountability at SAC?

The long and tumultuous conflict between the Student Activities Commission and the Georgetown University Students Association appears to have ended in a cease-fire, with a compromise announced last Sunday which will finally make SAC almost fully accountable to the student body.

By the April 29, 2010

Voices

Student solidarity in wake of recent sexual assaults

The recent cases of high-profile sexual assaults have once again reminded Georgetown students and administrators that sexual violence exists in our community. On a campus where approximately one in four women will experience sexual violence in their time on the Hilltop, it is truly unfortunate that it takes high-profile attacks for the community to pay attention to the problem of sexual assault. Sexual assault is a perpetual reality for many women on our campus, and assaults are happening weekly whether we wish to acknowledge them or not.

By April 29, 2010

Voices

Town versus gown: Why can’t we be friends?

Of all the bad things to come out of last winter’s snowstorms, the founding of student group Georgetown Good Samaritans might end up being the most damaging for the University. Losing President’s Day and nearly all city services was bad, but only Georgetown Good Samaritans perpetuated a damaging lie: That the neighbors would accept living next to students, if only we were nicer to them.

By April 22, 2010

Voices

Binge, boot, and rally: The best night of your life?

The first time I drank vodka, I didn’t throw up everywhere. Instead, my late night Skyy-fueled antics drove me to collapse in a Starbucks the morning of my 16th birthday. To make matters worse, two men at Starbucks called an ambulance, but a fire truck came instead. I narrowly avoided a hospital visit. But the worst part was not the eventual grounding or the fainting, but the shame I felt for behaving so recklessly. My best friend had lost her brother only months earlier to alcohol poisoning during a hazing incident. It was her mom who caught me that morning.

By April 22, 2010

Voices

The Happiest Place on Earth

Thanks to summer jobs, I haven’t been able to join my family on many of our recent summer vacations. At first I didn’t really mind—skipping family trips meant having the house to myself for a week to live as slovenly as I desire (which is quite slovenly, if I do say so myself). After the initial euphoria of living alone for a week wears off, though—usually after about 12 hours, when I notice that no one has washed my dirty plates—I always come to the same conclusion. As grating as being in a confined space with my family can be after seven or eight days, most of my best stories actually come from family vacations. It is the sort of thing that I really miss now that I have fewer and fewer opportunities to make new stories.

By April 22, 2010

Voices

I have a quote for you, New York Stock Exchange

Last weekend, at the behest of my finance professor, I went on the Business School’s annual New York trip. A friend of mine was also going on the trip, so I figured I’d at least be able to hang out with him for a few days in New York City and check out the New York Stock Exchange and a few banks. The first Wall Street firm we visited began by serving our group a continental breakfast and talking to us about the financial services industry, new developments at the company, and a bit about their recruiting process. Then we got to speak to some employees. I was chatting up one of their bond traders, and after a few minutes I learned that he worked on a desk that traded mortgage-backed securities—the financial instruments that blew a hole in the economy.

By April 22, 2010

Editorials

Calm crazy neighbors, back student rep

“How are you going to discourage students from bringing their cars? How do you discourage them, outside of shooting them?” a Georgetown resident exclaimed at a meeting organized by the Citizens Association of Georgetown Monday night.

By the April 21, 2010

Editorials

Does Norton even want D.C. voting rights?

We got fooled again. Just as it seemed that Congress would pass the D.C. Voting Rights Act, which would give Washington a voting delegate in the House of Representatives, D.C.’s non-voting delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton (D) decided not to introduce the legislation this week.

By the April 21, 2010

Editorials

University needs to address assaults

Despite the shocking number of sexual assaults at Georgetown this semester, the University administration has yet to comment on the crimes. Thus far, administrative officials have not publicly announced plans to address the numerous safety issues for students both on and off campus.

By the April 21, 2010

Voices

The Love Song of Maxwell Q. Maxwell (and biceps)

It all began in first grade, when our class learned how to (roughly) translate the English alphabet into Egyptian hieroglyphs. I wrote a poem for a girl named Alphonsine* in Egyptian hieroglyphs. Sure, I got sick of writing hieroglyphs after the first two lines (the little eagle things are hard, man), and eventually decided to finish the last two lines in plain-old English, but hey! I was hot stuff—four lines of panty-melting, swoon-inducing, first-grade creativity. Mentally, ladies were putty in my ink-stained, booger-laden hands.

By April 15, 2010

Voices

Great Britain: Greatest Hits

It is a long-standing tradition that as a columnist studying abroad, I am permitted one column per semester to devote to the foreign land where I live. Since I used up all of my armchair sociology on essays for the Berkley Center, I’ve decided to take a slightly less self-indulgent route with this column. Having spent the past fortnight on a road trip around Britain with my uncle, I’m going to provide you with some more useful insight than “Why I think Catholics and Protestants still don’t get along in Glasgow.” I’m going to try my hand at travel writing.

By April 15, 2010

Voices

Let me know, Monroe: Will you stay or will you go?

I love college, but if someone offered me a $2 million-a-year job, I wouldn’t hesitate for a second—I’d be gone. Sadly, that job offer isn’t coming my way any time soon. It’s absurd to consider it even a possibility. None of my sophomore classmates have any kind of skills that valuable. That is, except for one. Greg Monroe must love college more than Asher Roth, because that job offer has been in his hands for weeks now, and he’s still sitting in class. Professional basketball and its riches await the 6-foot-11-inch center, who has until April 25 to declare for the NBA draft.

By April 15, 2010

Editorials

Administration should spring for diversity

At this week’s Georgetown University Student Association meeting, Senator Nick Troiano (COL ’11) objected to the Academic Diversity Working Group’s proposal requiring all students to take two courses on the grounds that “diversity can be fostered, [but] it can’t be mandated.”

By the April 14, 2010

Editorials

Misguided idealism of Georgetown, Divest!

While many of the concerns and grievances articulated by the new campus group Georgetown, Divest! are valid, its demand that the University divest its money from companies profiting from human rights violations in Israel is logistically impractical and ultimately unreasonable.

By the April 14, 2010

Editorials

Don’t derail historic DCPS teacher raises

It’s no secret that Marion Berry has seen some scandalous activity in his day. So when the embattled councilmember describes anything as “the worst mess involving the city government that I’ve seen in my 31 years in city government,” it’s time to take notice.

By the April 14, 2010

Voices

The nanny diaries: From Mexico, with love

In a speech to his constituents in Las Vegas this past weekend Senator Harry Reid (D-Nev) promised that “we’re going to come back, we’re going to have immigration reform now.” This proposition was most likely politically motivated—as the 2010 census will confirm, over a fifth of the Nevada electorate is Hispanic. In San Diego, my hometown, nearly a third of the population is Hispanic. Needless to say, their vote and their issues are too great for any successful politician to ignore. While it can be easy to think about immigration as a purely political issue, the personal impact of immigration policy deserves attention, too.

By April 14, 2010

Voices

Internships: Opportunities or virtual slavery?

Yesterday, I spent about half an hour interviewing over the phone. If I’m lucky and the interview turns out to be a success, I will have the opportunity to spend the summer away from my family and friends, in “accommodations” provided by my employer, working 40-hour weeks, and earning exactly zero dollars. This might sound terrifying to some people. Modern-day indentured servitude, others might call it. And yet I’m kind of hoping I get the job.

By April 8, 2010