Special Projects

FEATURES 2/26/20 12:15am

Housing guide: What to expect when you’re expending — typical living costs beyond housing

By Simona Matovic

If you’ve never lived on your own before, budgeting for living expenses on top of rent can seem overwhelming — especially if the closest you’ve come to budgeting at Rice is planning out how to spend your Tetra. The main costs you can never really escape are food and utilities.

FEATURES 2/26/20 12:15am

Housing guide: Meal plan options

By Amy Qin

Feeding yourself for the first time can be the one of the most daunting parts of living off campus. Just ask me, who lived almost completely off frozen meals last year. Luckily, I’ve asked a few people who have fared much better for their advice on eating healthily and well while living off campus.

FEATURES 2/26/20 12:14am

Housing guide: How to get a house

By Anna Ta

Congrats! You’re going off campus! Even if you’re not actually amped about this decision (or had the choice taken from you), look on the bright side: it’s (likely) cheaper, you’ll actually get to know the city you’ve been living in and no one will ever declare a fire drill, come into your house and throw out your candles.

FEATURES 2/26/20 12:14am

Housing guide: Legal tips for off-campus students

By Ivanka Perez

With students beginning to search for off-campus housing and anticipating the housing draws at their residential colleges, the Thresher decided to ask a lawyer about common legal rights and concerns that students might face when moving off campus. We spoke with Rick McElvaney, former clinical associate professor at the University of Houston Law Center, about the legal rights that tenants have.

FEATURES 2/26/20 12:12am

Housing guide: Places to metro to!

By Anna Ta

Memorial Hermann Hospital: This is the stop closest to the South Colleges, across Main Street from Sid Richardson College. A lot of quick food options are available, such as Chipotle, the Halal Guys and the newly-opened Juiceland.

FEATURES 2/26/20 12:11am

Housing guide: A Love Letter to Montrose: A beginner’s guide to the eccentric Houston neighborhood

By Ella Feldman

I have a theory that you could live an entire academic year on campus without having to leave once. Think about it. Every single meal is provided, and the options for food outside of the serveries are numerous: 4.Tac0, The Hoot, bites from Coffeehouse and Willy’s Pub, snacks at the campus store. Even boba cravings can be satisfied on campus. We have a gym, laundry services, kitchens, clothing swaps, concerts, sporting events, art galleries, a movie theater and student-run haircutting business. Why leave?

FEATURES 2/26/20 12:04am

Getting out the vote: students prepare for primaries

By Ella Feldman

Next Tuesday, voters across Texas will head to the polls to select party candidates for the presidency and several statewide and local races. They’ll be joined by voters from 13 other states, making March 3 this election year’s Super Tuesday. However, not a single one of those voters will be headed to the Rice Memorial Center, much to the dismay of leaders of political organizations on campus.

NEWS 2/25/20 11:50pm

College elections plagued by errors and violations

By Kavya Sahni

Spring elections at the residential colleges came with a myriad of problems this year, following the implementation of OwlNest voting at some colleges. Tabulation errors of ranked-choice voting by OwlNest have pushed Will Rice College’s secretary race to the its college’s court. Although Jones College continued with Qualtrics, similar problems have led to a re-election for the positions of internal vice president and treasurer.

NEWS 2/25/20 11:48pm

On-campus primary polling location moved off campus

By Rishab Ramapriyan

Student groups are expressing concerns over the lack of an on-campus polling location for the upcoming March 3 primary election. These concerns follow a decision by county party officials to not hold a polling location at Rice due to accessibility concerns for non-Rice voters.

NEWS 2/25/20 11:46pm

Gorman approves funding for free menstrual products in bathrooms

By Alina Zhu

Dean of Undergraduates Bridget Gorman approved university funding for the installation of dispensers of free pads and tampons in residential college bathrooms and major academic buildings on Feb. 20.

NEWS 2/25/20 11:45pm

3 Years of SA In Review: Onwenu, Engles and Wickerson speak on progress, achievements

By Brian Lin

The end of the Student Association election season on Tuesday marked a new term for the SA. We asked the last three presidents to speak, in their own words, on the most prominent SA accomplishments from the past three years. In the administrations of former SA presidents Justin Onwenu, Ariana Engles and Grace Wickerson, the SA’s achievements span the creation of the Rice Harvey Action Team to the formation of the Financial Accessibility Working Group.

NEWS 2/25/20 11:43pm

Senate passes revised resolution in support of CBA between Rice Management and City of Houston

By Rynd Morgan

After several weeks of deliberation and significant changes to the language of the resolution, the Student Association Senate passed Senate Resolution 8 on Monday, Feb. 17, to recommend a community benefits agreement process for the Innovation District project.

NEWS 2/25/20 11:41pm

Former Rice football player pleads guilty in connection to Blain Padgett’s death

By Savannah Kuchar

Ex-Rice football player Stuart Mouchantaf pleaded guilty to two federal charges: conspiracy to possess with the intent to distribute, causing death and possession with the intent to distribute, causing death, at a hearing last Thursday. Mouchantaf is accused of causing the March 2018 death of his teammate Blain Padgett from an overdose of the synthetic opioid carfentanil.

FEATURES 2/25/20 10:48pm

From admirers to friends: Students discuss African & African American Studies steering committee

By Ivanka Perez

Taylor Crain and Zubaidat Agboola have known each other for a while. They’ve run into each other at Rice African Student Association and Black Student Association meetings and even took a religion and hip-hop class together. But it wasn’t until the two were selected as student members of the African and African American Studies Steering Committee that they really got to know each other.

A&E 2/25/20 10:05pm

Review: King Krule welcomes darkness, gets comfortable with chaos on “Man Alive!”

By Lia Pikus

If you ever a) were an angsty teen or b) hung out around other angsty teens, there’s a good chance at some point you’ve head-bobbed contemplatively as you pretended to understand one of King Krule’s cryptic lyrics. Since his ascension to his throne with his 2013 album “6 Feet Beneath The Moon,” 25-year-old Archy Marshall (aka King Krule) has reigned with a silver tongue and an enigmatic fist — as a counter-cultural figure he’s been largely reclusive, but as a lyricist, he’s one of the generation’s best.

A&E 2/25/20 10:02pm

Touchable Gods: Winningham photography exhibit resurrects Houston’s ringleaders

By Katelyn Landry

In a city as sprawling and teeming with life as Houston, crowds have an energy, a vitality and a gravity of their own. Photography professor Geoff Winningham (Baker College ’65) knows this. He’s known this since 1971, when the young photographer found himself caught in the gravitational pull of the Houston Coliseum.

A&E 2/25/20 10:01pm

Kameelah Rasheed’s “perhaps, there is no sequel” invites us to consider futurity

By Sanvitti Sahdev

Four bright yellow billboards materialized in the center of campus last week. Located in the west lawn next to Brochstein Pavilion, the first of them spells out a startling message in delicate black script: “a committee made an announcement: a better future awaits us.”

SPORTS 2/25/20 9:59pm

Owls seek first place finish against long-time rivals

By Spencer Moffat

In each of the past five years, Rice swimming has lost the Conference USA first place title to Florida International University. This week, they hope to break this streak at the conference championships, hosted in Atlanta.

A&E 2/25/20 9:57pm

New Menil exhibition creates dialogues between past, present surrealist works

By Moses Glickman

The Menil Collection’s “Photography and the Surreal Imagination” is a work of profound audacity, and is better for it. The exhibition, held in a single, large room bisected by a central wall, sets out to form a retrospective of surreal photography over a time period spanning from 1920 to today. The result is cramped and creative, displayed in a manner that seeks to draw big-picture linkages between eras and holds only lightly to chronology.

SPORTS 2/25/20 9:56pm

After slow start, baseball hopes for a turnaround

By Daniel Schrager

Some players might not be old enough to remember it, but when the Rice baseball team faces Missouri State University for a three-game series this weekend, it will serve as a rematch of the first game in the 2003 College World Series. For Rice, that game — an Owls win — sparked a run that culminated in the first and only College World Series title in program history. For Missouri State, that game represented the closest that the Bears have ever been to a College World Series title.