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NEWS 8/20/09 7:00pm

Rice ranks top in quality

By Cindy Dinh

We're number one! As detailed in the Princeton Review's new The Best 371 Colleges, Rice ranked at the top in the "best quality of life" category. The rankings were based on a survey of 122,000 students attending the 371 colleges featured in the book. The quality of life ranking was an aggregate of students' assessment of food on- and off-campus, dorm life comfort, campus beauty, ease of getting around campus, relationship with the local community, safety on campus and the surrounding area, interaction between students, friendliness and happiness of students and how smoothly the administration is run.

NEWS 8/20/09 7:00pm

Inside the New Colleges

By Josh Rutenberg

// Not only did they open at the same time, but McMurtry College and Duncan College share many of the same measurements and features. Both measure 125,700 square feet, for a total of 281,200 square feet, including the joint-servery. Each features five floors and 324 beds, split among 150 singles and 87 doubles. While the bottom four floors of each college have an internal hallway, the fifth floor is characterized by a single-width hallway with a terrace. The new colleges also have their own servery, complete with private dining rooms and libraries.

NEWS 8/20/09 7:00pm

Surveying the summer's silver screen selections

By Jackie Ammons

Call me sentimental, but watching a movie in the theater is an emotional experience for me. The larger-than-life screen, the booming sounds and the novelty of watching a film for the first time is a thrill that seems new and exciting each time I go to the theater.This summer was no exception. It seemed that each movie I watched over the last couple months had some kind of personal connection to me, either because of the screening location or the individuals with whom I saw the films.

NEWS 8/20/09 7:00pm

Parking deal evidence of Rice's generosity

By Staff Editorial

The deal Rice and H-E-B have crafted, allowing H-E-B employees to park for free on West Lot, may seem strange at first glance (see story, page 4). Rice seems to be reaping no benefit out of the agreement - had the university installed an H-E-B olive bar in the Rice Memorial Center, the deal may seem more even-handed.One day, Rice may see a return on this display of kindness. But if that day never comes, we won't mind. The area where H-E-B employees park are often empty, and never full, thus negating any impact the H-E-B employees may produce. Rice is simply helping a neighborhood business, during a time in which economic times are harsh all around. Any little bit can help, and Rice's generosity should be commended.

NEWS 8/20/09 7:00pm

Comp exam results remain steady despite class growth

By Jocelyn Wright

Even though the size of the freshman class increased substantially, the percent of students passing the composition exam remained at 71 percent, indicating both the reliability of the exam and the consistent strength of the incoming class, Program for Communications Excellence Director Deborah Barrett said.Although the percent of international freshmen increased by 67 percent this year, Barrett said this did not make any difference in the exam results, a trend consistent with last year.

NEWS 8/20/09 7:00pm

Reli professor leaves legacy of compassion

By Sarah Rutledge

Edith Wyschogrod, a former religious studies professor, died July 16. She was 79.Wyschogrod, a native New Yorker, started her career teaching philosophy at Queens College of City University of New York. She advanced from lecturer to a permanent member of their faculty and, in 1967, to chair of the department. She held this position until 1992, when she joined the Rice Religious Studies Department.

NEWS 8/20/09 7:00pm

Rayzor Hall welcomes Spanish Resource Center

By Jocelyn Wright

The new Spanish Resource Center, which opened this summer, will offer students an opportunity to learn about Spanish language and culture through an extensive reference database and educational activities, hosted in conjunction with the Department of Hispanic Studies, Spanish Resource Center Director Miguel Hernáiz said. Funded by the Ministry of Education of Spain and located in Rayzor Hall 321, the center is free and will be open on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. to students, faculty, staff and the Texas community, Hernáiz said.

NEWS 8/20/09 7:00pm

Rice Soccer 2009

By Yan Digilov

The injury bug happens to every team eventually. But for the women's soccer team, its presence has become all too infuriatingly commonplace. After graduating only one permanent starter from last year's roster, the 2009 women's soccer team features many familiar faces on the pitch, but if the coming campaign is to be remembered as a success the team will almost certainly have to keep away from the familiar bite of the injury bug.

NEWS 8/20/09 7:00pm

Rice offers West Lot spaces to aid H-E-B employees

By Sarah Rutledge

In an unconventional venture beyond the hedges, Rice is hoping to have established a beneficial relationship with a local business by appealing to their pocketbooks. The employees from a recently-opened H-E-B Grocery Store, located on Buffalo Speedway and South Blvd., have been parking in West Lot free of charge since the beginning of the month, and will continue to park there until next Monday, Aug. 31.The employees are parking in West Lot 5, the lot adjacent to the police station and post office, off University Blvd. Parking Manager Mike Morgan estimated that the H-E-B employees use 50 to 100 parking spaces at any given time. He said since the lot normally has 180 spaces and is infrequently used, parkers should not be impacted by the spaces temporarily in use.

NEWS 8/20/09 7:00pm

Sports Notebook: Rosa reaches NCAA semifinals

 

When junior Bruno Rosa began play in last May's NCAA Men's Tennis Singles Championship, it had been nearly forty years since Rice had produced a back-to-back All-American. But after running his way to the final 16, Rosa replaced Mike Estep (Will Rice '71), an All-American from 1969-71, as the last Owl to earn such honors.Having already led his team into the NCAA Tournament, Rosa joined then-senior Christoph Müller in the singles competition. While Müller fell in the first round to the University of Virginia's Sanam Singh, Rosa pushed past No. 8 Robert Farah of the University of Southern California, which was coming off of winning the national championship, in straight sets.

NEWS 8/20/09 7:00pm

Collapse of print journalism not completely irreversible

By Casey Michel

I saw the implosion from the inside out. The collapse of journalism, the creaking and crumbling and crashing of an industry that keeps politicians to task and athletes in the glare. I saw the faces behind it, the dinosaurs who were too slow or too unaware to update the business model when they could.I was in the middle of it this summer, in the New York magazine district, gleaning the lessons learnt from the movers of the publishing world. They admitted their failings. They told me what to expect in the immediate future. They made sure that my job prospects were grounded in reality, stuck in the mud of the recession and the layoffs.

NEWS 8/20/09 7:00pm

Students opt for historic housing at old Will Rice

By Jocelyn Wright

Historic Will Rice opened up this year to ensure that all incoming first-year students have beds on campus, and it will provide temporary on-campus housing to about 75 continuing and transfer students, Dean of Undergraduates Robin Forman said. Although Will Rice College and Baker College will be under construction this year, the 1912 wing of Will Rice is not being renovated, and will stay open this year to house these students. Currently, Historic Will Rice does not have any of the traditional support systems of a residential college, such as masters or a chief justice, and all residents will remain affiliated with their residential colleges, although Forman said support systems similar to chief justices and student maintenance representatives might be added in the coming weeks.

NEWS 8/20/09 7:00pm

District 9 is out of this world

By Joe Dwyer

Aliens. Guns. Exploding heads. All can be found in District 9, and all are among the many reasons that you should spend your last day of Orientation Week at this flick.Born from the ashes of director Neill Blomkamp and producer Peter Jackson's aborted Halo movie, District 9 is a fictional documentary of peculiarly unique proportions. In 1990, 20 years prior to the events in the film, a large alien ship drifted over the city of Johannesburg, South Africa. However, none of the expected invasion, exploration or Signs-inspired raiding occurred. Instead, the ship simply ... parked. Not knowing who was on board or what the ship's plans were, humans cut their way into the behemoth and discovered it contained thousands of severely ill and malnourished alien workers. With no other option than to help them, District 9, a grimy Soweto-inspired slum, was set up outside the city to house the refugee alien population.

NEWS 8/20/09 7:00pm

Minibus system can aid mass transit

By David Splinter

Standing on a street corner near the Pacific Ocean in Lima, Peru, I asked someone which bus could take me downtown. He pointed to a small 10-seater van pulling up behind us. A few of these minibuses would pass every minute and cost about a quarter.I'd seen them before, but never in such a system. And after using them to ride to and fro, I can honestly say that if there were minibuses in Houston and I had to wait less than a minute for one, I would probably sell my car.

NEWS 8/20/09 7:00pm

Print version of GA ensures integrity

By Erin Doctor

Today, I am going to justify killing trees.The Rice University General Announcements that I received on the first day of Orientation Week three years ago still sits on my bookshelf, right between an unopened differential equations textbook and The Elements of Typographic Style. I don't consult it very often, but until the day I graduate from Rice that General Announcements book is not going anywhere.

NEWS 8/20/09 7:00pm

Paper Heart ultimately charming, yet flimsy

By Brian Reinhart

In the first scene of the new mockumentary Paper Heart, Michael Cera (Juno), who plays himself, asks the director if the movie is "a quirky comedy, a romantic comedy." The director answers that it is. "Perfect," Cera says. "That's just what America needs."Of course, Paper Heart is not a necessary movie, or even an important one. But it is charming, funny and heartfelt nonetheless, cheerfully embracing its own insignificance and daring to break away from the clichés and celebrate young love between misfits.

NEWS 8/20/09 7:00pm

Finding their identities

By Josh Rutenberg

As the newest additions to the residential college system since Martel College in 2002, Duncan College and McMurtry College have already begun forming their own unique cultures and traditions. While the question of how to integrate the new colleges has long been in the works, Dean of Undergraduates Robin Forman and others working on the transition are confident that the colleges will be able to find their own identities. "On move-in day, McMurtry and Duncan won't have independent governing bodies," Forman said. "It will take them some time to develop a sense of what it means to be a residential college."

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