Eliza Jasani

NEWS 4/12/22 11:02pm

Rice debate places fifth, speech places twelfth at national competitions

By Eliza Jasani

Rice University’s speech and debate teams won several awards for their 2021-2022 competition season. Debate team members Jacob Tate and Maximus Renteria won the team its second national championship in the National Parliamentary Debate Association 2022 Championship tournament, and the team placed No. 5 in the overall season sweepstakes, according to David Worth, the director of the George R. Brown Forensics Society. The speech team placed twelfth in the overall season sweepstakes category at the American Forensic Association National Speech tournament.

FEATURES 4/5/22 11:32pm

Rice Children’s Campus: a home for young Owls

By Eliza Jasani

Every weekday at 7 a.m., the youngest Rice students wake up and head to school. Rice has many programs of study, but this one is not quite as well known as the others. The Rice Children’s Campus, sitting just west of campus between Rice Village and Rice Stadium, serves as a daycare and early learning center for the children of Rice faculty, staff and students. 

FEATURES 1/25/22 11:24pm

Senior Spotlight: Cynthia Chen talks making the most of an unexpected college experience

By Eliza Jasani

Martel College senior Cynthia Chen grew up envisioning the quintessential college life portrayed in movies and books. Having taken a semester off during her sophomore year and having spent so much time learning from home due to the pandemic, Chen said she almost felt robbed of this experience. But she has learned to accept that her college experience is turning out differently from what she originally expected.

FEATURES 11/9/21 11:30pm

Alumna Shannon Walker takes Rice mementos to the International Space Station

By Eliza Jasani

Edgar Odell Lovett’s eyeglasses, a stuffed animal, the crests of Rice’s 11 residential colleges and the logo of the Marching Owl Band were all among the objects that NASA astronaut Shannon Walker, Baker College ’87, MS ’92, Ph.D. ’93, brought to space aboard the first fully operational, crewed, commercial spaceflight in history. Walker visited campus on Oct. 12 to commemorate Rice Day, the day Rice University was formally opened in 1912. In an in-person talk, she discussed her recent trip to the International Space Station on the SpaceX CrewOne mission and returned the objects to campus organizations.

FEATURES 10/26/21 10:52pm

Pumpkin Grades: Discussing the Class of 2025’s unique transition to college

By Eliza Jasani

When October comes around, students start walking around campus wearing cozy sweaters and holding hot lattes from Rice Coffeehouse. As the cold approaches, something changes within the freshman class as well: talk of midterm exams, projects and pumpkin grades begin. About midway through the fall semester each year, instructors submit midterm grades — nicknamed “pumpkin grades” because of the season — to let freshmen know how they are performing in their classes.