This Monday, President Shirley Ann Jackson attended a Student Senate meeting. Many concerned students did a great job bringing up issues that are currently plaguing the campus; well thought out questions were asked, and Jackson did a good job responding to all of the concerns. Read more...

A recently published book by Emma Marris, The Rambunctious Garden, sheds light on the environmental issues of ecosystem management and species preservation at a point in which concerns over global warming are daunting to those of us who are particularly concerned with these issues. Read more...

On Thursday, November 3, the Rensselaer Center for Biotechnology and Interdisciplinary Studies had its second Public Interest Forum. The topic of this forum was “Understanding Alzheimer’s Disease.” The Director of Biotech, Jonathan Dordick, announced the purpose of these forums was to inform and inspire professors of other disciplines, undergraduates, and curious learners both in and out of the institution to some critical topics being worked on at the Biotech center presently. Dordick asserted, “Research at the Biotech [is] helping to move from randomness to something more concrete. He then briefly introduced the three speakers: Chunyu Wang, Wilfredo Colon, and Peter Tessier and told the audience that the talks today will help explain Alzheimer’s disease on the molecular or protein level. After all, the cause of many diseases is the result of proteins that act abnormally, causing neural function to decrease. Read more...

A year ago, RPI enacted a policy that limits the number of transferable Advanced Placement credits to 32. As a graduating senior at Rensselaer, I believe that this policy undermines the efforts of hardworking potential students, limits their ability to take specialized classes, and forces them to pay more tuition dollars to retake the same introductory classes. Read more...

The Rum Diary is the tale of a young Hunter S. Thompson played by none other than Thompson’s personal friend, Johnny Depp. In theory, it seems like a decent tale. Hunter S. Thompson, widely known to be one of the most high people to have existed ever, is bound to have an interesting life, right? In practice, the movie ends up feeling like a cross between many of Depp’s other roles. This definitely brings the movie down a peg, which is sad. Read more...

The new mayor of Troy, N.Y. is Lou Rosamilia, who was elected with a landslide 55 percent of the vote, according to the preliminary count. Rosamilia was the Democratic candidate for this municipal election, who beat out Republican opponent Carmella Mantello for the mayor’s spot. Rosamilia took the Democratic nomination when his predecessor Clem Campana dropped out of the race, citing attacks against him over his father’s ability to live in a Troy housing authority apartment and over the ongoing absentee ballot fraud investigation. Read more...

Monday night, the Student Senate had the honor of hosting President Shirley Ann Jackson and other members of Rensselaer’s leadership during the President’s annual address to the Student Senate. While it’s not unusual for a few non-senators to attend a Student Senate meeting, this week the room was packed, as dozens of students came to hear Jackson’s address. The meeting, as usual, was divided into two components: the presentation and the Q&A session. I’m not going to give a summary of either in this article, as I’m sure The Poly will have a story about this event elsewhere in the paper; instead, I’m going to discuss trends that I saw yesterday and how we, as a student body, can best move forward from this discussion. Read more...

What defines a human life? We are given the gift of life, but when do we truly receive it? A mother gives life to her child, but when does this transaction occur? When do we first realize that we are indeed alive—human beings capable of thinking and experiencing the world? Read more...

Just a few months removed from a berth in the NCAA Tournament in March, RPI’s men’s hockey team is off to its worst start in program history. The Engineers have only posted one win through nine games this season, including this past weekend’s ECAC opener. Rensselaer fell in a 4-1 decision to the Clarkson Golden Knights on Friday and followed with a 2-0 shutout loss to the St. Lawrence University Saints on Saturday. RPI is now 1-8-0 overall with a 0-2-0 ECAC record, while Clarkson improved to 6-2-2 overall and St. Lawrence is 1-5-0 on the year. Those two teams each have a 1-1 conference record. Read more...

This week I’d like to showcase a new member of the Union’s team, Managing Director of the Rensselaer Union Joe Cassidy. Cassidy has been working at his new job for a little over two weeks, and I took the opportunity to sit down with him and discuss what drew him to Rensselaer, how he’s been adjusting the job, and his plans for the future. The first thing I’d like to review before I go into details is what the director of the Union is actually responsible for. Read more...

The enthusiasm and excitement for NFL football that was dampened by a potentially never-ending lockout has finally returned in the form of a season with everything. There have been dominant teams and players, surprising upsets and complete blowouts, and just about anything else a football fan could dream of. So let’s recap the first half of the season with the best and the worst. Read more...

Proctor’s Theatre, located at 82 4th St. in downtown Troy, is the only remaining movie palace in Troy. A seemingly abandoned landmark at the edge of RPI’s campus, Proctor’s Theatre is soon to be restored and used to further the revitalization of downtown Troy. Read more...

This Sunday will mark the final excursion of the RPI Relief group to the Poestenkill, Prattsville, Greene, and Schoharie County areas in order to help clean up and restore the areas after Hurricane Irene. Formed by the Student Senate’s Advocacy, Community, and Advancement Committee, in partnership with the Dean of Students Office, RPI Relief has spent the past few months removing debris from rivers and tearing down hurricane-soaked homes in order to restore some of the hardest-hit towns. Read more...

The nightlife in Troy was greatly improved Friday as The Swing Syndicate, a swing dancing studio run by RPI students Orian Breaux ’12 and Emily McNeight ’14, held its grand opening. With swing lessons offered from 5-8 pm and open dancing starting afterward, the night was a great success. Swing (and dancing in general) isn’t really my thing, but I thoroughly enjoyed the celebration. Swing music is seriously fun to listen to and made me want to jump on my feet and flail around with everyone else even though I had no idea how to dance. I did end up learning a small bit; a very nice SUNY Albany grad student showed me the basics. Read more...

RPI women’s hockey opened league play this past weekend with two of its tougher opponents on the schedule—Quinnipiac University and Princeton University. The Engineers put up a valiant fight in both contests, but could only muster one point over the two-day span. The Quinnipiac Bobcats came out on top in a 2-0 shutout on Friday afternoon, while the next day saw Rensselaer and the Princeton Tigers skate to a 1-1 draw. RPI is now 2-5-3 overall with a 0-1-1 ECAC mark, while Quinnipiac improves to 3-5-0 overall and 2-0-0 in league play. Princeton maintains a 2-1-1 overall record and is 1-0-1 within conference play. Read more...

As part of a push to get RPI students engaged in Troy affairs, the Student Senate’s Advocacy, Community, and Advancement Committee sponsored a Candidates’ Forum last Wednesday in Mother’s to allow RPI students a chance to engage with the community members running for local elections and bring forward their concerns. Read more...

I enjoyed the Troy Candidates’ Forum last Wednesday. It was interesting to hear them describe what Troy was like and what it could become. Speaking about our school, presumably to an audience from RPI, many of the candidates were very candid about making statements like “We need to take advantage of RPI’s wealth,” or “Maybe RPI can help us with funding.” They talked about being from Troy, how college students could support Troy’s economy, and emphasized that the city’s much safer than it seems. It made me wonder if they said the same things to the women at Russell Sage College, or the commuting students at Hudson Valley Community College. Read more...

Thursday, the Rensselaer Union-funded Speaker’s Forum hosted a talk by Jeopardy! celebrity Ken Jennings. In 2004, Jennings set the record for most consecutive Jeopardy! wins in a row: 74. From his appearances on Jeopardy!, 1 vs. 100, Grand Slam, and Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader?, he also holds the all-time record for the most money won on American game shows: a grand total of $3,773,414.29. Last February, Jennings returned to the Jeopardy! stage for the IBM Challenge to face off against the language-processing computer Watson. The computer won, but Jennings still beat the other human competitor, Brad Rutter. Read more...

On Sunday, Rensselaer’s EcoEd Research Group, along with the Photography Club, held a workshop entitled Sustainable Photography: Thinking Through the Lens to promote awareness of environmental concepts and issues. Their overarching goal was to educate children in the area of environmental sustainability while integrating it with activities likely to entertain them. They would then be able to determine the viability of conducting similar projects in the future. Read more...