The Poly would like to welcome everyone back to campus for the spring semester. Yet another winter break—we’ve also heard it referred to as “J-term” or the “J-mester”—has passed, and we hope you made the most of your five weeks off. Read more...

The Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center is gearing up for another semester of performances, screenings, exhibitions, and more. Coming up first, The Eternal Return series offers a screening of Alfred Hitchcock’s 1958 classic thriller Vertigo on Thursday, January 26, at 7:30 pm in the EMPAC Theater. Tickets will be priced at $6 each. Starring James Stewart and Kim Novak, Vertigo is based on Boileau-Narcejac’s novel The Living and the Dead, which chronicles the story of a retired San Francisco detective with a crippling fear of heights who tracks the activities of a woman possessed by a spirit from another time. Read more...

After a rough start to the season, the men’s hockey team finally found its groove shortly after the semester break. The Engineers are currently on a two-game winning streak following a 3-0 shutout of Brown University on Friday and a 2-1 toppling of Yale University on Saturday. Prior to last weekend, Rensselaer had only mustered four wins since October, but now sits with a 6-17-1 overall record, including a 3-8-1 conference mark. Read more...

I crave human contact. Well, I don’t crave it, but I pretty much collapse without it. The first three weeks of break were spent being overwhelmed with family members at my house, catching up with high school friends, and celebrating my 21st. The last week of winter break was spent wallowing around my house doing absolutely nothing. My friends from home had already moved back to college, my mom was on a two week trip to Italy, and my dad works out of the house all day. So, the majority of that last week was spent with hours of isolation. This may seem like heaven to some; hell, it wasn’t too long ago that I was dying to have a single. But that week was torture. Read more...

Red Tails is a movie depicting one of the most inspiring tales of the entirety of World War II, an event which is already absolutely filled with inspiring tales, the story of the Tuskegee Airmen. Unfortunately, this movie absolutely dishonors that memory as it presents it in the worst way possible, with terrible writing, bad acting, and a storyline as predictable as it is bad. Read more...

RPI men’s and women’s basketball played to jam-packed schedule weeks before most students returned to campus. The men’s team played to a 3-6 record since the start of the new year, while the women’s squad posted a 4-5 mark since late December. Read more...

Welcome back to Rensselaer! I hope that your holidays were relaxing and rejuvenating, leaving you ready for this new semester. Read more...

Zinc-air batteries

Zinc resources are currently 100 times greater than lithium ion; hence a push towards zinc-air batteries would be a smart move. Zinc batteries are already used in hearing aids, but there is no rechargeable version yet. Once a rechargeable zinc-air battery is released in a few years, it can be used in laptops and electric vehicles. Zinc is a good resource as far as sustainability is concerned since it is recyclable, cheap, and has a high energy density. Read more...

Dear Rensselaer Students, 

I hope that you had a restful and fulfilling break. It is time to get back to the academic grind and to reconnect with friends, activities, and projects. I write this week to wish you a happy new academic year and to remind you of our commitment, going forward, to use The Poly as a venue through which to better communicate with students. Read more...

Chester’s Chicken is the newest restaurant venue to grace the Rathskellar with its presence, and it’s not half bad. Their food is quite the welcome addition to the Rathskellar’s repertoire, adding as it does fried chicken in all of its bounteous glory. They offer a standard sort of Kentucky Fried Chicken-style fare, selling chicken tenders, drumsticks, breasts, and the like. Golden fried potatoes and biscuits round out the combos alongside their decent selection of sides—which could be a little bigger but overall is not bad—consisting of potato wedges, baked beans, cole slaw, and mashed potatoes. Read more...

RPI women’s hockey started the new semester on the right foot, splitting the weekend against Ivy League foes Yale University and Brown University. The Engineers came away with a 4-2 victory against the Yale Bulldogs on Friday evening at the Houston Field House, but came up short in a 3-2 loss to the Brown Bears the following afternoon. Rensselaer is now 6-16-4 overall, with a 3-9-2 mark in league play. Read more...

To the Editor:

As a service to our students and their parents, we are advising all students who rent off-campus housing from a company using the name “Campus Habitat” that the continuation of their ability to reside in that residence may be in immediate jeopardy. Read more...

The Rensselaer Union Executive Board has been hard at work. Before the break, the Board met and reviewed budgets for the Mueller Center, Intramural sports, ICA/Varsity Athletics, and the Union Administration. This past Friday and Saturday, the Board returned to campus to review budgets for all Union-funded clubs and anything else remaining. All budgets were released this past Sunday, and appeals will take place this coming Saturday afternoon. Read more...