Ride sharing is a convenient option for students who do not have a car but need to travel. Taxis are often more expensive, less clean, and, in the Capital District, unreliable. Uber and Lyft are two of the most well-known ridesharing companies and they seem to be everywhere these days. However, there is one glaring gap in their coverage: Upstate New York. Read more...

Five capital district schools raced at the opening meet for the Engineers' 2016 season last Thursday, hosted by Siena College. Heading the men's team in the 5670 meter race were senior Ben Fazio and sophomore Grant O'Connor, who crossed the finish line together in third and fourth place with times of 18:28. Overall, the men captured first at the meet, while senior team co-captain Mary West led the women's team to a second place finish. Placing 11th in the 4000 meter race, she ran the course in 15:20. Read more...

This past week marked the beginning of a couple of significant annual events on the Rensselaer calendar. On September 6, Hockey Line started. For the next week, student teams will stay in line outside the Rensselaer Union, in pursuit of the first opportunity to buy hockey season tickets. A tradition that’s decades old, Hockey Line was born out of an organic line inside the Union, where season tickets were originally sold. It has since been moved outside on the Union patio and formalized. Even if you don’t think you’re interested in getting season tickets or don’t think hockey is your thing, you should still go and check out Hockey Line. There are cool activities going on with the event, including movie screenings, free food, and much more. Hockey Line finishes at 8 pm on September 12, when the students in the line will march up to the Houston Field House. There will be open skate on the ice that night, along with opportunities to meet the men’s and women’s hockey teams, and a few other things that night, so you should definitely drop by. My personal suggestion would be to buy tickets with the Red Army, our student section, who always get a pretty good spot in line and help plan out Hockey Line. Read more...

As the academic year begins to ramp up, many students find themselves at a loss as to how to properly organize their assignments, chores, appointments, and other obligations. Academic planners and agendas seem to serve some well, but can be cumbersome and leave out tasks without specific due dates. For others, to-do lists are the way to go, but they often fall short as people tend to overestimate or underestimate the amount of work they are capable of in a single day. Luckily, information technology has attempted to fix these shortcomings. At the moment, there are thousands of productivity, to-do, and calendar apps on the market. But how does a student go about picking the right app for them? Although it depends on the person for many, Wunderlist may be exactly what they are looking for. Read more...

Opening their seasons with a game lasting 110 minutes, the Rensselaer Engineers and the Sage College Gators men's soccer teams ultimately surrendered to each other in a draw after the 1-1 tie could not be broken in two ten minute periods of overtime. Read more...

Hello again RPI! I hope everyone had a great first week of classes and a good start to the school year. The Activities Fair last Thursday was an outstanding success with over 200 clubs from across campus present. With the help of all of our club officers we also managed to stay below the occupancy limit for the duration of the fair. Read more...

September 5–11 is National Suicide Prevention Week. This seems like a good time to share factual information about suicide, as well as discussing how each of us can recognize when someone is at risk for suicide, and become familiar with the best ways to react to someone at risk. We will also touch on the ways the suicide of someone we know, particularly someone we are close to, can affect us. Read more...

The Class of 2020 made its way to the East Campus Athletic Village Gymnasium for Convocation on Sunday, August 29. Read more...

In a previous notebook, I mentioned that the 2015–2016 community theme, resilience, wasn’t so bad. After reading what I wrote, Jack Wellhofer ’18 told me he’d never heard anyone support it. Administration tend to be biased toward it—for obvious reasons—and students tend to be biased against it. I believe that there’s more to it than a paycheck or spite, so here’s my case. Read more...

Along 15th Street sits the RPI Playhouse, where Players perform several productions a year. This year, the Players welcomed the new freshmen by allowing them to participate in one of three shows: Bad Auditions, SUPERHEROES, and Meet the Roomates. Under the guidance of current Players, the freshmen had 48 hours to prepare for a live performance in front of their peers. Students were evenly split between working on the set and acting on stage. Enthusiasm for this Navigating Rensselaer & Beyond experience was overwhelming. Out of the 50 students who have signed up for this event, 47 showed up for the Pancake Breakfast hosted at the Playhouse on Wednesday morning. Not all of their day was fun and games however, as the group had to work hard. Read more...

Grand Marshal Paul Ilori ’17 welcomed the Student Senate back from summer and immediately jumped into business with committee reports. While committees have not yet met, the chairmen of each committee outlined their plans for the year. Read more...

All of my life, I’ve been told that I always need a plan B, a backup plan, for almost everything I do. As I progressed through my first year of college, what became increasingly evident is that most of the time, I won’t have my life completely together, and I won’t have backup plans for the important things, and that’s okay. Read more...

The armory was hot on the August day that various activities were taking place around campus. Inside, the culture was completely changed, as the bamboo shinai flashed and the feet of students hit paddles instructors held high. The scene was mesmerizing, and watching the activities instilled a sense of curiosity. The Navigating Rensselaer & Beyond event exploring the martial arts consisted of three different forms: taekwondo, kendo, and kung fu, all great sources of exercise here on campus. Read more...

Located in the underground tunnels of the Darrin Communications Center is the the hub of WRPI, Rensselaer’s own exclusive radio station. It includes everything from a 20,000-plus collection of vintage vinyl records, to broadcasting booths and soundboards, to stickers stuck haphazardly on the wall—the “hippest” subterranean hangout for the station’s staff of about 20 students. Read more...

“Troy is really where the iron and steel industry started in America,” says a volunteer model railroad curator to a group of incoming freshmen. The freshmen are part of the RPI Traditions tour group, a Navigating Rensselaer & Beyond event that exposes the students to RPI and Troy’s rich history. “For years, Troy was the fourth richest city in New York and the 16th richest in the country,” the volunteer continues. When asked what his favorite part of the model is Bud replied that he has no one favorite part, but rather enjoys how much it reminds him of his days at RPI back in the early 1960s. Read more...

It is so great to see our campus alive with activity. To all our returning Rensselaer students, welcome back. And to our new students, we give you a special welcome as you begin the first week of your new academic journey. We are glad you are here and part of the Rensselaer family! Read more...

Navigating Rensselaer & Beyond may seem all fun and games, but A Day in the Life of an EMT is deadly serious. Hosted by RPI’s own EMT-B volunteers, A Day in the Life of an EMT is an exhibit showcasing the techniques EMTs learn and apply to assist those in need. Student ambulance operators teach incoming freshmen the vital skills an EMT should know, such as how to take blood pressure, control bleeding, use a stretcher, respond to mock calls, perform CPR, and of course, take vitals. Incoming students are taught these skills by being tasked with things like removing bloodied, or in this case, syruped gloves—gloves which were covered in maple syrup in order to teach the students the proper hygienic techniques—and by strapping injured patients to a board for transport, which is referred to as “backboarding.” No wonder Commons Dining Hall ran out of syrup at breakfast! Read more...

In light of the new school year, Rensselaer has appointed a new Associate Dean of the Greek Life Commons. Meredith Bielaska joined the Rensselaer community this fall after the position sat vacant for nearly a year. The previous Greek Dean, Rafael Matos, was removed from his position for unclear reasons after serving only six weeks at RPI. Read more...

I’ll begin with the same phrase you’ll probably hear 200 times over the next few weeks: welcome to Rensselaer! I am Paul Ilori ’17, the 151st Grand Marshal and wearer of headwear that was more fashionable when the Class of 1917 were seniors. The position was created in 1866 to honor Albert Harper, a student from Pittsburgh, PA who returned to graduate after fighting in the Civil War. Over the past century and a half, the role has transformed and has undertaken different roles and symbols. Currently, as GM, I serve as the presiding officer of the Student Senate and an officer of the Rensselaer Union, one of few truly student-run student unions in the United States. Our Union gives us the opportunity to explore ourselves outside the classroom and allows students to explore a wide range of interests, along with providing us with a direct voice in decisions made at RPI as a whole. Our school holds a unique place in history as the oldest technical university in the English-speaking world. But with all the information you’re having thrown at you right now, that’s enough history. Read more...