Pragati Pant

I did not realize that my classes on March 6 were the last I would ever experience on campus. In a matter of a few days, I lost the remainder of my last semester at Rensselaer to the novel coronavirus.

It’s been a few days since basketball legend Kobe Bryant died in a helicopter crash and I am still having trouble processing it.

The Indian Students Association’s Diwali show on Saturday proved to be a fun night of laughs, performances, and delicious food. The Bollywood inspired show included a skit from ISA members and performances from RPI Bhangra, RPI Raaga, RPI Rudras, and other club members.

An accessibility assessment application, a wildfire detection device, a disaster evacuation application, and a peer-to-peer service were all developed within a day at the Darrin Communications Center last weekend at HackRPI.

It’s no surprise that one of the most talked about courses on campus is Data Structures. This mostly freshman course provides an excellent, in-depth accumulation of information—ranging from the basics of C++ to memory management within various customizable data structures. I really enjoyed the course and learned a lot about the internal workings of the many data structures I now take for granted while coding.

Over five police vehicles and a SWAT team were seen on campus stopping a vehicle and apprehending multiple people on Tuesday around 9 pm. Near the time of the stop on 15th Street, uniformed officers with guns lined the Darrin Communications Center walkway near Russell Sage Dining Hall, where an arrest took place.

When you were little, crying was natural. If you fell down while running and scraped your knee, you cried. If your parents didn’t let you buy the coolest new toy, you cried. But, somewhere along the road of growing up, you were told crying is weak, that what you’re feeling doesn’t matter, and that you should just deal with it.

September 15 marked the beginning of Latinx Heritage Month, which recognizes the importance of Latinx culture and history within the United States. Three student organizations—Alianza Latina, the Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers, and Phi Iota Alpha Fraternity—have events planned throughout the month, and all students are welcome to participate in the festivities.

Out of the many clubs promoting sustainability on campus, Terra Café is definitely the yummiest one. They’ve partnered with Sodexo to bring affordable and alternative dining options every Wednesday. Located in the Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center, Terra Café tries to use local produce as often as they can when making these meals.

I spent this summer interning in New York City. While I loved my internship experience, I learned a lot about myself and the city outside of working hours. This was a new playground for me—one with different swings and slides than the ones I was used; my childhood in New Hampshire nor my college years in upstate New York had prepared me for a bite of the biggest apple.

To start the celebration of Earth week, Design for America held a dinner party in partnership with the Student Sustainability Task Force on Saturday. This event was open to all community members, and yielded about 50 attendees, ranging from RPI students to families with small children.

In early 2017, Coding&&Community was founded on campus by a small group of students. This addition to the Rensselaer community serves to educate local youth about computer programming and problem solving. The goal is to bridge the gap between coding and different roadblocks a student may face, including gender, race, socioeconomic status, and more.