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GUEST ROOM | Cornell Dining and the Campus Community: A Recipe for Successful Food Waste Reduction
As we approach the end of April, Sustainability Month at Cornell, it’s the perfect moment to reflect on what Cornell is doing — and more importantly, what we all can do — to fight food waste on campus. Cornell Dining has implemented a variety of behind-the-scenes changes that many students and staff might not even realize are happening. These efforts are effective, thoughtful and crucial — but they can’t succeed without broader community participation. Cornell Dining has implemented several back-of-house practices to ensure that food is used efficiently, and waste is minimized. Our team works to forecast demand accurately and refines food procurement, production and inventory to match our needs…
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SEIELSTAD | The Danger of “Live and Let Live”
“Live and let live” sounds like an easy, peaceful answer to a complicated world. At a place like Cornell – where students come from every background, belief system and worldview – it can feel like the most respectful path forward: You do you, I’ll do me. Don’t interfere. Don’t offend. Stay in your lane. But behind that philosophy lies a growing culture of indifference. When carried to its extreme, this kind of tolerance morphs into apathy – one that gives space for misinformation to go unchallenged, and for harmful ideas to fester quietly. It creates a climate where people stop asking questions, stop pushing back and stop caring about what…
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POGGI | Ithaca Is Monopolized
What comes to mind when you think of Ithaca? Is it the famed Moosewood restaurant, cascading gorges or Cornell University overlooking Cayuga Lake? Ithaca’s identity seems rooted in its alternative, hippie culture — hikers at every turn, farmers markets in full swing, arts and crafts fairs and community events like Porchfest drawing crowds. But that image no longer tells the full story. The reality of Ithaca today is an increasingly monopolized city, shaped largely by Cornell University and its surrounding neighborhood, Collegetown. The most obvious monopolies in Ithaca are the landlords. Property giants like Lambrou, O’Connor and PJ dominate the apartment and housing markets, owning a huge portion of properties…
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How the Money Moves: Funding a New Headliner Two Weeks Before Slope Day
After President Michael Kotlikoff rescinded Kehlani’s invitation as Slope Day headliner two weeks before the concert, the administration is now seeking to find and fund a new headliner, according to the email announcement. Kotlikoff’s announcement to remove the slope day headliner follows student and parent dissatisfaction regarding Kehlani’s anti-Israel rhetoric on social media. In a meeting with concerned students on Tuesday about Slope Day before the announcement, Kotlikoff was asked about whether or not the University would consider changing headlining artists. To this, he noted the “practical issue” with selecting another artist — the lack of time until Slope Day, which is set to take place on May 7. “We…
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Loyal to One: How a Single Playlist Became a Timeline
759 songs, 51 hours and 41 minutes. That is the current length of “Hazel’s Playlist,” the one and only playlist that I use. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve tried to be one of those people who makes cute playlists for studying, partying or their favorites of a specific genre. I really tried, but I always found myself coming back to this one. From the end of 2019 to today, I’ve added every song I enjoy to that playlist. The top being the oldest songs and the bottom the recents, I listen to chunks of the playlist in order on repeat. Eventually, I came to know the song order so intimately…
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Kotlikoff Joins More Than 230 Higher Education Leaders in Signing Letter Against Trump’s ‘Political Interference’
President Michael Kotlikoff signed a statement condemning the federal government’s political interference in universities as “endangering American higher education” this week. The letter, published by the American Association of Colleges and Universities, was signed by 238 higher education leaders — including all Ivy League presidents except Dartmouth College. In the letter, Kotlikoff and other signatories call for “constructive engagement” between higher education institutions and the federal government, urging the government to halt actions threatening academic freedom, research and the security of international students. “We are open to constructive reform and do not oppose legitimate government oversight,” the letter reads. “However, we must oppose undue government intrusion in the lives of…
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What Was Said at Kotlikoff’s ‘Conversation With Students’ that Preceded the Kehlani Announcement
The day before President Michael Kotlikoff rescinded Slope Day headliner Kehlani’s invite to perform, top administrators promoted an event to several pro-Israel and historically Jewish Greek Life organizations to meet with concerned students. At the meeting, administrators discussed potential options for the concert, protocols for political activity at Slope Day and student reactions to the controversial headliner. R&B singer Kehlani was set to perform at Slope Day, the annual campus-sponsored concert on Libe Slope following the last day of classes. On Wednesday morning, Kotlikoff announced that he rescinded the artist’s invite in an email to the campus community. When Kehlani was first named as headliner, dissatisfaction surfaced as students and…
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Golf Cards Another Season Best at Roar-EE Invitational
The theme of the weekend was improvement. “I’m starting to get my swing back; I’m starting to get my feel back,” said senior Jackson Debusschere. After a Saturday outing at the Roar-EE Invitational affected by winds from a storm cell in the second round, men’s golf still managed to finish seventh out of 10 teams, with the highest performances led by junior Weston Warden (72-75) and sophomore Tyler Debusschere (76-72). “We showed this week that we could consistently go out there, and everyone can put a round together and contribute to the team score, which is massive,” Jackson Debusschere said. “The Ivy League has gotten a whole lot more competitive…
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BADAWI | Watch the Throne
It is written that, at the festival of Lupercalia, the consul Mark Antony offered Julius Caesar a laurel-wreathed diadem. The gesture was met with slow, scattered applause. But when Caesar brushed the crown aside, the crowd erupted in cheers. Antony brought it forward again, and when Caesar refused it once more, the forum roared with greater acclamation. The irony is that, even as Caesar refused the crown, he did so from a golden throne, dressed in a triumphal robe. Staged or not, the event was intrinsically performative; at the time, Caesar was a king in all but name. Just days earlier, he had proclaimed himself dictator perpetuo —dictator for life…
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Is It Not Cool To Care Anymore?
When anticipating the release of her album Perverts, musician Ethel Cain took to Tumblr to lament about how fans interact with her art: “I feel like no matter what I make or what I do, it will always get turned into a joke. It’s genuinely so embarrassing.” Cain labels this phenomenon an “irony epidemic,” and claims that we’ve entered an age where no one responds to work with a serious gaze. This drought of sincerity has seemingly crept its way into every facet of modern art, a cultural response indicating that the consumer has no interest in taking work seriously. In Hollywood, franchises approach their fantastical universes with tongue in…