Selected tweets from #occupyharvard:

grateful for #occupyharvard today. Supporting the occupants in thought, word, and deed.

Harvard is still on lockdown. Told by a guard it’s until protests end. No tourists, no Cantabrigians. #OccupyHarvard

The #OccupyHarvard movement has begun! Will you stand with the Will Huntings against the Zuckerbergs? #WeKnowNothingAboutHarvard

Douchebag alert!!! Harvard student yelling on bullhorn out dorm window: “1%! 1%! Thank you Cambridge Police” ew #OccupyHarvard

#occupyharvard bc 25% of the students get 100% of the prime real estate

Gates to Harvard Yard were locked last night as Occupy protesters erected tents in the heart of campus. (Photo credit: dailycontributor.com.)

“education is a right, not just for the rich and white” #occupyharvard #occupyboston

RT @TheAtlanticWire: Harvard keeps #OccupyHarvard for Harvard students only http://theatln.tc/sM5znI

Though in other ways we may strive to be in a top 1% (of test scores, grades, our fields, etc.) we stand as part of the 99% #occupyharvard

“We must occupy again because Harvard employs the very people who were responsible for the economic meltdown” #occupyharvard

It’s raining, we’re super busy, and supplies are low. We hope #occupyharvard is doing alright. Solidarity.

WE ARE THE FUTURE 1%! #OccupyHarvard

This is great: Harvard Divinity students forming a human shield around Harvard Yard occupiers. #OccupyHarvard

Protester inside yard holding this sign high #occupyboston #occupyharvard http://yfrog.com/nv5ktmej

RT @keithmr81: Group of Harvard janitors w/ SEIU joins student march around campus for #OccupyHarvard - at least 400 ppl here now.

Harvard students opposed to #occupyharvard cursing at us marching. Your future presidents! #sad http://yfrog.com/g0k74gtj

These kids may be book smart but know nothing of real life. #OccupyHarvard

On Bing.com’s homepage:

Happy 375th, Harvard!

If ye who are unluckily still at school have been complaining about the drag that is Cantabrigian winter, The Voice is here to gently remind you that you’re, well, early.

For those of you not up to snuff on your Science Of The Earth knowledge, despite whatever maledictions we’ve been verbalizing toward the weather lately, winter technically starts tomorrow, December 21st, the day of the winter solstice. The solstice marks the day that the sun’s direct angle of insolation hits its farthest south in the Earth’s trajectory around the sun, the 23.5° South latitude, also known as the Tropic of Capricorn. See the following handy visual aids:

As the Earth revolves, its axial tilt of 23.5° points the planet in varying directions vis-à-vis the sun, resulting in different latitudes receiving the greatest intensities of insolation at different times of the year.

On December 21st, the Earth's southern hemisphere is angled toward the sun, such that the Tropic of Capricorn is the recipient of the most direct radiance.

After tomorrow, the direct angle of insolation will venture consistently northward as the Earth revolves, altering the latitudes which will profit from the most intense insolation, hitting the equator on the first day of spring and reaching its farthest north, the 23.5° North latitude line, on June 21st, the beginning of summer. That means we Harvardians at 42° North will bask in the direct rays of the sun’s glow…well, never.

On the literal bright side, however, the winter solstice does mark the shortest day of the year. After tomorrow, the amount of sunlight each day will increase gradually until June, slowly closing the crippling cycle of winter-induced nocturnality for we college students who wake up at 1 p.m. when the sun sets at 4:14.

* EXCLUSIVE account of the Harvard Business School student who was mugged yesterday evening, Saturday Dec 11th, 2010 at approximately 8:30pm. (His name has been retracted to protect his privacy)

From Noice to supposedly-safer-than-New-Haven Cambridge : WTF?

——————————————–

Dear friends,

As many of you have known, I was mugged yesterday evening. Many thanks to those who called or emailed to express your concerns. I really appreciate it. Here’s a more detailed description of the incident. Hopefully this may help you rethink your definition of “safe time” and “safe place”.

I had dinner in Harvard Square by myself and bought some fruits and drinks from 7/11 on my way back to campus (I live in Chase). I have no idea since when I was stalked as there were still many people and cars on the JFK street at 8pm on Saturday. As I was walking along the path outside Hamilton and almost getting to the lawn in front of Baker Library [...], two men quietly approached me from behind and wrestled me down to the ground. As one of them pressed me to the ground and said “give me your money”, the other quickly found and grabbed my wallet from the back pocket of my jeans, and then both of them ran away via the path and then the JFK bridge to Cambridge side. It happened at around 8:20pm and the entire process lasted about 20 seconds. I reported the incident to HBS security located in Aldrich immediately afterwards and filed it with HUPD. My friend’s friend found my empty wallet at the Cambridge side of JFK bridge – all cash and cards were taken.

They didn’t threat me with any weapon or claim to have any. I didn’t get injured at all. I am completely fine, both physically and mentally. I received phone calls from Youngme Moon and Barbara Siegfriedt later, to whom I suggested the school consider installing some security cameras around the boundary of the campus.

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With reading period and finals week rapidly approaching, it’s easy to get lost in the stress of the end of the semester. But here at the Voice, we want to remind everyone that the holiday season is also approaching. It’s the first of December, the beginning of the most wonderful time of the year.

It's not Santa's sleigh, but it brings the cheer

This morning, Cambridge City workers were spotted decking the halls and adorning the Square’s lampposts with greenery and red and gold ribbons. A few strings of lights have already made their way onto the streets and more are undoubtedly to come.

DECORATIONS ROCK

Let’s get festive Harvard! Don’t  get so lost in the finals season that you forget the holiday season. The weather’s getting cold, but it’s time to feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

What a well dressed lamppost

by Lexi Ross ’13

Want to see an innovative, non-convential theater piece created by a recent grad? Then check out The Untitled Project, conceived by Calla Videt ’09 and playing at various locations around Harvard square.

Calla Videt was born in New York City but spent most of her formative years in Singapore and Europe, where she gained a fascination for non-conventional ways of creating theater.

Calla, who graduated last spring with a special concentration in theater and physics, was heavily involved in both performing and directing during her time at Harvard. Her senior thesis consisted of a show which she wrote and directed on the Loeb Mainstage, entitled The Space Between. Unlike that work, which made heavy use of various forms of multimedia, Calla told us that Untitled Project is more of a simple, text-based piece, which she feels is the most meaningful to her as an audience member. Without giving away too much about this unique theater experience, Calla emphasized fluidity and spontaneity as some of the most prominent aspects of the show. In fact, while Calla conceived the original idea for Untitled Project, her cast of actors wrote much of the actual script during the rehearsal process. Calla also mentioned that audience feedback would be crucial in the creation process, and that the story might change entirely by the time the show continues its run in New York.

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The Daily Beast has the answer. The popular news website, the brainchild of former Vanity Fair editor Tina Brown, just released its ranking of the 50 most stressful colleges in the US. Lo and behold, Harvard is ranked #5, only trailing after Stanford, Columbia, MIT and Penn.

(Image courtesy of Google Images)

The five criteria taken into consideration are (excerpts from the actual article):

• The cost: Financial pressure is a huge stress-inducer. Tuition plus room and board, weighted at 35 percent. With 2009-2010 data from the National Center on Education Statistics.

• Competitiveness: How academically rigorous is the school? Weighted at 35 percent, with 2010 data from US News & World Report.

• Acceptance rate: More competitive schools generally produce a more competitive student body. Weighted at 10 percent, with 2010 data from US News & World Report.

• Engineering: Is the school known for its particularly rigorous graduate engineering program? Weighted at 10 percent, with 2010 data from US News & World Report.

• Crime on campus: Adapted from The Daily Beast’s analysis of college crime, weighted at 10 percent and ranked relative to this particular group of colleges. With data from the US Department of Education.

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