The notoriously snarky website Gawker caught wind of a Crimson editorial on Harvard students using Facebook in the classroom, or what most of us would simply call procrastinating. The article, however, takes this intuitive answer in an entirely different direction. Maureen O’Connor for Gawker introduces the piece with: “Elite college newspaper The Harvard Crimson has noticed a trend.”

Turns out in the Crimson the answer to why students use Facebook in lectures, or basically all the time, is not that everyone likes it/is stalking everyone else, but rather that we are a hoard of “Return On Time Investment” super-students. Hemi H. Gandhi for the Crimson writes, “During class, students will give their attention to whatever they think will give them the most utility in each moment. Past generations of students must also have wanted to maximize their ROTI during class. But technological innovation has provided today’s students with more options to do so in real time, via their smartphones and laptops.” Gawker deftly responds with this long reason of why we use Facebook with “According to my Harvard-to-English dictionary, the [former] translates roughly to: “Cuz we feel like it.”

When Gandhi continues on this line of reasoning, arguing for more innovative teaching practices to keep students’ attention, Gawker inserts “Also, Zuckerberg.” We’re inclined to agree with Gawker on this one–people, not just Harvard students, use Facebook to procrastinate. Sure, there are tons of incredible internet resources, but Facebook is not exactly one of them for maximizing critical thinking. Facebook usage in class doesn’t have to do with ROTI or seeing how much we can multi-task. It’s making sure that one guy/girl that you dated in high school is not happier than you.

Check out Gawker’s article: http://gawker.com/5852770/harvard-investigation-why-does-everyone-play-on-facebook-during-class

Check out the Crimson’s article: http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2011/10/24/facebook-class-phenomenon/

This winter formal season, The Voice tried a new experiment and played matchmaking for our dearest readers. The response was overwhelming, and if we couldn’t get back to you, our apologies. If the match we found for you didn’t deliver, we’re terribly sorry. Rest assured that with all the feedback we’ve received, our system will be improved in time for Spring Formals!

We thank you for your faith in our Matchmaking power, and we look forward to serving you again soon! Here are some stories*, variously titled “The Good, The Bad, and The Unexpected,” to round up the whole experience. Two freshman girls had two extremely different experiences, and a Varsity athlete in Eliot House went on a perfect date with a girl who still isn’t quite convinced about his sexual orientation. Maybe he’s too good to be true? Read on and find out for yourself!

*Names have been retracted to protect the privacy of our clients.

The Good:

As a blind dating newbie, my roommate and I decided to be adventurous and do the Voice Matchmaker together. Confused as how these matches would be made after no questions were asked about ourselves and only what we desired in a date, I was blessed by the matchmaking gods and asked to the Adams formal this past Sunday. My roommate graciously lent me a beautiful dress and sent me on my way into the Cambridge cold.

Unable to find the entrance and knowing nothing about my match except for his name, I wandered anxiously until I got a call from my date to invite me inside. Everything about the Adams House formal, whose theme was “Harry Potter,” was beautiful. The House could easily be mistaken for Hogwarts for the night. My date, a senior Adams resident, was extremely sweet and friendly and we wove in through the trees and mystical music to get inside, be sorted, and receive our wands.

Somehow, The Voice found me a perfect date and great new friend. We mingled for the night until he was drawn back to his room to work on his thesis. I am still unsure if the Voice worked its magic, if it was a purely magical night, or if Harvard is just full of truly nice guys. Either way it worked out for me, I had a great time and I hope my date felt the same!

Read on for two extremely “interesting” stories! Read the rest of this entry »

A party was busted at Yale and five students were arrested. The party was held at Elevate, a nightclub downtown, and the students were arrested for underage drinking. According to the Yale Daily News, “more than a dozen New Haven police officers and liquor agents raided the downtown nightclub where the event took place.”

According to the YDN article, it looks like there may have been some police brutality involved, and “according to interviews with about a dozen eye witnesses, one student was Tasered.”

Dang. Like Ke$ha said, “Until the po po shut us down….”

Well, this is just great timing. Everyone arriving at Terminal B at Logan Airport in the next few days should be aware that there will be no Silver Line service running from that terminal. Instead, “Massport shuttles” will run, and those might take forever.

Here are full details on the diversion, which may take a while.

Your best bet will be to probably find another Harvard student at the airport* and split a cab with him or her.

*How to recognize a Harvard student: Young, exudes air of entitlement, probably carrying book. Okay, KIDDING.

If you’re going to “officially license” our name, you could at least give credit where it’s due.

I’M JUST SAYING.

[EDIT: order has been restored] Read the rest of this entry »

First of all allow us to link you to THIS article titled Ethnic ‘Studies’ published by The Harvard Salient with the tag-line, “Harvard foolishly politicizes its curriculum.” Now, we have a few issues with this article. Let’s start with a few choice quotes from this article cleverly published over spring break when no one was going to notice:

• “The ethnic studies movement is motivated by an attempt to direct more attention to a topic that deserves no more attention than it already gets, and probably a good deal less. Other similarly useless departments, like Studies of Women, Gender, and Sexuality serve similar purposes….”
• “When the University agrees that its curriculum needs to change to address ‘the growing diversity of our campus’ or any other imaginary concern of its students, it opens itself up to politically motivated efforts like ethnic studies.”
• “It need not offer a course on African civilizations if there is none worthy of study. The progressive priorities of Harvard’s curriculum usually do not coincide, however, with the promotion of meaningful areas of study.”
• “Ethnic studies is a good example of an academic subject entirely driven by a leftist political agenda. While it is not absurd to suggest that there are some worthwhile topics that fall under the heading of “ethnic studies,” the area is certainly not important enough to merit a secondary field…Americans of color have undoubtedly done some things of note, but their ‘encounters’ and ‘experiences’ are not of paramount importance to a university education.”
• “The necessary elements of an educated man’s curriculum have not changed much over two thousand years of Western education…It is quite difficult for academia to justify an attempt to free the sciences from a ‘Eurocentric’ perspective, given that, with rare exceptions like the Abbasid Caliphate, little scientific and mathematical thought of consequence has occurred outside the Western world.”

Read the rest of this entry »

It looks like some of the houses feel the need to post more than one mediocre Housing Day video this year. Here’s Quincy’s second attempt after the seemingly lazy BBC -penguin-clip attempt. It features a dub over “I’ll Make A Man Out of You” from the Mulan soundtrack.

Our verdict: We’re really confused. And embarrassed for Quincy. Sorry beezies. To be fair though, it looks like an individual, not HoCo, made the video.