What sort of questions should I ask you? Who will answer? —F.W. Olin
Any and all questions are welcome. Both, either or neither of us will answer them. And you’ll like it!
—Captain Dominatrix
Horoscopes by Drunk Editors
Aries (March 21-April 19): The Dining Hall is a figment of your imagination.
Taurus (April 20-May 20): Beware of hats.
Gemini (May 21-June 21): Do it. You’ll probably regret it later. Do it anyway.
Cancer (June 22-July 22): Feel the energy in the air around you. Breathe those auras deep.
Stats to Start Conversations
Hello everyone! My name is Kat, and I like taking surveys: I get a rush seeing, about a minute after sending out a survey to the student body, the results pouring in. The resulting data quantifies the thoughts and behaviors of Oliners, giving a better impression of what the student body is actually thinking and doing rather than relying on hearsay.
Faults of Spiral Learning
“Spiral learning” is a rationalization for ineffective pedagogy and a self-fulfilling prophesy of poor educational outcomes.
The idea of spiral learning is that students should learn the basics of a topic without getting into details, then come back to it later, deepening their understanding while reinforcing the basics. It’s hard to object to that. And many of us recognize the pattern, in our own education, of struggling with a topic on the first attempt and really getting it only after several iterations.
Identity Politics: Being Queer
I’ve been seeing a lot of strong emotions surrounding identity politics, particularly on queer-related topics, like sex, gender, and sexuality. I’ve seen a lot of limited perspective on gender and sexual variation. Perhaps I get so much of this because of the people I’m around, or the fact that I put on The Laramie Project, but regardless, I think a little bit of queer theory is in order. Because the easiest way to explain the philosophical is to ground it in the personal, I’m going to start with my own identity.
Welcome from Frankly Speaking News
Welcome back, from Frankly Speaking—Olin’s unofficial, unaffiliated, student-run newspaper!
Olin is a school of rebirth. Clubs, events, and traditions all live and die with each new year. Clubs you’ve never heard of were big a few years ago and events you’d never think of will be held next year. The impermanence is freeing, but also requires that each year play an active part in Olin culture.
Helping Olin be Sustainable
This summer, we worked with Facilities to improve sustainability and stewardship at Olin. Our overarching goal was for Olin’s monetary, environmental, and proprietary resources to be managed and maintained more responsibly. We realized that we could work on many sustainability and stewardship efforts, but they would founder if we did not achieve community-wide involvement. Thus, our true goal was to not only begin sustainable projects, but also to make it easy for everyone to get involved.
A Candid Conversation with Matt Colyer
Matt Colyer has been in startups for his entire working career. That’s five years now; he graduated Olin class of ’07, and immediately started his own business. That particular startup didn’t pan out, but he’s remained a staunch startup developer ever since. He has recently launched a new company, Easel, cofounded with Ben Ogle.
Matt and Ben rolled into Yerba Buena gardens, downtown San Francisco, on bicycles. Over a chess table in the shade, Matt and Ben told me about Easel and what it’s like to live and breathe startups. Matt explained his love for working through ever-changing problems and learning on the fly.
Olin College is Bursting its Buttons
Once upon a time, one of Olin’s goals was to expand from a student body of 300 to a student body of 600. This was eventually dismissed, but Olin has not stopped growing in other ways—to the point where we are almost running out of space!
FWOP Fall: Dr. Horrible, One Acts
The Franklin W. Olin Players (FWOP)—Olin’s resident theater group—will put on two shows this fall.
One, a collection of one-act plays, will be staged during family weekend. The other, which will take place October 11–13, is Joss Whedon’s cult internet musical Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog. An aspiring supervillain video-blogs about his attempted heists and (lack of a) love life. In the course of an attempted theft, he accidentally introduces his crush Penny to his nemesis (the entirely unsympathetic hero Captain Hammer). It’s the motivation he needs to ramp up his villainy, with disastrous consequences.