The Bowdoin Orient

The women’s track and field team finished first out of seven teams at this Saturday’s 25th-annual Aloha Relays at Bowdoin. Like the men’s team, the women were coming off a third-place finish at the UNH invitational the previous week. The team will compete at the NESCAC Championship at Tufts this weekend. 

Bowdoin won 11 of the meet’s events and sealed the competition with 184 total points, beating out second-place Bates who earned 158 points. Katherine Harmon ’14, who won the hammer throw at the Relays, is currently ranked No. 13 in all of D-III in the event. Head Coach Peter Slovenski said he is pleased with her recent results.

“Katherine has gotten more explosive with her throwing this month,” Slovenski said. “She’s always been a great technician, and now she’s adding a lot of speed to her second and third turns.”

The men’s track and field team finished second out of five teams at the Maine State Championship this weekend at Bates. The tournament hosts finished first with 263 points, followed by Bowdoin with 177, the University of Southern Maine with 96, Colby with 69 and St. Joseph’s with five. One particularly impressive performance came from Chris Genco ’15, who won both the long and high jump. 

“Chris had a terrific day,” said Head Coach Peter Slovenski. “He’s got a lot of poise in competition and put together some impressive jumps.”

One other winner was Sam Seekins ’14, who ran the fastest 5K of the field by outpacing 15 other runners from the four other Maine schools that competed. 

Each month, members of Bowdoin’s athletic teams volunteer at the Midcoast Hunger Prevention Program (MCHPP), a non-profit organization located in Brunswick, to help provide food for people in the area who cannot do so for themselves. For the last few years, coaches have called upon student-athletes to aid the MCHPP in unloading large shipments of food that are made available to over 1,200 families in eight different towns around midcoast Maine. 

“Usually what will happen is that we’ll receive information from Midcoast Hunger about a large food delivery that is coming into Brunswick,” said Ashmead White Director of Athletics Tim Ryan. “Our coaches will then talk to their teams asking if they would like to help out, and that’s where we are able to lend a helping hand.”

 “Our connection really began with [former trainer] Jeanne Mayo, who has been heavily involved with Midcoast Hunger Prevention,” Ryan said. “Her relationship with the athletic department started to foster interest in seeing what we could do to help. Our coaches and students have accepted that opportunity as a great way to provide service to our community.”

On February 15, Bowdoin will celebrate the season with the revival of Winter Weekend, an old tradition of the College. Dani Chediak ’13, president of the Bowdoin Student Government (BSG), and Michael Hannaman ’13, co-chair of the Entertainment Board (E-Board) have been working together to organize an event to bring the campus together during the drab winter season. “This is actually a tradition from back when frats were at Bowdoin,” Hannaman said. “And what we’re trying to do is revive, but also redefine, what it is. We’re trying to make it about sports at Bowdoin, and College Houses and being outside during the winter.”

Safe Ride will no longer bring students to parties at off-campus houses, said Director of Safety and Security Randy Nichols. Although Safe Ride has had a policy of not bringing students to parties for several years, only recently has it begun enforcing it.

On campus, underage possession of alcohol can lead to a write-up from Security and a meeting with a Dean; off campus, it can lead to a court date, as eight Bowdoin students have learned this academic year. In addition to the two students who received summons on September 15 on Union Street—one for underage consumption of alcohol, the other for furnishing it—six students received summons on September 8 at 6 Summer Street.

The results of last spring’s NESCAC-wide alcohol and drug use survey, which were released to College officials last week, show that the drinking habits of Bowdoin students fall in line with peer schools, though students at the College are noticeably more proactive when it comes to calling for help in alcohol-related emergencies. Nine of the 11 NESCAC schools participated in the survey, which was distributed to about 20,000 students and designed with the intent of better understanding alcohol and drug use on each campus.