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I never realized how comfortable I had become in the “Bowdoin bubble” until I ventured outside of it for the first time since coming to campus. Stepping off the train at Boston’s North Station during Fall Break felt like a jolt to my system in a way that I had never experienced before.
I didn’t start talking until I was three years old. One of my first conversations was with four walls in my grandmother’s home in Morocco. My mom tells me that I would “faire la bise’’ each wall, enthusiastically (and in Moroccan fashion) talking a mile a minute: “How are you!” “Oh, it’s so great to see you.” “How are the kids?” I nodded along to imaginary responses, carving out equal pockets of ‘eye contact’ to ensure each wall got its share of my attention.
A hodgepodge of wallpaper details, nooks, crannies and even a time capsule, Bowdoin’s David Saul Smith Union is more than just your average student center. Before the building was constructed, the campus had no comparable student center.
On most social media platforms, it’s easy to curate an image—regardless of whether or not it represents one’s real life. On BeReal, however, this is not the case. The app, created in 2020 by French entrepreneur Alex Bareyatt, recently gained traction in the U.S.
The Bowdoin community has faced unimaginable challenges this semester, and while everyone processes hardship differently, “Polar Pause,” the extended Thanksgiving break this year, has provided students and faculty with additional time and space for rest and reflection.
At 6:35 p.m. Thorne dining hall was abuzz with students checking their email, screams were heard on the first floor of Hawthorne-Longfellow Library and FaceTimes were ringing in as the Bowdoin Marriage Pact released the initials of the ideal match of each student who participated.
After a disjointed year on (and mostly off) campus, the Class of 2024 returned to campus this fall as sophomores. Having experienced an atypical year at the College, the class is still expected to step into leadership roles within the community.
For the first time since COVID-19 sent students home last spring, the College hosted a campus-wide in-person event. Dubbed a “May 1 Celebration,” the Office of Student Activities scheduled a day of outdoor activities, live music and food trucks last Saturday afternoon to usher in the final month of the semester.
On Thursday night, the Disabled Students Association (DSA) hosted a talk on Relationships and Disability with YouTube personalities Hannah Aylward and Shane Burcaw. Their YouTube channel, Squirmy and Grubs, has garnered over 842,000 subscribers and over 147 million views.
On Wednesday evening, the Office of Gender Violence Prevention and Education (OGVPE) hosted its annual Take Back the Night event, offering a time for students, both on and off campus, to hold a moment of reflection about sexual assault and rape culture at Bowdoin in their individual residences at 9 p.m.
On Monday evening, as the sun began to dip below the horizon, hundreds of students, faculty and staff gathered on the quad in front of the Bowdoin College Museum of Art. On the Museum steps stood leaders of the Asian Students Alliance (ASA), other students who identify as Asian and Pacific Islander (API), faculty and staff affiliated with the Office of Inclusion and Diversity and individuals and groups of allies, including the Native American Student Association (NASA) and the Black Student Union (BSU).
The Bowdoin experience can now be inscribed onto a digital space, dedicated to documenting memories and celebrating Bowdoin’s unique community. Created by Max Freeman ’22 and Camilo Pareja ’22, Bowdoin Moments is an online platform where anyone with Bowdoin memories—whether they be students, faculty, staff members, alumni and visitors—is invited to share their stories in geospatial tags accompanied with a few sentences of reflections.
One student tested positive for COVID-19 on Tuesday, COVID-19 Resource Coordinator Mike Ranen announced in an email to the community. Through contact tracing, three additional students were identified as close contacts and have been moved to quarantine housing.
Bowdoin welcomed a new publication to its scientific community last week. Headed by Joanna Lin ’22 and Anthony Yanez ’22, the Bowdoin Science Journal (BSJ), a biweekly, student-published science journal, released its debut issue on March 1.
President Clayton Rose sent an email to the campus community on Thursday afternoon announcing that the College expects to welcome all students back to campus in the fall. Rose also outlined plans for commencement and summer on-campus activity.
With indoor gatherings limited by low occupancy limits in private residential common rooms, the Bowdoin Student Government (BSG) recently partnered with Facilities to purchase outdoor fire pits as a means to give students another option to safely socialize—the most recent initiative to enhance the student social experience in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic.
After recognizing potential obstacles not addressed by the College’s formal plan for welcoming students back to campus last week, Thomas Bao ’21 and Maddie Hikida ’22 launched Polar Bear Community Action (PBCA), a mutual aid network intended to streamline the process for students arriving back on campus.
Over the weekend, the College welcomed back 1013 on-campus students and 64 students who are living off campus but have on-campus privileges. This meant the launch of Bowdoin’s second semester of coronavirus (COVID-19) testing protocols—this time with a significantly greater volume of tests to process each week.
Staff from Residential Life and the Office of the Dean for Student Affairs—including Director of Residential Education Whitney Hogan, Associate Dean of Upperclass Students Khoa Khuong and Dean of Students Kristina Bethea Odejimi—offered several clarifications about the Campus Community Agreement on Monday, November 23 during an informal question-and-answer office hours session with students.
As COVID-19 cases surge nation-wide, the Bowdoin community has not been immune. Confronting rising cases of the virus on campus, the administration and on-campus students are evaluating steps forward as the Thanksgiving holiday approaches. In a Microsoft Teams interview with the Orient, COVID-19 Resource Coordinator Mike Ranen said that he was not surprised about the recent positive cases on campus.
Amid a spike in COVID-19 cases throughout Maine, COVID-19 Resource Coordinator Mike Ranen announced on Friday, November 6 that students would no longer be permitted to leave campus for any reason, effective Saturday, November 7. While many on-campus students said they understood the reasons for this decision, the change was still met with disappointment.
Among honks and cheers temporarily heard on Maine Street, Brooke Vahos ’21, who is living off campus, stood at the edge of the Brunswick Mall with a “Honk for Biden” sign in celebration of President-elect Joseph R.
A College employee tested positive for COVID-19 yesterday, according to an email sent to all staff and students from COVID-19 Resource Coordinator Mike Ranen on Tuesday evening. The employee has not been on campus since October 28 and received their positive result from outside the College’s testing program.
Effective tomorrow at 8 a.m., on-campus students are not permitted to leave campus for any reason, including to conduct personal or essential business, wrote Mike Ranen, COVID-19 resource coordinator, in an email to all students and employees sent today at noon.
With the results of the presidential election still unclear three days after Election Day, Bowdoin students, along with the rest of the county, are stuck in a state of limbo. Emotions run high, off and on campus.
In a reversal of the College’s previous policy, which imposed a strict November 21 deadline for all on-campus students to move out, a select group of students were informed last week that they have been approved to stay on campus beyond that date.
On Saturday, the Student Center for Multicultural Life hosted a retreat for first-generation (first-gen) first-year students living on campus. The event, which lasted the better part of the day, took place in Farley Field House, where the 26 first-year participants, six first-generation upperclassmen discussion leaders and staff and faculty who participated in a panel and delivered presentations were able to safely gather while maintaining social distance.
Despite the challenges of a remote semester, the Latin American Student Organization (LASO) has been planning programs to engage and include the Latinx community during Latinx Heritage Month, which runs from September 15 to October 15.
Effective Wednesday, October 7, students living on campus who miss a total of three COVID-19 tests will be asked to leave campus, according to an email from COVID-19 Resource Coordinator Mike Ranen sent to on-campus students today.
BC-3 is a 144 acre plot of land that occupies the southwestern zone of the former Brunswick Naval Air Station. Once used for base operations and military training, the land now serves as a monument to Brunswick’s rich history and biodiversity.
The first week of the semester saw the rollout of the College’s ambitious testing program for the fall. The plan dictates that students must be tested three times a week—Monday, Wednesday and Friday—for the first two weeks of the semester, and then twice a week—with one group tested on Mondays and Thursdays and the other tested on Tuesdays and Fridays—until campus closes before Thanksgiving break.
As first years, student staff at the Office of Residential Life and approved upperclassmen moved onto campus in late August, they said goodbye to a number of things. Some of the 653 students residing on campus said goodbye to their hometowns, while some said goodbye to their home states or home countries.
This summer, contractors carried out major renovation projects around campus in preparation for the new academic year. Major projects include the creation of two new collaborative spaces in Hawthorne-Longfellow Library (H-L), updates to Magee-Samuelson Track and Whittier Field and initial work on the Roux Center for the Environment.
