One signature signs away women’s right to choose in Alabama
May 29, 2019
Alabama state representatives signed a bill on May 14th that bans abortion at any stage and criminalizes doctors who perform the procedure. These doctors could go to prison for up to 99 years.The bill represents a large scale change occuring in our nation today. States like Alabama are using the...
College Board “adversity” scoring policy
Ryan Eastep and Charlotte Cebula
May 29, 2019
Ryan Eastep: The new adversity score is the wrong answer to the right question. First of all, it’s important to contextualize every application and its contents in order to fully understand an applicant’s qualifications. That said, a singular score on a scale of 1-100 is extremely surface leve...
Expanding horizons: broader perspective, broader understanding
May 20, 2019
Going into 11th grade, I was overwhelmed by the numerous options of history classes. Junior year was the first time in my life that I could choose from an array of regions, time periods, and themes to focus on. Before filling out the course selections sheet, I explored the curriculum booklet and loo...
Seeking balance: a complicated relationship with the metaphysical
May 20, 2019
While most of my friends spent their Easter weekend relaxing with their family at home, I was visiting a different type of home. I attended three different church services in the span of two days. I live in the threshold between three different worlds: the church, the home, and the school. My relatio...
‘Privileged poor’: discussing money among affluent peers
May 16, 2019
While browsing the New York Times Opinions page in an impressive bout of my senior slump, I came across an article titled “What the Privileged Poor Can Teach Us.” The privileged poor are lower-income students who were placed in private high schools, usually through community based organizations....
Telling my grandfather’s story
May 16, 2019
My grandfather Arie was released from the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in Germany 74 years ago. By age 10, he had undergone more horrors than most of us will experience in a lifetime. Though he was lucky enough to escape death, close family members of his were not. His sister, at the age of five...
Reflecting on Yom Hashoah
May 16, 2019
Today, Holocaust remembrance is as important as ever. As the number of living Holocaust survivors dwindles, we must uphold their legacies. We must all recognize and staunchly resist anti-semitism in their honor. Yom Hashoah Ve Hagevurah, or Holocaust and Heroism Remembrance Day, should serve in part as a...
Getting political: thinking ahead to the 2020 election
May 3, 2019
On the heels of a historic midterm election and looking ahead to what will probably be one of the most divisive presidential races in American history, I can’t help but feel overwhelmed. With twenty-one Democratic candidates vying for the nomination, it feels difficult for even the most politically i...
Pura Vida: how a cross cultural exchange changed my point of view
May 3, 2019
Today, seniors swarm the halls wearing celebratory shirts with “college” written on them. At a prestigious, high-pressure college preparatory school like Horace Mann, going to college is an expected next step after graduating high school. For many students here, attending one of the country’s m...
The black hole of sexism and misattribution
April 29, 2019
Have you ever heard of Dr. Katie Bouman? Well, even if you haven’t, chances are you have come across the first ever image of a black hole which has been circulating the internet for the past week. We have Dr. Bouman to thank for it. Her story, one that should be a celebration of scientific discovery and ne...
Notre Dame sets media ablaze. Why?
April 29, 2019
Notre-Dame de Paris is undoubtedly a significant historical, religious, and cultural monument that holds a lot of importance to a lot of people, and the fire that devastated the cathedral last week has rendered an outpouring of emotional support from the global community. However, in the wake of the fi...
Mark Mathabane on the power of the mind
April 12, 2019
Mathabane’s autobiography, “Kaffir Boy,” which we studied for months under an intense academic lens, materialized into raw emotions that poured out from the author himself during Book Day, a rare experience that I and other members of the Comparative Race and Ethnicity class were able to share. We s...
