Editors' Choice
What We Talk About When We Talk About Math 55
Just five years ago, the Math Department’s official word on Math 55 was that it was “probably the most difficult undergraduate math class in the country.” Now, they say, “if you’re reasonably good at math, you love it, and you have lots of time to devote to it, then Math 55 is completely fine for you.” So, what changed?
Mike Grant on Leverett, Loss, and Life
His guard office, where he works from 4 p.m. to midnight Monday through Friday, overlooks Leverett’s grassy courtyard. It’s a perfect spot for catching the evening traffic of students as they come in and out of the house. Over the course of the interview, more than a dozen students stop by to greet Mike. Their conversations are familiar and easy as they update each other on their days and riff on inside jokes. Beyond these daily encounters, he’s formed a slew of close connections with Leverett students and has heard many of their stories. “They would cry in here,” he says. “It made me feel special that some people trusted me to come and share these types of stories.”
For Rebecca Hall, History is Personal
Through comic books and other creative works, Rebecca Hall is transcending the bounds of traditional academia to share stories on Black history often lost in archives and mainstream discourse.
Half a Million Fish
After the museum processes its newest donation, the collection will include half a million skeletons of three-spined stickleback fish alone. Now, the Harvard Ichthyology collection at the MCZ is in the middle of a year-long process to curate and catalog these fish that, once completed, will help inform ichthyology and evolutionary research at large.
Become a Boba Shop To Get Into Harvard — by Your Friendly HSA College Tutor
It’s getting harder and harder to get into Harvard. Forget about all the stress that comes with crafting the perfect application and simply secure your spot by becoming a boba shop. You’ll find your way into every single classroom in no time.
Baking the World a Happier Place
Bake it Till You Make it LLC, a “community based organization dedicated to destigmatizing mental illness, normalizing mental health conversation and promoting authentic healing and recovery,” seeks to connect people through food.
The Jukebox that Shares Stories, Not Songs
These stories are part of Jukebox, a participatory art project created by Elisa H. Hamilton, who describes herself as a “socially engaged multimedia artist.” Hamilton intends for the project to create a hub for sharing and saving Cambridge residents’ stories, especially those of the city’s residents of color.
BioArt Grows in Popularity (And on its Own)
Both Sutela’s and Lin’s works are known as BioArt, an emerging field at the intersection of life science and creative expression. The pieces are often metaphors, using biological media to make a statement and redefine the boundaries of art. Much of the BioArt on display at MIT’s Symbionts exhibit criticizes the way humans interact with the natural world.
From the Institute of Geographical Exploration to East Asian Studies: A Retrospective on 2 Divinity Ave.
The map is centered on the Americas, and Asia is cut out almost entirely — curious for a building that houses East Asian Studies. Truthfully, it hints at the building’s complicated past.
Stripped Down: A Look Inside the Harvard Undergraduate Pole Dancing Club
The newly formed Harvard Undergraduate Pole Dancing Club seeks to "empower" its members, particularly people from "historically disempowered identities."
Anna Delvey Is Over It
From mainstream journalists to Netflix binge-watchers to students at the Harvard Business School, everybody wants to make sense of the Anna Delvey phenomenon — everybody, it seems, except for Anna Delvey.
Bird Brilliance: Exploring Harvard’s Ornithology Collection
Founded in 1859, Harvard’s Ornithology Collection has become the fifth-largest ornithological collection on Earth, boasting around 400,000 specimens and 8,300 species — over 85 percent of all known bird species.
Up-Close and Personal with Painting Conservator Kate Smith
Her intimate proximity to paintings differs from the plebeian museum goer’s protocol: don’t-touch-don’t-blink-don’t-breathe-that-looks-expensive. For Smith, getting up close and personal with the artwork is necessary to conserve a piece while staying true to the artist’s original artistic vision.
A Centuries-Old Papier-Mâché Octopus Swims Northwest, Finds a “A Second Life”
After decades of collecting dust in a Harvard Museum of Natural History classroom, a life-size papier-mâché model of an octopus has found a new home. With each of its looping tentacles stretching out about eight feet, it lies suspended above a grand staircase in the spacious, modern, glassy foyer of Harvard’s Northwest Building, home to labs, classrooms, and offices for Harvard’s School of Engineering and Applied Sciences.
The Harvard Professor in Apartheid South Africa’s Corner
The legacy of apartheid is still apparent in South Africa; it’s a legacy that has perpetuated the conditions of racism and poverty. Part of that legacy traces all the way to Cambridge, Massachusetts — to Samuel Huntington.
