Welcome! Now Let Me Save You Some Time
You may have noticed that almost everything in this issue was about first-years. That's our way of welcoming you to campus, and maybe hazing you a little bit, too. In case you missed it, we have profiles of all the first-years on pages 6 and 7. I'd like to toss in one more shameless plug for our first meeting of the semester, which is Monday night. Email us at [fakepapr] for details. We're doing some new things this year with the paper, so come to the meetings to help us manage new features and, of course, to help us think of ideas for each issue.
That said, I want my first Backpage to welcome first-years as much as the rest of the issue, so here are a few things students should know about Grinnell:
I didn't get to sleep after 8:00 this morning when this paper was finished. I'm just saying, I hope you're enjoying it, because we work hard on this thing.
The College has our own wind turbines proudly displayed on campus. They're in the advertisements, so they must be here somewhere. If you see them, let me know.
Also, apparently we have horses, too. Looks like they're in our hay barn. Maybe it's hidden in Noyce somewhere?
All the staff and administrators here have your best interests at heart. They are here to serve you, and you should allow you to make decisions for you and trust them when they say they know what they're doing, so they don't need to keep you updated on what they do behind closed doors. None of them are incompetent, stupid, out-of-touch, malicious, power-hungry, insensitive, jealous, paranoid, or passive-aggressive, and their only motivation is to help students out. They say they only exist to make our lives easier, so we should smile and nod and be grateful for their efforts.
Someone apparently scheduled the NSO Consent Workshop at the same time as the pool party. While I don't blame anybody for choosing lounge chairs over lectures, know that it is your responsibility to talk to your SA, RLC, or other staff members, and read the available literature, about consent and other issues because you missed it. If you are having sex or might have sex with anyone, even your significant other, you don't want to get into a difficult situation and be caught with your trousers down. So to speak.
SGA is another good resource for the above issues and for just about anything. Their offices are next door to Publications, so I spend a lot of time there. They are a treasure trove of information, and they meet with all the decision makers on campus quite often. They write College policies and they have a $350,000 annual budget, so they are not to be taken lightly. Also, they're nice people. That helps. At some point, you should consider running for a senator position. I did that (successfully) my second year, and I learned a lot about the inner workings of the College. And since this paper often critiques the policies of SGA, staff, faculty, or student groups, that experience also helps me bring you a better B&S!
You may think you came to Grinnell because it is unique or better than other colleges, but you are wrong. The administrators understand this, so for several years Grinnell has been involved in a major effort to become more like our peer institutions. This means that we can enjoy exciting new programs on campus, like paying for printing and firing our most trusted employees.
As many of you are already aware, the last few years have been rather rough on students here. We have seen our friends taken from us, our safe and supportive community put into question, and our respect for each other seemingly decline below an acceptable level. Feel free to ask me or any upperclassman about this if you're not sure what I'm talking about. Every year a few students make an easily preventable mistake, or don't examine their actions as carefully as they should. Please don't be that person. I hope your class doesn't have to deal with the kind of reprehensible, and frankly, downright stupid shit that my class has had to fix, fight, or simply plow through. But if you do, at least you'll see this campus pull together in ways that no other community can.
On that note, I should say that I absolutely love this place, and I'm sure you will grow to love it too, flaws and all. Again, welcome. May your four years here be the best of your life.
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