Volume 5 Issue 4

Major Laser

Major Laser

“You can do a lot of cool shit with lasers,” said Evan Peairs ’16, a physics senior who is using a laser in his thesis. “Lots of science.”

In addition to being prevalent in Science Fiction, lasers have an astounding variety of real world practical and scientific applications. From laser pointers to CD readers, cataract surgery and measuring the distance between atoms in molecules, laser technology is used in all kinds of fields, including Reed’s physics, art, and chemistry departments. Physical chemistry professor Dan Gerrity said, “You can burn things, cut things, blow air up into plasma; all sorts of stuff. In physics they’re using lasers to cool molecules down and analyze their behavior at very low temperatures. There’s such a vast array of applications.”

The Complete History of Renn Fayre Part III: 1990-2000s

The Complete History of Renn Fayre Part III: 1990-2000s

The Fayre came under fire in its third decade. During the 1990s, Policy and Liability first came to Reed in a big way, mostly due to increased federal scrutiny. The administration of George Bush Sr. took a deep, intrusive interest in what was going on at universities across the nation. Bush’s “drug czar,” William Bennett, publicly referred to Reed’s Student Body Handbook as an example of the “decadence and decay of American colleges.” Like all schools receiving federal funding, Reed had to pass a Drug and Alcohol Policy for the first time, and over the course of the 90s the administration even took occasional steps to enforce it.