Volume 16 Issue 2
Erik Beserra
Lockdowniversary

A year ago I stared at the numbers rising on the New York Times website. Every day I found myself feeling more inept as 10,000 became 20,000 became 40,000 became 80,000. I stared at the numbers like a moth at lights. Inept and discouraged. I still feel inept. I now have a tab with the New York Times vaccine distribution map. It is weird staring at this good news. Some part of me doesn’t feel hopeful since this is just what needs to be done. We failed and are now picking up the pieces.

Lockdowniversary
Volume 15 Issue 3
Lauren Mondroski
Dying to Get Outside? A Grave History of Hiking ...

This was before the establishment of large public parks, meaning that if you were a Victorian-era urban American, you most likely spent your time outdoors strolling and picnicking with family, friends, and lovers, all amidst the dead.

Dying to Get Outside? A Grave History of Hiking and Cemeteries
Volume 15 Issue 2
Allison Wallace
A list of good: a good list to make

· Arriving
· The first song you listen to through headphones
· When a good bakery has good tea (the complete experience)
· The crisp, blue outlines of the hills here in Western Oregon

A list of good: a good list to make
Volume 15 Issue 2
Nerissa Wright
Seek Discomfort

Portland is a peculiar white haven, and I come from a melting pot that smells like urine year-round. Both are good, but very different.

Seek Discomfort
Volume 14 Issue 1
Lauren Mondroski
Spoiler Alert: There Is No Coming of Age

Released on August 25, 2020, Haley Blais’ Below the Salt is an album I wish I had during my first year of college. Coincidentally, that’s when I first started listening to Blais, a Vancouver-based singer-songwriter and vlogger whose wacky sense of humor and DIY bedroom-pop bangers resonated with me, a freshman living on her own for the very first time and trying to make sense of the world and herself. That unsure first-year is a senior now, but no less unsure, and I think that’s the point of Blais’ debut album: her label writes, “Below the Salt is a coming of age story that recognizes that there is no real ‘coming of age.’”

Spoiler Alert: There Is No Coming of Age

Volume 1 Issue 8

Ben There II

Ben There II

My freshman year dorm room overlooked the front lawn from the third floor of Winch. O-week was unusually gorgeous, with the sun beaming, and from my perch I watched the hacky sack and frisbee circles that I was barred from being part of. The doxycycline confined me from sunlight (see last week’s “Ben There” at reedthegrail.com) so I either paced my room or took solo walks through the canyon. The roommate of my divided double was a junior who, being abroad, had missed out on the housing lottery. When he arrived after O-week he vetoed democratic process and usurped the mutually desired inner room. “I didn’t want a roommate but they were out of singles,” he told me.

The Transformation of Community Safety

The Transformation of Community Safety

When current Director of Community Safety, Gary Granger, came to Reed, he had a difficult task ahead of him. Reed was lurching in the wake of the deaths of two students due to heroin doses and was being forced to reevaluate how its drug and alcohol policy provided for the safety of the students. 

“After the second death, which happened just before I got here,” says Granger, “Colin Diver and Mike Brody were summoned downtown to talk to U.S. District Attorney and the Portland Police Chief. The attorney said, ‘we can help you out with that drug problem at Reed.’” Diver responded that he believed Reed had the problem under control and could continue to be semi-autonomous while remaining inside the law and providing for the safety of its students. Many of the changes Community Safety has made over the years have been to demonstrate that Reed takes the law seriously and is committed to providing students with a safe environment where they can succeed. 

Reed Union

On Thursday, April 10th, a group of faculty and students gathered in Vollum Lecture Hall to discuss changing the Reed curriculum. At this semester’s Reed Union, Questioning the Curriculum: Gender Studies, and Ethnic and Race Studies at Reed, a panel consisting of two students and three staff members presented their opinions on this matter and took queries and comments from impassioned community members. The question remains, though: has this event had a serious impact on Reed, and will it lead to changes in the curriculum in the future?