Friday, March 1, 2002

Beyond the Pale: Holyoke and Back

TDR staffer attends the "Beyond the Box V: Identity in Motion" conference at Mount Holyoke.

Campaign 2002: Senator Bob Smith

Interview with NH Senator Bob Smith.

TDR Interview: Harvey Mansfield

Harvey Mansfield, Professor of Government at Harvard University and noted political theorist, has recently made headlines, not for his books on Burke or Machiavelli, but for the two-grade policy he instituted in his classes. Mansfield, dubbed by his students as "C-Minus," instituted the policy so that students would not be harmed by grades that were not inflated—he would give students an inflated grade for their transcripts and also give them a true, non-inflated assessment in private.

Grade Inflation at the Other Ivies

Apparently, in its Class of 2001, 91 percent of Harvard graduates received the 'distinction' of honors. At the other Ivy League schools, the number is much lower: Dartmouth, 40 percent; Yale, 51 percent; Princeton, 44 percent; Brown, 42 percent; Columbia, 25 percent; and Cornell, 8 percent. The University of Pennsylvania does not release statistics because Penn administrators believe it would violate students' privacy.

Life and Death at Wrightsville Beach: Over a Century in the Carolinas

The house sits toward the southern end of a four-mile spit of land right off the coast of Wilmington, NC. It is a typical beach cottage, constructed entirely of wood, with a hollow structure of support beams comprising the first floor. Off one porch is an unfettered view of the berm, the sole protection the house has from the Atlantic Ocean, which beats the shore a mere 150 yards in front of the house.

The Politics of Masturbation

Such was the experience of many a hungry, innocent student or visiting passerby at a Wednesday lunch hour in the middle of February; those looking for a place to sip their smoothies or read drew back in horror at the site of enormous naked women posed in extremely compromising, lewd positions, brought to us by Kathryn Oliviero '01 in her presentation of her thesis research on the 'politics of masturbation.'

TDR Reader Response: The CIA Tortures My 'Upstanding' Family and Me

We at The Dartmouth Review appreciate and respect our readership, but sometimes things go too far. During the month of February, the newspaper received thirty-some voicemail messages from a Californian subscriber on a mission: to expose radio psychologist Toni Grant as a conniving terrorist intent on blowing up libraries and bookstores.

A Report from the Time Before Course Guides

Memories of a 1969 graduate of the College: When I was a freshman at Dartmouth, student guides to classes and professors were yet to be invented. We chose courses blindly or by word of mouth. The first student class evaluation came, as best I can recall, in my senior year, too late for it to be of much use to me, and it hardly mattered, because my career goals were still firmly undecided, and with that objective ahead of me, my grade point average made little difference.

Letters to the Editor

Letters from comedians, Berkeley, and the Grand Canyon State.

Dartmouth Students Compete in 'Collar-Off'

As athletes from across the globe competed in the Salt Lake Olympics, two Dartmouth students engaged in an equally intense competition. Ryan Gorsche '04, LifeStyles Editor of the Review, and Chris Moore '02, editor of the Dartmouth Contemporary, vied to see who could wear the most collars in Dartmouth's first known 'Collar-off.'

Trustees Decide on New Alcohol Policy, says Source

Time will tell if the alcohol policy is changed to reflect Binswanger's proposals or if the Trustees' stricter regimen of alcohol regulation will prevail. If the information received by the Review is correct, the forthcoming policy would constitute the Trustee's strongest step yet, three years after the announcement of the Student Life Initiative, to end Dartmouth's social scene, 'as we know it.'

Grades at Dartmouth: on the Rise

It would seem that students of Dartmouth would not have much to worry about these days, as a rise in average GPA's has drastically reduced the probability of failing out of the College on the Hill. Over a 50-year period the College's grades have inexorably risen over one point in the last half-century, from a mean of 2.2 in 1958-59 to 3.31 in 1998-99.

The Rev. Al: 'I fight for victims'

Al Sharpton comes to speak at Dartmouth.

The Pavilion: Serving Few, but Well

After several months of test runs, the Pavilion finally had its grand opening ceremony on January 8th.