Caltech is known for its rigorous academic environment, but beneath the surface lies a community of student-athletes who defy the odds daily, balancing their passion for their sport with the demands of academic life. One such athlete is Sam Small, a junior BioE major, minoring in Chemistry. His journey provides an enlightening perspective on what it’s like to be a student-athlete at Caltech.
Following two letters recently published on the Tech, we write to you in our role as Directors of the Graduate Student Council to address concerns about the moderation of the gradstudents@caltech.edu mailing list, which we manage.
This past week marked the conclusion of one of Caltech’s many traditions: interhouse dodgeball. Interhouse sports have been a Caltech tradition for as long as records can show, dating back to at least the 1950s, if not earlier. And, as the first interhouse sport of the year, interhouse dodgeball is an excellent opportunity to integrate the freshly rotated first year students into this long standing interhouse and intrahouse culture, all of which is accomplished by pitting them against each other on the tennis courts.
This past Sunday, thousands in and around the Pasadena area left their cars at home and dusted off their rollerblades, skateboards, and bikes to take the (hopefully not) once in a lifetime chance to traverse the closed Arroyo Seco Parkway. The six lanes and six miles of the winding freeway were closed to cars from 7 a.m. to 11 a.m on Sunday.
Q
Help! The triangle man is after me! What do i do?
-Pythagoras
A
Did you eat those mystery berries again? Have you considered that the triangle man is not real and it may just be the mystery berries, you moron???
Ugh, but I guess its too late for that. Here’s what you can do now since you can’t stop eating these berries:
The Caltech women’s and men’s soccer teams played their final games of the 2023 seasons this past Saturday, October 28th. Both teams played at home, honoring their seniors with their senior day ceremonies and their performances.
On October 1st, the day of move-in, an email was sent out by Emily Sanger, the Bechtel RLC (resident life coordinator). The email contained 63 temporary room codes, opening every frosh’s private room in Bechtel. These temporary room codes, while allegedly only lasting a few days, gave access to many student’s personal belongings. It’s unknown how many students these codes were sent to.
While Caltech is able to house all undergraduate students who wish to live on campus, this is not the case for graduate students. Only G1’s are guaranteed housing from the Housing Office; thereafter, graduates must enter an extremely competitive lottery to live in Caltech-owned apartments.
A common concern heard among the undergraduates on registration day these past few terms is “there aren’t enough hums!”. Broadly referring to all Humanities and Social Science (HSS) courses offered in a given term by the word ‘hum’, what specifically does the statement mean? That there aren’t enough advanced humanities courses being offered in any given term (i.e. not enough_ total HSS courses)? That there isn’t enough breadth of courses to satisfy their interests (i.e. not enough “interesting”_ HSS courses for any given student)? That there aren’t enough courses that fit into their schedule (i.e. not enough HSS courses at a given time)? The Academics and Research Committee (ARC) has compiled the following data to understand the source of the concern.
The Caltech Men’s Water Polo and Men’s Soccer teams saw success on Friday, October 13th and Saturday, October 14th – a strong start to the weekend for Caltech athletics.
At the start of 2023, students began to hear rumors of major renovations coming to Braun Athletic Center and Scott Brown Gym. We heard that the distribution of gym equipment would be changing, that the athletic training office would be moving, and circulating most of all, that the locker rooms were to see major renovations. For students and members, athletes and otherwise, this was an exciting change. The locker rooms had been outdated for a long time, both in their facilities and the ideas they reflected, and in April 2023, this much needed change began.
After arriving at Caltech, one of the first things I noticed about the campus once I finally had time to wander around was that, from what I could tell, this place lacked a consistent architectural style. There’s a mix of Spanish-style architecture like Beckman Institute, more modern-looking buildings like Chen, and silly guys like the Beckman Hall (and also ugly ass ones like Downs-Lauritsen). This mixing of styles continues inside, with some buildings like Bridge keeping their old-fashioned style but Gates-Thomas deciding to modernize. That’s all neat and cool, but it goes a little further than what you see walking up and down the halls. The place I noticed these tiny details is a sacred place where you have time to yourself, a place free of distraction, a place of relief: the bathroom.
On Friday, September 29, 2023, the Caltech Graduate Students and Postdocs United (C/GPU) hosted a rally to celebrate reaching a majority of signed union authorization cards. For those unfamiliar or just confused about the process, this was not a vote. Those in charge of the union effort made it clear that according to their recorded numbers, enough graduate students and postdocs currently support moving forward to a vote to force the issue. These same leaders have also been very vocal about the fact that a vote would not have needed to be forced if the administration had simply consented early on to let us hold one.
After over two decades ofcontinuous operation, Caltech Administration has banned the firing of the potato cannon as part of Blacker Hovse’s rotation events. Built in 2002 as part of a Ditch Day stack, firing it has been a Blacker Hovse tradition ever since. “The potato cannon was my favorite rotation event last year. I’m disappointed that this year’s frosh [weren’t] able to have the same experience as I did,” says Ethan Labelson (EE ‘26, Blacker/Dabney).
While houses throw a significant portion of the social events during the year, ASCIT throws events open to the entire student body every term. We’ve listed an overview of the events that we both host and help out with, often with our advisor, Tom Mannion, the Senior Director of Student Activities and Alumni Engagement.
Over this summer, the blazing-pink cinematic nuclear warhead that is Barbenheimer – the sobriquet of the dual releases of Barbie and Oppenheimer – hit theaters worldwide.
Following Dabney Boat Tours, Chill at Page, and Ricketts Open Mic Night, the team-based, tournament-style competition centered around the promise of a massive water fight at the end, which participants could use their tickets to prepare for. Up for sale were water guns, tubs of water balloons, and defensive materials like mattresses and cardboard. To earn tickets, participants competed against each other in a series of games - ranging from lock picking to tug of war.
