Weinberg sophomore Ece Agalar usually wakes up around noon and goes to bed at 3 a.m. Except for occasional at-home yoga sessions, the Istanbul native and former Daily staffer spends most of her days at her desk. The nine-hour time difference between Turkey and Evanston has turned Agalar, a natural early bird, into a night owl.
“It is very hard to maintain the balance under these circumstances,” Agalar said. “Especially for an international student who has to do this from miles away amidst the pandemic.”
Like Agalar, many students living overseas feel stuck in limbo physically in their home countries, mentally in Evanston.
As many return to campus, students who stayed home feel disconnected
While most students were moving to Evanston for Winter Quarter, Weinberg freshman Shray Vaidya was hitting “mute” on the Class of 2024 GroupMe from his hometown of Fremont, California.
In the GroupMe, students were texting about how excited they were to finally move on campus. For Vaidya, who opted to stay home because of rising COVID-19 infection rates across the country, the messages were “really hard” to see.
During Fall Quarter, only underclassmen who received exceptions were allowed to live on-campus. It was a difficult way to start college, but made easier by the fact that most underclassmen were going through the experience together, Vaidya said.
After months of contending with the Abolish Greek Life movement, many Northwestern fraternities and sororities plan to continue with recruitment this winter.
Although NU’s Panhellenic Association voted to cancel formal PHA-sponsored recruitment this academic year, individual chapters are hosting virtual informal recruitment. The Interfraternity Council is also recruiting virtually. Previously, IFC allowed for small in-person events as long as they met University rules and kept contact tracing logs. In a statement to the Daily, IFC President Nick Papandreou
said the policy was changed this week to ban all in-person events until future notice.
According to each chapter’s leadership, Northwestern chapters of Delta Tau Delta, Sigma Nu, Sigma Phi Epsilon and Zeta Beta Tau are officially holding recruitment. Though other chapters are listed on the IFC interest form, they did not respond to the Daily’s request for a comment on whether they will recruit classes.
January 14, 2021 at 11:35 pm by Katherine Swartz
Lea Toubian kept her victory statement to the Nexus short: âIâm incredibly humbled to have been elected. Time to get back to work.âÂ
Toubian is currently the chief of staff for the presidentâs office.Â
Courtesy of Lea Toubian.
Students elected the fourth-year political science and environmental studies double major to be the third Associated Students (A.S.) president of the 2020-21 school year, A.S. Elections Board announced Thursday evening in a live webinar.Â
Toubian won with 53.83% of the vote, while Carlos âAndyâ Ruiz, a fourth-year sociology major running against Toubian, received 46.17%.Â
In years past, the thought of staying at Northwestern over Thanksgiving break would have never crossed my mind. My family always gathers for the secular holiday instead of for Christmas and, as a result, it’s often the only time I’ll see my cousins in a year. However, traveling back and forth for that weekend from college has become a hassle, as I would be quickly thrown into reading and finals weeks, only to then return to New York a few days later upon the completion of the quarter. Additionally, flights are particularly expensive around Thanksgiving weekend, adding to the strain of trekking back and forth.