To The Trail, in response to the letter published in the December 5, 2014 issue:   In a letter published recently in the Trail, a reader raised objections to the divestment campaign currently underway within the student body. There are many critiques I could make of their arguments, such as the claims about how divestment would or would not affect the companies’ behavior, whether the companies’ behavior is in fact bad or not, or whether it is hypocritical to fight for divestment when oil remains a major part of our...

Editor’s note: this letter is a response to letters published in the Dec. 5 issue of The Trail.   To the Trail: In last week’s issue of The Trail, a letter to the editor appeared responding to a number of pieces that had come out in support of a transparent investment and socially responsible investment (SRI) campaign two weeks before. The author, Oliver Field, expressed his disapproval of the campaign. As participants in the campaign, we are happy to have sparked campus wide conversation and would like to respond to...

Dear Puget Sound Community, I am writing to express my concern that the way in which we have recently been approaching academic discourse is robbing us of the benefits that engaging in true dialogue has to offer. We enrolled in a liberal arts school with the perception that all of our opinions would be listened to and respected. For many of us, coming to Puget Sound was an escape from the judgment we had experienced in other communities. We sought a place where we could express our own views and...

Editor’s note: this is a response to letters in the Nov. 14 issue of The Trail. To The Trail: A few weeks ago, The Trail ran a series of articles arguing in favor of relinquishing the school’s investments in private energy companies to align with certain moral considerations. Unfortunately, I found these arguments rather unconvincing. Most of the pieces rightfully assumed that protecting the environment is a major concern for UPS students. However, one needs to have a grasp of what our endowment entails, what investing means, and how protecting...

by AUSTEN HARRISON In response to the recent article concerning the anti-queer nature of the Philosophy Department, I hope here to provide a brief defense of the issue in an anticipation of the argument against the author. There are three primary replies that could be given in defense of the department, all of which have their merits and faults: 1) the queer individual that was silenced was only silenced in an attempt to allow other students to speak; 2) the department has already taken measures to correct for the exclusion...

To the University of Puget Sound’s Vice President for Finance & Administration: Dear Ms. Mondou, I am a concerned senior at the University of Puget Sound. In the past months, I have become increasingly aware of a trend across the nation urging educational institutions to stop investing their financial endowment in environmentally destructive industries, particularly the fossil fuel industries of oil, coal, and natural gas. As a young person, I believe that reducing our nation’s dependence on fossil fuel based energy, whether domestic or international, is an imperative condition to...

To the Trail: The mission statement of the University of Puget Sound reads as follows: “University of Puget Sound is an independent predominantly residential undergraduate liberal arts college with selected graduate programs building effectively on a liberal arts foundation. The university, as a community of learning, maintains a strong commitment to teaching excellence, scholarly engagement, and fruitful student-faculty interaction. The mission of the university is to develop in its students capacities for critical analysis, aesthetic appreciation, sound judgment, and apt expression that will sustain a lifetime of intellectual curiosity, active...

by MELANIE SCHAFFER The hot topic on campus at the beginning of the semester was the new Student Union Building (S.U.B.) being built and people are still talking about it.  Unfortunately, many of the remarks are less than positive. Many Puget Sound students are disgruntled with its poor design which leads to less maneuverability, especially during busy hours.  Others are frustrated by the amount of time it takes to get a sandwich, regardless of which side of the Deli station they choose. However, the most salient complaint has to do...

by MELANIE SCHAFFER Chances are high that if you attend this school, or really any institution of higher education, you’ve heard about and/or participated in some form of discussion about various forms of assault on campus. In fact, earlier this semester, The Trail issued an article on the very subject.  The article discussed Puget Sound’s most recent steps toward ending sexual misconduct on campus. These include the addition of a consent workshop during orientation, led by Assistant Dean of Students Sara Shives, as well as the creation of a support...

by CLARA BROWN Last fall, a student was talking with his RA in the hallway, and invited the RA into his room to continue the conversation and hang out for a bit. At some point during their conversation, the RA spotted an empty case of Rainier next to his fridge, and she wrote him up. It was the first week of school, and she felt she had to establish herself as an authority figure in order to instill the message that drinking in a residence hall is not acceptable behavior....

To see the article that prompted this response, click here: http://trail.pugetsound.edu/2014/10/crows-on-campus-causing-problems-for-students/ Hello Sophie Carr, Thank you for writing the article about crows in the Trail! I absolutely love talking about the campus crows, and I’m glad that the conversation has moved into the newspaper. I would like to address a few misconceptions that may have influenced your article, in the hopes that the campus as whole may consider the idea that the crows may not be as problematic as first supposed, and in fact they may be a positive presence...