WEDNESDAY, MARCH 1, 2023 • 5
THE RICE THRESHER
EDITORIAL
Beer Bike accommodations are common sense
During the Student Association senate meeting on Monday, Feb. 27, student leaders shot down a proposed resolution calling for the Faculty Senate to prohibit midterm exams or major assignments being scheduled during both the week of and after Beer Bike. Though we agree with the SA that this proposal is far too unrealistic to ever get through Faculty Senate, there is some merit in the intentions behind it. As part of the Rice community, faculty should understand the cultural significance of Beer Bike as the ultimate Rice tradition — for all of campus — and consider avoiding scheduling exams or major deadlines immediately after it. To be clear, we don’t believe the university can or should force faculty to change their syllabi around Beer Bike. However, we believe it’s in the best interest of students and faculty alike to consider the effect of student participation in Beer Bike. It is unreasonable to expect that this cultural event, that by its very nature includes large amounts of socializing and a disastrously little amount of sleep,
won’t impair academic performances the following Monday. If the faculty’s ultimate goal is to help students learn, they should recognize that students likely won’t do their best work during this time, and having exams or
Faculty should understand the cultural significance of Beer Bike as the ultimate Rice tradition — for all of campus — and consider avoiding scheduling exams or major deadlines immediately after it. important assignments due at the start of the following week sets students up for failure. We don’t see why professors cannot work around Beer Bike in their syllabi the same way they would (or are supposed
to) work around a midterm recess. With that in mind, we also strongly encourage Rice Program Council to decide on Beer Bike timing as early as possible, so that all of campus can prepare in the way we are asking them to. We know that the idea of academics being second to drinking and partying is unfathomable at an institution like Rice. But Beer Bike cannot be equated to deciding to grab a drink at Pub the night before an exam. The latter is pure irresponsibility on the students’ part, while the former is a campus event and tradition that not only enriches the Rice culture, but also expects the participation of all students. The possibility that any student might decide to miss out on this annual experience to not fail an exam or bomb a presentation is a shame that should be avoided at all costs. The idea behind Beer Bike is that literally everybody should participate. We believe faculty should recognize that by designing syllabi accordingly and, when that isn’t possible, be flexible in their deadlines.
GUEST OPINION
The case for letting the SA burn In his 1995 essay “The Case for Letting Malibu Burn,” historian Mike Davis advocates for a “controlled burn” of the opulent — and wildfire-prone — California city. Continuing to pour resources into attempts at shielding Malibu from the natural fire cycle, Davis argues, is an unsustainable practice with numerous opportunity costs to the greater community. I invoke Davis’ essay title because the Student Association, like the insular fire zone he describes, faces its own legitimacy crisis. As evidenced by this year’s slew of uncontested races and a track record of low voter turnout, student apathy toward the SA runs rampant. Make no mistake, our community faces problems that demand action, but a question emerges: should Rice’s premier student government body still be framed as the main conduit for change? Put another way, is it time for a controlled burn of the SA? Logically, two primary options exist: try to work from within the SA structure or invest our limited time, resources, etc. into alternative forms of activism. Although the two aren’t entirely mutually exclusive and I believe the SA has utility in certain situations, I generally believe Rice would be better off with a paradigm shift away from SA-centric activism. When the advice students receive from those in positions of authority is an almost automatic suggestion to write a non-binding SA resolution, Rice’s activist culture — or lack thereof — shouldn’t come as much of a surprise. After all, most SA legislation, despite requiring weeks of work and bureaucracy, fails to materialize into tangible change. University administration rarely implements SA recommendations. Perhaps lackluster internal and external
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SA engagement isn’t the underlying illness, as the Thresher Editorial Board implied several weeks ago, but a mere symptom of an organization with intrinsic limitations. Take what is arguably the SA’s crown jewel achievement this year: a successful attempt to make the 2024 presidential Election Day a non-instructional day. I fully support this measure, but does the type of change the SA can create come anywhere close to matching the material
Maybe the SA fizzling out of relevancy isn’t the crisis some claim it to be, but a welcome opportunity to transform activist discourse at Rice. impact of other activist organizations? Rice Mutual Aid, for example, has collected and distributed tens of thousands of dollars to low-income students. (I should add that, unlike the SA, RMA has accomplished this feat without the public platform of aroundthe-clock Thresher coverage). Similarly, there are countless ways to get involved beyond the hedges. While activism for many at Rice starts — and stops — at fruitless voting initiatives (a topic that could take up a whole article by itself), Houston is full of groups engaged in direct action and community organizing. The Houston Tenants Union has helped secure life-changing housing rights victories. The Houston Abolitionist Collective, to name another, builds community safety beyond the prisonindustrial complex through educational events and materials, mutual aid, etc.
ricethresher.org It’s time for Rice to be serious about its climate pledges
Yet seemingly everywhere, from residential college emails to the pages of the Thresher, we repeatedly center the SA as the go-to agent of change. This is all the more troubling considering how activist resources are, by and large, zero-sum: every hour devoted to an SA resolution or committee directly trades off with an hour that could have been spent on other endeavors. Not only that, imagine if the spotlight the SA receives was redirected to the wonderful grassroots organizing work being done by activists outside of student government. Such a shift in focus might encourage other students, seeing desires to make an impact become actualized, to join these more meaningful and effective efforts. If the fundamental goal of activism is to leave our community in a better place than we found it, one of the first steps is determining which mechanisms and institutions can or can’t bring about the changes we want to create. Maybe the SA fizzling out of relevancy isn’t the crisis some claim it to be, but a welcome opportunity to transform activist discourse at Rice. Students losing faith in the SA isn’t some enigmatic phenomenon; it’s the natural progression of an organization whose design was always going to let us down—the natural fire cycle at work, if you will. It’s time to move on and allocate our activist resources elsewhere. It’s time to embrace a controlled burn.
Tyler Kinzy
WIESS COLLEGE SOPHOMORE
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CORRECTIONS The crossword “Making a Racquet” was written by Jayaker Kolli and Subash Jagadeesan.
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