Spring Break
The Coalition United for Free Speech (CUFFS) held a Free Speech Forum on April 16 in SU-214, and the room was packed with a variety of student interest groups. The forum addressed the ongoing issue of free speech rights and restrictions on the Northeastern Illinois University (NEIU) campus. At an earlier Town Hall meeting, President Hahs had been invited to attend the forum by the leaders of CUFFS, to which she agreed only on the condition that she could be one of the speakers.
The forum began with John K. Wilson, five-time author and founder of CollegeFreedom.org, who spoke on the problems experienced by students on campuses all over the country in regards to their free speech rights.
Que Ondee Sola and the Union for Puerto Rican Students brought ex-Puerto Rican prisoners Ida Luz Rodriguez and Luis Rosa Perez who came to school to discuss the reasons for their imprisonment and the crimes brought on from the U.S. government against Puerto Ricans efforts to become separate from the United States.
Rodriguez and Perez described their imprisonment as being a psychological game, "They (guards) would log our every movement, every movement, then they would hold us in shackles, legs and arms; we had to be cuffed whenever we left the cell and lead around by two guards. We were treated as serial killers...
As a writer, the things I know about the Olympics are relatively simple: buff bods, sports, wholesomeness and gorgeous figure skating. The only person I know personally who ever had anything to do with the Olympics is my friend, the great Poet Laureate of Ohio, Lonna Kingsbury. She was given the honor of carrying the Olympic torch one year.
Simple. That is, until my teenage son turned up an Expendable Youth song entitled "2016" and said, "Hey Mom! Listen to this!"
On Wednesday, April 8 a rare event happened for Jews around the world, one that happens only once every 29 years. It is known as "Birkat Hachamah", or the blessing of the sun, and it occurs when the sun reaches the exact place in the sky where, tradition explains, it was when it was first created.
"On Drawing," exhibited in the Northeastern Illinois University (NEIU) Fine Arts building, room FA-217 from April 13-24, thrusts against all conventions of drawing with its eclectic array of artwork created by the students of Professor Rafael Vera's Advanced Drawing class. This art exhibit was also organized by one of his students, making this exhibition a much more personal one.
This was student Stefan Carrera's first time being a curator of an exhibit. "I don't like being the center of attention," said Carrera. Chosen to be the lead by Vera, he was responsible for choosing the best out of three submissions from each student. On April 12, Carrera planned and organized the layout of the exhibit. "It allows me to take a step back from creating artwork and focus on the establishing of a coherent gallery composition," said Carrera. "I now have more respect for curators and their work."