Ben Cotton

Former Spectator staff share their experiences and thoughts before graduation. Today we hear from Ben Cotton, Akhil Mehta, and Thomas Rhiel.

Sunday morning, New York Times readers across the country faced a front-page profile of one female student's horrific experience with sexual assault at Columbia. Sexual assault has been in the spotlight since February, when the Blue and White published a story about Columbia's failure to properly adjudicate a repeat sexual assault offender. Two patterns have emerged in the dialogue since then. First: There is lack of accountability in the University's response to complaints. Second: There are flaws in student culture around consent. Perpetrators, the direct cause of sexual assault, are products of our very own Columbia community and culture. Columbians can and should hold University administrators accountable for their failures, but we also must take ownership of Columbia's culture around consent and support for survivors.

See photos on Darkroom.

With a 38-0 road thrashing of Princeton Saturday afternoon, the Columbia football team kicked off its Ivy campaign on a winning note for the first time since 2003.

It was a win for the ages for the Lions (2-1, 1-0 Ivy), who hadn't pitched a shutout in Ivy League play since 1998 and hadn't done so in an Ivy road game since 1961. Only its fourth win ever at Princeton, the game marked Columbia's largest margin of victory ever against the Tigers.

Senior quarterback M.A. Olawale led the Lions on offense, throwing touchdown passes to wide receivers Austin Knowlin and Mike Stephens. He also scored on the ground to provide the game's first points, putting Columbia up 6-0 midway through the first quarter.

Senior cornerback Jared Morine proved to be the game-changer again with his second interception in three games, running a Tommy Wornham pass back 51 yards for a touchdown to turn Columbia's 9-0 halftime lead into a 17-point advantage with 9:44 to go in the third quarter.

The Lions blew the game open in the fourth quarter, putting Princeton away with two touchdowns through the air and a third on the ground from junior running back Leon Ivery.

More photos on Darkroom.

I signed up for this year's Fun Run on a whim. I'd intended to do it freshman year, but didn't realize early registration was required until it was too late.

Last year, I was deterred by an 8 a.m. wake-up call on a day when I could have otherwise slept until noon. But a week before the event this year, my co-editor, a serious runner for whom this race is akin to a footnote, hollered across the office, "Yo, you doing PrezBo's Fun Run?"

That's when I decided I couldn't back down.

It's not as if I can't run. In fact, during each of the last five summers, I've done a triathlon that requires running a 5K after swimming half a mile and biking 15. I had not, however, run much at all in the month since this year's triathlon, nor had I ever run in a race after working in a newspaper office until the wee hours of the morning.

In an attempt to squeeze out every last possible drop of sleep, I set my alarm with the intention of getting up at 8:25 a.m. The announced start time was 8:30. There was no chance, I figured, that a race involving several hundred bleary-eyed college students was going to start on time.

At 8:35, I showed up on College Walk and found nothing but a few race volunteers, some discarded water cups, and a few other students hastily pinning number bibs onto their shirts and looking around, bewildered. We looked at each other, shrugged, and started to run.

I've run in Riverside Park many, many times, but I realized once I was there that I had no idea which way the runners had gone. Amid rising panic, I shouted a plea for help to a couple sitting on a bench alongside Riverside Drive. They pointed and urged us on, and we thus descended at a sprint into the park.

Luckily, some partake in the Fun Run with the intention of walking, so it wasn't long before I caught up to a group of stragglers. In fact, for a while, I felt pretty good—I was passing people left and right, and no one was passing me.

Unfortunately, this was not to last. Barely halfway to the turnaround point, I began to pass dozens of runners already on the way back, including President Bollinger himself. My suitemate, a member of the track team and thus a volunteer along the course, ribbed me both times I passed him for being so far back. And, as I knew would happen but still tried to stave off, running the first mile at a breakneck pace on little training and even less sleep meant that with about a mile to go, I hit the wall. Hard.

So, two days later, my quads are still sore from suffering through that last mile, and I still wish I'd dragged myself out of bed at 8:20 so I could have measured myself against Columbia's finest.

Next year, I will. Consider my competitive drive fueled.

Student Affairs has just released a statement announcing interim suspensions for the Alpha Epsilon Pi, Pi Kappa Alpha, and Psi Upsilon fraternities on Columbia's campus stemming from the NYPD's recent arrests of several members allegedly involved in illegal drug activity in their 114th street brownstones. Recruitment, initiation, and social events must all cease immediately as part of this suspension, and the national chapters for each fraternity have been notified. Full email from Dean Kevin Shollenberger after the jump.more

We've written about the dorms, the cutoff history, things to remember, and offered a calculator for pinpointing room possibilities in General Selection. But now that lottery numbers are public, we start to move away from conjecture and toward real number-crunching. So here we go—The Shaft's complete 2011 lottery number breakdown, split up by point value and then by group size, after the jump.more There's a lot here, so if you get through it all and have questions, let us know in the comments. And if you think you've found a mistake, please let us know—we've been staring at these numbers for hours on end. The old caveats—our tallies for suites available are based on the cutoff history numbers (with a few exceptions) and with some adjustments made for space held out of the lottery. Housing tells us that these numbers stand to be the ones that go up on the infamous whiteboard next week for selection, but we've seen in the past that sometimes other suites get held back at the last minute. If you're right around a likely cutoff, be prepared with alternate options. Also, we make reference several times below to groups going in as a certain size maybe doing so to pick into an RA suite—we'll have a separate post later this week explaining how that works. (In short, a six-person suite that has an RA and his or her rider in two of the six spots can be selected by a four-person group for the other four spots, usually friends of the RA. A six-person group can't pick there.) It's also nearly impossible to get a whole lot more regarding General Selection out of this data because that depends so, so much on how many people drop down from Suite Selection, which is why we've stuck to analysis of that round here. We'll have more on General Selection as we get closer to it, though. (Also, if you are—for whatever reason—curious as to how this breakdown compares to last year's, here's the one from 2010.) 30-point groups These are groups made up entirely of rising seniors. Six-person groups: Only 36 groups of this size this year, which is a marked decrease from the 47 that entered last year (only for the extras to have to drop to Senior Regroup). With the 40 East Campus townhouses cut to 28 after several are held out, plus seven EC six-person high rise suites, nearly all the groups of this size will get into EC. Pairing up is always the safest option, and it looks like a large number of seniors decided that was the way to go this year. (Advance prediction for next year—memories of this year's drop bring a fresh resurgence of six-person groups.) Cutoffs will depend on preference and whether any last-minute suites are held out (two from the high rise line were held out on lottery day, last year). But this looks promising right now. The high rise number may rise to 30/1000 or so (UPDATE: or even towards 30/500 if groups REALLY prefer these to townhouses this year) with every floor now renovated. The all-singles townhouse number likely won't change much from the 30/1700 range will actually get a little bit easier (anywhere from 30/2000 to 30/2500 or thereabouts depending on preferences), and the number for six-person townhouses with a double could scrape the bottom of the 30-point barrel. If some of the groups down there opt to go to Regroup rather than take a townhouse with a double, it's not out of the realm of possibility that a lucky six-person group could snag the last one in the Regroup round, something that would have been unthinkable last year (and surely will be next year again). Probably not likely, though. UPDATE: One of these groups will also grab the lone all-single six-person suite on the top floor of Hogan. Five-person groups: There are 47 groups like this, up from 31 last year. That's likely due to the elimination of the EC Exclusion rule—last year, there were also 23 ECX groups with a 30-point value. But it's a bit surprising so many seniors opted to make this the risk they're willing to take—there are only seven all-single five-person high rises in EC, and 10 fives in Hogan. (The 16th group is 30/969, so if another one of these suites isn't available for whatever reason, the cutoff could be worse than 30/1000 for both options—if not, it falls back to 30/1391 or shortly thereafter.) That's going to leave as many as 30 groups of seniors forced to decide whether they're willing to swallow a tiny double in a former-ECX suite rather than drop to Regroup. Again, the seniors in six-person groups should jump for joy that so many people went in this direction—very clear now that the six-person route would have been a better gamble for several more groups. With 56 former ECX suites, a fairly healthy chunk will probably be axed here (although with the huge number of 30-point pairs, there may not be many better options, so perhaps an extremely healthy chunk—see below), but a few should still eventually drop to groups with lower point values. Four-person groups: 58 of these—exactly the same number as last year. After accounting for RAs, though, it looks like there'll only be THREE of these suites available in Ruggles (cut from eight), 13 in Hogan (cut from 16), six in EC townhouses (cut from 10), and six in Claremont. That means the first three of those options are likely ALL off the board by 30/1100 or so, and Claremont (assuming it goes after Ruggles/Hogan/EC) as early as 30/1300 or so. An awful lot of four-point groups should get ready to drop to Regroup, where they'll just add to the huge number of 30-point pairs. Three-person groups: Only one of these. With only three Claremont threes available after RAs take out three of the six, this is good news for groups of three later on. Two-person groups: A mind-boggling 119 pairs! Last year, we only had 84. So that's the 11 Watt two-bedroom apartments (anywhere from 30/593 to 30/1000, depending on preference, as sometimes the one on the first floor hangs on for a while), all 25 EC two-person flats (after removing 10 for RAs and such), and then—wait for it—LITERALLY ALL OF WOODBRIDGE. OK, not quite. But there are only 78 suites in Woodbridge (after removing the three for RAs). At the very least, we can probably bet that the cutoff for high-demand lines H, K, and I will shoot up toward 30/1500 or so (depending on the preference between that and EC, and whether some people decide medium-demand lines on higher floors in Woodbridge are preferable), and the EC flats cutoff may do the same. But probably all of the medium-demand lines will go to 30-point groups as well, and the dozen Watt one-bedroom apartments may go, too (last year, both of those were available for 25-point groups, and the Watt one-bedrooms even held for lucky 20-point groups). And that still doesn't add up to 119! Seniors coming out of groups of four will eat up more of Woodbridge in Regroup, too. Rising juniors who were banking on Woodbridge, even with a good lottery number, may be out of luck. The result of all this may be that many seniors decide a former-ECX suite isn't so bad, after all. 20-30-point groups These are groups with students from multiple years, mostly combined junior-senior groups, but also some with several seniors and a sophomore or two shooting for former-ECX suites. Eight-person groups: Eight Seven of these—bravo! A Shaft standing ovation for the groups of juniors that finally realized that by offering the singles in the eight-person Ruggles suites to seniors, they could guarantee their own entry. These folks will likely snap up the pair of Ruggles suites with four singles (and two doubles), and then the first six eights with two singles (and three doubles). Six-person groups: Three of these—they're probably off to the best of the Ruggles six-person suites. The Shaft again applauds the wisdom of pulling in a senior or two to guarantee this. Five-person groups: If all 30 five-person 30-point groups that don't get an all-singles option decide that former-ECX suites are the best bet, and then a lot more seniors decide in Regroup that they'd rather go here than take a lesser Woodbridge suite or chance General Selection with a mediocre number, these groups could run out of luck in a hurry. There are enough seniors to eat up ALL of the former-ECX suites, with some to spare. Will that happen? Probably not. There are 14 five-person groups with a point value of 24 or better (but less than 30). That would be about the same number of groups that got ECX last year with a sub-30 point value, so maybe that happens again this year. No guarantees, though. Four-person groups: Three of these, maybe headed into RA suites—shouldn't be anything else left. Otherwise, General Selection. Three-person groups: Another one of these here. Claremont, again, if not an RA suite. Two-person groups: Fourteen groups here, and for them we shed a tear. This used to be a safe bet for a decent Woodbridge suite or a Watt one-bedroom apartment, but probably not anymore. It's likely going to be the last of the remaining Woodbridge suites or maybe a stray Watt one-bedroom (depending on the choices of people in Regroup—there are enough 30-pointers that these could pretty much all be gone), or dropping to General Selection (assuming a double elsewhere, such as a Watt studio double is unpalatable). 20-point groups These are groups made up entirely of rising juniors. Eight-person groups: This might get ugly. Looks like there are only going to be six eight-person suites remaining here, so the cutoff might be as early as 20/1178 or 20/1185, depending on whether a group decides to drop down somewhere. Last year, this cutoff was 20/2014—brutal. There'll be an awful lot of juniors stampeding into General Selection. (With this in mind, there's probably a decent chance that Housing implements a Junior Pair-Up option for next year, similar to Sophomore Pair-Up as it now exists, because it seems a bit unfair for so many juniors to be forced into General Selection without any other options.) Seven-person groups: Five of these, which is a new one—last year, there wasn't just a single seven-person group made up entirely of juniors. With people anticipating the growing difficulty of getting into Ruggles, this probably shouldn't be a big surprise. Claremont sevens go to these groups if they want them. Six-person groups: A dozen groups in this boat—people shooting for the Ruggles sixes after last year's juniors allowed one of these to slip down to sophomores. No more. Looks like two of these are being held out for RAs and such, which would leave six, so with three possibly gone to mixed-point groups already, the cutoff here might be as soon as 20/398. If not there because someone drops, 20/1088 or one of the couple of groups shortly thereafter. UPDATE: It could be that one of these groups also gets the six-person suite on the first floor of Harmony—that might go earlier, but a lot of people don't want to deal with the walk to Harmony. Consider that a wild card. Five-person groups: The seven groups here were probably hoping for former-ECX suites. Doesn't look promising, but you never know. Otherwise, General Selection. Four-person groups: Ten more groups here—unless they're heading for an RA suite, not going to be any choice but General Selection. Three-person groups: Eight groups, which likely means several planning on RA suites, and probably the last Claremont three-person suite somewhere in here. (That remains the most difficult cutoff number to predict every year.) Two-person groups: There are 76 of these groups, which is not an insane number, but it's tough to predict where they'll end up. We're guessing that there won't be anything from Woodbridge left, which means all 54 Watt studio doubles could go, along with the best from anywhere else—Nussbaum, probably. The eight doubles in the 113th Street brownstone also went here last year—probably a good bet that happens again. UPDATE: Perhaps the lone walkthrough double in River goes here, too—that's a wild card, though. 10-20-point groups These are more mixed-point groups, mostly combined sophomores and juniors. Seven-person groups: With five more Claremont sevens likely available, the cutoff number looks like 14.29/1917. That's tougher than last year—it's possible that some group drops and another group or two sneaks in here, but the 11.43-point groups that got in here last year are probably out of luck this time around. Four/five/six-person groups: Lumping these few groups together because unless they have an eye on a specific RA suite, it's almost certainly straight to General Selection. UPDATE: Two person-groups: Just four of these. They'll likely grab Watt studio doubles if there are any left (doubtful, it seems)—if not, they'll start the run on doubles elsewhere (see below—Nussbaum, maybe). 10-point groups These are groups made up entirely of rising sophomores. Seven-person groups: Nine of these groups that were perhaps praying for a Claremont seven-person suite to fall—those days are long gone, unfortunately. Instead, it's the tricky navigation of which individual drops to General Selection while the other six people pick rooms in Sophomore Pair-Up (or perhaps the whole group drops to General Selection). All the rest: Pairs and groups of eight (19 of those), six (33), five (6), four (29), and three (6) are in the same boat here. It's possible that some of the groups of six, in particular, were hoping a large suite would fall, as one of the Ruggles ones did last year. Nothing wrong with that strategy—were it to happen, you'd be sitting pretty, and you can use Sophomore Pair-Up so you aren't any worse off than if you'd entered as pairs to start. Regardless, doesn't look like any large suite will be available once the 10-point round comes around. With 99 groups entered as pairs already, we might have as many as 350 groups of two picking in the 10-point round (if every large group split up and picked as part of Sophomore Pair-Up rather than dropping to General Selection, which is unlikely). Where these groups go is anyone's guess since it depends so much on personal preference—every dorm has its pluses and minuses, and the best rooms in a less-desirable dorm are still probably better than the worst rooms in a desirable one. Assuming Watt is totally gone this year (last year, it wasn't), Nussbaum and Broadway are usually the next priority—it's possible some of those will be taken by juniors this time around, though, as we said above. In that case, McBain may have the most desirable rooms to start, especially because with so many on each floor it's the easiest place for a group of friends trying to stick together to all get neighboring rooms. Once those are gone, it's more from Broadway and Nussbaum, and some from Schapiro. The set of doubles on the sixth floor of EC will go to a group of pairs at some point, likely one with a middling number. And Harmony and Wien will probably bring up the rear, although people who live in either place like to defend them (so don't rule them out based on popular perception). That's all we've got. As always, hope you enjoyed all of this—more to come later this week on various intricacies in the process mentioned above but not fully spelled out. Again, questions in the comments welcome—we'll answer everything we can and update this post if necessary.

First, mad props in order! Bwog had lots of super-cool tidbits about lots of different dorms yesterday. We listed common registration pratfalls and how to avoid them. Now, we're delving back into the lottery, and going dorm-by-dorm with the lowdown on who's likely to get in where during the suite selection scrum. Lots to say here, so, three parts! The second to come later today, the third tomorrow.more You can use the cutoff history here as a reference, if you need it. But we'll list everything relevant to save you the trouble of jumping back and forth--numbers in parentheses are cutoffs, from last year if nothing else stated. In some cases, the history's pretty self-explanatory. But in other cases, things are a little bit more complicated. (And, note, again, "junior" means rising junior, not current junior, and so on.) One overarching point--the more housing cuts up suites (e.g. an all-single suite becomes one that includes a tiny double, singles get cut into doubles in corridor-living situations, etc.), the more the value of suites that have gone untouched rises. In other words, don't expect suite options that have gotten significantly more difficult over the last couple of years to suddenly get easier. And lastly, don't forget that RA riders can throw a wrench into any of the suite counts. 600 W 113th (aka Nussbaum): Doubles pretty straightforward--if you want one as a sophomore pair, you can just about have it (10/2746). Groups willing to take a chance can enter as several pairs and try to all pick into the same Nussbaum "suite" (which is not really a suite, but rather a lot of rooms that are picked into independently but share a kitchen/bathrooms). BEWARE the walkthroughs (10/2437)--in many cases, the entry room is the tiny room, which is pretty lousy for that occupant. 47 Claremont: This one's weird because it has so many odd suites. The easiest to decipher are the sevens--they made a huge jump in popularity last year (from 10/1224 to 11.43/2396) and for the first time were untouchable by all-sophomore 10-point groups. Expect that to continue this year--only groups with at least one junior will get these. The others are toss-ups.  The threes vacillate (20/154 last year, 20/2686 the year before), and since they're the only threes on campus, a few unusual entries (seniors with one willing to take the tiny single?) can throw this off. Safe if you're a senior, risky otherwise. The fours are the same--last year, for the first time, they went to all-senior groups (30/2282), likely because one of the lines of Ruggles fours was cut out and thus seniors missing out had no choice but to go here. That'll probably happen again--a real drag for them, as the one tiny single makes this option inferior to EC, Ruggles, and Hogan The single five-person and six-person suite? Your guess is as good as ours. Might be the saving grace for sophomores or juniors that took a shot with a group this size and saw all other options swallowed up. Broadway: Big doubles rising in popularity as McBain's walkthroughs and big doubles are chopped up bit by bit--went as low as 10/675 last year (though the year before was 10/2134, and the year before that was 10/1066, so don't take this number to the bank). But you'll need a great number to get this as a sophomore. The small doubles are, as always, available (10/2912). East Campus: Where to start? Everyone wants to live in EC. And if you're a senior, you can! Everything four, five (except EC Exclusion--see below), or six is going to all-senior 30-point groups. The four-person townhouses last year turned into the most popular suites on campus, cutting off at 30/301(!). So if you're in as a four and gunning for EC, there's a good chance you'll have to "settle" for Hogan or Ruggles. Five-person highrises are also tough (30/1023).  The other options have remained fairly consistent the last couple of years, so your chances are good but hardly a cinch for a six-person highrise (30/1466), two-person flat (30/1883), six-person townhouse with all singles (30/1804), or six-person townhouse with one double (30/2535). The oddity here is the sixth-floor doubles (10/2815), which are all alone on a floor with the EC Hotel, and probably will drop again to sophomores. East Campus Exclusion: Three years ago, an all-junior group or two snuck in here (20/303). Two years ago, groups with four juniors and one senior still had a decent chance (23.33/1236). Last year, it was three juniors and two seniors needed (26.67/2547). This year...might it get worse? The only way to be safe here is to have three seniors and two juniors, and thus a 30-point group value. Stay tuned for Part 2! And let questions abound.

Suite Selection is actually over (in case anybody expecting this post last night was wondering if we'd discovered another day). It's been quite a ride, from mysteries surrounding EC townhouses and exclusion suites to Ruggles sixes lasting days longer than they ever should have, to most pairs in this round actually avoiding the shaft—if you missed it, check out the archives here.more We still have some other fun stuff to come, in addition to more on General Selection, yes, as promised. We're waiting for all the numbers to be available for a full breakdown (sometime in the next few days, hopefully)—and while it's harder than with Suite Selection because there aren't group sizes to give hints as to individual intentions, we'll give it everything we've got left. Questions about any and all things Housing still welcome in the comments.

It's been a long three months since the last Shaft entry, but a question in the comments of that very post has prompted an investigation into the infamous Summer Waitlist. more What have we turned up? Not much, unfortunately—the waitlist and transfers and basically everything that goes on during the summer is undoubtedly the most secretive part of the Housing process (well, except for EC townhouse drama, perhaps). Housing tells us that first-year assignments went out last week, while Sophomores should be getting their new assignments this week, if all goes as planned. As the lottery wound down in the spring, we received repeated questions as to likely outcomes for people seeking to better their dorm fortunes during the summer. And we were constantly frustrated by a lack of information—Housing had no comprehensive list of all the assignments and changes made last summer, and as a result we didn't have much to offer. So, let us know in the comments or by email if you've received a new assignment or transfer or if you've heard of others in that boat. (We've already heard of one group that missed out on EC initially and had to split up suddenly getting a reprieve when a suite was vacated.) We'll stow away notes in preparation for next year. That's all for the moment. If we unearth a treasure trove of waitlist details, rest assured we'll be back with as many thousands of words as we can muster to help alleviate summer boredom—we've been suffering from withdrawal. But for now, back to hibernation.

We've gotten a veritable avalanche of questions about this. A lot of it can't really be answered definitively, but what follows here is our best guess. The short answer: Not much. Relax!more What are they doing with those brownstones next year? Previously, Student Affairs said: "The rooms in the brownstones will become part of general assignment for the 2011-2012 academic year, after the undergraduate housing lottery takes place. (In other words, the rooms will not be included in the housing lottery for the upcoming year. Beyond that, it's simply too early to comment.)" Who's going to live there, then? According to a spokesperson from Student Affairs, the rooms "would first be assigned to individual students who are guaranteed housing but who were not part of the housing lottery system. This may have been for any number of reasons." What sort of reasons might those be? And again, who's actually going to live there? That's all we've got right now for official specifics. A decision on what to do with the brownstones naturally comes after a decision on the frats, so it seems like a detailed allocation of this space is up in the air and may be for some time. But there are a number of possibilities. The first thing that's important to remember is that Housing doesn't match the exact number of rooms it has to the exact number of students in the lottery. There's a great deal of flexibility built in to deal with necessary room transfers, unexpected yield rates, and the like. It doesn't appear that they're adding as many rooms this year via renovations or additional buildings as they did last year (when there were renovations to McBain and Ruggles, and the new brownstone on 113th) or the year before (Harmony). This might mean that they'll ultimately use this space to maintain the flexibility they were going to lose. They just aren't including these buildings in the initial lottery. They could hold the space for transfer students. Perhaps they'll grant additional special interest or disability housing requests. They may need extra rooms for students who plan to go abroad for fall semester but return next spring (who thus aren't eligible for the lottery). What then might this do to the lottery itself? Probably not much. Will there be a few extra students in the mix this year (either non-seniors being kicked out of their brownstones or those who were planning to move in there)? Probably. But there aren't really that many students that live in these places---15 or 20 apiece, maybe. So perhaps 50 or so extra entrants into the lottery, probably in groups to try to continue to live together. Does this hurt your odds a little bit if you're a group of six gunning for an EC townhouse? Maybe, but it's unlikely to be a huge difference. If you're worried and really want to be safe, go in as pairs---that hasn't changed. Plus, if other students are moved to these brownstones, that might offset whatever shift this causes. If you know more, feel free to let us know. Much more on dorms and housing rules coming in the run-up to Spring Break.