This week, many undergraduates received their first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine in Lerner Hall. With the recent addition of individuals 16 and older to the eligibility pool for COVID-19 vaccines, almost the entire Columbia community is now eligible to be vaccinated against COVID-19.

As Columbia students prepared for another virtual semester in the midst of a global pandemic, many in California shouldered an extra burden: destructive, all-consuming wildfires that have ravaged over four million acres of land since the beginning of the year. And while natural disasters have turned innumerable lives upside down in the past year, wildfires have made an already confusing first year of college even more so for the class of 2024.

As of March 1, most local businesses will no longer supply plastic bags in compliance with New York state’s “Bag Waste Reduction” ban, which prohibits any establishment that collects state sales tax from distributing plastic carryout bags. But despite admitted benefits of long-term environmental impacts, local residents and businesses alike have voiced concerns about financial and operational issues.