Amelia Vinton ’23: Andover needs to take a stand against the fossil fuels industry. Making a commitment to divestment will strengthen the fight and encourage other schools and organizations to do the same. Andover can be a leader in fighting the climate crisis, and that’s why we need to divest.
Ginny Marshall ’25: Salt belongs in chocolate milk. The salt balances out the sweetness of the chocolate milk. But it has to be a moderately sized pinch. More than that, it doesn’t work. But once you try it, you’ll think to yourself, “This is what I have been missing all along.”
Robby Swan ’25: Chewing ice is worth breaking your teeth for. As someone who has braces, I know that in every crunch I am probably dislodging a bracket, but will that stop me? Absolutely not. Ice is low-calorie and satisfies my need for something crunchy.
Alyssa Schoonmaker ’26: Frozen pizza is better than room temperature pizza. Room temperature pizza is plain and feels stale. I’d take frozen pizza, in the fridge overnight, over any pizza that’s been sitting out on the kitchen table for a few hours too long.
Kashvi Ramani ’24: Music is best listened to at full volume. You heard me, FULL. As you jerk the lever into reverse and rev the engine, work into your routine, blast your favorite music from every speaker as the car vibrates with the electricity of the vibe. You’ll find you (and your likely illegal passengers pre-official license) bumping along to the beat. But this musical insistence shouldn’t be constrained to late-night car rides. Even when crammed into Silent on a busy weekend or gliding up a ski lift before cascading back down the mountain, the music you love deserves to be worshiped at its fullest. So tune out the world around you, shut off the lights, and sing along to a song playing so loudly you can’t hear your own voice.
Sinan Muratoglu ’24: It’s not that divestment is necessarily a bad thing to do, it’s just that it doesn’t really do anything. It’s a form of virtue signaling, which isn’t a terrible move, but it’s not very valuable to the cause of helping the environment. Even if every educational institution was divested, it would barely put a dent in the valuation of any publicly traded fossil fuel companies, and market pressures alongside the massive revenues of these companies would quickly correct this dent. Divestment would not affect the actions of fossil fuel companies. If you really care about “a greener blue,” spend money on things that will matter. Using renewable energy to power our campus would give money directly to companies that are developing renewable systems of energy that will someday become more cost-effective and efficient than oil, gas, or coal.
James Davis PG’23: This month will mark the first year of the invasion of Ukraine by Russia. Or, should I say, the proxy war of the US against Russia. I cannot stand the hypocritical outcry of the bourgeois media anymore. Russia would be a “terrorist state” ruled by a psychopath, while the Ukrainian regime is funded by the most damaging empire that has ever existed on Earth — the US, if you were still wondering. Even so-called left-wing people are fooled by imperialist propaganda, praising a Ukrainian nationalism rotten with far-right elements and its corrupt leader. Why has everyone lost their ability to use their brain? I can tell you why so many people turned from pacifists to supporters of a nonsensical bloodshed. Because Russia is considered a rival, an enemy by the US, it will therefore use all its media apparatus to shape people’s minds in its own interests. The US — and its military contractors — needed, wanted and provoked this war.
Gloria Chen ’24: Conceptually, hoarding physical items is no different from taking digital photos on your phone. Why do I get so much backlash when I say I hoard on pencil cases? The way our library books are organized is quite unfavorable for leisure reading. Instead of being organized by genre, the books are organized by author in alphabetical order. On the second floor at least, picking up a random thriller shouldn’t be this hard. Humans used to be so much more grounded to the Earth than we are today. Now, nature has become a decoration.
Michelle Fang ’24: I think the highest percentage a major should be in an overall grade is ten percent. I’ve had so many majors that are worth 20 or 30 percent of my grade, and at that point I just have too much anxiety to enjoy learning at all. Additionally, I think homework and participation should be 50 percent and quizzes/labs/majors should be the rest. Homework and participation are just as important as the results of a major in showing that you’re understanding the work. In fact, nowadays I’ve gotten into the habit of cramming everything from a unit to the week right before a test and, at the end of the day, I retain nothing. At my old school this was how grades were formatted; I liked learning a lot more and actually retained knowledge.
