Chicago Journal

On the quads

Vice President and Dean of Students Steve Klass has recommended to President Don M. Randel the decommissioning of Shoreland residence hall. The 650 lost beds, Klass said, would be incorporated into “the next phase of residence hall construction,” which administrators plan to build closer to the campus center. (See “End of an era?” December/03)....

Meanwhile, student life goes on. A new undergrad magazine, Vita Excolatur, adds erotica to U of C rag bins. Including literature, poetry, and drawings, the publication aims to “remind” Chicago students “that we are, in fact, sexual and attractive people,” editor and third-year “Stephen T.” told the Maroon, “and that sex and sexuality are not bad things and should in no way be taboo.” But in an April letter to the Maroon, first-year Liz Egan noted that the editors’ “unwillingness to associate their names with this magazine detracts from the legitimacy of their words.”...

A new online publication, the Chicago Quill (www.chicagoquill.com), explores politics, culture, and the arts—and is edited by Magazine intern Phoebe Maltz, ‘05, who in the April 4 edition slammed the low-carb craze in favor of the “nerdkins diet,” including “the classic pairing of Twix and Diet Coke.”...

Diving directly into politics, two U of C College Republicans won Hyde Park offices in March. Grace Lin, ’06, and Christopher Coordes, ‘05, both economics and mathematics concentrators, were elected 20th Ward and 5th Ward GOP committeemen, respectively. Lin told the Hyde Park Herald that she and Coordes were approached by city Republicans to run, and that newly elected Chicago GOP chair Clark Pellet funded their campaigns....

Political science and law, letters, & society concentrator Indivar Dutta-Gupta, ‘05, won a $26,000 Harry S. Truman scholarship, given each year to no more than 80 U.S. students poised to aid humanity through public-service careers. Dutta-Gupta, who cofounded the University’s American Civil Liberties Union and Men in Service chapters, plans to do human-rights work in D.C. and abroad, study international affairs in graduate school, and eventually enter the government’s executive branch.—A.M.B.