BY FLORI NEEDLE ’20
Mount Holyoke’s stated goal in renovating Blanchard is to create a space in which intellectual and social interactions can happen at once. According to the Mount Holyoke website, most of the $50 million renovations will be completed in the spring of 2018. However, some of the changes to Blanchard happened over the summer of 2017.
BY LINDSEY MCGINNIS ’18
100 years ago on Oct. 3, 1917, Mary E. Aplin, class of 1918, printed the first ever issue of Mount Holyoke News with the help of Business Manager Catherine McCausland, class of 1918, and a small team of staff and reporters. A publication called “The Mount Holyoke” had previously taken on the mantle of both alumnae and campus news, to the dissatisfaction of most students.
BY EILEEN O’GRADY ’18
Ralph Nader, tall and stoop-shouldered in his pinstripe suit, leaned both hands on the borrowed podium set up in the cozy sitting room of professor Christopher Pyle’s house in South Hadley last Wednesday evening. A group of 15 students perched on a collection of sofas and dining room chairs in a lamplit circle around him, their gazes fixed on the 83-year old political activist with rapt attention.
BY HALEY ROBINSON ’17
Carolina Rivadeneira ’16 is the perfect example of a Mount Holyoke graduate who has translated their academic and cocurricular work into a full-time career. Rivadeneira, born in Ecuador and raised in Miami, chose Mount Holyoke for its interdisciplinary academic offerings and longstanding feminist history.
BY MICHALA SAWYER ’17
Passover, known as Pesach in Hebrew, is an eight-day celebration of the freedom from slavery of the Israelites in Egypt. It is observed by keeping kosher, avoiding anything leavened and participating in the seder meals, which include four cups of wine, matzah, bitter herbs and retelling the Exodus narrative. Eating on campus can potentially be difficult for Jewish students observing Passover. To avoid leaven, or chametz in Hebrew, students have to avoid pasta, bread, cake, cookies, cereal, pizza and most alcoholic beverages, which make up some essential meals for college students.
BY HALEY ROBINSON '17
This week’s spotlight shines on Camille Coklow ‘16. Born and raised in Chicago, Illinois, Coklow’s father was the driving force behind her interest in Mount Holyoke. “[He] really wanted me to attend a ‘pedigree’ institution and felt as though Mount Holyoke would be the perfect place for me,” Coklow shared.
BY MADELINE SKRAK '18
“It’s so weird that I never see any boys there,” says a young woman referring to the Mount Holyoke College campus, which is just 4 minutes away from where she works at the Cumberland Farms gas station and a half-mile drive from where she grew up in South Hadley. Her plastic nametag reads “Cortney.”
BY SHILOH FREDERICK '17
“Desserts with Sonya” doesn’t have quite the ring that “Nutella with Pasquerella” had, but Nancy Apple, the director of environmental health, safety and sustainability, hopes that a chance to dine with the head of the college will motivate students to actively participate in this year’s War of the Watts.
BY FLORI NEEDLE '20
Junior Show, or J-Show, is a time-honored tradition at Mount Holyoke College. According to materials from the Mount Holyoke Archives, it began in April 1901 and continued intermittently until 1921, save for one show in 1919 that did not occur because of World War I. J-Show originally had a different name, and was once called the Junior Play and Junior Vaudeville.
