VOLUME 109, ISSUE NO. 19 | STUDENT-RUN SINCE 1916 | RICETHRESHER.ORG | WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 26, 2025
Championship waters at Rice: Swim and dive win conference championship in dive’s first year KATHLEEN ORTIZ
SPORTS EDITOR
When senior Mimi Filkin touched the wall as the anchor of the 400-freestyle relay, she had no idea why her team was cheering so loudly. The relay had finished fourth. Assistant coach Lauren Hurt ’24 started to cry and ran over to hug head coach Seth Huston. On the pool deck, other Rice swimmers were cheering and jumping up and down. Filkin, though, was still in the pool. “I was so tired, my brain just wasn’t working,” Filkin said. “I was like, ‘Why is everyone so excited? We don’t even get a medal, we got fourth. Why is everyone so thrilled?’” It wasn’t until about two minutes later when senior Amelia Kane started to pull her out of the pool that Filkin realized they had won the conference championship.
Tobey runs unopposed for SA president, Flemister conducts write-in campaign Secretary position remains empty, while two others are uncontested
SOPHIE GARLICK
THRESHER STAFF
While his peers rushed to finish their college applications, James Shee pirouetted into a gap year, trading textbooks for tights to chase his dance dreams. “There was this one performance of a ballet called Giselle. I was sort of at the decision point,” said Shee, an assistant professor in Rice’s chemistry department. “It moved me so strongly and almost unexpectedly that I
AMELIA DAVIS / THRESHER
ASSISTANT COACH
SEE CHAMPIONSHIP PAGE 14
If you don’t have control over your body, you can’t really express some sort of feeling through movement. It’s the same if I don’t understand some nuts and bolts of some kind of theory. James Shee ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF CHEMISTRY
Everybody’s contributions the entire year all led to that moment. Lauren Hurt “Dude, we did it,” Kane told Filkin. “You did it. We won.” The relay team — also including junior Lily Cramer and freshmen Ava Portello and Reese Cole — earned 52 points, putting them 1.5 points ahead of Florida International University to win the meet. “With a margin of 1.5 points, you have to think that every single thing we did all year meant something,” Hurt said. “All of it added up, from what we did in September to that 400-free relay at the end. Everybody’s contributions the entire year all led to that moment.” Another key factor to this year’s American Athletic Conference championship was the addition of a dive team. In 2023, the team was fourth in the conference but outscored all teams in swimming points. In 2024, the Owls placed third overall, continuing to stay competitive even without diving points. In 2023 though, the AAC introduced team diving, where a team of three divers collectively does six total dives across the 1-meter, 3-meter and platform apparatuses. The points from the event, which became a scored part of the conference meet in 2024, count double, similar to swimming relays. “Almost 20% of the meet is diving,” Huston said. “You just can’t give up 20% of the meet and expect to just completely dominate the other 80%. The teams are just too diversified and good for that.” Rice had two divers this year: junior Rylee Coyne and graduate student Megan Phillip. Coyne and Phillip, along with sophomore swimmer Catherine Eland who dove in the team diving event to fulfill
From ballet shoes to beakers: James Shee bridges art and science
AMELIA DAVIS / THRESHER
JAMES CANCELARICH
ASST. NEWS EDITOR
Trevor Tobey is formally unopposed for Student Association president. If the Hanszen College junior is elected, this will be his fourth year in the SA, following terms as a new student representative, a senator and, most recently, parliamentarian. This is Tobey’s second presidential campaign, after his loss to Jae Kim last year. Callum Flemister is running against Tobey as a write-in candidate. The Duncan College junior and Senate outsider — Flemister has never held a position in the SA — stressed their leadership experience as they vie for student government’s highest office. Tobey, despite all his years in the SA, claimed to be no defender of the organization as it currently is. “I would not be running if I thought we were a great organization. [We] did great things — I’ve stayed in this because I know we can do better,” Tobey said in an interview with the Thresher. Tobey said that he believes his term as president could be the turning point for the SA. In the upcoming election, students will vote on a series of amendments that Tobey spearheaded as parliamentarian,
which, if approved, will significantly change the SA constitution. “The four constitutional amendments would constitute huge changes to the Student Association that would make it more representative, that would make it more accountable, more transparent and the same, I think, with my election,” Tobey said. Whether or not the amendments pass, Tobey said his next internal focus would be on the bylaws, which he described as contradictory with both the current constitution and the proposed amendments. “There’s no accountability, there’s no equitability in that and there’s really no good governance,” Tobey said. “If you want to build an organization that’s effective in advocating, you have to have an organization that’s built for that and operates well internally.” Other internal changes that Tobey said he aims to implement concern financial responsibility and organizational reform. “I think it’s really important that we are spending our money on things that are benefiting every student and that we’re being really smart with our money because where we put our money is really where our heart is at, and is where our organization is focused,” Tobey said.
SEE SA ELECTIONS PAGE 8
realized, ‘Wow, this is a powerful art form and something I want to do for at least a few more years.’” Shee said he deferred his admission to Princeton University three times, spending his gap years training with the San Francisco Ballet and the National Ballet of Canada. “The first time I deferred, the dean of admissions didn’t even blink. She actually encouraged me to do it,” Shee said. Eventually, the time came for Shee to resume his academic career. He earned his undergraduate degree in chemistry from Princeton University in 2014, followed by a doctorate in chemical physics from Columbia University in 2019 and a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of California, Berkeley in 2023. Shee said he sees parallels between his two passions, both of which require discipline and mastery of basic techniques. “If you don’t have control over your body, you can’t really express some sort of feeling through movement,” Shee said. “It’s the same if I don’t understand some nuts and bolts of some kind of theory. I can’t further develop that theory or prove it wrong.” Shee said some added difficulties came with his transition back to academia as well. “When I stopped dancing, I knew exactly what my body could do,” Shee said. “But then in research … there’s all kinds of obstacles, and you don’t know what’s happening 99 percent of the time. “In Toronto, I’d close my eyes if it was a piece of music that I really loved a lot, so I came to the realization
SEE BALLET & BEAKERS PAGE 10