The Rice Thresher | Wednesday, February 25, 2026

5 candidates run for SA president in most crowded race since 2003

JULIANA LIGHTSEY MANAGING EDITOR

Five candidates are running for the role of Student Association president in this year’s election. The packed ballot is a stark contrast to last year, in which current president Trevor Tobey was the only o cial candidate and Callum Flemister, now a Duncan College senior, conducted a writein campaign.

Rice has not had this many people run for the presidential role since 2003, when six candidates campaigned for the role.

This year’s candidates are Chelsea Asibbey, Max Menchaca, Ananya A. Nair, Muyiwa Ogunsola and Jenny Karsner.

Since 2020, only one or two students have campaigned for the presidential role.

In 2024, Tobey, then a Hanszen College

senator, ran against Jae Kim, then Brown College president. Kim won the role.

In 2023, Solomon Ni, then the SA treasurer, won the presidency in an uncontested race.

“Dilf Hunter,” a satirical candidate created by the Thresher’s Backpage, won 22% of the votes against Ni as a write-in candidate.

This year’s crowded race comes as the current SA has struggled with student engagement, a point multiple candidates

emphasized in their platforms. Last year’s election saw a turnout of 1,375 voters, just 29.02% of the student body, down from a 42.09% turnout in the 2024 election.

Five constitutional amendments on last year’s ballot failed because they did not reach the required 20% turnout. Four of those amendments again failed in October 2025 a er they were reintroduced in a special election, also due to insu cient turnout.

Student Association election issue inside

KATHLEEN ORTIZ EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

Swim head coach Seth Huston took a peek at the team scores before the diving event on the final day of the American Conference Championship. Rice was still ahead.

“I’ll call it relief,” Huston said. “Just ‘okay, we did it. We’re good. We’re in the clear. Let’s go finish up and have some fun.’”

Rice swimming and diving won the championship for the second year in a row on Saturday. However, unlike last year’s win by a point and a half, this year Rice won by 154.5 points.

“I think last year, it was very much a surprise to the team, which was really exciting in and of itself,” Huston said. “This year, I feel like the team really came in and expected and wanted and did what it took to win right out of the gate.”

Rice stayed consistently ahead of the competition during the four-day meet in Greensboro, North Carolina. The Owls were ahead by 31.5 points at the end of Day 1, 167 points at the end of Day 2 and 148.5 points at the end of Day 3.

“Anytime you’re going into a championship event like that, and there’s eight sessions, if you’re gonna win, really, you got to hit,” Huston said. “You got to be pretty close to awless. And what I mean by that is we had to be ready to go and step up every single session.”

Rice had 12 individual podium finishes and three relay podium finishes, including sweeping the 1,650yard freestyle. Sophomore Ava Portello won the 1,650, followed by seniors Ella Dyson and Ava Hamblett.

“You sweep a championship event, that’s domination,” Huston said of Portello, Dyson and Hamblett.

Rice cuts ties with The PhD Project after agreement with federal government

JAMES CANCELARICH NEWS EDITOR

Rice University, alongside 30 other universities, has reached agreements with the Trump administration to end partnerships with The PhD Project, an organization accused of discrimination by the Department of Education’s O ce for Civil Rights, announced in a press release on Thursday.

The PhD Project is an organization that aims to help Black, Hispanic and Native American professionals earn higher education degrees as well as pursue leadership positions. The OCR determined that the partnered institutions violated Title VI of Civil Rights Act of 1964.

It is unclear what agreement was reached between Rice and the Department of Education’s O ce for Civil Rights. The press release states that each institution

also agreed to conduct a review of its partnerships with external organizations that violate Title VI by restricting participation based on race.

In March 2025, the ORC announced that Rice, alongside 44 other universities, was under investigation for “raceexclusionary” practices amid allegations that universities’ partnership with The PhD Project violated Title VI. The OCR alleged in a press release that the organization limits the eligibility of participants based on their race.

Chris Stipes, a Rice University spokesperson, declined to comment on the agreement.

At the time of the initial investigation, Stipes said the school was reviewing its a liation with The PhD Project and cooperating with the OCR.

Admin to audit O-Week traditions for hazing under new federal guidelines

JULIANA LIGHTSEY MANAGING EDITOR

Rice administration will be examining Orientation Week traditions and activities this semester to ensure none qualify as hazing in light of recent federal antihazing guidelines.

Collin DeSoto, Ava Casperson and Chad Federico, the McMurtry College O-Week coordinators, wrote in a joint statement to the Thresher that O-Week coordinators were told by administration on Tuesday that they would have to provide extensive information on each of their college’s traditions as part of the review.

“We were formally told that we must audit all 2025 Advisor Training and O-Week events (approximately 30 to 50 in total) by completing a detailed 25 question questionnaire for each and meeting with First Year Programs and our Core Teams before the second week of April,” the coords wrote.

Residential college leaders and O-Week coords also met with Dean of Undergraduates Bridget Gorman two weeks ago to discuss the matter, Gorman wrote in an email to the Thresher.

“We are conducting a review of O-Week activities as part of our ongoing hazingprevention e orts,” Gorman wrote. “We’ve encouraged student leaders to keep this guidance in mind throughout the year.”

The McMurtry coords said they were concerned about the unexpected workload required to complete the audit process.

“We were not consulted about how this new expanded workload, particularly during Co-Advisor selection, would a ect our compensation a er having originally signed our contracts in the winter,” the coordinators wrote.

The review of O-Week comes a er a federal law, the Stop Campus Hazing Act, was passed in 2024. The law requires all universities receiving federal aid to disclose hazing incidents in their annual security reports, maintain a hazing prevention policy and publish a hazing transparency report that includes any student organization found to be in violation of their policy. All universities were required to publish this hazing transparency report by Dec. 23, 2025.

Rice published its hazing report for 2025-2026 Dec. 15, 2025 on the Dean of Undergraduates’ website. The report found no incidents of hazing behavior.

“No violations have been found since July 1, 2025, to date,” the website reads.

Each semester, Gorman sends out a hazing notice email to all students, reminding them that Texas criminal law and Rice’s Code of Student Conduct both prohibit hazing.

“Hazing activity can include a wide variety of physical brutality, other physical activities that subject the student to risk of harm, consumption of food or alcohol that subjects the student to risk of harm, intimidation, threats, or requiring the student to violate criminal law,” Gorman’s campuswide email on August 11 read.

The Stop Campus Hazing Act defines hazing as any action that creates “above the reasonable” risk of physical or psychological injury during the

FROM FRONT PAGE

THE PHD PROJECT

“Rice University is deeply committed to promoting an inclusive environment for all members of the community,” wrote Stipes in an email to the Thresher at the time of the investigation. “We are dedicated to upholding the principles of diversity, academic freedom and excellence while ensuring strict adherence to all federal and state laws.”

Other universities cutting ties with The

KONSTANTIN SAVVON / THRESHER

Students matriculate during Orientation Week 2025. O-Week is currently under an administrative audit after new federal hazing guidelines were implemented.

initiation or membership of a student organization, regardless of individuals’ willingness to participate.

S. Daniel Carter, president of Safety Advisors for Educational Campuses, said in an interview with the Thresher that the standard for what constitutes “reasonable risk” can di er based on the context of a situation or speci c student organization. Carter provides consultant services on campus safety issues.

Not only is consent not a defense, enthusiastic participation is not a defense.

S. Daniel Carter PRESIDENT OF SAFETY ADVISORS FOR EDUCATIONAL CAMPUSES

“If members of the football team are made to engage in certain physical activities that are consistent with a football program, that’s not hazing,” Carter said.

”If, however, you were to require a member of a chess club to perform a similar physical feat, that would be above the reasonable risk for participation in the chess club.”

Carter said residential colleges fall under the umbrella of student organizations in the

PhD Project include Duke University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Yale University, according to the press release.

“We are hopeful that other institutions with similarly discriminatory practices will follow suit, paving the way for a future where we reject judging individuals by the color of their skin and once again embrace the principles of merit, excellence, and opportunity,”

Secretary of Education Linda McMahon said in Thursday’s release.

eyes of the Stop Campus Hazing Act. O-Week traditions such as waking New Students up at odd hours of the night for activities could potentially fall into what Carter called the continuum of hazing.

“If you wake someone up in the middle of the night, require them to engage in activities when they would normally be sleeping, and then release them the next morning from those activities without having completed sleep, you have triggered the sleep deprivation criteria that is in the statute,” Carter said.

The McMurtry coords said Rice administration did not provide specific examples of O-Week behaviors that could have prompted their review, but it seemed likely sleep deprivation was a primary concern.

“From our experiences as New Students, Advisors, and now Coordinators, we recognize the impact of limited sleep during O-Week and are continually working to improve that aspect of the program,” the coordinators wrote. “While surveys indicate lack of sleep is a common complaint, these traditions still consistently rank among the most meaningful and memorable experiences for students, o en receiving stronger feedback than some academic and departmental presentations that students o en report to be ‘unengaging’ and ‘repetitive.’”

Even if individuals consent or voluntarily participate in certain risky activities, they

can still meet the act’s de nition of hazing, Carter said.

“Not only is consent not a defense, enthusiastic participation is not a defense,” Carter said.

Concern about long-held traditions of student organizations was a contentious topic during the dra ing and passage of the Stop Campus Hazing Act, Carter said. However, even beloved activities on the less harmful side of the hazing continuum can pave the way for escalation into more dangerous behaviors, he said.

“I understand that might be where some of the concern is coming in, that things that are considered to be traditions are now being looked at in the light of harmful conduct,” Carter said. “I’m sympathetic to some folks who may see their traditions as being challenged, but I would strongly encourage them to consider the potential consequences of those traditions.”

The McMurtry coords said they are eager to address possible concerns about O-Week traditions and want to prioritize making New Students feel welcomed.

“We look forward to addressing sleep concerns, which requires collaboration with Administration and fellow Coordinators to balance essential academic support and information about Rice’s resources, along with the community-building traditions that have and continue to shape Rice’s culture of care without sacri cing the quality or importance of either,” the coords wrote.

The OCR said in the press release it would continue to negotiate with the 14 other schools in the investigation that have not agreed to end their relationship with The PhD Project. Cornell University, Georgetown University and Vanderbilt University are among the 14.

This is the Trump effect in action: Equality of opportunity on campuses across the nation.

Linda McMahon SECRETARY OF EDUCATION

“This is the Trump effect in action: institutions of higher education are agreeing to cut ties with discriminatory organizations, recommitting themselves to abiding by federal law, and restoring equality of opportunity on campuses across the nation,” McMahon said in the press release.

Author, educator John Green announced as commencement speaker

JAMES CANCELARICH NEWS EDITOR

Bestselling author John Green will be delivering Rice’s 113th undergraduate commencement ceremony.

Commencement will take place on May 9 at Rice Stadium.

Green is known for his young adult novels and nonfiction works, such as “The Fault in Our Stars,” “Looking for Alaska” and “The Anthropocene Reviewed.”

The author is also known for his impact in public education, working with his brother Hank Green on the YouTube channels vlogbrothers and Crash Course, as well as educational media nonprofit Complexly.

“John’s work speaks directly to the spirit we seek to cultivate at Rice: intellectual curiosity paired with empathy, creativity paired with responsibility, and achievement paired with purpose,”

President Reggie DesRoches wrote in a campuswide email. “His ability to combine storytelling, intellectual rigor and a genuine commitment to improving the world makes him an inspiring voice for our graduates as they prepare to lead in an increasingly complex society.”

Green’s books have been translated

into 55 different languages and have sold millions of copies. His most recent book, “Everything is Tuberculosis,” is a nonfiction account of humanity’s fight against the deadly disease.

His ability to combine storytelling, intellectual rigor and a genuine commitment to improving the world makes him an inspiring voice for our graduates as they prepare to lead in an increasingly complex society.

Reggie DesRoches RICE PRESIDENT

“I’m honored to join Rice graduates and their families and friends for this extraordinary moment,” Green said in an interview with KHOU. “It’s so exciting to be able to celebrate with students who’ve accomplished so much in their Rice careers.”

Resolution calling for Black studies major blocked from Senate agenda

been successful.

A resolution to push for the African and African American Studies minor to expand to a major was blocked by a vote at Monday’s Senate meeting.

The resolution, which listed nine coauthors, was denied from entering the agenda. Opponents to introducing the bill said it would make more sense to introduce it for the incoming senate session once changeover takes place.

The resolution cites the national political climate and institutional commitments to diversity, equity and inclusion as a reason for pushing for the change.

“Expanding curricular support for Black Studies, alongside increased cultural programming and institutional visibility of Black and African American culture, will

contribute to student belonging, intellectual diversity, and institutional resilience against external pressures that undermine academic inclusion,” the resolution reads.

The resolution also cites the limited breadth of the minor, as well as peer institutions o ering majors in Black studies, African American studies and Africana studies.

“The existing Minor in African and African American Studies at Rice provides important interdisciplinary coursework but remains limited in breadth relative to student demand and the scholarly signi cance of Black Studies,” the resolution reads.

Student Association President Trevor Tobey said he had “nothing against the bill” when advocating for it not to be put on the agenda, but resolutions in the past that have been passed on a “whim” have not

“The reasoning is that starting a new project two weeks before changeover is not going to be e ective, because this charge is going to go to this executive committee,” Tobey said. “I can tell you this executive committee is not going to achieve what this bill is doing.”

Tobey said supporters of the resolution should meet with stakeholders like the Center for African and African American Studies before moving forward with the legislation.

Wiess College Senator Eli Risinger, a coauthor of the resolution, spoke in favor of adding the resolution.

“The AAAS department has been trying to make this a thing, and they keep getting shut down,” Risinger said. “I think if the students pass this, it sends a strong message to the admin that we want this in

the future.

“A lot of students have been asking for something of this capacity, and I think it’s very important that we pass it, because that’s still our job,” Risinger continued. “We’re still in our tenure, even though it’s coming to an end. It’s our responsibility to still represent the students at this.”

Lovett College President Ayush Suresh said he agreed with the resolution but it would likely be more effective once administration had changed over from the election.

“I think that it probably makes sense to bring it back up in the next Senate in literally two weeks so that everyone who’s actually going to be able to vote on it and actually make it into an e ective policy and bring it to life can actually have some sort of legislative insight put into what’s passed,” Suresh said.

Hot water issues affect multiple residential colleges

LINA KANG THRESHER STAFF

Sid Richardson, Wiess and Jones Colleges have recently faced water issues, including sporadic temperatures, leaks and dark coloring.

“For the past couple of weeks, every time I go in the shower, the water oscillates from warm to super burning hot,” said Micayla Pang, a Wiess freshman. “This happens every three minutes. All the hot water will just come out, out of nowhere, and it just catches you by surprise and burns you.”

Wiess freshman Jasmine Godoy said she submitted a work order to her college’s Student Maintenance Representative after experiencing issues with her shower, and Housing and Dining fixed it by the next morning.

“They xed the temperature, of course, but then they even xed the knob, which was a little bit loose,” Godoy said.

Maintenance technician Dewayne Mosquinski said the problem at Wiess was not a systemic problem but rather a situation of wear and tear with parts that regulate the temperature.

“We’ve had probably ve or six students report, and each time when we’ve gone and changed out parts on the shower valves, the problem has gone away,” Mosquinski said. “It’s more about individual showers having issues now. It could be quite a few of them, but without it being reported in a work order, we can’t go to individual rooms and check.”

Carter Chan, a Sid Rich sophomore, said students at his college experienced poor water pressure on Feb. 14, with the floors, toilets, sinks and showers not working properly.

“When the water came back on at 5 p.m., a lot of people said that their water was dark brown or orange,” Chan said. “Almost all the $oors didn’t have hot water until a couple days later, and someone reported a huge water leak in the fourth $oor hallway.”

When the water came back at 5 p.m., a lot of people said that their water was dark brown or orange. Almost all the floors didn’t have hot water until a couple days later, and someone reported a huge water leak in the fourth floor hallway.

Carter Chan SID RICHARDSON COLLEGE SOPHOMORE

Mosquinski said there had been issues tying in some water lines, connecting the plumbing of Sid Richardson and

Seibel Servery to the new Lovett and Chao Colleges.

“They didn’t think the outage was going to take as long as it was,” Mosquinski said. “It did, and Sid lost water that way. Every building has tanks, storage tanks, and they were hopeful that the storage tank would last long enough that Sid wouldn’t really be that much a ected. And then that tie-in took longer than expected, which happens in construction.”

On top of the loss of water, Mosquinski said Sid’s pressure relief valve blew, which shut down the water heaters. The valve is part of the hot water tank and controls the hot water.

“They were able to get it repaired, and now they have hot water,” he said.

Jones also experienced unrelated water issues where the water heater would shut down during random times of the day.

Jones Student Maintenance Representative Brad Mahung said he helped monitor the temperatures of the shower to provide data for Mosquinski and the team.

“So originally, [Mosquinski] had told me to just go into the boiler room, and there are two temperature sensors that I can just look at the screen and sort of see,” Mahung said. “But then I noticed that those temperatures would usually $uctuate several degrees away from their set point. And I was curious to know, ‘okay, what’s going on here? How is it a ecting the rest of the system?’”

Mahung said he decided to collect data

by putting a thermometer in every shower from 10 p.m. to midnight for 10 minutes to look for the trends for the last two months.

“[Maintenance] tests it during the day,” Mahung said. “Of course, no one’s showering, so you get the hot water, but then at night, everyone’s trying to take a shower. It overloads the system. How do we make sure we’re meeting demand when people are taking showers and balance the system?”

The maintenance team was also brought in to watch the boilers the whole day during the three days of the freeze, which also helped them isolate the issue.

“We were able to nd the issue there with the water heaters, and we got that corrected for the last week and a half, two weeks, we’ve been getting great numbers from the students we’ve talked to at Jones,” Mosquinski said.

Mahung’s data, beyond showing what times the showers were overloaded, had shown that the men’s showers were about 20 degrees hotter than the women’s showers. With the data, the maintenance team has made repairs and it has changed to become a 5 degree di erence.

Mahung said early reporting plays a key role in preventing small issues from escalating.

“Many times people will see a minor issue, let’s say, doors closing, and be like, ‘Oh, it’s just sticky,’” he said. “But then with time, things can quickly grow into a bigger problem.”

Rice receives $14.1 million to establish Center for Space Technologies

ABIGAIL CHIU SENIOR WRITER

The Texas Space Commission awarded the last of its $150 million funding package to the Rice Space Institute for a new Center for Space Technologies. The center’s director, C. Fred Higgs III said the goal is to position Rice as a leading intellectual hub for lunar space research and design while advancing Texas’ drive to expand its leadership in space.

Higgs said the proposal, which was originally submitted in October 2024, would have the center be housed at Rice but functioning as a statewide lunar technology and commercialization hub that integrates research and development activities.

The 2023 Texas Legislature has funded 24 space projects in total, including the $14.1 million allocated for Rice’s Center for Space Technologies. Last year, the Texas Space Commission received an additional $300 million in state funding for future grant awards over the next two years.

The Rice Space Institute, which was founded in 2000, researches planetary habitability and human life beyond Earth. The institute’s director, David Alexander, said it has connections with NASA, scienti c institutions and the commercial space industry.

“We have the next generation of engineers, scientists, communicators, all the things that we need. But also we have the technologies,” Alexander said. “It’s not about a technology for the moon, it’s a technology for exploration, which means that those technologies will bene t people back here on Earth.”

Rice will collaborate with other Texas universities to bring Texas to the forefront of space exploration, said Alexander.

“[The center is] going to be focused on developing capabilities and technologies to explore the moon,” Alexander said. “We

wanted to take some of the strengths that Rice has in some of the related areas, and bring that to bear on how we might explore the moon more e ciently.” Alexander said there are more centers

planned within the Rice Space Institute across di erent schools of study.

“The vision has always been to try and create centers of excellence, of focus points that tap into what we need to do,” Alexander

said. “We need to do a huge amount of stu in space if we’re going to achieve our goals, whether it be the moon or Mars, science, understanding the solar system, life on earth, if we’re going to send humans.”

Why the Thresher endorses election candidates

Endorsing a candidate for any elected position is a responsibility we take very seriously, one rooted in over a century of history from newspapers across the country. It is an essential exercise of the First Amendment and journalistic principles to serve the public and a tradition worth continuing, especially at a time when both the Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times’ editorial boards have had their endorsements axed by their owners.

Each year, the members of this editorial board sit down with the candidates in all of the contested races. We ask each of them questions about their platform, how they would handle the responsibilities of their role and the crucial issues facing the Rice campus. We don’t campaign for candidates, and we stay out of the news writers’ separate, objective coverage of each candidate.

It’s our goal to do the work students

COLUMN

may not have the time or energy to do. Our campus already su ers from low engagement with Student Association elections. We understand that many students have midterms, jobs and social commitments. They may not have the time to do extensive research on the SA candidates and the issues they will face, but we do.

We hope to be as informed as possible on the issues students care about and what our leadership is doing about those issues. That’s what we bring to our SA endorsements, too. In our interviews with candidates, we asked them about the new meal plan, the Blanket Tax, the Initiative Fund, the future of campus party culture and institutional neutrality — all issues that Rice students have proven they care about. Their answers on these topics drive the decisions we make and are re ected in the reasoning we give in each endorsement.

Critics of the Thresher’s endorsements have said the Thresher has a stranglehold on campus media with little room for comment or dissent. However, our editorials have never stood as the only guidance we o er on elections. We encourage students to come to their own conclusions about who to vote for by producing unbiased news stories on each of the candidates and hosting a debate for the candidates to answer student questions and deliver their message live. The Thresher also welcomes comments and dissent in our opinions page.

Using our platform to understand where candidates stand on tough issues is not a responsibility we take lightly, and publishing the conclusions we come to is a freedom of the press we consider crucial to a healthy democracy. We encourage students to vote for whoever they believe will best represent Rice, regardless of our suggestions.

An urbanist’s guide to Houston: Houston must confront its flood risks

JACOB JORDAN & NICOLAS COOKER THRESHER STAFF

On Feb. 9, the Federal Emergency Management Agency released a new set of dra ood maps for Harris County, establishing outlines for 100-year and 500-year oodplains that more accurately assess the county’s ood risk.

The 100-year oodplain area increased from 307 to 439 square miles, while the 500year oodplain area increased from 204 to 266 square miles. Including the oodways, the total oodplain area will cover 824 square miles, or about 46.3% of the county.

These maps were developed in response to increased precipitation estimates in the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Atlas 14, which incorporated results from Hurricane Harvey. They have been in development since 2019and were initially slated for release in 2021 but were delayed numerous times before being quietly uploaded.

The signi$cance of this release and its delays becomes clear when we remember what happened to Houston during Hurricane Harvey. As the storm stalled over Texas in August 2017, parts of the city received over 40 inches of rain, with 1 trillion gallons pouring on Harris County within 4 days, causing $125 billion in damages and claiming over 100 lives.

More than anything, the storm showed

that Houston was much more vulnerable than previous ood maps had suggested, underscoring the need for a new risk assessment. In addition to revised maps, several measures were adopted in the immediate a ermath of the storm to prevent risky development within oodplains. These included regulations mandating pier-and-beam construction, high-wind protections and applying rules from the 100-year standard to the 500-year standard.

But in the years since Harvey, many postdisaster concerns have been neglected. Over 65,000 new homes have been built in oodplains across Harris County since the storm, and ood-prone builds have represented about 20% of new development in Greater Houston. Many of these builds were in high-risk suburbs like Cypress, Sugar Land and League City, while 258 new oodprone builds were near Rice.

The Houston Association of Realtors shelved a nearly realized project in late 2025 that would have disclosed ood risk in home listings. HAR members feared, justi$ably, that this information could lead buyers to avoid high-risk properties. At the same time, this will undoubtedly expose more homeowners and renters to dangerous ooding situations in future hurricanes.

Meanwhile, the new FEMA dra ood maps dramatically change ood risk for Rice students and faculty living both on and o campus, substantially a ecting ood

insurance costs and safety expectations. Rice largely sits in the Brays Bayou oodplain, a highly urbanized, slow-moving river hampered by a lack of ood control infrastructure despite decades of continuous improvements. The stretch between Beltway 8 and Main Street, including University Place, is the widest part of this oodplain.

It’s not surprising that the new maps have raised much of central and western Rice campus and its surrounding roads to the 100year oodplain level, signaling a higher ood risk than previously recognized.

In fact, 34% of University Place, the neighborhood Rice sits in, would be moved to a higher risk zone. These elevated risks will a ect many of Rice’s new developments, including substantial parts of the Gateway Project. But without proper ood information disclosure on major rental sites, these risks can go unnoticed until it’s too late.

Houston will always be ood-prone. Its increasingly sprawling development, particularly in oodplains, has accelerated its risk. In a world with increasingly severe weather, ignoring this truth simply because it might lower home values or scare o buyers will only make us more vulnerable to these changes.

If we want to build a more resilient Houston and not relearn the mistakes of Harvey, it’s time to confront the reality of our ood risk and build in a way informed by the past rather than in denial of it.

Jacob Jordan is a Baker College junior studying civil and environmental engineering with a minor in environmental studies. Nicolas Cooker is a Martel College sophomore studying computer science with a minor in environmental studies. They believe that every Rice student should be well-informed about their built environment and have the knowledge necessary to advocate for their interests in and beyond Houston.

Next week’s question:

When voting for SA President, what issue matters most to you?

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Rice admissions ‘inspired’ by prospective students

RISHI ANARKAT THRESHER STAFF

Each year, thousands of students submit their college applications, hoping to be a part of the next matriculating class at Rice. What most applicants and their families never see is what happens next: the long, meticulous process by which those applications are read, debated and ultimately admitted or rejected.

This process of cultivating the next generation of Owls is led by Yvonne Romero, vice president for enrollment and dean of admissions and financial aid. Leading the Rice Office of Admission, she heads a team of over 30 admissions officers who divide applicants based on geographical regions.

“Each admission officer has a territory they manage, whether a region of the U.S. or a region of the world,” Romero said.“The idea of the territory manager is that they become an expert in the curriculum and the educational opportunities available to students from those regions. The territory manager really serves as the expert on the file.”

This expertise is critical, Romero said. Contextual review, the philosophy Rice’s Office of Admission uses to evaluate applicants, requires admissions officers to understand each student in the context of their education, opportunities and lived experiences.

“I’ll often say that even two students at the same school, and possibly even in the same family, have a different lived experience and a different life,” Romero said. “Even in the case of twins in the

same family, nobody is living the same exact life.”

Rice pairs each application with at least two reviewers during the initial phase of evaluation. The pair consists of a pilot — the territory manager who focuses on academic context — and the co-pilot, who focuses on personal context.

“You have the pilot looking at all the academic factors: the transcript, the school profile, the counselor recommendation and the teacher recommendations,” Romero said. “The co-pilot is another officer, but they look at the personal parts of the application. Things like the activities, the essays, the Rice supplemental component and any interviews or other recommendations or materials that come in for the student.”

Romero said a common misconception among applicants is that their le is glanced at once and forgotten. In reality, applications are o en viewed many times.

“It can vary,” Romero said. “The two readers will vote on the application and indicate whether a student should continue with further conversation, go straight to committee or be considered competitive but not likely to rise in our pool.”

Along the way, applications are discussed across multiple stages of evaluation, allowing admissions officers to revisit files and consider them from different perspectives before any final decisions are made.

“A lot of people think it’s very random, but we’re very intentional and very careful,” Romero said.

Romero said she is often inspired by the hopes and dreams of students applying to Rice.

“On any given day, we hear what students are passionate about and how they hope to make an impact in the world,” Romero said. “That’s incredibly inspiring.”

Sociology Ph.D. student wins Pulitzer for editorials on train safety

RUBY GAO THRESHER STAFF

On his way to school in East Houston in 2024, a 15-year-old boy was killed by a train while crossing railroad tracks. Six months earlier, Leah Binkovitz, a Ph.D. student in Rice’s sociology department, called for train safety measures in the area.

Binkovitz, a senior editorial writer for the Houston Chronicle, said her studies at Rice gave her a perspective that sets her apart from traditional journalists, which she brought to her reporting on train safety. The series detailing how officials failed to protect Houston residents from dangerous railroads won the editorial board — including Binkovitz — a Pulitzer Prize in 2025.

“I had this inclination to want to know how a particular event or story that you’re covering fit into a larger context,” Binkovitz said. “Sociology definitely gives you those tools and frameworks to begin to understand. The train series — we certainly were not the first to cover it. But I credit my sociological training in framing and pitching the series, which was to understand how this seeming ‘inconvenience’ in someone’s daily life connected to a much bigger system of power and economics, history and all these courses together.”

Binkovitz first arrived in Houston in 2014 to report for the Chronicle after getting her master’s degree in journalism from Columbia University.

Eager to focus on Houston’s urban design and suburban growth, Leah Binkovitz said she left the Chronicle to join the Kinder Institute for Urban

Research in fall 2016. After reaching all but dissertation status in sociology at Rice, she returned to the Chronicle in 2022 as a full-time reporter.

“The thread that connects started at the Chronicle, and then going back to school and going back to the Chronicle,” Binkovitz said. “It’s just my interest in Houston, and the way it works is always the driving focus through all of that, trying to more deeply understand this strange place.”

Binkovitz said the transition was a natural extension of her journalism work.

“It seemed like a pretty smooth step from journalism to sociology,” Binkovitz said. “To me, the commonalities are more compelling.”

A few months after she returned to the Chronicle, Binkovitz and three other members of the paper’s editorial board began investigating the dangers freight trains posed to Houston Independent School District students in Houston’s East End, particularly near McReynolds Middle School.

The train danger was not just something Binkovitz reported. She said she experienced it firsthand.

“I had to walk around a train one time just to get to an interview at McReynolds, because the train was stopped on the tracks and I was super pregnant and stumbling around the rocks,” Binkovitz said.

After the death of the teenage boy crossing the train tracks in 2024, Binkovitz said railroad officials finally began paying attention to what she and her colleagues had been writing about.

“They couldn’t ignore it any longer,” Binkovitz said, her voice trembling.

“Our story was not the first to show that it was a problem, but unfortunately, a death is sometimes what it takes to get people to pay attention.”

Binkovitz said Union Pacific Railroad created a funding initiative to improve crossings.

“They started a state grant program to help get money to create overpasses, underpasses or whatever infrastructure is needed,” Binkovitz said.

But Binkovitz said the scale of the problem in Houston far exceeds the available funding, leaving many schools still at risk.

“Houston needs millions and millions and millions, if not billions, to address this problem systematically,” Binkovitz said. “So many of the schools

are still dealing with this.”

Despite all the difficulties, Binkovitz said the reporting on the dangerous trains brought renewed attention to an issue that had lingered for generations.

“When we were at McReynolds, I remember meeting a parent who was dropping his kid off, and he said, ‘Oh, I was dodging the trains when I was a kid,’” Binkovitz said. “It was a generational issue. It was families feeling represented and seen.”

But for Binkovitz, simply reporting isn’t enough if it isn’t followed by action.

“It was a little bit mixed emotions, because we wanted to feel like we had done a lot, and we still had this feeling like we hadn’t done enough change,” Binkovitz said. “We still feel that way.”

Binkovitz said at the 2025 Pulitzer Prize ceremony in New York City, speakers focused on the political threats and pressures journalists face. However, she said she is more concerned about the future of journalism’s readership.

“It was this feeling of being honored and recognized by peers,” Binkovitz said. “But also at the same time feeling like, ‘okay, who’s reading it? Is enough of Houston reading this and caring about this?’”

Binkovitz said meaningful change o en begins at the community level, drawing from her own reporting experience.

“Really go local and think about your impact locally, report locally, connect people to their own community locally and help them understand why their community is the way it is,” Binkovitz said. “That’s really a unique space that you can fill, and I think that you can see change.”

Black students reflect on history of inclusion in MOB

In the fall of 2025, Chaundra Frank ’00, ’22 met Kosi Onwuamaegbu at a Rice Black Men’s Association event and talked about the upcoming football game. Onwuamaegbu, a Sid Richardson College senior, told Frank he would be there, performing with the Marching Owl Band on the tuba.

Frank realized this was a rst for her.

“You know, don’t take this the wrong way, but I recall the MOB back in my day, and I honestly don’t recall seeing any Black students in the MOB,” Frank said she told Onwuamaegbu at the event.

Frank’s involvement with Rice runs deep; she ran track while completing her undergraduate degree, graduating in 2000. She came back to pursue an MBA, which she earned in 2022. She has served as president of the Association of Rice University Black Alumni since June 2025 and is president-elect for the R Association, a group that supports Rice letterwinners.

As Onwuamaegbu passed Frank at the ARUBA tailgate on Homecoming weekend, Frank continued to think about what the history of Black students’ experiences in the MOB looked like.

“I just thought, ‘wow, we just never explore this,’” Frank said. “I’ve never thought about it. I mean, I’ve seen someone did a Black history timeline for students at Rice with the rst Black student and when they were admitted and the rst Black athlete, all these things, and I thought, ‘well, of all things, we didn’t even think about the MOB.’”

The earliest indication of a Black student in the MOB was in 1973, eight years a er the school admitted its rst Black undergraduate students.

Craig Jackson ’77 matriculated at Rice in 1973 and joined the MOB at the encouragement of his high school band director.

“I didn’t realize until I went that it’s a scatter band, it wasn’t a marching band,” Jackson said. “We get to practice, and we’re running around the eld, making jokes and I said to myself, ‘well, this is going to be a lot more fun than I expected.’”

Jackson said his memories of the MOB were framed by the culture of the 1960s.

“It was a time where everything was anti-establishment, even the band,” Jackson said. “The ’60s were crazy and the

culture of ‘anything goes’ was a signi cant part of MOB culture. We were vicious too.

It wasn’t just funny, it was hardcore satire we were doing. The culture was back in those days anything goes, not just funny but dastardly funny.”

Jackson was a freshman in the MOB during the “Hal ime of Infamy” against Texas A&M University in 1973, during which the band made fun of Aggie military traditions and formed themselves into the shape of a re hydrant in tribute to the school’s mascot: a dog named Reveille.

Band members had to be transported out of Rice Stadium in food service trucks to escape a crowd of A&M students waiting outside, unhappy with both the MOB’s show and their loss to Rice.

“You go and make fun of a military school’s traditions and you get run o the eld,” Jackson said. “We didn’t expect to be in danger, but we knew we were going to piss people o .”

Michael Julian learned about the MOB

during his sophomore year of high school while attending a weeklong Young Owls Leadership Program with EMERGE.

The ’60s were crazy and the culture of ‘anything goes’ was a signi cant part of MOB culture. It wasn’t just funny, it was hardcore satire we were doing.

Craig Jackson CLASS OF 1977 MOB MEMBER

Julian matriculated in 2015 and joined the band in his freshman year. A sousaphone player, Julian recalled learning over 60 songs in his rst three years with the band.

Julian has taken a pause his undergraduate coursework, but he remains involved with the MOB today.

It was during a conversation with a Black alumnus of the MOB while walking in the Martin Luther King Jr. Day parade a few years ago that Julian learned about the MOB’s history of Black members.

“She was telling me how much I would have been such a welcome addition back in her time,” Julian said of the alumna he met. “The percentage of the MOB that is Black has increased over the last several years. But when I joined in 2015, I think for a while, I was pretty much the only active Black person in the MOB.”

As Julian enters his 11th year with the group, he said his goal is to grow the diversity of the band.

“I think the aim is to get better in terms of recruiting aspects,” Julian said. “The MOB is open to all denominations, backgrounds, gender identities and expressions and things of that nature, so I think I wish the general population would know a little more about it so we could also maybe get some more Black students

Grammy-winning music video director leads lmmaking workshop

In 2026, Taylor Swi ’s “Blank Space” music video looks almost archetypal. Pastel mansions, couture tantrums, the artist cast as a man-eating romantic — all of it so uently pop that it’s easy to forget just what made it a cultural landmark in 2014. But director Joseph Kahn insists that, beneath the polish, it’s an industrial-metal video in disguise. On Friday, he spent two hours at Rice explaining exactly how.

“There is a Ministry engine running at a high BPM underneath every pop video I do,” Kahn said. “I just lay the pop music on top of it.”

The Grammy-winning music video director — whose credits also include Swi ’s “Bad Blood,” Britney Spears’ “Toxic” and Lady Gaga’s “LoveGame” — walked through his career, his creative process and his philosophy on what it takes to make art at a Rice Cinema Club workshop.

Rice Cinema Club co-president Steven Burgess and outreach co-director Hayne Lim hosted the session at PCF tent 1. The event was sponsored by Rice’s School of Humanities and Arts, Program in Media Studies and the Student Activities/ President’s Programming Fund.

Editor’s note: Burgess is the Thresher’s video editor.

Lim said the workshop came about a er he ran into Kahn last summer in Houston when Kahn’s most recent feature lm, “Ick,” was screening at the River Oaks Theatre.

“Despite being in the industry for so long, Kahn has always been committed to prioritizing one thing above all in his art: fun,” wrote Lim, a Jones College senior, in an email to the Thresher.

Kahn grew up in Houston and began his directing career here in his late teens. One of his rst music videos was for German industrial band Die Krupps in a local bar for $2,500. Kahn screened the footage during the workshop, pointing to his younger self on screen.

“I look like a little virgin boy there,” Kahn said.

The aggressive, high-energy ethos Kahn learned from the industrial bands he grew up listening to still shapes his work decades later, even when he’s directing for pop stars.

Kahn described his approach to “Blank Space” as strategic, a direct response to the cultural moment. In 2014, he said, Beyoncé and Rihanna dominated pop culture. He said the “skinny blonde white girl” aesthetic wasn’t cool. So Kahn leaned into every accusation against Swi : the entitlement, the boyfriend carousel, the wealth. The goal was to make that perspective, as he put it, “cool as hell.”

During a Q&A session, students asked about navigating the politics of multimilliondollar productions. Kahn said his advice was blunt and practical: If you want the artist to spend money, make it their idea.

“Once their ego is on the line — whether it’s a pop star, Toyota or an executive at Apple — they are invested,” Kahn said. “If you say, ‘It’s my idea,’ they won’t give you the money.”

Martin Xie, a McMurtry College sophomore, said he appreciated Kahn’s insight into the business of entertainment.

“I was concerned about how we should tackle stakeholder/ nancing concerns while maintaining artistic integrity,” Xie wrote in an email to the Thresher. “He responded that the executives who have made it to the top o en already possess good taste in creative direction, which gave me some hope about the state of the industry, that … there is structure in place to help talented people succeed.”

Houston came up repeatedly throughout the session. Kahn compared growing up in the city to Luke Skywalker on Tatooine, a place he said is de ned by dreaming about escape.

The city’s car-centric geography shaped how Kahn thinks about spatial relationships in lm. He contrasted Martin Scorsese’s lms, made by someone who walks places, with Houston’s sprawling strip mall culture.

“If you’re going to make ‘Fast & Furious,’ Houston is a good place to start,” Kahn said. “But if you want to make ‘Goodfellas,’ you probably need to live in New York.”

The workshop covered technical foundations as well. Kahn emphasized what he called the “wax on, wax o$ ” theory of lmmaking, arguing that mastering technique creates freedom. Once something is in your system, he said, you can tell broader stories.

Near the end of the session, Kahn told students that lmmaking isn’t a “smart person’s job.” It’s a job for weirdos, for the “scum” of society who couldn’t t in anywhere else. He drew on his experience working with artists like Eminem, describing successful artists as people who share a background of hardship.

“Something has to be broken in you,” Kahn said. “And if it’s not broken, go break it. Art doesn’t come out without pain.”

Rice Cinema Club’s outreach co-director, Emaline Davis, said the workshop was one of the organization’s “best events so far, with a

really great turnout of students.”

“Not only was Joseph Kahn a great presenter, but the Q&A and workshop portions of the event seemed to really engage the student body in a way that I haven’t seen with other arts-related events at Rice before,” wrote Davis, a Will Rice College junior, in an email to the Thresher. “Kahn gave very straightforward, genuine advice that made everyone want to keep asking more and more questions.”

Lim described the workshop as “very interactive and up-close.” Kahn, he said, was a signi cant draw for the club as “one of the most proli c artists to come out of Houston.”

“We wanted to bring in someone who’s a big name in their own right, but also so that we could address the Rice community with, ‘Hey. This person’s from Houston and found this much success in art and media. You can do it too,’” Lim wrote. “At the end of the day, we put on a good time, and I just hope students walked away having enjoyed themselves and getting to meet Kahn in the esh.”

Annual maid cafe showcases Japanese and Vietnamese culture

Students dressed in frilled

cat ears and satin gloves welcomed guests into Rice’s third annual Maid Cafe, hosted in Sid Richardson College Commons on Saturday.

This collaboration between the Rice

Japanese Student Association and Rice Vietnamese Student Association brought together dance performances, themed service and a lineup of competitions to create an immersive event that blended community and culture.

Rice JSA and VSA decided to collaborate to bring maid cafes, a

popular experience in Japan, to Rice University. VSA co-president and Sid Rich senior Vivian Ha said the team started the planning process in December 2025, and spent a lot of time recruiting maids, reserving spaces and making a menu of both Japanese and Vietnamese treats.

“It’s a source of comfort for a lot of people to come and relax with maids serving them,” Ha said. “The vision came to life two years ago, and now we have a whole maid cafe.”

After doors opened at 4 p.m., students flowed quickly into the commons, which was decorated with pink balloons and stickers. Attendees sat at tables where two maids greeted them in Japanese and took their order for food and drinks.

While sitting at tables covered in bright magenta tablecloths and pink ower petals, attendees were o$ered spam musubi, tuna onigiri, pandan wa es and egg tarts. For drink options, the maid cafe had ube cloud co$ee, lemon boost yakult, black sesame matcha boom and strawberry matcha boom, all with pink heart-shaped straws.

Attendees also had the option of requesting a photo card or Polaroid picture with a specific maid, which came with a complimentary photo decorating kit.

The event began with a string of introductions as the maids went onstage in groups and struck poses. Adding to the energy and theatricality

of the afternoon, all of the maids took the stage to perform a medley of dance performances, including “Good night ojousama” and “Chikatto Chika Chika.” Will Rice College sophomore Chloe Zhu performed a solo dance to “Kawaikute Gomen,” which received loud cheers from the audience.

The maids provided the attendees at their respective tables with a variety of forms of entertainment, from back massages to fan services.

“I have done this for the last two years, and because everyone that participates as a volunteer is wearing a fun outfit, it takes away any of the pressure of social conformity,” said Nathan Zhao, a Wiess College junior. “We got some training sessions with all the maids prior to this, and it was a good time as a whole just doing the actual service.”

In the makeup contest, four volunteers from the audience were given a makeover by maids using a dollar store makeup kit. Then, maids faced off against each other in a wig snatching contest, with Sid Rich sophomore Landon Geronimo emerging as the winner after multiple rounds.

Ha said this year’s event was the largest maid cafe ever held at Rice, with over 300 guests and volunteers.

“I think we are classified as the biggest maid cafe in Texas right now,” Ha said. “No other school does this, and we wanted to bring a sense of Japanese and Vietnamese culture to Rice.”

Review: Post-‘Brat’ Charli xcx reaches ‘Wuthering Heights’

Following up the widespread success of Charli xcx’s 2024 album “Brat” is a near impossible task. Time and again, we see the same story of an artist seeing runaway mainstream success only to be forgotten just as quickly. Most artists trap themselves in a cycle of repetitive attempts at creating albums that sound virtually identical to their success story, leaving fans tired of a played-out sound. Charli xcx is not like most artists.

After ‘Brat summer’ and the album that went alongside it, Charli xcx became a household name. For the first time in her career since “Boom Clap” in 2014, her music burst into the cultural zeitgeist. Her unique style of hyperpop blended with introspective and vulnerable lyrics was fresh and necessary for the time.

Because of this sudden burst of popularity, her fans began to anxiously await her next project. Nobody expected it to be “Wuthering Heights,” an avant-adjacent darkwave art-pop album that provided the soundtrack for a controversial adaptation of the beloved book by Emily Brontë.

But such a decision is so undeniably Charli. She has never allowed herself to be boxed in and usually seems to guide herself toward a place of artistic nirvana where she can express herself precisely how she wants to.

Her music isn’t for the charts, it’s not for the public — it’s not even for the fans. Her music is for her, and the decision to create an album like this just proves that point.

Despite this bizarre left turn from the pop idol, “Wuthering Heights” itself is really marvelously crafted. It

opens with “House,” which itself opens with a spoken word poem by John Cale before devolving into industrial noise with Cale and Charli xcx screaming about how they think they’re “gonna die in this house.”

It is equal parts unnerving and beautiful, providing an experience that is difficult to describe with words alone. “House” also functioned as the project’s lead single, giving us a glimpse into this new direction Charli

is forging for herself.

As a whole, “Wuthering Heights” is a dark album, with frequent allusions to death, dying, obsession, fear and being trapped. Songs like “Chains of Love,” “Dying for You” and “Altars” capture these feelings, describing the pain and terror that being in love can inflict on one’s psyche.

Songs like “Seeing Things” describe a ghostlike figure (clearly a reference to the spectral ghost of Cathy in the novel) and “Out of Myself” describes rubbing salt in a wound. The overarching tone of this album is that of woe and regret, almost a gothic, macabre love that matches the aesthetic of Brontë’s book wonderfully. Indeed, the record rightfully takes a lot of inspiration

from the book, with “My Reminder” describing a rivalry from early youth and “Always Everywhere” allowing Charli xcx to speak through the perspective of Cathy.

The album works as a stand-alone work, a companion to the book and a soundtrack to a movie that blends the modern and the gothic. It brims with the regret that oozes out of every page of “Wuthering Heights” and shows us the internal heartache that exists out in the British moors in such a tactile way. It is produced primarily by Finn Keane, with Justin Raisen, Nathan Klein and Lewis Pesacov on a few tracks each. The team did a wonderful job with the work, capturing Charli’s vision for this grim world and transforming it into that dark sound that is somehow so new and yet so classically Charli.

The standout track is “Wall of Sound,” produced by Keane, which provides an expansive and overbearing attack on the auditory senses while Charli sings of the pressures of girlhood and the lies prejudice tells us. It mixes love and hatred and forces the listener to feel that pressure themselves, with huge orchestral arrangements, layers upon layers of sound and vocal effects reminiscent of the concept of the same name — Wall of Sound — invented by Phil Spector in the mid-1960s.

When looking at “Wuthering Heights” both individually and in the context of the career Charli xcx has enjoyed, it is impossible not to love it. Though not as strong as some of her previous works, it is a spectacular addition to her catalog that is deserving of immense praise. It is a reminder that, despite whatever happens, Charli will do what she wants to do to fulfill her artistic mission and create something extraordinary along the way.

Rice Cinema screens Filipino classic ‘Manila in the Claws of Light’

Rice Cinema screened Lino Brocka’s 1975 neo-noir “Manila in the Claws of Light” on Saturday at the Pitman Cinema Theatre in Sarofim Hall. The screening was held in collaboration with Anakbayan Houston, a Filipino youth organization, and commemorated the 40th anniversary of the People Power Revolution in the Philippines, a four-day nonviolent uprising that toppled a 20year dictatorship.

Known in Tagalog as “Maynila sa mga kuko ng liwanag,” the lm follows Julio Madiaga (Bembol Roco), a young sherman from the island of Marinduque, who arrives in Manila, Philippines searching for his girlfriend, Ligaya Paraiso (Hilda Koronel). Ligaya le their province months earlier with a woman named Mrs. Cruz, with the promise of schooling and legitimate work.

Julio eventually nds Ligaya trapped in sexual servitude in the home of a merchant in the city’s Chinatown district, where she has been held since shortly a er her arrival.

The lm’s plot moves through Manila’s informal labor economy — construction sites, street life and the sex trade — tracing the overlapping conditions that shape the lives of poor migrants to the city.

Cal Mascardo, Rice Cinema’s lead projectionist and an organizer with Anakbayan Houston, said the decision to screen “Manila in the Claws of Light” emerged from conversations among their “kasamas,” or associates, about the 40th anniversary of the People Power Revolution and students’ role in sparking revolution. Rice Cinema, they added, was invaluable in securing the distribution rights and venue for the screening.

“The Rice Cinema staff is very amenable to having its student employees program events, so I wanted to do something that brought my organizing work onto Rice campus,” wrote Mascardo, a McMurtry College senior, in an email to the Thresher. “We chose to screen Lino Brocka’s Manila in the Claws of Light because it remains a living document of resistance, raising consciousness of the ongoing fight for land and national sovereignty in the Philippines.”

Brocka made the lm during the martial law dictatorship of Ferdinand Marcos, who suspended the Philippine constitution and dissolved democratic institutions in 1972. He worked within the melodramatic conventions of popular Filipino cinema while making a lm whose subject matter was a direct indictment of the Marcos government. The lm’s restored edition premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in 2013 and is widely considered a masterpiece of Philippine and world cinema.

In 1983, Brocka founded the Concerned Artists of the Philippines, a collective of cultural workers organized in opposition to the regime. He was imprisoned in 1985 for direct opposition to the government and released a er international pressure. Ferdinand Marcos Jr., the former dictator’s son, won the Philippine presidential election in 2022 and is the country’s current president.

Brocka and cinematographer Mike de Leon shot the lm almost entirely on location in Manila. The cinematography is intimate and mobile, attending to the physical textures of the city — the bluegreen paint of informal settlement walls, the neon of the entertainment district, the conditions of construction sites and laboring bodies.

The sound design layers construction

noise, street commerce, ambient voices and an intermittent synthesized score throughout, rarely allowing silence.

One recurring gure is a construction worker who sings on the job site, holding a booklet of popular songs, his voice running alongside the noise of the site. When he falls from sca$olding and dies, the lm moves on at roughly the pace of the workday.

The lm’s most sustained sequence occurs a er Julio and Ligaya reunite.

Ligaya, in a long unbroken scene, recounts what has happened to her since her arrival in Manila — the con nement, the other women in the house kept compliant through morphine addiction and the violence that marked her days. The scene is shot with a oating, undecided camera that moves between the two characters without settling into a conventional shotreverse-shot.

Anakbayan Houston is a chapter of a

national Filipino student organization working on issues of Philippine sovereignty, human rights and antiimperialism. The collaboration re ects Rice Cinema’s continued interest in lms whose historical contexts remain politically current, such as its recent screenings of Ali Ahmadzadeh’s 2023 drama “Critical Zone” and Johan Grimonprez’s 2024 documentary “Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat.”

Even decades a er the lm’s release and the People Power Revolution, Mascardo said Brocka’s message still resonates today.

“The struggle against fascism and for national democracy is far from over— both in the Philippines and here in the U.S.,” Mascardo wrote. “These global struggles are deeply connected, and it is the responsibility of the youth to educate themselves and organize to ensure that People Power is truly realized.”

FROM

FRONT PAGE SWIM & DIVE

Portello received two automatic qualifying bids to the NCAA Championship meet with first-place finishes in the 1,650 and 500-yard freestyle. Sophomore Reese Cole earned an automatic qualifying bid for winning the 400-yard individual medley.

Portello and Cole each had three individual podium finishes, and Portello led the team in individual points with 92.

Portello and Cole weren’t the only underclassmen with strong finishes,

though. Freshman Bella Zhang placed second in the 200-yard individual medley, and freshman Lily Archibald placed second in the 100-yard freestyle.

“That shows we had a strong team that will be returning next year with the mindset to do it again,” Huston said.

As for the upperclassmen, Huston recognized senior Lily Cramer, who placed third in the 400-yard individual medley, and junior Sami Johnson, who he said “provided so much depth.”

“You don’t win it on a handful of people,” Huston said. “It’s a whole team effort. So those ladies, really, made some big, big contributions.”

Huston said 11 swimmers advanced to the College Swimming & Diving Coaches Association of America National Invitational Championship, where Rice finished third last year. He also said two divers advanced to the NCAA Zone meet.

“I look at the conference championship as kind of the first step in their championship season,” Huston said. “So, they’ve passed that test. Now, you know, now we move on to extending the postseason.”

EDITORIAL CARTOON

“We’re a swim school now!”

Game-winning shot extends Owls’ unbeaten streak to 19

Even the rowdy home fans at the Minges Coliseum in Greenville, North Carolina weren’t enough to stop the Owls from extending their historic win streak to 19 games on Saturday.

With their 60-58 road win over East Carolina University, Rice improved to an undefeated 14-0 in the American Conference and 24-3 overall. Rice and ECU needed all 40 minutes and 13 lead changes to determine a winner.

In the rst quarter, Rice struggled to get shots to fall, scoring only three eld goals in the rst 10 minutes. Scoring contributions from redshirt junior guard Hailey Adams, senior guard Dominique Ennis and senior center Shelby Hayes, as well as a strong defensive e ort from the Owls, gave them a 10-8 lead at the end of the rst quarter.

As the game transitioned into the second quarter, both teams began to heat up on the o ensive end. Ennis and sophomore guard Aniah Alexis scored 11 of the team’s 15 points in the quarter to keep the Owls in striking distance, as Rice went into hal ime trailing 27-25.

ECU led by four early in the second half before Ennis buried a wide-open threepointer, cutting the Pirates’ advantage to one. Rice struggled to shoot throughout

the rest of the period, hitting only four eld goals out of 20. The Owls made up for their lackluster shooting with physicality in the paint, getting to the free-throw line o en and going 9-for-9 from the charity stripe. A er three quarters, the ECU lead was only three points.

Lou found Dom on a dime. I knew when we found her on a dime, it was going in. That’s how much faith I have in our players and the work they put in.

Lindsay Edmonds

WOMEN’S

BASKETBALL HEAD COACH

With just under six minutes remaining in the game, ECU mounted a six-point lead, its largest of the game. The Owls quickly responded with a 9-0 scoring run o three layups by Hayes, putting Rice ahead 57-54 with 2:24 le to play. The Pirates responded with a 4-0 run of their own, giving them a one-point lead with under 30 seconds le Coming out of a timeout, the Owls had full control with the shot clock o . With only 14 seconds to play, junior guard Louann Battiston found a wide-open Ennis in the

corner, and Ennis connected for the gamewinning three.

“Lou found Dom on a dime,” head coach Lindsay Edmonds said. “I knew when we found her on a dime, it was going in. That’s how much faith I have in our players and the work they put in.”

ECU drove into the paint for a game-tying opportunity, but Adams sealed the 60-58 win with a block under the basket.

“What a battle,” Edmonds said. “Our young ladies, they fought, and in signs of adversity they stayed together and they answered and responded every single time.”

The Owls’ starting ve scored all but four of the team’s points, with three players in double gures. Ennis led the Owls in scoring with 16 points and four rebounds, Hayes put up 11 points and ve rebounds and Adams posted a double-double with a career-high 19 rebounds, 11 points and four blocks.

Adams’ performance put her in the top 10 in program history for career blocks (91) and rebounds in a season (312). She ultimately earned American Player of the Week honors.

“Hailey Adams just does Hailey Adams things,” Edmonds said. “She lls up the stat sheet, she’s our Swiss Army knife — there’s so many things Adams does that no one else can do.”

Rice remains on the road Wednesday night against Temple University. If the Owls can sweep their remaining four games, they will nish undefeated at home and in conference for the rst time since the 201819 season.

Our young ladies, they fought, and in signs of adversity they stayed together and they answered and responded every single time.

Lindsay Edmonds WOMEN’S BASKETBALL HEAD COACH

Rice has already punched its ticket to the American Conference semi nals, but with a statement nish to the regular season, an automatic bid to the NCAA tournament might not be necessary. The Owls continue to earn national attention a er receiving 11 votes in Tuesday’s USA TODAY Coaches Poll, strengthening their candidacy for an at-large bid.

Volleyball head coach agrees to ve-year extension

KEYA PATEL ASST. SPORTS EDITOR

Rice volleyball’s all-time winningest head coach, Genny Volpe, has agreed to a ve-year contract extension that will run through the 2030 season, according to a press release from Rice Athletics.

Volpe has made historic marks on the program with six conference championships since 2009 and nine NCAA tournament bids during her 22 years on South Main.

Her impact extends beyond team success. Volpe has been recognized individually as a two-time Conference USA Coach of the Year (2008, 2018), the 2020-21 AVCA Southwest Region Coach of the Year and the 2025 American Conference Coach of the Year. In 2023, she was inducted into the Rice Athletics Hall of Fame.

“Coach Volpe’s program epitomizes our mission of creating a best-in-class experience for our student-athletes,” Director of Athletics Tommy McClelland said in the press release.

Academic performance has been equally central to the program’s identity. During Volpe’s tenure, 48 Owls have

earned conference All-Academic honors.

“She has built a program that is respected nationwide for its level of success on the court and in the classroom, and I am con dent the coming years will see new chapters added to this impressive legacy,” McClelland said.

Entering 2026, Volpe holds a 434-227 career record and the highest winning percentage in program history at .657.

“I am extremely excited to continue to lead the Rice volleyball program and truly believe the best is yet to come,” Volpe said. “Rice volleyball has been such a huge part of my life for many years, and I can’t think of a better place to be.”

Most recently, Volpe led the Owls to the program’s first American Conference championship with a 15-1 regular-season conference record. Rice went 19-8 overall while facing six ranked opponents — the program’s most in a regular season since 1992 — resulting in the team’s sixth NCAA tournament appearance in the past eight years.

“I wholeheartedly trust in our mission to cultivate championship-caliber programs through elite development of our student-athletes on every level,” Volpe said.

Guard’s career night not enough as men’s basketball falls at Tulane

under ve minutes le in the rst half.

However, just before hal ime, momentum shi ed as Rice missed four of ve shots to close the half. Tulane closed on a 13-3 run, leading 36-33 at the break.

Both teams traded three-pointers early in the second half, but back-to-back threes from Tulane ignited a 15-2 surge for the Green Wave, as they had a 54-38 advantage, the largest of the a ernoon.

Rice refused to back down. Graduate guard Trae Broadnax sparked an 11-2 run for the Owls with a steal and layup. Anderson then knocked down ve straight free throws and a layup, bringing Rice within ve points of Tulane with 4:25 to play.

Lanier said key stretches swung the team’s momentum.

“We were trading baskets,” Lanier said. “We just needed to be a little more staunch defensively.”

Men’s basketball dropped a close game Sunday at Tulane University despite a season-best performance from senior guard Nick Anderson.

The Owls slipped to 11-16 with a 5-9 record in American Conference play. Anderson logged 29 points and seven rebounds, but it

was not enough as Tulane pulled away in the second half.

The matchup began quickly, with Tulane hitting early shots and commanding an 11-7 lead, but the Owls stormed back with an 8-0 run sparked by a three-pointer from freshman guard Bodey Howell as they took control of the game. Anderson chipped in a pair of three-pointers, and a second three from Howell propelled Rice to a 30-23 lead with just

Each time the Owls threatened, Tulane seemed to have a response. The Green Wave stretched the margin back to double digits with an 11-4 run. Rice continued to ght, with a Broadnax three-pointer cutting the de cit to six with 23 seconds remaining, but Tulane closed the game at the free-throw line, making ve of six.

Rice shot 42.9% from the eld and 40.7% from beyond the arc, hitting 11 threes for the 12th time this season. Tulane was e cient, shooting 47.9% overall, and they outrebounded the Owls 34-27. Broadnax supplemented Anderson’s performance with 16 points and six assists, and Howell added nine points on three triples.

After the game, head coach Rob

We didn’t have enough of a presence on the offensive glass. They’re not a great rebounding team, they’re not a great block-out team and we needed to go and get those extra possessions.

Rob Lanier MEN’S BASKETBALL HEAD COACH

Lanier also said the Owls missed rebound opportunities.

“We didn’t have enough of a presence on the o ensive glass,” Lanier said. “They’re not a great rebounding team, they’re not a great block-out team and we needed to go and get those extra possessions.”

Rice returns home Wednesday against the University of South Florida, looking to nish strong with four games le in the regular season.

S.A. ELECTION RUNDOWN

Ananya A. (Ananya) Nair is a McMurtry experience staple. She is sincere. Chelsea Asibbey might be Trevor Tobey II. She has experience.

College rundown, based on previous and current statistics.

Baker will be apolitical to avoid cortisol spikes. We predict that most Bakerites will abstain from voting, but some will vote for their native Chelsea.

Per Trevor Tobey’s gerrymandering amendments, Stinky votes separately from Lovett. We predict that most Stenches will vote for Jenny, because they vibe with whatever Jenny’s got going on. They’ve also heard that she makes great ice cream.

Will Rice embodies the ethos of the Gadsden Flag with their “don’t tread on me” attitude towards Perch. We predict that most Will Ricers will vote for Mo.

Hanszen is teeming with well-meaning establishment Democrats. We predict that Hanszenites will vote for Jenny.

Jenny “Cano” Karsner is nice. Big waver. Max Menchaca desires power of some sort. He wrote a song.

Because of Wiess’s self-contained, circular economy (as long as Rice remains exclusionary enough), Weisspeople will be compelled to rally for their homegrown candidate, Jenny. Anyone who does not vote for Jenny will be excommunicated from the members of the college of the Weisspeople of Wiess.

Jones is proud of its status as the most socially liberal, fscally conservative college. Jones has an insatiable desire for winning; thus, they will be voting for Max, as they respect him for winning Brown’s Finest.

Brown, while embodying strong democratic socialist beliefs, generally forgets to vote. The 3 votes cast will be for Jenny, Max, and Jae “President of Everything, Doer of Nothing” Kim.

Though the switch is happening next year, the spirit of Lovett has already been gentrifed, triggering a switch from liberal to conservative. We predict they’ll vote for Chelsea.

Sid Richardson is full of aspiring Bill Gateses and Jordan Petersons. However, provided their dietary inclinations, their decision is entirely based on a candidate’s opinion on abortion – a girl’s gotta eat! We predict they’ll vote for Chelsea.

Martel aligns with Pinochetism, but has to go with Chelsea for balance. We didn’t bother to ask anyone from Martel what they think.

Muyiwa “Mo” Ogunsola is on Fizz. He is a freshman.

McMurtry is solidly blue, defying their purple label. Murts will go for their own Ananya A. (Ananya) Nair due to the sincerity of her GroupMe messages.

Duncan is proud to have the largest number of Green Party voters of any college, with a grand total of 5. They appreciate an unlikely underdog, so they will vote for Mo.

Chao really doesn’t know what’s going on yet. They will decide the moment their fnger hovers over the poll.

Takes on hot-button issues

Meal Swipes Publics

Chelsea: Supporter of current plan and alleged co-conspirator with H&D.

Mo: Has FO-“Mo” from the old meal plan system, 1 B.M. (Before Mo). He wants to revert plans just to experience being able to swipe in your friends at effectively no cost.

Ananya A. (Ananya) Nair: Wants to establish a universal meal plan with unlimited swipes for everyone. This plan will cost students $1 each.

Max: Unlimited Tetra and 10 meal swipes a semester.

Jenny: Supports abolishing meal swipes in favor of everyone rushing into the servery to claim their food before it runs out. Each meal will be flmed and watched by a select circle of Weisspeople.

Chelsea: Believes every public should be capped at 100 people, with free hard alcohol for all attendees.

Mo: Thinks publics are awesome, and that all colleges should host monthly publics. Mo thinks this would curb REMS numbers because people would be less excited to drink.

Ananya A. (Ananya) Nair: Thinks what happened to NOD should happen to other publics to keep Rice inclusive and wholesome. More specifcally, that means canceling all of them.

Max: Wants to make publics more inclusive for off-campus students. He will try to pass an amendment about this.

Jenny: Believes that every public should be clothing optional in the spirit of NOD.

Highlights from recent Kinder Institute Polls

80% of Business majors reported they are voting for Chelsea.

• Ananya A. (Ananya) Nair is expected to receive 0.01% of the vote.

100% of Sports Management majors will be too busy to vote.

• Jenny had a typo in a recent Instagram post, reported by 25% of Backpage writers. This may potentially upset English majors.

• 80% of freshmen reported planning to ask ChatGPT who should get their vote. ChatGPT is expected to respond with Mo, because “it’s not about seniority – it’s about alliances with those similar to you.”

• 95% of SWGM is planning to vote for Max.

• Since 1916, an average of 0% has changed after each SA President’s term. The past year, however, has seen unprecedented changes: the addition of late night dining, $5 printing credit (coinciding with a $5 tuition increase), and bolstering Rice’s presence on the national stage at the government racism meeting. And everyone cared.