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‘CRAMMED’ THE INDEPENDENT PRESS OF VIRGINIA COMMONWEALTH UNIVERSITY
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VCU cuts price for quad dorms, students say it’s not enough
Students sit in their 'quad' dorm room in Rhoads Hall on Sept. 14. The room was originally intended to house three students. Photo by Andrew Kerley.
SPORTS
OPINIONS
PRESS BOX
SHINY CHANDRAVEL Contributing Writer
Illustration by M. Moreira.
VCU belongs with the big dogs in 2K KYLER GILLIAM Staff Writer College basketball is coming back to our consoles and joysticks, as video game publisher 2K recently announced a “college basketball experience” that will be released as early as 2027. However, the excitement from sports gamers has been diminished by 2K clarifying only over 100 of the 361 Division 1 teams will make the cut. VCU 2K Continued on page 5
I wonder how quickly the Sumerians would have invented the wheel had the fire keeping them warm died out. How would the polio vaccine have been synthesized if the lights above Dr. Jonas Salk flickered and died? Imagine if Einstein had been denied the chalk that would one day illustrate the theory of relativity — changing our understanding of the universe forever. These moments of human discovery stand as reminders to be grateful that our scientists and innovators had heat to warm them, lights to shine on them and resources to make their work possible. Their genius, while strong enough to support the gears that run civilizations today, was once vulnerable and fragile too. I have worked in a microbiology lab at VCU for a year and a half now, studying a vaginal bacterium that may be linked to pre-term birth in pregnant women. I vividly remember the week the Trump Administration warned universities not to fund research including the word “women.” That day, my peers and I did not face our microscopes, pipetting away. We faced each other.
VOL. 71, NO. 5 SEPT. 17, 2025 Winner of 400+ statewide and national awards
BRYER HAYWOOD Contributing Writer First-year computer science student Joseph Bellanti was only notified weeks before the start of the fall semester that an additional roommate would be squeezed into his Rhoads Hall dorm — turning a “triple” into a “quad.” “It’s just pretty cramped,” Bellanti said. “There’s not a lot of space. I don’t think this room was made for four people.” Bellanti is one of over 100 students at VCU who had their rooms converted over the summer to fit the university’s second largest freshman class in history, with more than 4,500 students arriving on campus. The VCU Board of Visitors met on Sept. 11 and approved a rate reduction of roughly $500 for each student living in a “quad dorm,” bringing the price down to $7,645 for a ninemonth lease. “I don’t think [for] any price they should just shove an extra student, an extra book case in here, an extra fridge,” Bellanti said. “I don’t think it’s possible, but they did it.” VCU has grappled with high admission rates for years, partially as a result of the university’s guaranteed admission policy for high school students with a 3.5 or higher GPA. Around 80 students in 2023 were housed off-campus at the Graduate Hotel due to a lack of space, according to ABC 8. Many students are currently being housed in “overf low spaces” — lounges converted into dorms — in Gladding Residence Center. QUAD DORMS Continued on page 2
I work in a VCU lab to better the lives of women.
Trump’s cuts are working against me.
SCIENCE CRISIS Continued on page 9
Illustration by Zoë Luis.
Student drag show
Key matchups in WBB non-conference
VCU needs to put the ‘public’ back in public transportation
see SPECTRUM page 7
see SPORTS page 4
see OPINIONS page 10