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MIT’s Senior House dormitory closes, and a crisis blooms at colleges

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Re: MIT’s Senior House dormitory closes, and a crisis blooms at colleges

#211

Post by pishpash »

jpmattia wrote: post #209
pishpash wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Professors aren't the ones dealing with undergraduates, it's the administration. The administration is answering to the MIT Corporation and the Board of Directors, whose interest has long become to grow the "investment vehicle" (endowment, professorial industry nexus, bureaucracy, etc.) through commercial and real-estate ventures, patents, and the cultivation of the brand. Students, graduate or undergraduate, and the…

You must have had a different interaction with the MIT Corp: I've found that they have nothing other than the best interests of MIT at heart. Most of the members are alums, and several of them have made very significant donations (with not a whole lot of recognition imo.) I'm not saying the MIT Corp hasn't made mistakes, but I've never questioned their motives for doing the right thing.

I don't even think you are contradicting me here. It's just that "MIT" has grown to be a lot lot more than educating its students (for better or for worse), and its ... "interests" much more varied as a result. After all, the students are there for a few years and then leave. Who are the real long-term stakeholders here? As I pointed out already, it's the bureaucracy, the professors, all the commercial interests wanting in on the MIT pie, and an institutional leadership interested in all the powers that accrue to overseeing a larger endowment with a greater capital return.

How MIT's immediate neighborhood has developed into an unlivable office park is a vivid example of what I say.

Re: MIT’s Senior House dormitory closes, and a crisis blooms at colleges

#212

Post by Veelox »

totony wrote: post #204
indigochill wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.hackthebox.eu/en is one There's also http://3564020356.org/ (Actually I misremembered this one - you gain access by reading an intro to crypto and then answering a question about it. As I recall you get additional access by solving other, more challenging tests)

I tried hackthebox.eu... https://i.imgur.com/Axq0GPu.jpg

I think that is what you are suppose to see.

Re: MIT’s Senior House dormitory closes, and a crisis blooms at colleges

#213

Post by rasz »

rothbardrand wrote: post #94
mhalle wrote: post #26

As a Senior House alum and former instructor at MIT, what bothers me the most is how MIT is teaching horrible standards of ethical behavior through their actions. Improper use of metadata to track down individuals in a confidential survey about mental health and substance abuse would end a scientist's career. MIT did it. Collective punishment of a group for the actions of a few is an educational and social antipatter…

What happened to the MIT Administration? Ever since Aaron Swartz death, it seems the administration of the school has been corrupted by some influence. My guess is that, like so many universities in this country, the administration is not answerable to students or even alumni.

You are forgetting Star Simpson 5 years earlier. MIT was always like that.

Re: MIT’s Senior House dormitory closes, and a crisis blooms at colleges

#214

Post by indigochill »

Veelox wrote: post #212
totony wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I tried hackthebox.eu... https://i.imgur.com/Axq0GPu.jpg

I think that is what you are suppose to see.

No, there is an actual landing page. Might want to follow up on that via the provided instructions if you're getting that page.

Re: MIT’s Senior House dormitory closes, and a crisis blooms at colleges

#215

Post by BoorishBears »

throwaway2048 wrote: post #176
BoorishBears wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't think it was meant to be a political post. The entire thread is about a purported cultural shift that's starving out the environment that people like Steve and Woz thrived in. In fact, I would be disappointed if it was meant to be about politics because it'd come across as an attempt to shoehorn politics into a discussion about much broader social trends

What exactly do you beleive politics to be? This sort of thing is a prime example of politics, the failure to recognise that is harmful to your understanding. Politics isnt just voting for congress-critters and presidents.

I don't feel it is useful to narrow this to a political issue rather than a broader social trend.

I also don't particularly appreciate the tone of your replies and especially statements like "the failure to recognise that is harmful to your understanding", which come across as somewhat condescending and less about seeking a proper conversation than about attempting to lecture.

So I won't be replying further to this thread.

Re: MIT’s Senior House dormitory closes, and a crisis blooms at colleges

#216

Post by ocschwar »

rothbardrand wrote: post #94
mhalle wrote: post #26

As a Senior House alum and former instructor at MIT, what bothers me the most is how MIT is teaching horrible standards of ethical behavior through their actions. Improper use of metadata to track down individuals in a confidential survey about mental health and substance abuse would end a scientist's career. MIT did it. Collective punishment of a group for the actions of a few is an educational and social antipatter…

What happened to the MIT Administration? Ever since Aaron Swartz death, it seems the administration of the school has been corrupted by some influence. My guess is that, like so many universities in this country, the administration is not answerable to students or even alumni.

The problem with MIT is that while MIT students are well, MIT students, and MIT faculty are MIT faculty, MIT administrators are generic college administrators, hopping from school to school as they hunt chances at promotion.

Re: MIT’s Senior House dormitory closes, and a crisis blooms at colleges

#217

Post by mrgordon »

Stranger43 wrote: post #210
mrgordon wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thats not what happened here. Current and former students are overwhelmingly united on the same side. The administration misused some voluntary response data as a pretext for shutting down a community that they didn't like. There are no loud senior citizens subduing youths unless you mean the administration. Au contraire, the students and alums were fighting together to prevent Senior House from being replaced with a…

the reality of the situation is that a dorm was closed by the people whom it's financial viability depended on because it never grew into something fully independent, nor into something that the people running MIT's budget found especially useful. Already there we have a narrative break, sure a lot of people who's identity have gotten mixed with a particular community feels they lost something but that don’t mean soc…

Its a college dorm. It was never meant to be "fully independent" and there is absolutely nothing wrong with a dorm being "sanctioned and financed by the establishment." MIT made a decision to cover their own asses in case anything went wrong in the dorm as they've been doing since famous hazing / suicide cases happened in other dorms / living groups fifteen years ago. More college-bound eccentric geniuses will end up considering other institutions of learning if MIT's campus becomes devoid of spaces that they find inspiring, creative, fun, etc. Luckily MIT still has some solid living groups despite this but removing two undergraduate dorms in quick succession will definitely have an effect.

Society doesn't know enough to judge whether they lost something. That doesn't really matter ultimately as MIT is the one that made the decision. If MIT could have gotten everyone in the dorm to sign a legal waiver then they would have been more than happy to let it stay.

You say the people running MIT's budget didn't find it "especially useful". It is a dorm that houses people. Its not like the option is to have no dorm. They still need a dorm. It was a specific cultural purge to shield legal liability.

Re: MIT’s Senior House dormitory closes, and a crisis blooms at colleges

#218

Post by afarrell »

taysic wrote: post #168
JustAnotherPat wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Counterculture is a threat to the current liberal elite status quo. After the defeat of Hillary Clinton, her corporate cronies are trying to consolidate power and develop an army of mindless millennial drones.

No not really. Have you gone to Senior House? There are plenty of communist ideals all over the walls. I'm sure plenty of Hilary supporters though I haven't been there this recent election

Unless I'm misremembering where my social circle lived, there was at least one SH alum on the Clinton campaign's technology team.

Re: MIT’s Senior House dormitory closes, and a crisis blooms at colleges

#219

Post by totalZero »

meddlepal wrote: post #99
rothbardrand wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What happened to the MIT Administration? Ever since Aaron Swartz death, it seems the administration of the school has been corrupted by some influence. My guess is that, like so many universities in this country, the administration is not answerable to students or even alumni.

Undergrad students are a nuisance for a school like MIT nowadays. These are giant research corporations masquerading as academic institutions.

This is so true. My opinion is that the MIT administration does not give a damn about undergraduate students.

Re: MIT’s Senior House dormitory closes, and a crisis blooms at colleges

#220

Post by totalZero »

ocschwar wrote: post #216
rothbardrand wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What happened to the MIT Administration? Ever since Aaron Swartz death, it seems the administration of the school has been corrupted by some influence. My guess is that, like so many universities in this country, the administration is not answerable to students or even alumni.

The problem with MIT is that while MIT students are well, MIT students, and MIT faculty are MIT faculty, MIT administrators are generic college administrators, hopping from school to school as they hunt chances at promotion.

This is especially true of the curricular administrators in the registrar's office, and S^3. You find a lot of folks in positions of authority who just don't get what it's like to be an undergraduate student at MIT.
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