Friendworking = friendship + networking

You’ve probably seen this LinkedIn/Tinder mashup on Facebook already, but what is Coffee@CU anyway? One of ADI Labs’ spring projects, it’s meant to give CU students an outlet to meet people outside of their social circles. Its well-known perception of Columbia and Barnard campus culture tends to focus on isolation, loneliness, and stress culture, yet the school’s online presence is active with discourse as seen in various CU-associated Facebook groups and sites. Coffee@CU is one of the latest hubs of campus meetups, currently run by ADI member and PM Jimmy O’Donnell (SEAS ‘19). I sat down with Jimmy to talk about the history of Coffee@CU and why Columbia has a niche for such a site.

The Coffee@CU site is addictive but riddled with ambiguity. Its layout is simple; one can scroll through photos of CU students that list their name, school, interests, and free time. Anyone can request a coffee meetup with someone else by sending a quick, witty message. But the site is vague and doesn’t specify whether its users are looking for hookups, new friendships, or networking opportunities. According to Jimmy, the ambiguity is in part purposeful to initiate new relationships and friendships that otherwise would have never happened due to a campus social that people often find stifling.

“The culture of Columbia lives online,” says Jimmy, citing student life sites like WikiCU and CULPA, where campus commentary breeds. I’d add that often these online enclaves such as Columbia Buy Sell Memes reflect a ‘community’ built not on connection but rather commiseration and the social isolation that’s a reality for many Columbia students. “Columbia’s a fundamentally lonely place, where people have problems building a community and finding and keeping friend groups,” Jimmy says, explaining that Coffee@CU was created to target the difficulty many students encounter in making social connections on campus. The site was originally created by Parthi Loganathan (SEAS ’16) in an effort to meet new people in his last semester at Columbia. In fact, Jimmy and Parthi first got to know each other on a Coffee@CU meetup, and this spring, Jimmy takes over project manager as the site is nurtured by ADI Labs, a group of students who focus their energy on creating working sites and apps for Barnumbia students’ needs. Now, Coffee@CU is seeing a resurgence of interest as ADI coders build upon the site’s foundation built two years back.

Read more about Coffee@CU after the jump

Imagine this, but artsy

New York City is packed with amazing culture and inspiring art, but sometimes it’s difficult to break the Morningside-bubble and experience it all first-hand. “Where Art Thou” is a weekly guide to interesting and notable lectures, events, and performances for the literary/musically/theatrically-inclined on campus.

On campus:

• At 6:30 pm this Thursday, February 8, photographer LaToya Ruby Frazier will be talking about how she uses her work to “fight injustice… and create a more representative self-portrait.” The event will take place in the Katharina Otto-Bernstein Screening Room, at Lenfest Center for the Arts (on 129th Street). More details can be found here.
• Also at 6:30 pm this Thursday, Buell Hall will be hosting a screening of What’s in a Name? (Le Prénom), a film about familial arguments brought to the surface after a the protagonist tells his friends and relatives the name of his future son. The screening will be followed by a discussion in French.
• Next Saturday, February 10, the International Affairs Building will be the host of a Yugoslav Experimental Film Symposium that “focuses on the marginalized area of the experimental moving image, addressing alternative forms of film, video, and paracinema in the former Yugoslavia that both flourished and were erased from the official historical record.” Events and screenings will take place from 10 am to 5 pm in 1219 IAB.

Off campus:

• The Mount Holyoke Club of NYC is hosting a “Sip and Paint” night at the Art Studio of New York (on W 96th Street) next Saturday, from 3 pm to 6 pm. The entry cost includes paint supplies, but drinks are BYOB. Find ticket details and more info here.
• Next Sunday, February 11, soprano Heather Hill will be performing at Riverside Church as part of Riverside’s Beyond the Dream series. Hill’s music will present “songs celebrating the beautiful diversity of America by musically exploring themes of freedom, justice, and unity.” Reservation is required, but tickets are free.

Picture via publicdomainpictures

I hope this isn’t your TA

Have you ever had that one TA who never shows up to office hours or recitations? Or the one who can never correctly answer your questions? Or the one who has to teach the class, but you’d probably learn more if they just didn’t? Fear not, we have some simple solutions.

• Nap. Just nap the whole time. See this as a form of self-care. Treat yourself by getting the full 8 hours of sleep you deserve and saving yourself from having to endure your shitty TA’s teaching.
• Try to bag that A with ass-kissing. If your TA sucks, it’s highly possible that they’ll be easily persuaded. Why not use that as an opportunity to boost your own grade?
• Knit. Let your inner 80-year-old woman come out. The warm winter weather is starting to turn bitterly cold, so save yourself money and knit yourself a sweater or something else warm.
• Cry. We all need a good cry once in a while. Or every time you show up to your shitty TA’s class.
• Make Pavlov proud and classically condition at least one classmate. This needs no explanation.
• Bring an opaque water bottle filled with booze to class and turn their shitty teaching into a drinking game. Make every class with your shitty TA a party.
• Become a grad student and then build a time machine to go back in time and become your own TA. They say you shouldn’t mess with the past when you have a time machine, but this is a risk that you should definitely take.
• Go to their office hours to show that you care. At the end of the day, no matter how shitty your TA is, they’re all there for one reason only: to help students. They work hard to make sure no one is having a hard time, and simply showing up to their office hours will put a smile on their face. Nothing makes TAs happier than seeing students understanding the material that they were once struggling with.

Why is there only one person in that classroom via Pixabay

Venture out of the MoHi bubble and take a trip to the Brooklyn Museum!

Happening in the world: With new remote sensing technology, researchers were able to discover over 60,000 hidden Mayan ruins in Guatemala. The technology, called Lidar, allows archaeologists to find things that are invisible to the naked eye. (BBC)

Happening in the US: Russia recently developed a new nuclear-armed torpedo that could easily strike US coastal cities, prompting Trump to call for the US’s production of new nuclear arms, following his promises to strengthen the country’s nuclear arsenal. (USA Today)

Happening in NYC: A man was recently found dead in Riverside Park near W 158th Street and Riverside Drive. He was found lying on a stairwell, face-down. The cause of death is currently unknown. (NY Daily News)

Happening on Campus: The Ethiopian Eritrean Student Association is heading to Brooklyn to attend the Brooklyn Museum for Target First Saturdays: Black History Month! Check out the Facebook event here.

Overheard: “I just met you, and like, you seem so mean.” “OK, nobody tells this guy my name.”

Brooklyn Museum via Wikimedia Commons