Just keep swimming through shopping week!

Happening off-campus: Marks & Spencer is making its London Fashion Week debut on Friday to showcase its fashion credentials and appeal to younger, fashion-focused shoppers both domestically and internationally. The collection of 57 runway looks celebrates the retailer’s 100 years in fashion with heritage-inspired womenswear and menswear. Under CEO Stuart Machin, M&S has been strengthening its omnichannel strategy, aiming to double online sales in its fashion, home and beauty division and increase online’s share of total sales from 34% to 50% in the medium term. (Reuters)

Happening near campus: Open water swimming in New York Harbor is becoming increasingly popular through organized groups like URBANSWIM, which has facilitated nearly 200 harbor swims this year, though the activity remains unconventional and logistically complex. While water quality has improved a lot over recent decades, bacteria levels remain variable and are prone to spiking after storms or sewage overflows. Safe harbor swimming requires extensive precautions including Coast Guard coordination, trailing motorboats, visibility gear, paddlers, and careful attention to strong currents and heavy boat traffic—measures that organizers emphasize are essential rather than optional. (Gothamist)

Happening on-campus: This Friday, September 18 and Saturday, September 19, The Paulo Freire Conference will take place at Teachers College in Russell Hall’s 4th-floor Smith Learning Theater. Organized by the Paulo Freire Initiative at Columbia University with support from the Institute of Latin American Studies (ILAS), the Lemann Center for Brazilian Studies, and the Transformative Learning Technologies Lab (TLTL), the all-day conference will feature lectures, panel discussions, poster presentations, and audiovisual screenings examining Freire’s work as a social technology with concrete outcomes in curricula, teaching methodologies, structural reforms, and public education policy implementation worldwide. The event is bilingual, offering programming in both Portuguese and English to ensure accessibility for an international audience of educators and researchers. You can find more information about registration here. 

Rewatching: I am, once again, rewatching Gilmore Girls! It’s that time of year again AND my roommate and I just got a TV for the biggest double maybe in the world, and it fits so perfectly above our fireplace. We watch it while we attempt to slog our way through our mountains of reading, and have started at the beginning. Currently still on season one, but I already can’t wait for Jess to be introduced!

Riverside via Bwarchives