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The Student-Run Newspaper of Williams College Since 1887

The Williams Record

The Student-Run Newspaper of Williams College Since 1887

The Williams Record

The Student-Run Newspaper of Williams College Since 1887

The Williams Record

Jacob Posner, Executive Editor for Podcast

Jacob Posner ’23 is a history major from Chicago, Ill. He is an executive editor for podcast and previously served as a section editor for features.

Email: [email protected]

All content by Jacob Posner
Out of the eight dining hall workers who responded to a Record survey, seven reported dissatisfaction.

Dining staff say they are overworked, frustrated as a result of labor shortage

Kitt Urdang, Jacob Posner, and Saud Afzal Shafi October 6, 2021
As the College navigates a local and national labor shortage, some members of the Dining Services staff say they are overburdened, lack confidence in the quality of their work, and are experiencing low morale. Of the eight dining hall workers who responded to an anonymous survey by the Record, seven expressed dissatisfaction with their experiences working in Dining Services this year.
Whitney Lincoln ’20 (left), Lindsay Avant ’21 (top right), and Sydney Jones ’21 (bottom right) spoke with the Record about their experiences as Black athletes on women's soccer. (Photos courtesy of Grace Byers, Lindsay Avant, and Kris Dufour.)

Navigating ‘white structures and white expectations’: Black athletes discuss race, belonging on women’s soccer

Jacob Posner May 19, 2021
The Record spoke with three Black players on women’s soccer who took significant time off from the team over the last two years, or, in one case, quit the team outright. They all emphasized that their experiences on the team were symptomatic of it being part of a majority-white college, of “having to navigate through white structures and white expectations,” as one player put it.
Without help from the College, the term-limited faculty whose contracts have already ended or will end after this semester must find new positions. Many are struggling to navigate job markets with little demand for their labor. (The Williams Record/Emily Zheng)

Term-limited faculty face uncertain futures amid pandemic job market

Jacob Posner, Josh Kirschner, and Katharine Cook April 7, 2021
During spring 2020, despite widespread calls for support from term-limited faculty members, the College declined to offer a blanket extension of all term-limited faculty members’ contracts, citing financial uncertainty. Instead, it provided term-limited faculty members the option to take an unpaid research associate position to aid in the job search. While some term-limited professors were ultimately offered extensions on a case-by-case basis, others were left to face a beleaguered job market.
College reports 4 potentially connected COVID cases

College reports 4 potentially connected COVID cases

2 students among the 4 cases attended indoor gathering on Saturday
Kevin Yang, Annie Lu, and Jacob Posner March 23, 2021
Two students have tested positive for COVID-19 after attending an indoor gathering at Gladden House on Saturday night, Dean Sandstrom confirmed to the Record today. The two COVID-positive students who attended the gathering — along with another student who did not attend the gathering, as well as a faculty or staff member — are part of a larger cluster of four cases reported in the last week.
One in Two Thousand: Weiwei Lu ’23

One in Two Thousand: Weiwei Lu ’23

Jacob Posner November 18, 2020
This week the script in R chose Weiwei Lu ’23, who discussed her love of Tunnel City coffee, becoming an accidental major in comparative literature and her character development over the past year. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Quarantined students face communication gaps, criticize lack of College support

Quarantined students face communication gaps, criticize lack of College support

Kevin Yang, Annie Lu, and Jacob Posner November 11, 2020
In October, two more students at the College tested positive for COVID-19, bringing the total number of positive tests among students to five. Upon receiving their positive test results, the students were told they had to move to isolation housing, and their respective podmates, who were informed about an hour afterward, were given less than an hour to pack and move to Dodd for a two-week quarantine. The ensuing series of events, based on interviews with four students who were placed in quarantine across the two incidents, revealed a significant lack of communication on the part of the College.
One in Two Thousand: Jacob Fink ’23

One in Two Thousand: Jacob Fink ’23

Jacob Posner October 21, 2020
This week the computer (using a script in R) chose Jacob Fink ’23, who discussed growing up in Williamstown, his experiences as a Duncan Robinson superfan, his interests in psychology and Malcolm Gladwell.
Students have been gathering in large groups that violate the 10-person limit imposed by COVID guidelines. (The Williams Record)

Large gatherings of students violated the public health guidelines. The College’s response has been spotty.

Kevin Yang, Annie Lu, and Jacob Posner September 30, 2020
If you walk past Frosh Quad at 11 p.m. on a Friday, you’ll hear pounding music and see groups of first-years wandering between buildings. It almost seems like a regular Friday night — not one in the middle of a pandemic. In the weeks since students returned to campus there have been a number of instances in which students violated the College’s public health guidelines — which limit gatherings to groups of 10 — sometimes with gatherings of dozens of students. The College’s responses to different instances and types of violations have varied widely.
“This is being Black at Williams:” Instagram account amplifies Black voices, issues of racism within the College

“This is being Black at Williams:” Instagram account amplifies Black voices, issues of racism within the College

Arrington Luck, Jacob Posner, and Jackson Hartigan August 5, 2020
“I remember a white student complaining to me about how me and my black friends participated too much/too well to the point that we ‘dominated’ the class, and informed me how other non-white classmates felt the same way,” reads a June 30 post from the Instagram page @blackatwilliams. “It was as if he was asking me to give him a chance. And to top it off, it was an Africana course. His entitlement infuriated me.’”
After battling with COVID-19 symptoms, Calle and her mother went for a walk last weekend in Flushing Meadow Park in Queens, New York. (Photo courtesy of Tania Calle.)

Three Williams students experienced COVID-19 symptoms. These are their stories.

Jeongyoon Han, Kevin Yang, and Jacob Posner May 21, 2020
While many students at the College have felt the effects of COVID-19 from afar — financially, emotionally, academically — relatively few have come into close contact with the virus itself. But for three students, it has become intimately familiar. Tania Calle ’20, Kalina Harden ’21 and Max Mallett ’23 all experienced telltale coronavirus symptoms and either lived in or passed through an epicenter of the virus.
PHOTO BY KEVIN YANG/THE WILLIAMS RECORD.

Professors approach remote learning with creativity, cautious optimism

Jacob Posner April 3, 2020
Imagine you are a Williams professor. You care deeply for your students. You try to develop a high-quality, intellectually invigorating experience. But the College has shut down, and a pandemic threatens the world. You’re at home, perhaps with a child or two to take care of, and an elderly parent to worry about. Your only teaching tools are online — Zoom, Glow, Piazza — but you’ve never taught online.
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