The advising center has recently expanded its hours to five days a week as part of continued efforts to increase advising services for students on campus. The center serves as a complement to the more popularly-known faculty advising service. Advisers involved give students guidance on core requirements and address their specific policy concerns. Though the advising center was previously open...

Despite a general decrease in both violent and non-violent crime in the Eagle Rock area over the past year, crime in the residential blocks surrounding Occidental has spiked by 35 percent in recent months, according to Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) reports. Two cars were reported stolen and multiple students had possessions stolen from their rooms. According to the LAPD's...

First-year halls clinched first and second place in Occidental's first-ever conservation challenge, a competition to see which residence hall could reduce its water and energy consumption the most. Stewart-Cleland Hall and Chilcott Hall came in first and second, respectively, followed by Erdman, Bell-Young and Stearns halls. The average student consumed 25.6 gallons of water during the challenge, down from 26.47...

In an act of solidarity, student supporters of the Coalition at Oxy for Diversity and Equity (C. O. D. E.) gathered at the entrances of Lower Herrick last Thursday to encourage faculty as they exited their meeting with Dean Jorge Gonzalez. The sit-in was organized for students to express their support for a petition set forth by 56 faculty members...

The Career Development Center (CDC) hosted its second annual Law Week from Nov. 4 to Nov. 13 as part of an ongoing effort to ramp up pre-law advising at Occidental. Throughout the week, student were able to attend pre-law workshops, law career panels and a law school fair. Law Week serves as the CDC's most recent step in developing Occidental's...

Occidental faculty members and administration have created a committee to address privacy concerns prompted by the seizure of 42 administrative staff and eight faculty hard drives last July. College officials claim that the information was requested in response to an ongoing investigation by the Department of Education (ED) into the college's handling of sexual assault allegations. Occidental's practices are being...

Amid calls to push Occidental toward a more sustainable future, students in the Urban and Environmental Policy (UEP) department have spearheaded the school's first campus-wide conservation challenge. The competition pits residence halls against each other to see which hall can reduce its water and energy consumption the most. Efforts to implement the event came about after UEP major Lila Singer-Berk...

As students flooded lower campus for Occidental's annual Toga dance, a ruptured pipe inundated upper campus with water. The flooding left multiple residence halls without water and damaged the vivarium of the Bioscience building. According to an email from Director of Communications Jim Tranquada, the flooding began around 12 a.m. Sunday when a 6-inch steel water main running between the...

Students at Occidental College have increasingly become targets of criminal activity, despite crime reports from the LAPD suggesting the opposite. While some incidents have allegedly been limited to verbal harassment, other students have found themselves facing potentially life-threatening situations. Although there was an apparent uptick in crime in early 2013, a recent Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) report shows that...

Occidental College has hired recent graduate Emma Sorrell '13 as its first-ever Sustainability Coordinator. This action came as a response to student efforts encouraging cohesive campus sustainability. Her goals include reducing water and power consumption on campus; expanding public transportation opportunities for students, faculty and staff; and providing sustainability advice on any projects that involve updating campus buildings and facilities....