A nearly $800 million increase in Washington University’s endowment over the past fiscal year is allowing the University to allocate more funds to departments previously subject to significant budget cuts.

For many years, it’s been trendy to talk about the Wash. U. “bubble”—which includes the Danforth Campus and the Loop, and to a lesser extent downtown Clayton and Forest Park. What doesn’t get mentioned is the community within a community composed of those who live on campus.

The Study Nights at College Hall (S.N.AT.C.H.) program aims to provide students with a quiet study space on the South 40. Every Sunday, Washington University reserves College Hall as a place for students to study, and Dining Services provides snacks for students studying in the facility.

The Office of Residential Life makes important decisions that impact every student on campus. Whether you’re a freshman or a graduate student, if you have housing through Washington University, then ResLife’s decisions are going to affect you. With this in mind, we urge ResLife to fully weigh the impact of their decisions prior to changing policies.

Starting in fall 2011, being a Residential Advisor (RA) will no longer jeopardize a student’s eligibility to receive financial aid. In an email to all RAs for the 2011-2012 school year, Associate Director of Residential Life Mary Elliott announced that the RAs will now be considered full employees of the Office of Residential Life.

The Office of Residential Life recently decided not to charge student groups to rent rooms for the remainder of this semester. Any room rental charges incurred before the fee suspension will be reimbursed. When Student Union learned in October of ResLife’s plan to charge for rooms, SU representatives were caught by surprise by the program’s implementation.

If you’ve been following the uproar over the new Residential Life room reservation fees, there are three things you probably know: First, that student groups are unhappy about it; second, that ResLife made the decision out of financial need; and third, that ResLife has not been open to student group input on the fee structure or on how this affects student groups.

Event planning can be stressful. As ALAS (Association of Latin American Students) members led auditions for more than 20 hopeful Carnaval participants on Sunday, a sophomore in an emblazoned black polo quietly set up the speaker system and video-recording equipment at the front of the Mudd Multipurpose room. As they danced, he remained alert for any technical difficulties.

Residential Life recently made the controversial decision to turn almost every usable meeting space on the South 40 and in the Village, including Ursa’s (both fireside and stageside) and the Village Blackbox, into premium spaces starting next semester. This decision means that student groups will have to pay money in order to reserve these spaces. This decision has been met with much derision from the students, many of whom think that it is ridiculous that student groups should have to pay through the nose to meet.

Burglaries on campus fell sharply and off-campus ones nearly doubled between 2008 to 2009, according to new statistics on crime at Washington University. The statistics, whose public release is mandated by the Clery Act of 1991, show four different categories of university crime levels over a three-year period.