Student Life has a lot of slightly strange traditions, but our Valentine’s Day issue definitely has to be one of the weirdest. Every February, we publish the Student Life Sex Issue, where we ask the student body of WashU about their sex habits, from their rice purity score to what songs they want on their romantic playlist. As co-editor-in-chief this year, I got to make the important decisions: what songs, from the 264 submitted, should go on our official playlist.

As I depart my South 40 dorm each day for the next four weeks before the final time I close the door, I’ll likely find myself becoming more and more reminiscent as my undergraduate years come to an end. But for now, I’ll hold off on staring longingly and romantically out onto the South 40 from a window (until the inevitable sound of a fire alarm or a shouted obscenity) and try instead to spend as much time as possible with the people for whom I will never be able to truly express the extent of my gratitude and love.

In making social movements trending topics online, we also somewhat dissociate from their reality, making the activism itself dependent on algorithms and a majority stance. But we can’t afford to repeatedly relearn everything we committed so much reeducation to in 2020.

Hundreds of Washington University seniors traveled to Chicago over Fall Break for their class trip. Students explored the city visiting landmarks such as the Bean and viewed the skyline from a cruise on Lake Michigan. The trip served as a chance to solidify friendships that began on freshman floors and create new relationships for the year.

I’m not the man I used to be. Or rather, I’m not the boy I used to be. When I got to Wash. U. back in 2007, most of you were dancing to Ja Rule at bar mitzvahs, or whatever it is kids do these days. I myself arrived on this campus in the harsh middle years of late-onset puberty; I was a knobby exoskeleton with exactly six facial hairs to my name.

My name is Barrett James Bradley, but everyone calls me Barry.