Recent Posts

Alumna creates indie film “The Long-term Side Effect”

Featured, Lifestyle February 13, 2013 at 3:34 pm Comments are Disabled

Forget “(500) Days of Summer” and “Little Miss Sunshine.” Mason may be more interested in independent film “The Long-Term Side Effect,” which was produced and directed by a Mason alumna and features a number of Mason students and faculty, as well as actors in the D.C. area. The Mason students and faculty working on the movie make up a good percentage of the cast and production crew, with 10 alumni, one current student, one professor and one staff member. This is fitting because Dannie Snyder – the producer, director, writer, music composer, and one of the cinematographers and audio mixers for the film – is a Mason graduate of 2010, who studied Theatre Studies, Film and Video Studies and music. “During my senior year, I directed a studio theater production with the Mason Players called Fuddy Meers, where I met Kathleen Mason who was playing the lead role,” Synder said. “I promised to one day write a film for her, which resulted in ‘The Long-Term Side Effect,’ her debut for the screen.” And so the indie film was born. “The Long- Term Side Effect” was originally going to be a series of five different short films filmed within four […]
Students give a face and story to statistics at first annual Mason Lobbies

Featured, News, News1 February 13, 2013 at 3:22 pm Comments are Disabled

“Democracy is messy, it’s noisy, it’s complex. But in a very deep way, it’s amazing,” said President Angel Cabrera to a group of Mason students who travelled down to Richmond for Mason’s first lobbying day. “You’re going to be a part of the process today.” The students, who traded in their T-shirts for blazers for the day, spent Feb. 7 talking to Virginia state delegates and sena- tors to off er a personal touch to the statistics lawmakers consider when doling out state funds to universities. “Th is is the best possible way of telling folks what’s happening at our beloved university,” said delegate David Ramadan (87th district). Mason Lobbies is a new initiative put together by the student government to allow students, alumni and faculty to share what they love about Mason. I think they get tired of seeing the admin-istrators and presi-dents, but they love seeing students; so, it’s really important that you’re here to- day because you tell the George Mason story best -Laura Fornash, Secretary of Education Forty-three current students and 15 alumni, along with a bevy of faculty from offices across campus, showed up to represent the university. “Today is so important for you to […]
Photo of the week: Passion for basketball fuels alumni love

Featured, Multimedia February 12, 2013 at 5:10 pm 6 comments

Passion for basketball fuels alumni love Joe Shannon proposed to his girlfriend Ellen Face during the eight minute media time out at the Feb. 9 men’s basketball game against Delaware. Though Shannon completely surprised Face, he was more than confident he would not be turned down. The couple met through mutual friends 10 years ago as undergrads. They reunited two and a half years ago and began dating, sharing a mutual love for the Mason men’s basketball team. The couple travels to see the team play in conference tournaments each year in Richmond with their mutual friends.
Volume 89

Print Edition February 10, 2013 at 7:06 pm Comments are Disabled
Photo of the week: Taking advantage of the weather

Multimedia, News, News1 February 4, 2013 at 2:41 pm Comments are Disabled

Junior Alex Budnick utilizes the fresh snow by visiting Liberty Mountain in southern Pennsylvania. Unseasonably warm weather put a strain on local ski resorts earlier in the season, but the recent cold weather and snow has allowed area snowboarders and skiers to visit the mountains.
Housing selection rears its head

Editorials February 4, 2013 at 1:12 pm Comments are Disabled

The last thing on anyone’s mind when coming back from a long winter break is housing. We have not even been in school for two whole weeks and we already have to decide where we want to live during the 2013-2014 school year. As a sophomore, I am already somewhat familiar with the process of housing but as a freshman, the whole process can be just added stress. When I was first accepted to George Mason, filling out the housing application was simple; you answered questions about what you did and didn’t want in a roommate, decided where you wanted to live, and then the University did the rest. However, the housing selection process has changed a bit since my days as a freshman. To begin, you must figure out what kind of group you want to be. From all the housing selection information meetings which I’ve attended, groups of four have always been strongly recommended. Finding a group of four definitely looks better written on paper. For example, you might have a group of friends all of whom want to live in different places with different people, making it difficult to form a group of four friends. If anything, […]
Everyone judges, everyone hates it

Editorials February 4, 2013 at 1:11 pm Comments are Disabled

Everyone judges. Unless you are affiliated with Mother Teresa or Gandhi, I am sure you have passed judgment sometime in your life. What organization someone is affiliated with causes judgment, what you wear, what you believe, who your friends are. These are all things that people pass judgment on. I know I am guilty of it just like everyone else but in my opinion everyone is entitled to what they want to say. Everyone has an opinion and whether you personally agree with that opinion, is it really worth the argument? Of course there are people that love to debate and argue but personally I am not one of those people, especially when it comes to something as petty as what student organization you are involved in or what you choose to wear. The people who act as though they are the victims of judgment or say they don’t judge are usually the worst judgers of all. When people follow the stereotypes that society has created, that’s when the competition of what is ‘cool and uncool’ or what is important and not important comes into play. Our university’s student organizations for example are pinned against one another. Who cares what […]
Real food is sweet at SweetGreen

Lifestyle, Multimedia February 4, 2013 at 1:10 pm Comments are Disabled

With the New Year and a new semester kicking off, keeping up with 2013 resolutions can be more difficult than keeping up with the Kardashians. The most common resolutions include losing weight and becoming healthier. Whether you live off or on campus, there is a restaurant to indulge in without worrying about getting off track – and it will leave you feeling relaxed and energized. Sweetgreen is a relatively local food chain restaurant with locations in only D.C., Maryland, Virginia and Pennsylvania. Luckily, the closest Sweetgreen is in Fairfax and is only 17 minutes away from campus. So what makes Sweetgreen, well, sweet? Sweetgreen specializes in fresh, quality-made salads in which the ingredients come from local and organic farms. Nowadays, most people don’t know where their food originates, which is why Sweetgreen places a chalkboard in the restaurant to let customers know exactly where they get their food from. Sweetgreen is perfect for vegetarians, vegans and anyone that is trying to lead a healthy life – or simply enjoy a delicious meal. The restaurant is Chipotle-style, where you have the choice of picking one of Sweetgreen’s eight signature salads, or you can customize your own salad. If you are indecisive, […]
Mason Makes Careers

Lifestyle February 4, 2013 at 1:08 pm Comments are Disabled

Name: Alex Romano Graduation date: May 2012 Degree: Communication concentration in Journalism. Minors in Public Policy and Management;Criminology Current job: Staff Production Secretary, CBS Evening News with Scott Pelley What are your day-to-day responsibilities? I’m in the CBS Newsroom serving as a liaison to the Evening News Fishbowl and providing those in the Fishbowl with any operational and logistical support they need. In the Fishbowl are the five Senior Producers, the Executive Producer and our Managing Editor and Anchor Scott Pelley. I spend much of my time helping producers prepare elements for pieces, researching and finding material for stories, feeding raw material out to our other Bureaus where a piece is being cut, and I’m in the Control Room during our broadcast running scripts to the Director and AD. How did you degree and/or classes at Mason help you land the job? I can’t pinpoint anything specifically, but I think it was a combination of my classes and great professors. The work I did proving myself as a CBS Page is really what lead me to obtaining a staff position here at CBS News (which are few and very hard to come by at any network). Having a degree specifically […]
The Vagina Monologues come to Mason

Lifestyle February 4, 2013 at 1:06 pm Comments are Disabled

Mason is joining the V-Day global effort to stop violence against women and girls by presenting Eve Ensler’s play, the Vagina Monologues, on Feb. 15 – 16. With the help of WAVES and the Women’s and Gender Studies program, the Vagina Monologues will take place at 8 p.m…. in Harris Theater. Tickets for the show are discounted to $5 for Mason students and $25 for the community. This will be the 14th year the show comes to Mason, and the goal of the show is not only to stop violence against women, but to fund beneficiaries. The Vagina Monologues will benefit Dating Abuse Stops Here – a service to teens and parents who experience date violence – and Mason’s Victims of Violence Fund, which is used for Mason students who have experienced violence. The funds raised by the show will go toward proper medical care for victims. “One billion women violated is an atrocity,” states a banner on the V-Day Campaign’s website. “One billion women dancing is a revolution.” This statement goes along with this year’s monologue, a spotlight of the show, and it is titled “One Billion Rising.” To celebrate the 15th year of V-Day, the foundation is inviting […]