The Opinion section is thrilled to introduce named columns at the ‘Prince,’ starting with six columnists this semester and more to join in coming semesters. Our columnists will publish regularly and, we hope, become consistent voices in the campus conversation.
Opinion, and perhaps opinions from voices you’ve come to know, can do good for our campus. They hold power to account and, at their best, contribute to the goals of journalism. For example, Christofer Robles’ 2022 column about the discrepancy between the allocated $9 for late meals and the actual cost of items prompted the University to adjust its pricing, ensuring that Late Meal covers an entrée, side, and drink. And after I shone a light on Princeton’s need to improve harm reduction for drug use, University Health Services (UHS) began making Narcan and fentanyl test strips available.
Behind each of these columns are people and values: Christofer wrote his Late Meal piece because he values equity, in both the big issues and the small ones — as he said, consistently paying out of pocket for late meals makes it less accessible to lower-income students. I wrote about harm reduction because I believe in a just society where no one is left behind, everyone has dignity, and the University, as our social safety net, has an obligation to its community to provide us with the resources we need to thrive.
These worldviews have implications beyond these specific contexts. We bring them wherever we go, and apply them to whatever we write about. Reading a series of columns by the same author is seeing things through the writer’s lens — it’s looking at campus through the ‘Christofer glasses’ or the ‘Eleanor specs.’
This is our thinking behind named columns. Just as Ezra Klein, David Brooks, Tressie McMillan Cottom, and Ross Douthat can be counted on to write interestingly and from a consistent perspective about what is going on in the U.S., we hope that our columnists can bring you interesting, consistent, and insightful perspectives about what is going on at Princeton.
Below are our inaugural set of named Opinion columns for Spring 2024. Click on each tile to read more about each column.
As months and years pass, we hope that our columnists will earn a dedicated readership where you become familiar with each writer’s focus, interests, quirks, and qualms.
Our opinion staff without a designated column will continue to publish, and we will continue to publish guest contributions. I invite you, reader, to join this motley crew. And if there’s anyone in your life about whom you wonder, “what would they think?” with every issue you encounter, tell them to come to the ‘Prince’ Opinion section.
We hope that, in time, students will come to trust our columnists as passionate, respectful, established voices in campus conversations. By seeing through the Conger contacts, Santos specs, Buckley binoculars, Ava aviators, and Lee lenses, readers will gain fresh insights by stepping into a new perspective. We all are hoping not only to inform and engage but to challenge and entertain, ultimately fostering a more connected and shared campus discourse.
Eleanor Clemans-Cope is the head Opinion editor for the 'Prince'. She can be reached at eleanor.cc [at] princeton.edu or on X at eleanorjcc.
Read More
Who really cared about the encampment? Maybe just the ‘Prince’
Abigail Rabieh“By engaging in frenzied coverage, the ‘Prince’ contributed to the construction of a narrative that the fabric of the campus was torn apart by this encampment and helped create an environment in which advocacy for a change of the status quo in Gaza seemed to be the biggest issue on everybody’s minds. But this was not an accurate picture of what students experienced in Spring 2024.”
"By engaging in frenzied coverage, the ‘Prince’ contributed to the construction of a narrative that the fabric of the campus was torn apart by this encampment and helped create an environment in which advocacy for a change of the status quo in Gaza seemed to be the biggest issue on everybody’s minds. But this was not an accurate picture of what students experienced in Spring 2024."
In Trump’s America, the national media should learn from student journalists
Eleanor Clemans-Cope“As the next administration begins, national media should follow the example of student journalists and pay closer attention to the situations on each campus, breaking national storyline tropes when they don’t fit.”
“As the next administration begins, national media should follow the example of student journalists and pay closer attention to the situations on each campus, breaking national storyline tropes when they don’t fit.”
Try On theater needs to try something new
Christie Davis“Try On theater admirably tries to address inclusivity. But in order to actually achieve inclusivity, it needs to adapt again.”
“Try On theater admirably tries to address inclusivity. But in order to actually achieve inclusivity, it needs to adapt again.”
