Zach Jonas

The Association of Amherst Students (AAS) senate voted to change the current voting system to ranked choice voting (RCV) for all elections on Nov. 17.

On Nov. 8, President-elect Joe Biden announced the appointment of Doctors David Kessler ’73, Marcella Nunez-Smith and Vivek Murthy as co-chairs of his new coronavirus task force.

Following a nearly covid-free fall semester, the college has announced its plans for a similar spring semester, which will see seniors, juniors, first years and transfers invited back to campus with more indoor spaces open for daily use.

After years of advocacy, students will be able to declare a major in education studies as early as the fall 2021 semester. The college faculty overwhelmingly voted to approve the major in the faculty meeting on Tuesday, Oct. 20, after a proposal was created by an education studies working group of several faculty and staff members.

On Oct. 9, Chief Financial and Administrative Officer Kevin Weinman announced that the college would move from to Covid-19 Level Two: “Heightened Awareness” on the Campus Operating Status scale. On Oct. 8, Massachusetts Department of Public Health (MDPH) designated the Town of Amherst as “higher risk” in its weekly Covid-19 Health Report. The college had been operating on Level One for the entirety of the semester until this moment.

Several small swastikas were found carved into a table at the Book and Plow Farm, Chief of Police John Carter announced in a community-wide email on Oct. 10. Since the discovery, the college has condemned the act and the Amherst College Police Department (ACPD) has moved the table to police storage. The college does not have information about who drew the swastikas.

Seven weeks into the fall semester and students have adjusted to life on campus, Covid-rules and all. Though the semester began with strict Covid-testing protocols, quarantine requirements and Covid-rules enforcement, on-campus students report that the latter has been relaxed as the semester has progressed. Nonetheless, students still worry about breaking the rules, but not for the obvious reason. As one student, who asked to remain anonymous due to having broken some Covid rules, said, “No one wears a mask on campus to protect themselves from Covid — they’re wearing it to not get reported.”

Sara Kathleen (Hoctor) Brunner Schmitter passed away on Saturday, Sept. 5, President Biddy Martin informed the community in a campus wide email.

Now a defeated challenger in the primary race for Massachusetts’ first Congressional district, Holyoke mayor Alex Morse saw a campaign that came under fire — then made a comeback — after the leadership of the College Democrats of Massachusetts (C.D.M.A.), the University of Massachusetts Amherst College Democrats (UMass Dems) and Amherst College Democrats (ACDems) alleged that Morse used his position as a politician and an adjunct professor at UMass to have sexual contact with students.

For the past three months, the college has set forth careful, calculated planning for the precarious experiment that began last week: bringing the 937 students from across the pandemic-stricken country to live and learn on campus.