The 23 CUNY campuses that banned smoking in January have prestigious company. Barnard has tweaked its smoking policy and is now going to be "a smoke-free campus," effective March 21. According to an e-mail sent to students yesterday the change "is the result of regular requests from various members of the College community to complete a process we started in 2004 when we first limited outdoor smoking on campus." more ›

New York is in the midst of graduation season, when freshly minted scholars don cap and gown to accept sheepskins and jobs they will probably remember as their most demeaning. But first they'll have the opportunity to ingest the wisdom of their commencement speakers. Also, it's an opportunity to get on TV and be tackled by security guards. David Letterman ran a top-ten list of signs that you have a bad commencement speaker. Shockingly, no mention of whether the speaker's name rhymed with Gov. Nelliot Schvitzer. more ›

The Columbia University students' hunger strike to protest Columbia's non-inclusive attitudes about redevelopment and curriculum continues with one less striker. Just after midnight on Sunday, a post went on up on the Columbia Hunger Strike website saying, "This evening, one hunger striker was admitted to St. Luke's hospital. She will not continue the strike for personal medical reasons." The student, Aretha Choi, who attends Barnard, later wrote:...my disappointment increases as I remember the bitter... more ›