Wellesley Student Aid Society Clothes Closet reopens
Wellesley Student Aid Society (WSAS) has reopened its clothes closet on the first floor of Billings, in the link near the Schneider Center. The aim of the closet is to provide free gently used clothing for students at Wellesley. The closet sees its greatest numbers of people during the winter, when students are in need of articles such as coats, hats, gloves and boots, but also provides clothes for many other occasions, as well. WSAS is a non-profit that operates independently from the college.
Marseille Allen ’01 leads efforts to help Flint residents during water crisis
Marseille Allen ’01, aided by Alicia Whittington ’01, Jamilah Freeman ’’02, Elizabeth Miranda ’02, Dana Weekes ’03, Dara Taylor ’’04, Hollee Mangrum-Willis ’04 and Charlotte Newman ’04, have been leading efforts to help Flint, Michigan residents get drinkable water. She has started a Water for Flint campaign, which has raised over $50,000 and has organized distributions of water and other supplies such as baby wipes to critically affected areas in Flint. These efforts come in the wake of a change in the source of water supply in Flint, which caused the lead and iron pipes to erode and contaminate the water, making it poisonous. To get water, residents of the city now have to rely on water bottles or special filters, but many cannot afford the expense. Allen has called the Flint crisis “one of the most horrific, man-made human tragedies in modern American history.”
Elizabeth Levine Reede ’84 develops virtual reality helmets to allow people to visit museums
Elizabeth Levine Reede ’84, co-founder and CEO of WoofbertVR, an arts education company, is developing virtual reality helmets that simulate virtual tours of famous museums. Her company has also developed apps that, along with the goggles, allow users to enter museums and receive tours. Thus far, users are able to enter the Courtald gallery in London, and later this month a gallery from the M.H de Young Museum in San Francisco will become available. Reede has said that “our goal is to use VR to democratize access to art and culture and offer this content to anyone in the world, so users can experience the same thing at the same time, which is the best way to share global culture.”
Assistant Professor Angela Bahns leads study on similarity in relationships
Assistant Professor of Psychology Angela Bahns, in conjunction with Professor of Psychology Chris Cardell of the University of Kansas, are the lead authors of a paper called “Similarity in Relationships as Niche Construction: Choice, Stability, and Influence Within Dyads in a Free Choice Environment,” which studied the importance of seeking like-minded people in relationships. The paper found that couples are not likely to change over time, and that would-be couples have similarities from the very beginning of their relationship. Additionally, the paper concluded that the importance of finding similarity in relationships is greater than previously thought. The paper was published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, one of Psychology’s top journals.
