by Kaelynd Brouillette ’29 on February 5, 2026

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Opinion - Campus

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“College will be the best time of your life!” was a phrase I heard all too often prior to moving into Providence College. Hearing so many stories from my friends who were already in college, my parents, and others engraved the expectation that college would, in fact, be the best time of my life. There was a sense of glorification, like I would have the most fun every moment of every day, which put the pressure on for this sense to come to fruition. College can be fun, exciting, and meaningful, but is it always that way? Absolutely not. The expectation to always be having fun quietly brews pressure under the surface, and when you’re not constantly happy or social, it feels like you’re doing college wrong. PC is not a big campus, meaning that this problem is more visible in our community than others, and comparison becomes unavoidable. 

You see the same people everywhere you go, like at Ray Dining Hall, the Phillips Memorial Library, or out on the weekends. That is just the nature of PC. You always know when something is happening, where it is happening, and who is going to be there, making comparison to others ever so present. The small, tight-knit environment of PC turns this idea of “fun” into a measurement, with a feeling of guilt that comes from deciding to stay in and get work done, not having an established group of friends, or feeling like everyone but you has it together. The pressure of the idea that you should always be happy and having fun isn’t always explicit, but it is constant, and you run into it everywhere you go.

No one talks about how mandatory “fun” starts to feel either, like it is some sort of assignment you must complete in order to get an A in social success, metaphorically speaking. There is an overarching assumption that staying in is a waste of a valuable weekend evening, making some parts of college social life feel almost performative. Going out even when you are exhausted or uninterested becomes a habit, with the idea behind it being to do things to say you did them, rather than enjoying your time. All this to say, are you really having the “best time of your life,” or has the going-out and fear-of-missing-out culture victimized you into thinking that fun and joy are something you need to prove, rather than feel? 

What often gets lost in the pressure to enjoy every single moment, is how much of college exists in the in-between. Most days are not packed with parties or major milestones, but with quiet routines: walking to class alone, sitting in the library longer than planned, or going to bed at a time that seems like it is earlier than everyone else. These moments don’t match the version of college we think we should be having, leading to that overwhelming resentment that we’re not living up to the pressure that has been artificially set on us by expectations. Nonetheless, these moments are not signs of failure, per se. There are parts of college that don’t appear on everyone’s social media, such as the feeds that are perfectly tailored to give the perception of a perfect life; yet, they make up the majority of the experience. Learning to sit with these moments and appreciate them, rather than resenting them, is arguably where growth actually happens. Maybe, the pressure to have the best time of your life can ruin the time you are actually in.

by Maria Mantini ’26 on February 5, 2026

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Opinion - Campus

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On Jan. 25, I watched from my window as mounds of snow began to accumulate all over campus and visibility lowered to a cloudy white haze. With classes canceled for the next day, this was a prime day to catch up with friends, binge watch the show you’ve been meaning to start, or grab whatever you could find in your dorm and go sledding down the Guzman Hall hill. By the end of the day, the snow was knee-deep. After the snowfall continued into Monday, parts of Rhode Island were left covered in 11.5–20 inches of snow.

By Tuesday, the college was able to hold classes and most pathways had been salted and cleared off. However, there was one blaring exception to the college’s clean-up efforts: the student parking lots. A quick walk through any student lot on campus proved that cars that were parked before the storm were still parked there a few days later, unable to move from the mounds of snow that surrounded them.

My friend is currently a full-time student teacher at a local elementary school. After a virtual teaching day on Monday, we walked to the Hunt-Cavanagh Lot to check on her car and it was clear that she would not be able to drive it the next day. The snow surrounding the car was over a foot deep and extended more than a foot behind it. While plows had come through to clear open parts of the lot, no effort had been made to remove the snow near any of the cars.

Relying on her car to get to student teaching, she went to the Office of Public Safety to ask when the lots would be cleared, to which the answer was a firm, “we don’t know.” This lapse in effort on the part of the college caused her to miss student teaching on Tuesday (a day she will have to make up later in the semester) and take an Uber to her school on Wednesday. Other student teachers expressed similar concerns about their ability to travel and even their reputations for having to miss work. Providence College should not be preventing students from being able to attend something that is part of their required course of studies.

With faculty lots largely cleared, it seems that the priority in the clean up was the college’s ability to hold classes as soon as possible. My friend received no communication from Public Safety or the Office of Transportation about what to do or what the timeline was for clearing the lots. She even mentioned to me that she wouldn’t mind shoveling out her own car if the college provided shovels. Instead, she was left desperately asking around for one, not anticipating beforehand that this would be a problem. Her car was not cleared out until Wednesday night.

With the $400 students are paying a year to park on campus, the lack of attention and communication about this matter is appalling. Many students do not keep cars on campus just for fun, but rather rely on them to get to student teaching, jobs, nursing clinicals, or other obligations. It is understandable that the college would need some time to get snow cleared away after a storm of this magnitude, but the student lots were cleared days after the rest of campus was. The least Providence College could have done was communicate the plans to their students. By not making an effort to assist with this matter and giving no clear timeline for this work to be done, the school is making a stark statement that these student interests are a low priority.

by Sam Silva ’28 on February 5, 2026

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Opinion - Entertainment & Society

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Our current national debt is $38.6 trillion dollars. That number is enough to make the Elon Musks, Jeff Bezos, and Mark Zuckerbergs of the world wince. You still may be asking yourself, why does this matter to me? I am in college and I do not have any life plans figured out yet. You also may believe that it is not our problem or that we are not the ones who should be held responsible for previous Americans’ poor decisions. It is unfair, but this debt will be passed along to us.

To start, let me break down our fiscal budget. There are two subsections of government spending: mandatory spending, which is legally required for Americans, and discretionary spending, which is approved annually by Congress. Mandatory spending consists of entitlement payments, including Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and some smaller programs. In 2025, mandatory spending was projected to be around $4.2 trillion. Additionally, discretionary spending, which includes things like defense, transportation, and education, totaled $1.8 trillion. The last and arguably most important part of government spending is interest payments on previous debt, which for 2025 is projected to be $965 billion. It is important to note that our current interest payments are not being used to fund new projects, but rather fund past payments. In total, our government has spent approximately $7 trillion and had only $5 trillion in revenue, which means our budget deficit is approximately $2 trillion. These numbers may seem disconnected from our generation. However, in the near future we will feel the effects of this debt.

Our government is spending at an unsustainable rate. As we spend more, we borrow more, increasing interest payments, and creating a cycle. If we continue down this route, we could default on our debt, meaning we can no longer fund our payments. As a result, the United States would experience a major economic crisis. Treasury securities are known as one of the safest securities. Following a default, confidence would be lost in those securities and most likely lead to a decreasing market. This forethought allows us to look into the future you may want. Activities like saving money, investing, buying a home, or even starting a family become a difficult task. This is because there will be increased unemployment and higher costs for families. As we get deeper into debt, we get closer to default.

It is our turn to enact policies that will cut down this massive debt. It will be a difficult task, as we need to simultaneously increase revenue and decrease spending. The last time the government ran a surplus was in 2001, following the end of Bill Clinton’s presidency. Clinton was the last president to fully address this crisis, where he focused on raising taxes and cutting spending. The problem is, raising taxes and cutting spending is unpopular for many Americans and therefore, lawmakers will not address the issue. Our current fiscal plan does not support sustainability. However, we have a voice, we can pressure lawmakers, we can vote, and we can agree to make political sacrifices that will better our future. If you are interested in learning more, you should visit The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget (https://www.crfb.org/), a bipartisan, non-profit that aims at educating the public on fiscal policy.

by Marcus Howley ’28 on February 5, 2026

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Opinion - Campus

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On Dec. 1, 2025, I woke up to see the flyer for a birthday celebration for the generative artificial intelligence platform ChatGPT hosted by the Ryan Business School. It was a strange sight to see an invitation to an AI-themed birthday bash. The party was complete with pizza, cake, prizes, and even coveted Friar Leadership and Immersion Program points. A variety of fun AI-themed activities were available, along with chances to talk to various experts in the field of AI. A fun time for anyone and everyone who believes in a future powered not by man, but by machine. 

Since its release on Nov. 30, 2022, ChatGPT, founded by techno billionaire Sam Altman and his company OpenAI, has changed the way people have gone about their daily lives. Many utilize ChatGPT as a glorified search engine, using it to look up simple information that a Google search could have solved. That being said, a Google search would now bring up AI-generated results from Google’s Gemini, and both ChatGPT and Gemini have occasional factual errors. Others, however, utilize it in a way that is more in line with the recent string of commercials released by OpenAI, using it to create workout plans, generate an itinerary for their trip, and give them recipes for meals. This day-to-day utilization of ChatGPT in our lives is a concerning step in how we decide what to do. 

The final and most infamous way people have used ChatGPT is to complete assignments and academic tasks, the bane of any teacher trying to give out work over the past three years. Students especially have flocked to various generative AI programs to speed up work and aid them with assignments. This has ranged anywhere from tests to homework. No classroom is free of AI usage.  

The business school’s desire to familiarize students with the workings of generative AI programs is understandable. Business students are coming to expect that they will be working in an environment that has some level of AI integration in it. Companies have been scrambling over one another to either develop their own AI systems or to show how they are on the supposed cutting edge of innovation with high levels of AI integration. While the business school’s teaching of AI is unproblematic and even warranted in the current business climate, its endorsement of AI through the birthday celebration is a bad look on the objectives of Providence College. 

In its mission statement as a school, PC describes itself as a liberal arts institution with a commitment to a high standard of higher education. Under the section on academic excellence, it states that “its core curriculum addresses key questions of human existence, including life’s meaning and purpose, and stresses the importance of moral and ethical reasoning, aesthetic appreciation, and understanding the natural world, other cultures, and diverse traditions.” The crown jewel of this objective is the Development of Western Civilization course that is mandated for all students to take. The college prides itself on getting students to think about large and philosophical issues as well as deeper issues about our own human lives. 

Scroll through any syllabus handed out by a team of professors for DWC, and you will almost certainly find a segment on the usage of AI. While professors have a wide range of views across the spectrum of what is acceptable AI usage, most in the DWC program fall into the camp of an outright ban on its use by students for assignments. The goal of the program is to get students to read and think about complex texts and ideas, to be able to come to their own conclusions, and to become a more well-rounded person and learner because of it. AI robs students of this; by learning about the texts through generated summaries and grasping ideas through artificial explanations, students are unable to complete these goals. The business school’s endorsement of ChatGPT runs against the core values of PC as an institution, creating a bad look for a college that prides itself on the facilitation of higher comprehension and understanding. 

by Georgina Gamble ’29 on February 5, 2026

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Opinion - Campus

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Nothing can quite compare to the feeling you get when you run down Esplanade in Pelham Manor in New York.

There is something special about the way the world looks when you are running down that two-way street and all the ingredients for a perfect run blend together. The way the hot concrete pounds beneath your feet, and how the early evening sun bounces off of the trees and reflects on the roofs of the gorgeous houses. The feeling of your lungs working just right, and if you close your eyes, it almost feels like you’re flying because you are running so fast. Your playlist—some conglomerate of Gracie Abrams, house music, and Charli XCX—blasts in your headphones.

I don’t think anyone quite gets Esplanade like I do. Esplanade makes me forget all the sweat sticking to my skin and how I want a glass of water so badly I can almost taste it. When I’m running on that street in early August, I shake my head at the fact that I whined as I laced up my sneakers because I would’ve rather been lying in bed.

I daydream about my runs back home a lot more than I think the average person does. I have new views during my runs now—I traded the sprawling front lawns dotted with hydrangeas for a snow-covered campus with trees all too barren for my liking.

I like to miss my hometown. I like to feel the lump in my throat when I remember how invincible I felt in the days before I knew how cold a New England winter could truly get. My summer tan is still there if I squint hard enough.

Contrary to popular belief, treadmill runs aren’t all that bad. My runs feel a bit different—a bit more stationary than I am used to—but sometimes, I get that familiar feeling in my breathing that almost makes me feel the hot August sun if I close my eyes. I don’t see anything wrong with nostalgia. I think it’s healthy for the insulation of your winter coat to contradict with the feeling of ultraviolet rays on your skin. I’m sure that someday I will yearn for these winter months too, and I will miss the first time I discovered how such thick blankets of snow can hush the world, just as my music drowns out the sound of my footsteps on the concrete.

by Courtney Wight '26 on February 5, 2026

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Opinion - Campus

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As a senior finance major, I had to take an Assessment of Learning exam and the Senior Assessment Exam as a part of my Finance Capstone. The AOL was strictly focused on finance, while the SAE was a cumulative exam on all things covered in the Ryan School of Business’s core classes. Even though paper still exists, the business school, proud of embracing new technology and too lazy to actually grade anything, made both the exams online, while with in-person proctors, notably without a lock-down browser.

Now it should not be surprising that with one week’s notice from my professor, I was not able to remember everything I’ve ever learned in finance since freshman year. After the AOL exam—which went terribly—I was comforted knowing many of my friends in the class also struggled. The professor explained the grade would be curved, and it was only three percent of my grade, so in my head it was not the end of the world. 

This mental peace lasted only momentarily because all students in the Finance Capstone took the exam the same day, so a couple hours later, I was able to check the Canvas grade distribution with the other classes’ grades. To my absolute and complete shock, a student in the other section managed to receive a 96.7 percent, despite the overall average being 58 percent. 

My first instinct was that this student must have cheated by using ChatGPT or another AI tool. By giving an online exam without a lock-down browser, the business school and finance department must know students will be cheating. Either that, or they are extremely naive. I got my confirmation that this student cheated when I ran into some students from the other class later in the day, and the student with the highest grade admitted to using ChatGPT on every question.

Sadly, rampant cheating during online exams and quizzes has become the norm within my business school classes. Whether it was my Principles in Marketing exams or online quizzes in Legal Environment for Business, students openly cheat. While some of my professors genuinely do think the best of their students and that they actually do want to learn, other times it feels like the business school is suggesting professors ignore students cheating by not enforcing mandatory lock-down browsers.

I have had online exams with a lock-down browser, and it was not a big deal. A lock-down browser is a simple and easy solution to cheating with online exams. I would also like to remind the business school that paper exams are still alive and well. In various business classes, I have taken exams the old-fashioned way, and while students may still try to cheat, it is not as easy as copying and pasting every single question into ChatGPT and having a response within seconds.

I’ve also experienced this problem as a tutor for financial statistics at the Student Success Center. Many of the students visiting the center expressed their frustration with studying for hours only to see their classmates not put any effort in and receive 100 percent on their exams because they used ChatGPT to answer every question.

I will acknowledge that some online business school exams must allow for computer access, specifically those testing on Excel. It would be impossible to test students on their Excel knowledge without allowing them to use the program. However, there has to be a better solution than allowing all students to freely use their own computers with complete access to the internet.

At the end of the day, students who want to cheat and waste almost $70,000 a year will. In the process of writing this article, I’ve spoken to many other business school students who experienced similar frustrations. One of the friends I spoke to remembered a Principles in Marketing exam, with a lockdown browser, where they witnessed another student using ChatGPT on their phone underneath the desk to cheat.

I argue the complete lack of discipline or punishment from the business school has encouraged a culture of brazenly open cheating. While there may not be a simple solution to this issue, requiring a lock-down browser would certainly be a start. Additionally, ensuring students are not on their phones during exams should be a given. The business school needs to do more to enforce the academic integrity policies of Providence College. We cannot keep this culture of not wanting to punish students for cheating because all it does is establish that students can cheat without any repercussions. I am sick and tired of seeing students receive perfect grades they do not earn. I am done studying to earn an imperfect grade when I know a majority of my class has not even opened the textbook, but will receive a better grade than I do. Unfortunately, I do not see this culture changing, so let’s just say I’m glad to be done with the business school once I graduate.

by Ian Gualtiere ’27 on February 5, 2026

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Portfolio - Poetry

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May the angels light our way tonight
on such a desolate island. Where seals
swim up the harbor mouth, birds take flight,
and sheep roam in octaves on green fields.
Boats offshore watch not us, but waves
that slap their sterns in a prolonged rock.
We’re left to the hills and stones, and caves
that fall darker and deeper than the loch.
No film nor image can capture the land;
a fertile moonscape that can subtly bloom
single houses, which have sunk into sand.
Names remain only on the slabs of doom
that remind us of these nights, where cruel 
wind and water take no prayers in the rain.
Souls of our fathers hold an everlasting duel,
and our mothers hold their breaths from pain.
Sleeping a century later, this island holds
the remains of a generation that is lost.
Broken chimneys and windows have told
any passer that the sea around has a cost.

by Grace Batsie ’28 on February 5, 2026

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Portfolio - Poetry

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“I’ll text you,” you say as you leave.
But we both know you might not.

The text thread is on borrowed time,
And it may be a miracle that you showed up
in the first place.

The expiration date has passed,
But then you show up again,
And it’s like everything is new again.

So, you may or may not text me after,
But you leaving,
Means I had you in the first place.

by Benedict Bergeron ’29 on February 5, 2026

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Portfolio - Short Fiction

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Immured in a darkling dungeon, you see the sun setting into night beyond the windowsill, which is sealed by a rusting gridiron. Clinging to the flaking bars, you bruise your knuckles as you strike the iron, desperate to capture a single ray, a single photon of light. A great hook of hot steel wraps around your neck and yanks you down. Choking, your body slams against the slimy stones and, looking up, there stands, enwreathed in dark garments which reek of former victims and somehow echo their screams long ceased, the Lord of Shadow, FAFSA. He leers over you and grips with fingers that glint with a slimy lustre, his odious hook, a staff of torment and agony. You gaze at the two pale lights that glitter beneath his hood, and in them lie dusky images and luminescent shadows of faces, contorted and gored; and his smile appears with teeth as white as snow and pearl gems. Lord FAFSA bellows a grim laugh that transcends the spoken word, piercing the mind and heart and soul with a dreadful terror. Behind your eyes well countless tears, and your throat catches with the struggling breaths of horror; the sheer evil of this profane creature from hell causes your lips to part in pitiful sobs. You rise, guided by this fell being, weeping profusely and ever desiring to flee, yet the room is darkness. The iciness of his wet fingers seeps through your shirt and chills your shoulder. With all of your might, you search for escape, dry your wailings, try to become whole again, but his ensorcelments are too potent. At last, he guides you to a chair and sits you down before an old, strobing computer screen. There are innumerable lines that must be filled, but half of it you do not understand. Through your blinding sobs, you ask him with a sniffle what each line is for; and, through his lips, which you can almost feel flapping behind your ear, his dark words and cold breath tell you in legal jargon everything you need to know. Yet still, you do not understand. He only repeats himself while you grow more and more confused. The strobing screen causes your eyes to burn and your brain to swell. As your deep sorrow, your pure, unabated agony augments with every passing moment, you beg him, “Please, please, I don’t want to do this. Let me go! Leave me alone!”

His quiet, mocking chuckle drips like thick sap into your ear, and he says, “You want me here … you need me here … I am your only hope.”

You know that he speaks the truth, and that makes your anguish all the more bloodcurdling.

At last, you pray, and that one photon you hoped for appears and bolts through the window like an arrow. Line by line, the form is filled, and the demon shrinks and shrivels into the harmless imp that it is. Your weeping ends, and the form is done. The door opens, rumbling on great steel hinges, and your family and loved ones rush in, hugging you and kissing you, having feared the worst. In that moment, after this uttermost evil of the world was revealed to you, you realize what is truly most important. Such joy! Such love! Such a putting of things in order!

Yet, as you leave that horrid dungeon, you can still feel FAFSA’s cold hands caress your shoulders, and you hear the whisper of his diabolical voice in your head.

“I will see you next year…”

by Emilia Farrell ‘28 on February 5, 2026

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Athlete of the Week

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It is not a secret to anyone on the Providence College campus that the men’s ice hockey team has been on a roll this year. The Friars have swept opponents the past three consecutive weekends, which pushed them to a dominant seven-game win streak. The team’s overall performance has resulted in them rising to the top rank of Hockey East with a conference record of 11–3–1. The first pair of wins came against the University of Maine, then rival Boston College, and quickly Boston University as well. Each weekend has tested the team in different ways, but every time they have risen to the occasion while under immense pressure. 

The standout player across all of these recent games is alternate captain Aleksi Kivioja ’28. A native of Espoo, Finland, Kivioja is in the midst of his second strong season at PC. Before suiting up for the Friars, Kivioja played for two years with the Omaha Lancers, where he served as an alternate captain and appeared in 103 games, which allowed him to gain valuable hockey and leadership experience. No. 14’s most recent success has come through his impressive work on both ends of the ice. On the defensive side, Kivioja blocked a shot or more in all of the six swept games. On offense, he is equally as effective, scoring goals in three of the six games and recording assists two. One special goal for Kivioja was the game-winner in a close game against Boston University on Jan. 23, after which was awarded Hockey East Play of the Week. To start this play, Kivioja passed the puck to No. 22 Clint Levens ’27, who then passed it right back to Kivioja for a quick goal with 2:41 left in regulation. This important recognition by the Hockey East Conference reinforces how skillfully he has been playing as of late. Three out of Kivioja’s four goals on the season have been in the past five games alone, demonstrating how far he has progressed recently. His ability to transition seamlessly between offense and defense makes him a critical presence on the ice for the Friars. Overall, Kivioja demonstrates what it means to be a team player on both ends of the ice. His performance has played a catalytic  role in Providence’s recent success. As the regular season is coming to an end, Kivioja will no doubt also be playing a key role in the team’s aspirations for postseason play.