All Nighters

Starting college is the first time that many students will be away from their homes, their friends and their families for months at a time. It is a transition that can cause homesickness and a sense of isolation. One thing that can make this adjustment even more difficult, is when college is not just in a different city or state, but in a completely foreign country. This week, my guest is Tahmeed Hafeez, a senior at Brown University. He grew up in Bangladesh, yet he has been attending school abroad for the past eight years.

Welcome back to season three of All Nighters! Our host, Lindsey Krill, will be talking to other college students about the things that keep us up at night. At Brown University, there is an online romance forum that has a match-making success rate so rare, it’s almost mythical. Brown Bear Admirers is a Facebook page where students post messages and anonymous compliments inquiring about the relationship status of fellow students. This week, I’m sitting down to talk with Carrie Shao and Jordan Fox. In the spirit of Valentine’s Day, they’re here to tell me the story of how a single message created a lasting relationship.

It can sometimes feel like there isn’t enough time in the day to go to class, work on papers, study for exams and still have a social life. Somehow, Dhruv Gaur, a junior at Brown University, managed to do all of this while preparing for and winning the popular game show “Jeopardy!” when he was just a freshman. He holds the title of the 2018 College Champion and was invited back to the Tournament of Champions this past November. This week, Gaur sits down to tell us what being on “Jeopardy!” and going viral as a result has been like.

Note: This episode contains descriptions of death and depression. It’s easy to get caught up in the everyday life of being a student. There’s always the next paper to start, midterm to study for, and Friday night out with friends to plan.Every once in a while, however, events at home or in our outside life happen that snap us out of the student mindset and put everything into perspective. For college senior Roxy, a series of unexpected deaths and injuries began happening her sophomore year and continued for much of her time at Brown. On this episode, she talks about what it was like being away from home, which left her removed from her family and largely alone to struggle through the aftermath.

Note: This episode contains descriptions of schizophrenia and suicide. Suicide is the 10th most common cause of death in America, yet it is the second most common among college-aged individuals. More than half of students have had suicidal thoughts and 10.5% have seriously considered attempting suicide. Alarmingly, these numbers continue to rise every year. For Melissa Antonia Perez, suicide is anything but a statistic. In 2017, her older brother, Andrew, died by suicide when he was just 20 and Melissa was a college sophomore. Melissa sits down to tell me how she has dealt with his death and what her life has been like ever since.

Note: This episode contains descriptions of schizophrenia and suicide. Today's show is the second half of our conversation with Melissa Perez. She discusses how she continues to process her grief while keeping her brother's memory alive.

If you've ever been on a college campus without students around, it can seem lonely. This semester, Monica Ocitti, who is a first-year student at Brown University, is not only one of just a few people at school, but she is the only student living in her dorm. This is how she got there.

With the majority of colleges and universities holding classes over Zoom this semester, students are stuck attending school from their bedrooms. Faced with the new realities of remote learning, some students have chosen an attractive alternative: taking time off and opting out of classes completely. Amy Lowndes is a student at Pomona college who would have been in her senior year, had she not taken a leave of absence this semester to spend time living in Anchorage, Alaska.

You may be surprised to meet an outspoken conservative student at Brown University – a place which holds the stereotype of being a haven for students with super liberal views. This election cycle has highlighted the division throughout the country and the increasingly extreme polarization among party lines. The average conservative seems almost alien to the average liberal and on today’s show we talk with Ryan Handel, a student on the board of the Brown Republicans Club. He addresses the elephant in the room and tells us what it’s like as a Republican on a liberal campus.

Meeting people, dating and starting a relationship is hard to do regardless of age, timing and place. Since the pandemic began, it has become downright difficult. On today’s show, Mako Mendoza and Ciara Carlyle, both seniors at Brown, share an alternative experience; they met people and started relationships not in spite of, but because of the pandemic. This is the story of how Ciara and Mako found their girlfriends and all four women ended up under the same roof.