‘Tis the Christmas season when gifts rest under a festively decorated pine tree. The traditional opening of presents may feature those homemade, others store-bought, and the rest somewhere in between. However, one type should stand above the rest during...

Homelessness is caused by complex reasons, creating a difficult cycle of dependency. People should help make a difference by volunteering at local homeless shelters, helping serve meals and organizing activities. Volunteers can arrange clothing drives...

College rankings have a bad reputation for not being representative of a university’s physical and social attributes. Students should use college rankings as a factor to make college decisions; however, they should not be everything.  By mainly...

The semester is coming to a close with finals, the final hurdle before winter break. Exams, projects or both might make the last week of the semester hectic for students. There is a lot of pressure because finals affect our marks, and many students have...

Checking into a hotel, buying alcohol and renting a car: Even though people are considered adults when they turn 18, they don’t have the ability to do those things until they are 21. Not having these abilities at 18 defeats the purpose of being called...

After the Supreme Court’s decision against affirmative action in June 2023, many NIU students are questioning if their scholarships are in jeopardy. The NIU Faculty Senate is discussing which of the race-based scholarships they have to get rid of. The...

Sex scenes and nudity in movies and TV shows are largely unnecessary, sometimes adding nothing to the plot and causing awkward moments if you are watching with your parents. There should be more consideration among producers when adding sex to media,...

Severe weather can occur anywhere, and all areas deserve equal protection and accurate forecasts. Radar holes, spots where precipitation cannot be forecasted completely accurately, are dangerous and need to be patched.  Meteorologists use radars to...

The Northern Star’s daily newsletter TLDR is not being delivered to Outlook emails, but the management board will continue to produce it despite this setback. Northern Star staff and readers began reporting on Nov. 7 that their Monday and Tuesday...

Every semester, students complain about one of the biggest obstacles known to college students: course registration. Most complaints come from courses not being offered. In the time spent complaining about these difficulties, students could join department...

A car with tinted windows pulls up to a house with a caved-in roof and chipped paint. A person gets out of the car, goes up to the mailbox and retrieves a bag of weed from the mailbox. The person puts an envelope with money into the mailbox. Another day,...