Who can I contact about CSAIL student events or student life issues?
What can I do when I don't feel like studying, doing research?
What do people do for fun around the lab?
I would like to organize a student activity. How can I get funding?
Where can I eat?
Where can I get some culture?
Where can I find out what movie's at LSC this weekend?
Where can I find more information?
Who can I contact about student events or student life issues?
The CSAIL Student Committee. The CSC serves as the interface between the student body and CSAIL headquarters. It acts a funding agency for student events / recreation and advocates on behalf of the students should student issues arise. Direct any questions or concerns or any ideas for student events to CSC President Ajay Brahmakshatriya
What can I do when I don't feel like studying, doing research?
- The Graduate Student Council homepage: http://gsc.mit.edu
- The CSAIL Student Committee organizes periodic student events; look for their email announcements.
- The ASA (Association of Student Activities) homepage: http://web.mit.edu/asa/www/
- A list of club sports http://web.mit.edu/athletics/www/clubsports/index.html
- A list of intramural sports: https://intramurals.mit.edu/for-participants/sports-leagues/
What do people do for fun around the lab?
We pride ourselves in not only working hard, but also in having fun. There are several lab sponsored social activities for CSAIL members and friends. Most are student organized and run, and all are tons of fun!
Board Game Nights
CSC has a large collection of board games which are made available to the student community during board game nights. Typically, board game nights are weekly on Fridays starting at 5pm. The board game nights occasionally include EECS (not just CSAIL), and have recently ran a cross-university game night (CSAIL/Tufts).
CSAIL Olympics
The CSAIL Olympics (formerly the AI Olympics) is two weeks of fun and games held every year for members, family, and friends of the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab. Participants are randomly divided into 4 teams by filling out a simple questionnaire. Details for this year's Olympics will be announced to the lab when ready. Check out some of the past Olympics: http://projects.csail.mit.edu/olympics/.
You can also watch some of the previous student-made videos for the regular CSAIL Olympics movie competition: http://projects.csail.mit.edu/olympics/movies.
LAN Parties
CSC periodically organizes LAN Parties for free-to-play video games on-campus. These events typically include dinner or an assortment of snacks.
Muffin Mondays
Every Monday at 5pm the lab hosts a snack time with pastries from Flour in the G9 lounge. Come out and socialize with your peers in CSAIL while enjoying delicious treats courtesy of CSC!
Movie Nights
CSC organizes subsidized dinner+movie outings for students interested in seeing popular movies on opening day.
Girl Scout Benefit (GSB)
GSB is a weekly event, held on Friday evenings, at which graduate students and other members of the lab gather to chat while enjoying cold refreshments. We provide (for a nominal fee) a wide selection of delightful fizzy foamy beverages. GSB is typically held in the Gates 9th floor lounge at 5:30. GSB has a long history, leading back to the old AI Lab. The name 'Girl Scout Benefit' comes from a time when the bottles and cans from the gathering were (supposedly) used to help fund a girl scout troop of one of the daughters of a staff member of the lab. This is no longer the case, but the social aspect of the gathering remains. http://projects.csail.mit.edu/gsb/archives.html
Foosball Table, Ping Pong Table, and Dart Board
Need to step away from the computer for a few minutes? You will find a foosball table and a pool table on the 4th floor (near where the Stata Center connects to Building 36), a ping pong table on the 5th floor bridge between the Dreyfoos and Gates towers, and a dart board in the second floor lounge (near TIG).
SIGTBD
CSC runs an annual joke conference (http://sigtbd.csail.mit.edu/) complete with a program committee, a review and rebuttal process, and a conference with talks and awards on April 1. Submissions open in the fall.
Piano Practice
The Student Committee has placed a nice piano keyboard for students on the 8th floor of the Gates tower in room 882. For more information please visit https://calendar.google.com/calendar/embed?src=cscmitofficial@gmail.com&ctz=America/New_York
I would like to organize a student activity. How can I get funding?
The CSAIL Student Committee is a group of students who determine how student activity funds will be spent over the year. We always love to hear ideas on how to make the lab a fun place to be. If you want to organize an event that is predominantly targeted at CSAIL students, faculty and staff, you should contact the student committee about funding possibilities: http://projects.csail.mit.edu/student-committee/
MIT Campus Dining's website (http://studentlife.mit.edu/dining) has information about dining locations on-campus.
On the first floor of Stata is the Forbes Cafe, which serves an extensive lunch menu. Menu selections include hot entrees, sushi, and made-to-order specials as well as grab-n-go sandwiches and salads. The facility is open extended hours for cafe items such as coffee, snacks and to-go meals.
On the fourth floor of Stata, the R and D Pub offers beer, wine and light fare from 4-10pm Thursday & Friday nights during this fall term(closed in the summer). The R&D Pub requires you to be 21+ years of age. The Muddy Charles (http://web.mit.edu/muddy/), is also a short walk away in Walker Memorial. While it does not offer food (only beer and wine), students are allowed to order delivery to the pub.
If you like cheap food in a Styrofoam box, try the "food trucks" which are parked on Carleton street behind MIT Medical during lunchtime. They may not be gourmet, but they are a surprisingly tasty lunch for $3-4
The closest vending machines are located in the uppermost level of the basement, near the garage stairwell. The vending machines in Building 56 are often better stocked than those in Stata.
Finally, check out these menus for Boston and Cambridge Restaurants (take-out/delivery): https://www.mit.edu/~rei/food.html
- MIT Museum, (which prominently features work from CSAIL!): http://web.mit.edu/museum/
- The MIT Activities Council (MITAC): http://web.mit.edu/mitac/ MITAC offers discounts to many local area activities and ideas for things to do in the area. (And they have a convenient desk in the Stata Center lobby which is open a few days a week.)
- Museum of Science (and IMAX theater) (free for MIT students with ID, thanks to Tau Beta Pi): http://www.mos.org/
- Boston Symphony Orchestra: http://www.bso.org/
- Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (free for MIT students with ID): http://www.mfa.org/home.htm
Where can I find out what movie is at LSC this weekend?
The Lecture Series Committee (LSC--not to be confused with LCS!) is a student group that runs movies on campus every weekend. You can find more information at http://lsc.mit.edu/.
Where can I find more information?
Here are a few links with a lot more information.
- Graduate Student Council web page: http://gsc.mit.edu
- MIT LifeSites http://web.mit.edu/lifesites/ - LifeSites is designed to provide quick access to the hundreds of services, activities, programs, and groups that support personal, family, and community life here at MIT.
- CSAIL Student Committee: https://projects.csail.mit.edu/student-committee/
- For women in CSAIL: https://engage.mit.edu/organization/gw6
- Student Council for all EECS grad students: http://web.mit.edu/eecsgsa/www/about.html
- Student Council for all MIT grad students: https://gsc.mit.edu/
- EECS-level student group for support resources: https://www.thrive-eecs.mit.edu/