Last Friday evening, I joined my fellow members of the Class of 2016 as we came together to watch the unveiling of this year’s Brass Rat design. Before the doors even opened, we already had a class-bonding experience — waiting outside Kresge in freezing temperatures.

A forum entitled “Before and After — The MIT Experience,” took place Sunday in W20’s Mezzanine Lounge from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m., featuring four speakers from the Class of 2017 and three from the Class of 1967.

Editor’s Note: This article originally ran 11 years ago in Issue 3 of Volume 123 of The Tech on Tuesday, Feb. 11, 2003.

TWELVE MILES wasn’t always a long haul. But for the types of companies that fill Cambridge’s Kendall Square and Boston’s Seaport, a dozen miles might as well be an eternity. Biogen Idec found this out in 2010, when the Cambridge biotech giant moved some of its workers from Kendall to a shiny corporate campus in Weston. The Weston digs were a quick car ride away from Biogen’s researchers in Kendall, but within a year, Biogen execs were laying plans to return to Kendall Square.