It’s Opposite Day! Cornell “Hottest” and “Worst”
If ranking season doesn't slow down, Cornell is going to have an identity crisis. Named "Best Motto" by Motto Magazine and "Worst Motto" by IvyGate readers, Big Red is not only the "Hottest Ivy," but the "Worst Ivy," too.
Noting that "identifying America's best colleges is about as exciting and useful as naming your favorite luxury sedan (Audi)," Radar breaks out their Back-to-School "Worst Colleges in America" list. Naturally, the only Ivy to meet Radar's rigorous low standards is "America's Best Safety School," Cornell, where "low academic satisfaction, an oppressive Greek system, and a boring host town have inspired dozens of depressed students to hurl themselves over campus gorges." Distinguished alumni Ann Coulter and Bill Maher earn negative points for their alma mater, as do "the ugliest girls in the Ivy League" (in Cornell's defense, that is why Ithaca College exists). And then:
"I haven't overheard a single intellectual conversation in three years, unless it was between Indian or Asian students," writes an architecture major on Students Review.
Come on, Radar -- you're not supposed to ask architecture students about the social life; they only leave their Rand Hall cells to stock up with a visit to the local fraternity coke dealer! Try the cool-looking dude in the cowboy hat from the Orientation 2007 guide. He's totally macking the hot goth chick in the front. And you know he and the Asian guy talk Sartre all the time.
More "worsts," after the jump.
- Worst State University: Michigan State, where rate-of-incarceration rivals rate-of-graduation.
- Worst Trust-Fund-Baby College: Bennington College, where "the number of bird species on campus (121) is more than the number of black (10), Hispanic (18), international (19), Asian (14), and American Indian (1) students combined."
- Worst Christian University: The "ironically named" Liberty University, where dancing, alcohol, and R-rated movies are verboten.
- Worst Party School: (tie) Chico State and San Diego State. This confused us, because 15% graduation rates suggest that Chico and SD are actually quite talented at partying.
- Worst Military Academy: Virginia Military Institute, for gruesome hazing and prison-like environment.
- Worst Women's College: Texas Woman University, for failing to use the plural form.
- Worst College in America: Drug dealer safe haven / Moonie recruitment center University of Bridgeport.
--MAUREEN O'CONNOR
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August 20th, 2007 at 9:56 pm
No tats? That chick is a poser!
August 20th, 2007 at 11:00 pm
Wow. Talk about a horrible entry. When you guys are on the internet all day is this seriously the best thing you can find? OH ANOTHER CORNELL BASHING POST LOLZ!!!!11 AND LOOK THERE’S A GOTH LMAO. DUDEZZ GOTHS ARE SOOO EMO JKJK!!!1
August 20th, 2007 at 11:15 pm
dude, why’d you post that 4 times? Chill on the enter key buddy!
August 21st, 2007 at 12:15 am
Who the hell thinks its a compliment when a publication called “Motto Magazine” ranks your motto as the best? Why does “Motto Magazine” even exist, and furthermore, who or what reads it?
August 21st, 2007 at 1:23 am
Morisy, I’m ashamed. Really.
August 21st, 2007 at 2:22 am
We all know Cornell is the worst Ivy, that’s no surprise, but I have to take exception with the notion it has the ugliest girls in the Ivy League. That title goes to Harvard, and everyone knows that.
August 21st, 2007 at 7:03 am
Well, it’s the worst RATED Ivy. But it all depends on what you want to do. If you want go into engineering physics, do research in biology, or go into hotel management, it’s really the best. If you want to major in history, sure, go to Harvard.
August 21st, 2007 at 9:28 am
To tack onto what Renee said, the architecture school is also the #1 PROGRAM IN NORTH AMERICA (note: I am not an architecture student), but as a current student, im disgusted that part of our tuition dollars went to fund that crappy faux-Rolling Stone orientation guide and all its accessories (the Orientation Leader “backstage passes” are a joke). Its a bigger waste of money than building Milstein Hall.
But all that aside, I’m sure the editors at Radar are still crying about having received their rejection letters from Ezra. Maybe we’re not such a “safety school” after all.
August 21st, 2007 at 10:27 am
I will bet my kidney that of people who applied to Cornell and another Ivy, more people were rejected by the other and accepted into Cornell than vice versa.
Cornell needs to accept that fact that it will never win on IvyGate, and also learn that said fact means absolutely nothing.
August 21st, 2007 at 12:06 pm
The next post on IvyGate will be an all Ivy penis size study. I think everyone will be more interested in knowing which Ivy is best endowed than what Radar and Motto Magazines and USN&WR say.
August 21st, 2007 at 1:30 pm
EVERYONE KNOWS WHARTON HAS THE BIGGEST DICKS
August 21st, 2007 at 5:35 pm
We can go on and on about what our individual programs are ranked, but the Cornell administration is going mad trying to make Cornellians aware of one simple fact of mathematics: we are by far the biggest ivy league school with 14,000 undergraduates as opposed to, say, Yale’s 5,000. We simply cannot have the same acceptance rate or be as competitive. Beat yourself up over this or just go enjoy your school; it’s up to you.
August 21st, 2007 at 6:43 pm
According to the peer assessment section of US News, Dartmouth is the worst Ivy.
August 21st, 2007 at 6:59 pm
You suck, Todd Rundgren.
August 22nd, 2007 at 11:11 am
As an Ithaca College alum, I don’t know whether to be flattered by your statement or offended.
I’ll take both.
August 22nd, 2007 at 11:45 am
snowballa? Do you really snowball? Is your name Heather Brooks? God bless Ithaca College!
August 22nd, 2007 at 3:02 pm
Why is everyone arguing about which school is the “Worst Ivy?” As if there aren’t enough overly self-entitled pricks in our - need I remind you- ATHLETIC LEAGUE. FYI: Ithaca was rated “Most Elightened Town In America,” has subverted taxing control by the US and NY State Governments by creating their own currency, and has more PhD’s per capita than any other college town. Can New Haven say that? I think not. What they can say is that they have the highest crime rate of any Ivy League institution, no wait, there is still Columbia. BOO!
August 23rd, 2007 at 1:19 pm
“inspired dozens of depressed students to hurl themselves over campus gorges.”
dozens … but, wait, the suicide rate at Cornell is something like 4.5 students per 100,000 (it comes out to about 1 every 2 years). Oh, I see, the article very obviously is meant to cover a span of at least 50 years and 600,000 students (assuming roughly 24 is the bare minimum to be considered ‘dozens’).
Also, Renee, I don’t think there’s a single ranking out there that puts Cornell as the worst rated ivy. Even the biggest ranking, US News, doesn’t list Cornell as the worst rated.
August 23rd, 2007 at 3:28 pm
If I didn’t know it was for O-week, I’d think “Orientation” was referring to sexual orientation. There’s almost a 1:1 correspondence between those students and the Village People.
October 10th, 2007 at 7:59 am
Yes sure people say Cornell is the worst but when it comes to making some money in the real world, Cornell is the probably the best ivy league to go to. With two student run Mutual funds which no other ivy league school has, students here can get involved with investment banking quite easily. Why is it that no other ivy league has this? Maybe because no other ivy league makes practical application of their studies. That is why Cornell is rated so high in the original article about being the hottest ivy league school. I recently went to Goldman Sachs for a networking event and they said that Cornellians comprise the third largest demographic of their company. I could really care less about other ivy league schools because if I wasn’t at Cornell I would not know as much as I do about investing. Cornell was not my safety ivy league school either. The thing about is that after you graduate, no one cares about where you went to undergraduate school, they care about how much money you are making for them.