So you think you’re pretty awesome. You are, like, the greatest thing that’s ever happened to Harvard. You effected lasting change during your time there, and you want to make sure, at the tender age of 23, that your legacy will be remembered. So what do you do? Why, you create an “award” in honor of your greatness and name it after yourself!

Aaron Chadbourne, Harvard ’06 and now a first-year at Harvard Law School, felt that his myriad accomplishments as an undergraduate were being overlooked. I mean, Aaron Chadbourne changed Harvard! Aaron Chadbourne is a legend! So Aaron Chadbourne decided to create the Aaron Chadbourne Student Advocacy Award to honor Harvard undergrads most similar to Aaron Chadbourne. Chadbourne sent out an email detailing his latest accomplishment – the Aaron Chadbourne Award – to the Harvard UC list:

Nominate a Student Representative for the 2008 Aaron D. Chadbourne Student Advocacy Award:

Aaron Chadbourne has established an annual award to recognize a student who has made a positive and lasting impact on Harvard, for the benefit of the student body, by forging and leveraging relationships with Harvard administrators and faculty members.This award shall be given annually to a junior or a senior at Harvard College who has served as an Undergraduate Council-appointed representative to one of Harvard’s administrative or student-faculty committees or in a similar capacity on a board or committee at Harvard that works closely with faculty and administrators.

An honorary award may also be given to a faculty member or administrator who promotes student representation and participation in decision-making at the College and University and who serves as an advocate for student interests at Harvard. 

Many originally thought the Chadbourne Award was an April Fool’s joke. The Crimson has a pretty good take:

Originally questioned as an April Fool’s joke over the UC general e-mail list, the self-titled award was announced under a blurry panorama centered on Lowell House, where Chadbourne lived as an undergraduate, and was accompanied by a paragraph detailing Chadbourne’s involvement in student government. While at Harvard, Chadbourne was a UC representative for three terms and served as chair of the Student Affairs Committee (SAC) in 2005.”

After the jump: the Aaron Chadbourne Award proves D.O.A.

Chadbourne’s peers roundly mocked him, but as the creator of the Aaron Chadbourne Award, he asked himself: would a guy as courageous as Aaron Chadbourne give up? Aaron Chadbourne was pretty sure that Aaron Chadbourne would stick up for what was right.

That is, until the Harvard Administration bitch-slapped him. The Crimson, as always, with the scoop:

An administrator called to inform Chadbourne of a University policy regulating the establishment of awards that would jeopardize his position as a proctor if he created an award himself. “Had I been fully aware of this policy, I wouldn’t have even gone down this road.”

Chadbourne, bowing to public pressure (Harvard alums emailing each other about his antics now account for 50% of the internets!) has taken down both the award and his website. That’s right, folks: aaronchadbourne.com – and the Aaron Chadbourne Award – are now dead.

Chadbourne may no longer be accepting applications for his award, but IvyGate is. Fill out Chadborne’s form and email it to back to tips@ivygateblog.com. We’ll announce the winner of the IvyGate Memorial Award for the Aaron Chadbourne Award (as well as choice snippets from the best applications) later this week.