Yale Secret Society Taps of 2010, Cool Your Jets

yalesocietiesThe Yale Pundits, culprits of the Scroll and Key application prank earlier this year, have released the list of taps for the top secret societies late last night. The newsletter-style email for the "Yale Does It Nude" addressed to and credited to former YDN editor-in-chief Andrew Mangino cracked what will hopefully be the last swine flu joke. Ever.

By the looks of it, Key is holding onto their YDN legacy by tapping current managing editor Bharat Ayyar.  Meanwhile, Skull and Bones kept it presidential, welcoming Yale College Council president Rich Tao along with current publisher of the Yale Record, Nozlee Samadzadeh-Hadidi.

The Pundits' announcement is hot on the heels of Rumpus's publication of the graduating class of 2009 society members list. Regarding our mistake in framing that coverage, we hope you commenters will cheer up now that we've covered everything. After all, this shit's supposed to be secret, right?

After the jump, the original email from the Pundits and a video of a slow loris getting tickled.

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How To Get Into An Ivy League School: A Step-by-Step Guide Featuring Testimony From a Real, Live Silver-Spoon Legacy and a Racial Minority!

42-17432509IvyGate's Guide to Admissions: Part II

Getting into an Ivy League school can be likened to winning the lottery: Pencil in a bunch of scantron bubbles, cross your fingers, pray to be struck by lightning. But instead of winning millions, you're rolling the dice for the opportunity to impoverish your parents. (Or ruin your credit rating, or both!) Nevertheless, aspiring Ivy is a time-honored American pursuit, and no matter how improbable, impractical, and ultimately unpleasant the prize may be, thousands attempt it every year. Mostly, we do it for the free t-shirts.

What follows is IvyGate's foolproof, guaranteed, 100%-success-or-your-money-back step-by-step guide to swindling your way into the school of your dreams.* Be warned: It isn't always pretty, and a few of these steps (#3, section ii, second option) might make you go to hell.

1. Have perfect SAT scores, an off-the-chart GPA, amazing extracurriculars, leadership positions in everything, and the ability to leap tall buildings in a single bound. Duh. This one is a given, a prereq, if you will. Even the richest kid in the world won't get in if he's apt to flunk (or, more likely, drop) out.

2. Be from an insanely wealthy and/or well-connected family, preferably one with an Ivy League legacy. Apply early. While legacy admission standards aren't as hilariously low as they used to be, a study by Princeton SOC professors Espenshade and Chung equates legacy status with a 160-point SAT boost (on a 1600-point scale) to the privileged few who definitely need it least. But that's not what we're talking about here. To guarantee admission, you need to be the child of a major donor, the kind who write seven-digit checks to their alma mater and have buildings named after them. One such Ivy Leaguer, the grandson of a prominent university trustee, told us about his admissions process, starting with an unconventional and star-studded campus tour:

my grandad flew to meet my dad & i [at the university], and i just figured that it was going to be a regular day of tours & walking around. however, when we got there we were met by a super friendly admissions guy. he took us on the regular tour, but then we ditched it because he said "it's completely useless" (ironic, considering how much energy & money the university pumps into those tours) he took me around campus, and then brought me to meet a representative from the most popular department at the school, which i claimed to be interested in it. (later, i realized that he was one of the senior professors and chair of the undergraduate program) then they shuttled me over to the president's office. i didn't really GET that it was the president until they told me after we met. the meeting was brief, but looking back, it was quite an unbelievable opportunity. after lunch, we wandered around campus with another admissions rep, who told me all about undergraduate life.

After the jump: Anonymous Silver-Spooner (ASS) (Don't be mad, ASS! We tease because we love/hate) continues his story and we offer five more tips for getting in. Read the rest of this entry »

Searching for my Yale College Dad

Yes, Princeton is being investigated on charges of discriminating against Jian Li in its admissions process.  The Daily Princetonian reported a couple weeks ago that the investigation has broadened, but the best part about the article is the unmoderated melee going on in the comments!

Since the article went up on the website one commenter "Yale College Dad" or, as the cool kids have begun to call him, "YCD," has posted the overwhelming majority of the 200 comments, responding to everyone else with a rapid fire of enraged fury oh so common to the internet.

One of his better posts:

To the pimple popping Princeton brats...Jian Li has more than a strong argument. At the Ivies, especially at HYP, the evidence is overwhelming and compelling, and it is clear and convincing that for decades, there has been a racial basis, conscience or non-conscience, directed against Asian American applicants. Regardless of the outcome of the decision on Jian Li's complaint from the OCR, since it also consists of biased politically correct appointees, who will undoubtedly rule against Jian anyway, Princeton's admissions files will be OPENED, and this could bolster Jian's claims when viewd by an impartial party. This case has put Princeton and the Ivies on notice for more future complaints and federal law suits based racial discrimination by Asian Americans. They won't be ignored, mocked and ridiculed and be treated as frivolous anymore, especially by the Daily Princetonian....090909 has yet to post a credible reponse. Laugh it up, Princetonians, because the joke will be on YOU!!! BTW, some of my relatives and best friends are graduates of Princeton. Ha!Ha!Ha!Ha!Ha!Ha!Ha!Ha!Ha!Ha!Ha!Ha!Ha!Ha!Ha!Ha!Ha!Ha!

But what isn't so common is his encyclopedic knowledge of the case! From my super-scientific estimation, YCD has quoted extensively from at least a handful of articles and legal texts regarding this case, all in his valiant efforts to defend an innocent student from the Princeton's discrimination and its students' ridicule.

After the jump, the plot thickens!
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Princetonian ‘Joke’ Issue Shows Knack for Subtle Social Commentary

<em>Princetonian</em> 'Joke' Issue Shows Knack for Subtle Social CommentaryWe knew there was a reason we hadn't yet written about Jian Li, the high school senior who sued filed a civil rights complaint against Princeton for discrimination after they rejected his early application. (He claims they held his Asian ethnicity against him.) And boy are we glad we waited, since now he can probably add the Daily Princetonian as a defendant.

In yesterday's annual "joke" issue, the Prince ran, among other laugh-laugh-sigh satires, an op-ed by one "Lian Ji" titled, "Princeton University is racist against me, I mean, non-whites." "Hi Princeton! Remember me?" it starts off. "I so good at math and science. Perfect 2400 SAT score. Ring bell?" Having upturned that modest divet, they keep digging for another 550 or so words:

"What is wrong with you no color people? Yellow people make the world go round. We cook greasy food, wash your clothes and let you copy our homework. Brown people are catching up, too but not before the 2008 Beijing Olympics."

WOW. I mean, wow. After the year that brought us the Dartmouth Review Native American flap and Yale Rumpus' "Me Love You Long Time" ado, it's as if someone just pushed reset. Let's see that again! There should really be an award for the student(s) who, every year, think they will be the ones to transcend racism by displaying it in its crudest form. And who, every year, make utter fools of themselves (and learn that irony isn't a defense). So kind of them not to spell it "Orympics."

If this doesn't blow up in their faces, it's by the grace of God. Princetonian Editor-in-Chief Chanakya Sethi '07 told us he was "aware there were concerns" about the piece, but hasn't heard any direct complaints yet. Then again, students are in reading week. "If there are people who are concerned, I'm concerned," he said.

The best part is, the people responsible for running it -- the outgoing board, Sethi included -- won't even have to deal with the (still hypothetical) fallout. The hate mail, the meetings with deans, the sensitivity training seminars -- all will fall squarely on the shoulders of their successors. Thanks, fellas. It's been fun. Don't let the picketers hit you in the ass on the way out.

P.S. -- The Globe's must-read Brainiac had this first.