Harvard Releases Infomercial to Boost Admissions
Just kidding. But this is funny. Like, so funny I wanna go buy a cable knit sweater funny. (And I do not like cable knit sweaters.)
Just kidding. But this is funny. Like, so funny I wanna go buy a cable knit sweater funny. (And I do not like cable knit sweaters.)
A couple of days ago, a drunk Harvard Law grad Brian Schroeder burned down a chapel containing the remains of and memorials to unidentified 9/11 victims. Schroeder turned himself into police soon thereafter and posted the $3,000 bail Sunday night.
The remains managed to make it out unscathed thanks to some badass, apparently fireproof chambers made to protect the DNA that might one day identify the victims. The wooden benches, cards, photos, flowers, and other painfully sweet memorials, however, did not have badass, fireproof containers. They were destroyed.
Of course, Schroeder's friends and family think he's a real stand-up guy and that the incident was somewhat out of character. According to his mother:
[Brian] doesn't really have any explanation or memory of what took place. Now, he's just trying to minimize the damage to his career and make amends. You know, take responsibility and move on.
Do go on, Mrs. Schroeder...
I'm appalled and my heart goes out to [the families who had built memorials to loved ones lost in the 9/11 attacks at the E. 30 St. chapel]. Because I know it's basically like a cemetery and a memorial that's so very important. I just cannot imagine, nor can he, why he would have done that.
Bingo. Why would you do that? Seriously, dude, burning down a cemetery/memorial is not a funny prank. This is a somewhat funny, Ivy League prank. But let's go on the record and just say stop trying, Ivy League-rs. Or you will lose your job and your six-figure salary. Like Brian did.
Oh, and it might help if you stopped wearing those Ed Hardy t-shirts. That shit is made of the devil's old underwear or something.
Last week, Georgetown sophomore Charley Cooper made national news with a job listing for a personal assistant. He's 20-years old and apparently the whole college affair all too much for him to handle on his own.
According to Vox Populi, the Georgetown Voice's blog, the original as went something like this:
As my PA you will receive an email once a day by 9:00 am with a task list for that day and a time estimate for each task. Important tasks will be bolded on the list and must be done that day (even though everything on the list should theoretically be finished on a daily basis) …
PA example tasks -Organize closet -make bed -Drop off / pick up dry cleaning -Drop me off / pick me up from work -Do laundry -Fill up gas tank -bring car for servicing -schedule appointment for haircut -Pay parking tickets -manage electronic accounts -shopping and running errands -other random tasks.
Needless to say, Georgetown is not in the Ivy League. (And neither is Mr. Cooper.) But when a student does something so god-awful douchey that the Washington Post reports on it, something must be done.
Everyone's favorite Yale student, Aleksey "So Sexy" Veyner, might've done something like this. And Mike Kopko definitely started DormAid, a service that offered maid services to Harvard dorm rooms and pissed off pretty much the entire school. But Georgetown should know better, right?
After the jump, a couple of reasons why not.
The girls who brought us the Harvard douchebag contest have extended their reach beyond Cambridge. Yesterday, Windsor Hanger '10, Stephanie Kaplan '10, and Annie Wang '11 of Harvard's Freeze College Magazine launched their new "collegiette's guide" called Her Campus, setting a new precedent for useless Ivy League publications (which, to be fair, could explain about 90% of all Harvard media enterprises).
After contacting co-founder and CEO Kaplan about what these three Prada Devil wannabes hope to accomplish with their new cyber digs, she responded with a lengthy mission statement:
From: stephanie@hercampus.com
To: qichen@ivygateblog.com
Subject: Re: IvyGate's inquiry about Her Campus
Date: Wed, Sep 16, 2009 at 4:20 PMHerCampus.com is an online magazine for college women that seeks to pave the way for the media industry to successfully make the transition online. Her Campus will transition magazines to today's digital world by individualizing its content college by college by setting up "My Campus" branches, beginning at Harvard and eventually expanding to 1000+ colleges and universities nationwide. By supplementing national with local content, Her Campus represents the future of online media.
Uh, was there ever a time when the internet wasn't national? Not only that, but the pearl-donning triumvirate of the Ivy League's new Seventeen seems to think they're the first ones to come up with the idea of female-oriented college media. Read more after the jump.
Harvard Medical School recently announced
that it would loosen its restrictive policies regarding student-media interaction. Called "ill-advised" and "problematic" by Harvard professors themselves, the old policy stated:
All interactions between students and the media should be coordinated with the Office of the Dean of Students and the Office of Public Affairs. This applies to situations in which students are contacted by the media as well as instances in which students may be seeking publicity about a student-related project or program.
Dr. Nancy Oriol, the developer of a guideline that essentially censored HMS students on medical conflicts of interests, continues to insist that the policy's goal was to "help students, rather than limit speech or control what they say on controversial topics."
This comes after HMS came under fire for its dubious approach to medical ethics and suspiciously opportunistic professors, including those who served as paid consultants to drug companies and brushed off questioning students who didn't want to kill their future patients. (HBS is looking less corrupt by the minute.) But in a less than prudent choice of PR action, HMS didn't even bother submitting its conflict of interest policies for review to the American Medical Student Association last year, promptly receiving the very non-Harvard grade F from the board in 2008.
Read more about the irony of Harvard's crappy report card after the jump.
Harvey Cox, Hollis Professor Emeritus of Divinity, exercised his 300 year-old right to graze his cow in Harvard Yard yesterday.
The Hollis chair, first held by Edward Wigglesworth in 1722, is the oldest endowed professorship in the country, and the perks match the needs of 18th century Harvard professors. (Might these also include the right to own house slaves and the liberty to beat women with thumb-sized sticks?)
Cox equates his cow grazing with saving the Earth, although the event itself seems a bit more niche. In front of a crowd of students, faculty and onlookers the cow, a Jersey named Faith, ate grass while a band of tubas played in celebration of Cox's retirement. There was even a pretentiously titled Latin oration: Ager Secularis: Movere ad Deum et Ruminare.
This cow idea could spawn some budget solutions. And it could potentially revitalize the Cambridge meatpacking industry. Think Bartley's best burger but MUCH fresher. And, in this case, blessed.
After the jump, more photos and a real live (think anticlimactic) video of Faith eating grass.
Great news for the guy in lecture who's been blocking everyone else behind him with his eight popped collars--douche is in this season! The New York Observer recently declared Ivy League fashion the trend of this fall, beckoning in a new era of flagrant assholery.
Defining "trad" as an "Ivy League-inflected style that's managed to retain an old-school sensibility without seeming dated or costumelike," writer Joe Pompeo immediately goes on to contradict himself:
Think Oxford button-downs (and that’s real button-downs, meaning collars that button down, not simply dress shirts, to which the term is often misapplied). Natural-shouldered blazers. Flat-front khaki trousers. Loafers. Bow ties, rep ties. Polo shirts in solid colors. Lots of madras plaid. Early Brooks Brothers. New England WASPs. F. Scott Fitzgerald.
Does the sidekick monkey come with the outfit? Read more after the jump.
The adjective “Dickensian” is exactly three syllables too long to describe the typical Harvard application essay. Not so for that of Khadijah Williams, who overcame homelessness to be accepted to the class of 2013. (Finally, someone who won't complain about being Quadded.)
In spite of her poverty, Khadijah graduated fourth in her class from Jefferson High School in Los Angeles. Her story is undeniably compelling. The media’s coverage of it, however, is less so. Khadijah was first profiled in the L.A. Times with an article that reads like the reporter took a pyramid-scheme screenwriting seminar over the previous weekend:
At the shelter, [Khadijah] was often bullied. ‘You ain’t college-bound,’ the pimps barked. ‘You live in skid row!’
Does this mean the Advocate will finally get some real grit? Read about Khadijah's prom dress and a bundle of (really) shameless jokes after the jump.
Today's Crimson featured a neat little open letter from Bradley Smith, founder of the Committee for the Open Debate on the Holocaust. Yep, it is exactly what it sounds like. A group that questions the existence of the Holocaust.
Bradley Smith, the founder of the organization that placed the ad, is a known Holocaust denier who has been identified for his hiding behind the veil of free speech in America. Here's his coolest quote:
I don't want to spend time with adults anymore. I want to go to students. They are superficial. They are empty vessels to be filled.
Really, economic times are hard—Harvard knows that—but the Crimson business board is really opening the flood gates with this one. Not only is the Harvard Hillel pretty serious about not ignoring Jewish history, but to be frank, their student body is pretty aware of the sensitivity of certain issues.
Seriously, the First Amendment is awesome, but would the Crimson might as well run a full page for the Imperial Klans of America on that campus. (Yeah, that's the real link. I'm on some sort of list now I think. Fuck you, Harvard Crimson Business Board for making me reckon with freedom of speech!)
After the jump, pictures of kittens. Because IvyGate was not built to deal with bigot-speak. But you can see the ad in context, too.
UPDATE: Max Child, President of the Harvard Crimson, published an apology. Evidently it was some sort of crazy accident. They even gave the ad money back to Mr. Hates-the-Jews. Nice cover-up, dude.
Why collect baseball cards when you could assemble together the ultimate New York clichés that real New Yorkers wish would get hit by the subway? Simon Rich, Harvard '07, writer, and former 'Poon-tangler, has paired up with New Yorker cartoonist Farley Katz to create caricatures, most of which one can avoid by never going to the East Village. Each card includes personal statistics—level of intelligence, cunning, and money—as well as their alma mater (or lack thereof). According to the New York Superheroes blog:
In this glittering metropolis, you can’t cross the street without spotting a costumed crusader.... Every superhero in the New York City universe is represented along with their special powers, origin stories and power ratings. There’s the Out-of-Work Banker, the MFA Student, the Blogger and over a dozen more, all striving for glory in the city that never sleeps.
Notable Ivy League mentions are Harvard and Yale, apparently from which "creative hacks" and "intelligent black men" graduate. It remains unclear whether or not they lose their superhero status once they lose their jobs and start giving eye BJs.
See some superhero collectibles after the jump.