Contest ends May 23rd.

If your memory is a bit clouded, you’re in luck. A new website called accepted2017.com has compiled all the ridiculous facebook posts of over-eager college newbies from all over the country. The ‘Cac has some stellar kids coming in.

Tufts

The typically over-prepared one:

“Anyone else obsessed with the idea of preparing for a zombie apocalypse? When I did my alum interview, we actually had a discussion about the best dining hall at Tufts to use for a defense and where to get materials. That’s when I realized tufts was awesome.”

And the one that tries way too damn hard:

“If you have a pizza with radius Z and thickness A it’s volume is Pi(Z*Z)A”

Middlebury

More frightening considering the rural location of campus. Also… what? :

“Would you guys still be my friend if I cut your heads off and peed in them?”

There are a lot of cows up there… :

“I’ve only heard good things about Middlebury’s milk. Refreshing, thick (but not too filling!), and always readily available! The more I hear about it, the more I fall in love. I keep having dreams about my first few sips. #milkenthusiast”

Bates

Maine tends to skew the definition of “adrenaline-pumping”:

“Hello everyone how are you?! Well I am great! Just a quick question.. I am a HUGE sports buff and I am actually pretty talented (not to brag) and I’m just wondering whether I should join the fencing club or the equestrian club. I am only into very exciting sports that get my adrenaline pumpin so I narrowed it down to these two! Please help. Would also meet in person for coffee if that is preferred ”

Wesleyan

This one should fit right in:

“Where can I get carnivorous plants at a decent price?”

Trinity

Good luck kid – you’re gonna need it where you’re going:

“I really hope there are no democrats in this group.”

Williams

Perfect:

“anyone else a legacy here?? im the 6th in my family to go to Williams ”

And my favorite, not from the ‘Cac but great none the less:

University of Vermont (UVM)

“Massachusetts fo’ lyfe!”

Silver, who watches Jeopardy with his frat and plans to invest his winnings in a start-up NGO, had this to say about the presence of a ‘Cac rival: ”There’s no such thing as a rivalry at Tufts, we’re not that great at sports.”

Watch the interviews with both contestants here.

What do you need to do to get one of these beauties? Download the Bates-grown app that is bringing a tint of romance to the ‘Cac-scape. Contest begins tomorrow, May 14th, and runs through May 20th. We’ll be posting links for you to download the app and automatically be entered.

Keep coming back for more info and a shot at allllll the case envy.

The only thing the admissions officers claim will work are “letters that indicate a deep interest in the college’s scholarly offerings,” but they haven’t heard our ideas yet. As ‘Cac insiders, we think we might be able to get you in with the admissions officers, whom we assume are basically the same as the students they once selected. Try these concepts:

1. Literally write and perform a music video with Vampire Weekend, about yourself. We don’t want to hear from your teachers or your pastor, we want to hear from your musical idols. Include a joke about how you only care about Oxford commas to the extent that the greater culture does, because prescriptivist grammar rules are super lame.

2. Send home-made granola. Cookies are great and all, but they ain’t got nothin’ on a good argument about preferred granola binding agents (peanut butter, obviously). Include a note about dietary restrictions and a recommended greek yogurt pairing. Extra points if it resembles birdseed.

3. Send them your heavily-annotated and worn copy of your favorite book. Infinite Jest? Cliche. Kurt Vonnegut is preferable. 

4. Get your parents to give the “how much is it going to take?” line and pull out their checkbook, but make it a giant novelty checkbook like the ones they give out at golf tournaments. Lulz rule the day.

5. Offer to pay for surgery.  From the Times article:  An entreaty that Ms. Brown received last month, from a father of a student on Union’s waiting list, may just top them all. “I was offered free rotator cuff surgery,” she said. “Or, alternately, carpal tunnel surgery. I said, Unfortunately I do not need either surgery. And he said, But you will.” // Clearly, the check was just not sufficiently blank. Ms. Brown probably does need Lazik, or something.

6. Show them that your twitter account has 30,000 followers. It’s okay if it’s Weird Twitter, because we’d still be impressed. If you’re stuck at ~150 followers it’s time to look into buying some, Romney style.

7. Book Macklemore for their spring fling. Book the NEXT Macklemore for their spring fling.

8. Get published on Thought Catalog, then publicly disavow Thought Catalog.

9. Cure cancer. You’ve probably got a couple of free months. Make it happen.

10. Break a story on ongoing wrongdoing by either the US government or a major corporation. Hope you live in DC, kid. A bank or a fossil fuel company would probably be ideal–but make sure they don’t have anyone on the board of trustees, first.

11. Become a writer for In The ‘Cac. That way, if they don’t let you in, they’ll be forcing you to lie. How rude. 

12. Show them photos of you as a child in your room covered in gear from their school. I mean, how many kids have even heard of Amherst? But you had!

13. Divest from their college. Then talk about how it worked for Apartheid.

14. Write an op-ed for the campus paper about why the campus needs your presence. Though the school probably doesn’t need you as badly as the opinions editor needs that last op-ed.

15. Paint a 19th century Romanticist masterpiece. Do so literally in the 19th century. How you’re going to do that is up to you, but can you imagine how amazed they’ll be if you can point to your painting on a slide in the frosh art history seminar?

16. Write them letters that indicate a deep interest in the college’s scholarly offerings.

As an avid reader of The ‘CAC and proud Connecticut senior, I must briefly voice my concern about the way Connecticut is perceived as an “other” in the NESCAC. It’s simply an issue of semantics.
Every other school is referred to by the first name sans “college” or “university” except for us.
Connecticut just wants to be on the same level as Wesleyan, Tufts, Amherst, Williams, Bowdoin, Colby, Hamilton, Middlebury, Bates, and Trinity; no surname needed.
Please, remove “College” anywhere Connecticut is written. Connecticut (Conn) wants to be like Middlebury (Midd) , and Wesleyan (Wes) and Trinity (Trin).We just wanna fit in.
Start the trend ‘Cac writers/moderators! The camel has spoken.

My first reaction: Is this real? My second: Hmm, perhaps Connor has a point. Do Camels everywhere suffer from insecurities as a result of their perceived ‘otherness’ at the hands of the media, Twitter users, etc. who refer to their beloved school as Conn College? The issue of “College” semantics is one that we here at In The ‘Cac don’t spend a particularly long time thinking about when writing articles about Conn; in combing back through archived posts I’ve found that our usage of College varies, but that generally we do not append College to Connecticut or Conn. See this article about a Conn professor contributing to Moonrise Kingdom, or this one about the meaning of ‘bro’. Almost all of the articles written by our Camel contributor eschew the usage of Collage, like in this one about shared governance at Conn. But then in an article about the retirement of President Higdon we used College multiple times, though so did a Camel whose tweet we included in the story.

To be fair, Connecticut College is the only school in the ‘Cac that goes by a state name, so the issue might just be that writers tend to err on the side of caution so as not to confuse readers. But then again, Amherst shares its name with the town it’s located in, and could easily be confused with UMASS-Amherst, though is almost never referred to by its full moniker. But Amherst has more name recognition than Conn, so perhaps that’s where the insecurity arises–is Connecticut College not well-known enough to be called Conn, a-la Midd and Wes? Is it truly the “other” in the ‘Cac because its name begs clarification?

For our part, it’s probably safe to assume that readers of our blog know what we are referring to when we write Connecticut or Conn. In the future, we will standardize our usage of the school’s name and drop College from any reference if Connecticut the state is not also mentioned in the article. We hope this editorial decision will bring Conn students and alumni everywhere a sense of belonging.

Today, over half a year after the Charter Committee report was published, many students feel frustrated/embarrassed [insert the emotion of your choice here, Bantams] by the administration’s actions and have repeatedly expressed a desire for more honest and transparent relationships with faculty and the upper echelons.  Initial reactions to Jones’ email across campus have varied, but the overwhelming sentiment seems to be “good riddance”.  A few students were polite enough to preface their rant about Jones with some variation of, “It’s not that I think he’s a BAD guy, he’s just _________.”  And so the story goes.  Many Trinity students used social media as a way to input their two cents, posting on Facebook and Twitter that Jones leaving was the “right thing to do,” given the state of turmoil the College seems to be in these days.

Upon further inquiry, some students mentioned that they feel betrayed by the administration and are too discouraged to defend Trinity’s name when it seems like shady back-room deals are being cut at the expense of students.

Jones’ announcement today is not the first to spark colorful visceral reactions.  In 2011, in the President’s White Paper, Jones sharply criticized fraternities and alluded to banning Greek organizations on campus.  Then, this past fall, latent threats in Jones’ commentary materialized into a whopping 49-page Charter Committee social policy, resulting in waves of backlash from the nationwide Trinity community.

In response to the administration’s blunt instrument approach in addressing the schism between academics and social life, many alumni have closed their wallets to their alma mater.  The impact has been noticeable: Trinity, who usually leads in the NESCAC March Mania alumni fundraising competition, finished behind Bates, Colby, and Connecticut College this year by a 3-to-1 margin.  Donations for fiscal year 2013, which ends June 30, have also fallen behind, totaling only $5.9 million out of an overall goal of $9 million.

Interestingly enough, there is a divide in student sentiment when it comes to giving back to Trinity.  A contingent of students that agree with Jones’ decision to step down are also horrified with alumni reactions to recent social changes.  ”I don’t get it,” one junior student said, “cutting off giving and plummeting Trinity’s rankings seems Draconian and stupid. As a student I’m getting screwed by it.”  While the student chose to remain anonymous, he vouched for others, too:  ”This is a problem that no one is addressing,” he noted, “and tons of people are pissed off by it.”

So, while student reactions are inconclusive on Jones’ announcement, a common thread of hope for a restored Trinity is out there.

This is a song for the ‘Cac ages, poised to be more viral than ‘Freebird’–or, at the very least, the power ballad of Summer 2013. Bros, brothers, and brosephines: embrace The DFP.

The design:

You’ll notice I said “had.” After the past year’s worth of work and adjustments (including tearing up the road to our current science center, taking down a dorm, and encouraging students to prepare for construction noise depending on the dorm they chose to live in next year), it turns out it’s just too damn difficult to build the new center onto an existing building on the side of a hill.

In an email sent out Thursday afternoon, President Biddy Martin informed the campus community about this difficult decision: