Ivy League Round-Up

DEVON GRANDY (New York, New York)

We’re changing the format of our round-ups, particularly those pertaining to the Ivy League; rather than simply arranging the stories alphabetically by which school they pertain to, these posts will open with our favorite of the week’s stories. This will no doubt give the various Ivy communities an extra incentive to be outrageous as they vie for the coveted slot before the jump.

Dartmouth’s frat/alcohol culture continues to bestow important lessons upon its graduates; Jeff Deck (Dartmouth ‘02) has been traveling the nation practicing both douchebaggery and property defacement. Venturing far and wide, Deck utilizes his “typo correction kit” consisting of “permanent and dry erase markers, several types of Wite-Out, chalk, pens and crayons” to fix poor grammar and spelling everywhere he finds it. Because, you know, how can you expect him to correct public and private property with only one type of correction fluid?

Deck’s rationale for his cross-country campaign of obnoxiousness: his inherent “knack for spelling” and his experience writing for The Dartmouth as an Opinion Editor and humor columnist. BOTO would like to state for the record that its own writer also possesses innate grammatical prowess and that he happens to restrict his powers of pomposity to a modest, infrequently-read weblog.

Mass resignations, sexual assault, and fraud after the jump:

Brown may be resorting to the Common Application for its future applicants, beginning with the class of 2013; critics of this standardization of the application argue that Brown’s trademark diversity and eccentricity will be forever compromised if its students are not required to write essays concerning their opinions on which animal would be best supplemented by cybernetics and whether or not it is possible to roast a soggy marshmallow.

Also at Brown: an article in the Daily Herald tells the charmingly uncomfortable story of two ‘06 undergrads and how Facebook poking escalated into “awkward intercourse” and a one-night stand. BOTO is positive that this article is good, old-fashioned satire due to its proximity to April Fools’ Day and the fact that it reads like an excerpt from The Onion; it also occupies the same “features” section as articles on the risks of condom theft and the possibility of ResLife shanty towns. Props to the Daily Herald, which is on its way to quickly becoming the BOTO Pick for “Favorite Parody Newspaper.”

Columbia continues to reach for new heights in its ongoing quest for catastrophe at the student government level. In our continuing coverage of student council mishaps, GSSC’s entire (read: three people) Elections Commission resigned in a huff over perceived interference from the GSSC Judicial Committee in the election process. Besides the normal committee-commission rivalry, Elections Comissioner Susannah Karlsson and her comrades have asserted that the Judicial Committee allowed some candidates to file their statements of intent for up to three hours past the accepted grace period while others were turned away. By extrapolating from current resignation and impeachment rates BOTO can project that by this time next month the ranking official on GSSC will be Acting President/Jewish Theological Seminary Liaison Ari Brenman. Hail to the Chief!

Somebody at the Cornell Daily Sun must feel that Cornell’s better-known alumni aren’t cutting it when it comes to recent politics, because they’re trying awfully hard to make themselves seem relevant; who knew that two of Eliot Spitzer’s lawyers were Cornell Law grads? And isn’t defending a hypocritical solicitor of hookers the type of thing a university typically doesn’t want to associate itself with? Looks like Cornell may need a Barack Obama of its own.

Dartmouth also gets an honorable mention for its daringly clever headline writing. Thank you, Big Green.

Harvard’s dean of admissions and financial aid was featured in a Crimson article detailing how Mr. William R. Fitzsimmons (Harvard ‘67), despite having the most Harvard-compatible name BOTO has ever heard of, was discouraged from applying to the College due to its perception as “a bunch of atheists, a bunch of rich snobs, [where] you’d flunk out and you’d lose your soul.” Mr. Fitzsimmons, however, has obviously become none of these and has garnered recognition for his evidently superior “gatekeeping.” As one of his colleagues praises him, “‘We go on a golf trip and he’s got 100 folders with him… he knows every one of them. He knows every kid.’” He then destroys the hopes and dreams of 92.9% of them.

Penn has made Mommy and Daddy proud! None of the other kids in class got an AA+ on their credit rating, did they? Besides Harvard and Princeton, that is. Gold stars!

Princeton demonstrates proper treatment of a sensitive matter: two months after being named a defendant in a sexual assault case, the University has decided that now is the proper time to “look more closely at the lawsuit.” Turns out that Princeton isn’t just a defendant to better “facilitate [the] gathering of evidence,” but is actually being sued for realsies over its allegedly negligent behavior. It’s a good thing somebody looked at the fine print before going into court just winging it, huh?

Yale caught a transfer student from Columbia forging his application and stealing financial aid money-about $46,000 of it. The best part? It appears that said Columbia transfer may have previously forged his way into Columbia by claiming he had transfered from Yale. He now faces charges of larceny and forgery, proving once and for all that one needs only a partial Ivy League education to be arrested for white-collar crime.

For the record, the BOTO Pick for the category of “best cybernetically-enhanced animal” is our new mascot, BROTOR the sinister yet adorably cute robot panda. We’ll have an image of present-day BROTOR soon, but for now enjoy his playful childhood antics from his days before the accident.