Now that The Draw results are out, classes are over, and you’re looking harder and harder for something to distract you from your last finals of the year (and possibly ever…), it’s time to focus on what really matters:

What theme is your next dorm or house going to have?

We have a long and time-honored tradition here at TUSB of suggesting dorm themes for the upcoming year, which can be found here: Part I, Part II, Part III, and Part IV. To our knowledge, none of these themes have ever been used, although I would still really like to push for Adelfart.

Special thanks to Jasmine, who helped come up with a lot of these; you’re a great person to bounce ideas off of, not only for this post, but in life as well. You are also much better at HTML than I am.

As a graduating senior, I am so incredibly sad to say that this will be my last post for The Unofficial Stanford Blog. Granted, most of my blog history has just been these puns (and this one about Cal that I’m proud of), but there’s still nothing more satisfying than seeing your stupid, ultimately inconsequential, thoughts and ideas circulating the internet for a day or two. That being said, this Dorm Theme series has been a highlight of my blogging–nay, STANFO–nah, blogging– career, and just as it was passed onto me by one Josh Freedman, I would like to pass it on to another eager, pun-loving underclassman, so please let me know if you’re interested! Anyways, leave a comment below letting us know your favorites, or suggestions for even better themes! Let’s get this party started.

Stern-ify Play Queue

“GET LARKY” by Daft Punk
SERRACKLEMORE AND RYAN LEWIS- “Can’t Hold Us”
LIL TWAIN ft. DRAKE, FUTURE- “Love Me”
IMAGINE DONNERAGONS- “It’s Time”
JUSTIN TIMBURBANK- “Mirrors”
ZAPATAPOP- “I Love It”

Wilbur

GAME OF OTERONES- perfect metaphor for freshman year: Seduction. Betrayal. Peter Dinklage.
DJRO UNCHAINED
KAREOKADA
TRANCK OCEAN
ARROYO TO THE KNEE
CEDRORITOS LOCOS TACOS- It’s better than dining hall food.
A RINCLE IN TIME
DYSOTOPIAN SOCIETY  Continue reading “The 5th Annual …”»

Spring Quarter, as illustrated by Hyperbole and a Half

This morning I tried to take a sip of my room key while attempting to open my door with an iced mocha.  Sleep deprivation has seized another victim.  Wasn’t this supposed to be an easy quarter?

Spring quarter is powerfully portrayed in the Stanford mental mythology as a time of never-ending frolicking.  Admit Weekend and NSO make it particularly compelling.  Life at Stanford is an endless series of fountain-hopping and suntanning, right?

But spring quarter rolls around and shatters that illusion.  Spring break wasn’t long enough, the 9.5 week quarter is a tease, and your professors interpret “Dead Day” to mean “perfect day to schedule all your final presentations.”

Sigh.  It’s enough to make you wanna pull a John Mayer and grow your hair out and wear silly hats.

Stop this train – I want to get off and go home again
I can’t take the speed it’s moving in
I know I can’t
But honestly won’t someone stop this train?

It doesn’t help that we’re a bunch of overachievers.  Admitting to stress or a sense of inadequacy is too often equated to failure, and we bottle it up, rather than discussing it constructively with our peers.  We become victims of our own perfectionism.  You don’t want to be the first one on the dance floor when it comes to expressing vulnerabilities.

Kudos goes to the outreach programs of recent months and years.  Rubber ducky in the Claw people, “talk to me about anything” people, and the Bridge Peer Counseling: I salute you.  But there aren’t enough of you.  The more we discuss this problem, the more people will feel motivated to do something about their stress.

So here’s the good news: if you’re stressed, you’re not alone.  When we’re honest about it, we’re all a bunch of Stanford ducks, paddling ferociously.

The great news?  You can do this.  You’ve done it before, you’ll do it again, and if you open up to your friends about how you’re feeling, you’ll find a vast network of cheerleaders rooting for you.  They love you, they care about you, and whether or not you do, they believe in you.  To quote famed Greek philosopher Zacharius Efronicus:  “we’re all in this together.”

By next Wednesday, you’ll be this guy:

Go rock those finals, Stanford.  You got this.

The Red Couch

Being an independent artist (read: not affiliated with a department) isn’t easy on this campus. Space and resources are  slim pickins, and even if you manage to know the right people to book a venue and get the right gear, it’s tough to get students to commit to come out. We’re all spread a little too thin, and sometimes you even have miss your best friend’s performance.

This is where the Red Couch Project (RCP) comes in. RCP is a student-run production collective that will handle this whole mess. Can’t find a venue to perform at? We’ll find it for you or we’ll work with you to create one (i.e. impromptu outdoor session – Stanford is a beautiful campus). Worried people won’t be able to make it? We’ll record it for you and spread the word online. We’ve been capturing performances of independent musicians for almost three years now, and we’ve accumulated more than 65 videos of Stanford-affiliated musicians performing their work. Check out our videos.

So where does the ‘Red Couch‘ component come from? To us in RCP, it’s an icon that symbolizes how performances should always feel – intimate, personal, informal – like you’re sitting in your dorm room playing for your friends. In the past, we’ve had artists perform on the Red Couch because of the symbolism and, well….because it’s kind of just hilarious. Currently, the Red Couch lives in a little venue called Do.Art Galleria in the Mission in San Francisco. We moved the couch to provide Stanford artists with an opportunity to meet and perform with city artists who are doing art (in various forms) full-time.

And in case you’re easily bored by the constraints of furniture, we’ve started new “Off The Couch” sessions. In these sessions, we hop off the couch and explore some unique and unusual collaborations rather than capturing live concerts. You can check out the latest one below – it involves a dancer improving to the music of a cellist and guitarist in an empty yoga studio. 

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As we all know (but apparently the rest of the world doesn’t), Stanford is not just a tech-startup incubator with a football team. There are a ton of passionate and talented artists of all kinds on this campus, and RCP is here to support them in ways that the university currently isn’t.

Red Couch Project on Facebook

I’ve seen worse than this. Be thankful I didn’t use bathroom stall photos.

Ever notice that when the dorm cleaning staff is gone for five minutes, everyone seems to temporarily lose their damn minds? I have always found it astonishing that such intelligent people seem to have missed out on basic lessons in manners and cleanliness. Don’t y’all remember anything from Barney? To be fair, by five minutes I really mean the weekend. I understand that things might start to pile up a little more than usual in the bathrooms when the trash isn’t taken out for a couple of days, but come on. There’s a line and we have more than crossed it. If you notice a trashcan is actually overflowing with paper towels, would it be that difficult to find another place to dispose of your garbage? If you’re feeling extra generous, you might even put some pressure on that giant pile of very compressible paper towels and create more room in the can (whodathunkit, right???). In what world does it make sense to just toss your stuff on the ground near the can because it clearly won’t fit? I could get into the nitty gritty bits of bathroom etiquette, but let me instead refer you to this very informative Jezebel article. Take notes, people.

This article is a response to an article on the New Yorker website.  The ideas expressed here are the opinions of the author alone, not an official opinion of the University or this publication.

Dear Mr. Thompson,

This morning you published an article entitled, “The End of Stanford?”  It is one of the most sensationalist and unsubstantiated pieces of journalism I have ever read.

“Anyone can create, edit or contribute to any page.”

You are misinformed about the Stanford of today, but you didn’t make an effort to learn more about it.  Of your 14 hyperlinks, 9 of them referenced articles from your own website.  The only reference to the stanford.edu domain was that of Synergy’s website, which publicly displays the password for its own wiki page.  See the screenshot from Synergy’s webpage at right.

You may not have done your research, but I have, and I would like to clarify some of your points.

We are no mere tech incubator.  Stanford University is ranked #1 in the world for its arts and humanities programs.  85% of our undergraduates as of the last academic year are in non-engineering majors.  Our political science, psychology, economics, English, history, and sociology graduate schools all rank in the top 5 in the nation.  Our business school is #1.  Our law school is #2.  Education is #5.

“It is for you to know all, it is for you to dare all.”
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

I’m no zealot for the start-up culture myself, but it must be contextualized to be understood.  At a school with 6,999 undergraduates and  8,871 graduate students, 12 students dropping out to form a company is hardly statistically significant.  While you may not approve of Stanford’s start-up culture, I dare you to deny its efficacy:  companies formed by Stanford alumni create $2.7 trillion in revenue annually and have created 5.4 million jobs.  We have the world’s 10th largest economy.

In your article, you ask, “Shouldn’t [a great university] be a place to drift, to think, to read, to meet new people, and to work at whatever inspires you?”  We wholeheartedly agree, and this is exactly what our curriculum seeks to do.  This is why our new, introductory course sequence (mandatory for all students) is called Thinking Matters.

I’m mostly puzzled by your article because I don’t understand your motivation.  You’re a Stanford graduate.  Why are you taking such inaccurate hits at your alma mater?  To take us down a notch?  It seems like your deliberately controversial article is just a ploy for page-views.

I invite you to visit Stanford as it is today.  Heck, I’ll give you a tour.  Join me in seeing Stanford not as we appear to the uninformed eye, but to those who engage in its true academic culture.

I promise you’ll be pleasantly surprised.

Kristi Bohl, Stanford ’13

You’ve spent an hour blowing your hair out. You’re tugging at your shirt, making sure it isn’t bunching in any weird ways. You’re trying to convince yourself that your cutest pair of flats aren’t pinching your toes, your throat isn’t sore from talking, and your cheeks don’t hurt from persistent smiling. You’re making PG-rated chitchat with the girls next you in line, notably those with last names of the same letter as your own. Suddenly you hear it. The clapping. The scream-singing. The doors burst open and you hear the incessantly catchy lyrics of yet another anthem as you’re quickly ushered in. This is rush, and you’re effing exhausted.

            I could write a pretty hefty article full of tips and advice that echo the sentiments of Stanford’s Inter-Sorority Council, many of the girls you’ll talk to during rush, and possibly your RA or friends that have gone through the process before. I’m going to try really hard not to do that. If you’re planning on going through girls’ rush, you’re going to hear a LOT about how “you should really pick the place that’s best for YOU”, and how you should just focus on “being yourself”. No offense to all of that, but it’s a little trite, and you’ve undoubtedly heard it all before. This is an article for those of you thinking about going through rush, maybe on the fence about sororities in general, maybe unsure of what exactly to expect from the whole process. I want to give you some concrete advice, hopefully some of which that you haven’t  already heard before, that might actually help you figure out if Stanford’s sorority scene is right for you.

A little background: I am a member of one of Stanford’s housed sororities. For the sake of this article, I don’t think it’s really important to say which, as the things I want to talk about will focus on Stanford’s sororities as a whole.

Continue reading “When Fools Rush…”»

“We need to get women to start out aiming big and staying in.”

One of the most daunting aspects of being a female in the technical fields is the dearth of female role models.

Growing up at my elementary school, I dreaded the inevitable biography book report.  I always got Marie Curie.  No slight to Madame Curie, but I couldn’t help but shudder to think that the only techy female role model my teachers could dig up for me died 80 years ago.  Painfully.  Of radiation poisoning.  The prospects seemed bleak for a ten-year-old girl who liked science.

Leading Ladies of Tech

Enter Sheryl Sandberg.  The Chief Operating Officer at Facebook and former vice president of Global Online Sales and Operations at Google, Sandberg is one of the most influential women in the world.  She and a new generation of women leaders in tech – like Yahoo!’s Marissa Mayer (Stanford B.S. in SymSys) – have shown young women everywhere that female leadership is no mere possibility, but also a necessity for an egalitarian society.

Sandberg’s credentials make her a prime role model and spokesperson for the modern feminist movement.  Her modest autobiographical Twitter bio of “mother of 2, wife of awesome guy, friend to many great women” belies her professional accomplishments and impact.  After graduating summa cum laude from Harvard and receiving her MBA from Harvard Business School, she worked with the World Bank and served as Chief of Staff for the U.S. Treasury during the Clinton years.  She’s now #10 on Forbes’ list of the world’s most powerful women.

Sandberg only recently tackled issues of gender in leadership, but has done so with gusto.  Her famous TED Talk “Why we have too few women leaders” has over 2 million views, and her new book Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead has been translated into 24 languages.

The Bad News

Sandberg opened the talk with a sobering description of the state of women in modern leadership.

The blunt truth is that men still run the world.  Unequivocally, no question about it.”

Continue reading “Lean In: Sheryl…”»

Yesterday, Rachel Maddow, host of MSNBC’s “The Rachel Maddow Show” spoke to the Stanford community about her time as an undergraduate and about her new book “Drift.” Memorial Auditorium was packed, filled with students drawn by the chance to see one

Rob Reich and Rachel Maddow, answering questions during the Q&A.
Photo credit: Charles Russo

of Stanford’s most famous alumna.

You could almost miss the fact that the talked was sponsored in honor of the 25th anniversary of the Program in Ethics in Society. But Maddow and the people that introduced her, Professor Rob Reich and senior Jessica Asperger,  gave us reminders that the focus of the talk was about ethics, about how the choices we make have consequences.

Maddow first introduced us to this subject by talking about her time at Stanford. Although she didn’t have any prior plans to complete a Public Policy major or honors thesis, they became steps towards completing her personal goals. After coming out and deciding to become an active member of a gay community she believed was being terminated by AIDS, Maddow said,”At age 17, I came out and thought my role was to fight.” She didn’t know what exactly she was going to do or how she was going to accomplish it but the program was one of her first steps down the long road that has allowed her to become one of America’s most thoughtful political commentators. Continue reading “Rachel Maddow t…”»

Trying to get in the spirit of St. Patrick’s Day while studying for finals?  Sigh – you’re not alone.

But if you want a catchy study tune to keep you in the mood, check out this witty ditty, care of Stanford biology alum Adam Cole, B.S. ’09, M.S. ’10.  You’ll probably learn a lot – let’s hear it for Sacchyromyces cerevisiae!

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The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth…

Need I say more?

Mmmmocha!

EDIT:  updated (bigger!) prizes – see below!

Winter at Stanford evokes myriad images in our day to day lives.  From the sidewalk scrawlings of “regarde le ciel” (look at the sky), to the Barista art in the foam of your mocha, it’s often the little things that add spice and color to your day.

For this photo contest, we’re asking YOU to submit your favorite photos from this winter, be they artsy, fartsy, or just plain cool.  Whatever “winter” means to you, in this place, in this time, on however much caffeine you’ve been drinking, email it to stanfordblogging@gmail.com.

The stakes:  $30 $50 gift card to the overall winner: choice of Ike’s, Starbucks or Amazon!  $15 $25 gift cards to the three honorable mentions (same choice).  And if you’re awesome enough, we’ll just add more prizes.  Because we can.  The contest ends on 3/22.

Thank you to Safemart for helping to make the Winter at Stanford contest on The Unofficial Stanford Blog possible. Whether it’s sipping hot chocolate at the CoHo in the Winter, playing Ultimate Frisbee at the Oval in the Spring, crunching leaves underfoot as you take a Fall stroll to Cantor or running around Lake Lag during the Summer, Stanford has a million things to offer. But at some point, most of us venture out of the Stanford bubble (at least for a few years).  Are you graduating this year and planning on sharing a house in Palo Alto with your draw mates while you work for the latest hot start-up?  Or perhaps you’ve got that investment banking job or Teach for America position that you’ve always wanted and will be moving to the Big Apple.  Wherever you end up post-graduation, Safemart has the home security solutions you’ll need to keep your new apartment or house secure.  Check out state-of-the-art Safemart alarm systems and related home security products today!

Just don’t get them started about the Claw.

I’m not sure exactly why, but Stanford has an unspoken stigma against asking questions in class.  Ask too many questions and you become “that guy.”  Pipe up and the entire class turns to you like the creepy, synchronized, green alien dudes in Toy Story.  Once the professor starts calling you by name it’s game over.

I’ve always been confused why question-asking feels so taboo in a school so obsessed with intellectual vitality.  Are we willing to compromise our understanding for the sake of looking like we have our act together?  Is it really so bad to admit weakness?  Are we too timid to risk humiliation at the hands of a Nobel laureate, or to face Socratic-style evisceration in a Law School seminar?  (OK, that’s a fair point.)

I’m no exception to this rule, and throughout my time here, asking questions in large lectures has always brought up my pulse and threatened to jumble my words to the point of incoherence.  (Pro tip: asking questions should actually be less scary in large lectures, because fewer people know who you are!)  Better to risk looking like a fool in class than to have it incontrovertibly proven in the final, right?  What have we got to lose?

I want to take this opportunity to thank the question-askers.  You guys rock.  Ever notice the rumble of shuffling paper right after you ask a question?  Yeah, that’s because everyone else had the same question, they were dying for someone to ask it, and they’re now frantically taking notes.  Ever seen the masses turn to you with widened eyes?  Yeah, that’s the look of a hundred students trying to convey “thank you” via ESP.  You keep us from keeling over every time the prof skips the proof or dismisses the big step as “obvious.”  You, sir or madam, are insistent, attentive, and on your game.  In a phrase: you go, Glen Coco.

As we round the bend to finals, never forget that asking questions is a very good thing.  Stay curious, my friends.

Would you like $250 $140? Right now? Free and clear? How about every quarter? Yeah, so would I. However, unlike most random hypothetical questions, I can actually deliver on this one. $250 $140 of your tuition per quarter automatically goes to special fees. However, saying as you don’t ever actively consent to this distribution of funds to various student groups, the ASSU would be in something of a legal snafu if they didn’t give you the option of taking the money back at some point. So they do. For the first two weeks of every quarter, you have the option of waiving the money you paid for special fees. It’s really that simple. You can get a refund for $250 $140 worth of special fees every quarter. The solitary attached string? The leadership of groups that get special fees are allowed to request a list of students who waived their fees and may bar those students from using their services. But that’s seriously it. Now some food for thought: what could I buy with the $750 $420 a year that I currently spend on special fees? Here’s my short list:

 - A boatload of Philz coffee

- Seven Four trips skydiving

- One of those giant stuffed trees from the bookstore

- A romantic weekend in Tahoe

- My weight in marshmallows

- *Part of* The mens water polo team

- Parking for my entire Stanford career ~two years

- A flight to somewhere very far away

- 30 17 cases of Two Buck Chuck

- Half an Ochem textbook

- An iPhone 17

- 3 2+ Dance Marathon pledges

- The worlds most hipster bike

- Someone to slap me when I procrastinate (could definitely use one of those right about now…)

Continue reading “Party With Fees…”»

“I am the Lorax. I speak for the ‘Tree’” . No, I’m not misquoting Dr. Seuss. I’m talking about the  news that broke today about the registrar’s proposal to change the  earliest class to 8:30, speaking on behalf of a huge portion of the Stanford community united in their common representation by the unofficial mascot  of the Tree: Stanford athletes.  As a member of the lightweight rowing team, I have been a varsity athlete for the past three years. Being on a sport at Stanford is not just an activity, it is a lifestyle. It influences how I eat, sleep, study, and even think. Rowing crew has taught me things that no class could ever so deeply impress upon my soul. Beyond the importance of teamwork, it has taught me that when times get tough, it’s better to see problems as opportunities to transcend weakness by choosing to dig in and pull harder rather than give in to get my boat’s bow ball  to the finish line ahead of the other crews.

Stanford’s culture celebrates student’s achievements both inside and outside the classroom like no other university I have ever seen. Upon coming here, I was overwhelmed by the tremendous respect and support for excellence in all its forms: whether you can juggle six hundred flaming bowling pins at once, code an entire operating system in a few hours, sing the Iliad in original Greek, or move a ball up and down a field or court with incredible agility, you are AWESOME and contribute to the collective awesomeness of this university. No matter what you do, your accomplishment builds to a cohesive whole that drives Stanford, and the rest of the human race, forward. This unbelievable spirit has pushed countless people, myself included, to keep going and to be the best that they can be no matter how tough times get.

Stanford women’s soccer, 2011 national champs

That’s why I was so disturbed to hear of the Registrar’s decisions in today’s article in the Daily. Most sports on campus have practice twice a day throughout he year; usually one of those practices (whether it be rowing on the water, weights, swimming, conditioning,etc.) happens before 9:00 class and finishes just in time to get to 9:00 class. Having classes start any earlier would make it impossible for many athletes to effectively plan their class schedules around practice to take the classes they are passionate about and need to graduate in four years. This would severely hinder the academic experience for many athletes who chose Stanford for its top-shelf combination of academics and athletics. Moving classes any earlier than they are would also be deleterious to athletic performance. Stanford athletes don’t win national championships and Olympic gold medals automatically by being at Stanford and soaking up the glorious northern California sunshine year round while their competition elsewhere in the country is stuck trudging through a snowbank to practice inside; they win only as the result of hours of practice and good, old-fashioned hard work. If we have to shift our practice schedule any earlier to accommodate for an earlier class schedule, our practices will be much less effective as we will have less time to sleep and eat  in accordance with our high energy demands. In rowing, we like to say that every stroke you take “off”, mentally or physically, is one stroke behind the competition; clearly, any lack of focus can get you left at the starting line. I highly doubt that anyone who calls himself or herself a Cardinal wants to see this happen on the grand scale.

As an upperclassman, I vividly remember Dean Julie saying during orientation that whenever the Cardinal takes the field, we ALL take the field.  So, when you think about whether or not you will really miss your pre-class donut in the morning (or, for that matter, whether or not you even go to early morning classes), think about the sense of pride you get from dancing to “All Right Now” every time we score a touchdown, the sense of pride you feel when your friends win a national championship, the chills you got when we won the Rose Bowl. Whether we realize it or not, pride in athletic accomplishment is so deeply engrained in the very fabric of our school’s culture and identity that we cannot act contrary to it.  Sign the petition to make sure it stays “All Right Now”.

In case you haven’t heard, the Registrar has proposed moving popular Stanford classes to 8:30 a.m. and disallowing students from taking overlapping classes.  If you’re passionate about this issue, the VPUE is giving you an opportunity to provide input.

Academic Affairs has scheduled a meeting with Vice Provost Harry Elam TODAY at 5:45 PM in the ASSU offices in Old Union.  All interested students are welcome to attend.  Be sure to arrive on time.

The ASSU Senate petition against the changes can be found here.