As if the college application process wasn't hard enough, Vassar College had to go and punk 76 kids into thinking they got into the popular liberal arts college when they most certainly had not. So as a token of its regret the school is now...refunding the screwed students their $65 application fees. On the one hand the school admits that payday will be "of very little consolation" but on the other hand? These kids have college-application-from-hell stories to tell for the rest of their lives! more ›

Not to be outdone by NYU and their upcoming course on Occupy Wall Street, Columbia University will offer its own course on the nascent movement this spring. Offered by the Anthropology Department, the course [pdf], called "Occupy the Field," will offer "training in ethnographic research methods alongside a critical exploration of the conjunctural issues in the Occupy movement: Wall Street, finance capital, and inequality; political strategies, property and public space, and the question of anarchy; and genealogies of the contemporary moment in global social movements." Finger Twinkling 101 is a prerequisite. more ›

Some of our fondest moments at University occurred while we were reading College Magazine. What? You've never heard of it? Dude, they taught us that girls totally don't like unshaven faces (except when they do?) and that guys should just put themselves "out there," and that wouldn't it be cool if girls emitted a pheromone that told us they wanted to do it? Now, their exhaustive list of the most Hipster Campuses is out, and congratulations NYU, FIT, and Parsons! Better luck next year, West Point. more ›

NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly paid a visit today to the SIPA class that David Dinkins currently teaches at Columbia University, and Bwog reports that Kelly was thoroughly heckled (by an NYU saboteur!). But don't worry, the Commish thinks those protesters are just adorable. more ›

A Fordham sophomore who is paralyzed from the neck down after a fall from his lofted bed is suing the school for not installing guardrails. Last February, after a night of drinking, 20-year-old Kei Usami fell almost four feet from his bed and fractured his spine. According to the Post, his lawsuit also alleges that the schools volunteer EMS medics transported him without a neck brace, exacerbating the fracture. more ›

With college grads facing at least $25,000 in debt after graduation, some prospective students are opting to turn down expensive, prestigious institutions. For instance, there's Daniel Schwartz, who was accepted to Cornell but decided to go to CUNY's Macaulay Honors College: The Wall Street Journal reports, "Mr. Schwartz says his family could have afforded Cornell's tuition, with help from scholarships and loans. But he wants to be a doctor and thinks medical school, which could easily cost upward of $45,000 a year for a private institution, is a more important investment. It wasn't 'worth it to spend $50,000-plus a year for a bachelor's degree,' he says." But isn't it worth $50,000/year to see Vinny at Columbia or to name drop Cornell like the Nard Dog? more ›

Students graduating from college in 2010 had an average debt load of $25,250, up five percent from 2009. And unless they're lucky enough to score a highly-coveted job at a collection agency, chances are these students are unemployed or underemployed. It's bleak! How bleak is it? It's so bleak that college graduates today face the highest unemployment rate in recent history: 9.1%. Good thing a college education is about intellectual enrichment and not just some institutionalized bourgeois method for joining the middle class. more ›

Hey, if you're going to drop over $50,000 on tuition at one of the nation's best schools, you should get taught by the best of the best, right? Intellectual powerhouses, real braniacs, Serious Academic Figures...like Vinny from the Jersey Shore. more ›

College admissions officers at some of the country's most elite schools are sick and tired of slogging through long-winded personal essays from applicants, so they're capping them at 500 words. Because, really, no one wants to read four pages about your meaningful time volunteering with the crippled ferrets at the animal shelter in BuFu, Ohio. more ›

[UPDATE BELOW] Student loans will account for more than $1 trillion worth of debt this year, amazingly set to surpass credit card debt. But there is a presidential candidate who is brave enough to free you from all this debt by never allowing you to get federal assistance to go to school in the first place: Dr. Ron Paul. "Just think of all this willingness to want to help every student get a college education," Paul said on NBC's Meet the Press. more ›

Pace University's library had a wee bedbug problem, but now that's all behind them, a spokesperson assures us this morning. We reported yesterday that the university's Henry Birnbaum Library was abruptly shut down in the afternoon, and one student said a librarian conspiratorially leaned in to say: " 'Don't tell anyone this,' and then whispered 'bed bugs.' " The school says everything's under control now, but some students are on edge because the freshman dorms are located in the same building as the library. more ›

The NYPD's controversial spying programs don't just include "sending undercover officers into ethnic and Muslim neighborhoods to act like 'a human camera' and 'map the human terrain' in mosques, hookah bars, and Internet cafes." Turns out they also involve flat out spying on college students. And students, faculty and legal experts are, understandably, furious. The multi-year police operation violates U.S. privacy laws and could jeopardize millions of dollars in federal research money and student aid. more ›

Higher education is Big Business: students who pay the full tuition without assistance had lower grades and test scores than others, and more than a third of admissions deans at four-year colleges are doing more to recruit those who can pay full price. New Jersey college Seton Hall is bucking this trend by giving their smartest incoming students a $21,000 discount—two-thirds off the tuition price. "The primary motivation has been that as we go through what looks like a double-dip recession, we wanted to help our students," Seton Hall's president tells the Times. more ›

Earlier this year, former governor David Paterson announced he was joining the faculty of NYU. Now it turns out he'll be a visiting professor teaching a seminar called, "The Art of Governing," which might possibly be code for "Being Dysfunctional in Albany" or "Admitting Coke Usage, Affairs Days After Becoming Governor." more ›

Now, more than ever, college is crazy expensive and the U.S. Department of Education has created a website that will make parents of prospective college students faint. more ›

Since New York started handing out letter grades with their Department of Health inspections, a number of college cafeterias have been performing quite poorly and students and their parents are not amused. Today the Times catches up with the story, and though the schools are rushing to fix things ("We let the students down,” one admin said) it is too little, too late for some. Why bother with school food, these kids want their Five Guys, and they want it now! more ›

Earlier this month, America's youth—specifically those currently enrolled at Rutgers University—paid Snooki of Jersey Shore an absurd amount of money to come fist pump at the school. More than the university paid Toni Morrison, in fact. (Kids today! Etc.) Now Senator Joe Kyrillos is prepping a proposal in the state Senate that would essentially, hopefully, lead to better choices. more ›

Health Department inspections at three of Fordham University's dining facilities last month revealed a (dirty) laundry list of violations, including "evidence of mice or live mice present in facility's food and/or non-food areas, 'filth flies,' and not storing hot food items above 140 degrees Fahrenheit and cold food items below 41 degrees Fahrenheit." Two things to note here: The cafeterias are operated by Sodexo, a French multinational corporation that has previously been fined by the NY State Attorney General and that is now contracted to run concessions at the soulless new Coney Island. Second: Fordham students are as outraged as they are unsurprised, and they say they've found all sorts of weird stuff in their food. more ›

Despite a major presence in the national psyche, the story of the comely college co-ed who goes "Lesbian Until Graduation" is probably just a myth, at least according to the National Center for Health Statistics. The same study from the Center [PDF] that told us that kids these days aren't having sex as much also indicates that women with bachelor’s degrees are actually less likely to have had a same-sex experience than those who did not finish high school. more ›

Earlier this week, a baby grand piano left on a sandbar in Florida's Biscayne Bay puzzled people... until 16-year-old high school student Nicholas Harrington revealed it was part of his application to super competitive Cooper Union. Harrington said, "I wanted to create a whimsical, surreal experience. I don't like it be considered as a prank. It's more of a movement." But what did Cooper Union think of the stunt? more ›

Harvard recently cried "hate crime" when they found numerous LGBT studies books doused in urine in their library, but it turns out that it was (probably) just an accident! A janitor knocked over a bottle, which happened to be filled with urine, as he was cleaning and it spilled onto the books. Apparently peeing in bottles is popular over at Princeton, too. So now the question is how the hell are you studying so hard that you can't take advantage of the wonders of indoor plumbing? We know Addreall is probably making your Organic Chemistry worksheet utterly fascinating, but don't give them any excuse to start making Pee Pee Bottles for adults. more ›

We know what a shock the bust of the Columbia drug ring must have been to you, so it would be a pity to further dishearten you about the state of our universities. But in the interest of journalistic integrity we must inform you that there are other college kids out there who do drugs. Even right here in our very city! One NYU student told the Daily News, "Drug use is everywhere. It's different from the 1960s, when our parents experimented with drugs...now it's more practical, part of going to school." more ›

In a culture of iPads and Twitter and the inability to step away from a screen for five minutes lest you miss something, the New York Times is shocked to find that about 75% of college students still prefer textbooks over e-books. Mainly because you can actually take notes in textbooks, and don't need to constantly be worried about power sources. How quaint! But then sophomore Jonathan Piskor had to get all prep-school on us and say, "I believe that the codex is one of mankind’s best inventions." We'd switch to e-books in a heartbeat if we never had to hear a college kid try to impress us with Latin ever again. more ›

Because many more students than expected have have decided to attend NYU this fall, some students may be living in hotel rooms. The Washington Square News reported, "250 students guaranteed housing for the fall semester have yet to be issued room assignments. As of Friday, August 6, 98 of the 250 students could not fit into any NYU residence hall. The other 152 students may be split up from housing pairs to fill remaining beds that are still empty." more ›

How smart do you think you are, college kids? A new website that insists it is not a gambling website could pay you for that self-awareness, provided it's backed up by some actual knowledge. Ultrinsic allows students at 36 colleges, including NYU and Columbia, to bet money on their own grades. But do they really know what the odds are? more ›

The Princeton Review's annual "Best Colleges" list—based on surveys of 122,000 students at the 373 schools—features seven New York schools! Way to go, right? Except those seven schools are getting called out for containing the unhappiest students in the nation. (All the happy kids are allegedly at Brown University.) more ›

Opening this September with a freshman class of 150, NYU Abu Dhabi is shaping up to be a pretty competitive school. According to the Times, 90% of the first class is bilingual, and they have an average SAT verbal score of 715 and an average math score of 730. It's also turning into a completely international university. Robert M. Berdahl, president of the Association of American Universities, said, "The NYU model reflects a very different and thoughtful approach to what [NYU president] John Sexton and others perceive as the increasing globalization of higher education and the disappearance of traditional boundaries." But is Abu Dhabi really a college town? more ›