Freshman Orientation 2017

SERENDIPITY | 5 Survival Tips and Tricks for New Cornell Students

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Cornell is a difficult place – colloquially, we are known as the easiest Ivy to get into… but the hardest to graduate from. While many of you are among the swaths of high school valedictorians, science fair winners and speech and debate aficionados, all of you will certainly fail at some point in your college careers. Whether you be staring at your grades with a terrible kind of awe, realizing three days later that you never turned in (or started) your final essay, or getting sent to the hospital for drinking too much during O-Week, Cornell will crush your souls in every way, shape and form. But worry not! After pressing on through four years in this frozen wasteland, you will emerge as elite graduates who have a remarkable capacity to change the world for the better.

Freshman Orientation 2017

BANDI | A Big Red Ball

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One of my formative orientation week events was Big Red Ball. For those of you who don’t know what Big Red Ball is, don’t worry—it’s really simple. All you need is two goal posts, a large open space and a ball. The rules are almost exactly like those of soccer, except instead of a small, black and white ball you use a big red ball. Like you know those big inflated balls you see in the Walmart children’s section, held inside a standing container with rubber straps so you could pull the balls out from the bottom and throw them back over the top?