Third Formers : Are They Getting Taller?
The Short Answer: No
The Middling Answer: No, But This Is A Larger Class Than Usual, So There Might Be More Third Formers Who Are Tall Or Short, Even Though on Average Heights Are The Same.
Man, it seems like everything at St. Paul’s has gotten worse in the three years I’ve been here: the rules have gotten stricter, seated has become longer, the food has become worst, the newbs have gotten way taller than in my day… Actually, that last one might not be true. Even though it might seem to many upper formers – including, apparently, my article assigner– that our third formers have markedly increased in size and decreased in cuddliness, this reporter was not entirely convinced – but who was a lowly senior writer to doubt the wisdom of his article assignment? Just why third formers are supposed to have become taller was, and possibly never will be, apparent to me, but I nonetheless developed some hypotheses. One: the admissions office favors taller students; two: a chemical spill into the drinking water approximately fifteen years and nine months ago; three: a complex optical illusion/conspiracy orchestrated continually by ITG and the theater department to make third formers appear taller. None of these seemed too likely, but being the good investigative reporter I am I decided to hit the streets of Millville to find out the truth about our third former’s length.
Cheung '11
The first logical step seemed to be hanging out in Sheldon and waiting for an admis-sions officer to let something slip. For thirty-six hours, I roamed Sheldon, bugging conference rooms, hiding in the ducts, and rifling through admissions files. Unfortunately, I was discovered after passing out from a combination of sleep-deprivation, hunger, and terror. After I revived I was let go – but with an inexplicable scar on my arm, that they insisted was from my fifteen foot fall from the ceiling but which I am convinced is some sort of microphone. Have no fear – the minute I made it back to Foster I wrapped my arm in tin-foil – good luck getting your little bug to transmit now, admissions officers!
Despite my brush with death, I wasn’t satisfied yet – the admissions office had still not divulged its secrets to me – so I tried a new tack: psychological manipulation. Every morning and afternoon for the next three days I walked past Sheldon just as admissions officers were going to and from lunch, wearing platform shoes every other day. Their reaction was the same on both the days when I wore sneakers and the days when I wore bright red leather pumps with 5-inch heels – failure. However, I can’t know whether or not they were just hiding their glee at my towering stature or not, so I decided I was going to have to brave the belly of the beast once more, and finally directly confront an admissions officer.
Descending from my room one night to an unnamed dorm, I hesitantly approached the adviser on duty – one Mr. XXXX, a known associate of the admissions office. “Mr. XXXX –”, I querulously inquired. “Is it true that third formers are getting taller!” What are you talking about?” he replied.
“I’m on to your game – the third formers – are they taller or not? Answer me!” No, of course not, that’s ridiculous.”
Changing my angle, I ventured, “Well, are there more repeating third formers?”
“No more than last year…”
Already trembling from having spent this much time in an officer’s presence, I quickly escaped back to my room, question answered, but still unsatisfied. Of course, an admis-sions officer would lie to me, what did his word prove? I decided I would have to search for someone who could be trusted – a student, like me, to be specific, a Student Admis-sions Officer from last year. Leaping to my computer I hammered out a message, the staccato of the keys echoing through my room as I plunged the depths of Facebook to find answers. I sent out a message through the ether, and then waited, sleeplessly, for two days until a message came tumbling back: “we obviously don’t discriminate based on height since it is not part of the application and so we don’t know how tall anyone is.”
Clearly, the admissions office was not going to divulge its secrets – they’d even got-ten to the SAO’s. Foiled, I wrote off my first hypothesis. Grudgingly, I moved on to my next idea: a targeted chemical spill which affected only future St. Paul’s student’s parents, magically warping their children and making them taller then normal humans. I googled around for 15 minutes, got bored, and wrote this theory off.
At last, I was down to just one, final theory: a massive optical illusion, orchestrated by ITG and the theater department for their own nefarious ends, which uses smoke, mir-rors, and video cameras to make third formers appear taller than average. After my last class on Saturday, with only one day until my article was due, I headed down to the theater department to see what I could dig up. As I walked into the New Space, the doors swung shut behind me and locked as all of the lights turned off. Just then I heard a noise behind me – turning, I saw a figure, already swinging a jet black mag-lite at my nose. While I was dazed, he dragged me outside, yelling at me never to return.
All my hypotheses – undone. At this point, I almost despaired of ever completing my article – why not just give up? I stumbled off to the business office to cry, my tears mixing with my blood. Sobbing, I threw open the door, only to see not the secluded, empty room I was hoping for, but a meeting of some sort, consisting of Mr. Matthews, the crew coach from Princeton, several NBA scouts, three lab coat bedecked men with East German accents, and Dick Cheney. A uniformed man standing to the side pressed a sweet smelling rag to my face and everything went black.
When I woke up the next day, somehow back in my dorm, there was the severed head of a pelican lying on my sheets. I managed to keep my composure long enough to throw the head into the trash, but I’d gotten the message loud and clear – I’d better stop looking in case I found out the truth. Are third formers getting taller? Will anyone believe what I’ve gone through? Is the Pelican worth a broken nose? All these questions rattled through my mind, but my deadline loomed. I had no choice but to type up this description in a caffeine fueled hour, and then send it down the maw of my mojotube* to my editor’s waiting desk.
*If you haven’t read Hunter S. Thompson, what I mean by this is my email.
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