An Open Letter to the Class of 2019

Dec 16

Dec 16 An Open Letter to the Class of 2019

HELLO, FUTURE WILDCATS. Assuming you came to this website before telling your family, friends, and classmates the news, let us be the first to congratulate you on your admittance to a top 12 top 13 university. Seriously though, congrats. After 18 years of flashcards and highlighters, Redbulls and AP classes, all-nighters and building houses in a third-world country, you’re going to NORTHWESTERN. THE DREAM!!!

In fact, you are such a special bunch that rather than appropriating An Open Letter to the Class of 2018, we wrote you a whole new article to properly sing of your accolades and advise you in how to handle the months leading up to Wildcat Welcome Week.

EVERYTHING YOU MUST DO NOW THAT YOU HAVE BEEN ADMITTED TO NORTHWESTERN

Buy out the entirety of the Northwestern bookstore’s school apparel. Unlike Kyle who has worn that Harvard sweatshirt since 10^th grade and will end up shoving it in the bottom of his closet once he ends up at University of Wisconsin, you can now proudly sport your Northwestern t-shirt without fear of rejection.
Spend 10 minutes a day in an icebox with a fan blowing in your face to help acclimate to the Chicagoland climate. You’ll thank us come October-April.
Rip apart your high school textbooks and burn the remains. You’re into college now!
Frantically try to salvage the charred scraps of your AP Bio textbook and tape the pages back together. What are you doing? You still have to take AP tests, and can you really handle the emotional toll of getting a B-? Old habits die hard.
Go through the Wikipedia page of famous Northwestern alums if you haven’t done so already, so that anytime Stephen Colbert, Rahm Emmanuel, or George R.R. Martin come up in conversation, you can manically shout, “THEY WENT TO NORTHWESTERN!”
Also memorize every fictional character that even mentions Northwestern. For starters, references to our alma mater can be found in Mean Girls, Modern Family, Step Brothers, Northwestern Magazine, and Parks and Recreation. Strategically pick movies that feature a strong female protagonist who happens to have graduated from Northwestern and despite her ridicule of the shallow fashion industry, takes a job for the ruthless Miranda Priestley, editor of Runway Magazine, and as she slowly changes herself to accommodate her job, she alienates her adorable chef-boyfriend, and—It’s The Devil Wears Prada. You should watch The Devil Wears Prada.
Learn all the words to the fight song. Please. None of us here know it, and someone has to sing it on the off chance we win a football game.
Savor every nutritional home-cooked meal you get. Your diet for the next four years will consist of hot cookie bar and booze.
Doodle Mr. or Mrs. Morty Schapiro across all your notebooks.
And most importantly, RELAX and CELEBRATE. Whether high school was the best of times or the worst of times, enjoy the last few months of living with your parents and eight-hour school days. For better or worse, you won’t see some of these people for years, if ever again. Get a full night’s sleep for god’s sake. Your hard work paid off, but believe you me, you will work hard at Northwestern, and you will love it. So for now rest up, do whatever makes you happy, read up on our Northwestern reference guide, and get excited to be a Wildcat.