1. The philosophy department could put its shingle out on Washington Road. The cars already drive past there, so it would be easy to do, and I’m sure we’d get a lot of drive-in custom for such services as, “Will Critique Pure Reason for Food.”
2. We take photographs of all the urinals on campus and get the art history department to certify them as masterpieces of modernism. (Hey, it worked for Marcel Duchamp.) All we risk is the cost of a print job at CVS and the reputation of 21 tenured faculty members.
3. Better idea: We turn the writing seminars into vampire workshops. The freshmen will read the complete works of Bram Stoker and Stephanie Meyer, integrate these lessons into their favorite works of classic literature (copyright must be expired), then we sell under such titles as, “The Beautiful and the Dead: FitzGerald Revisited.” To judge by the bestsellers at Amazon.com, this would net us at least $2 million in advances from a reputable publishing house.
4. I know the chemistry department has a thermal lance. We use it to break into the sealed vaults at the Bank of England, make off with the plates for pound sterling and start printing foreign currency. We circulate the notes among pirates in Somalia and agree to launder their ill-gotten gains with the aid and complicity of the Syrian government. The Near Eastern studies Department will be charged with negotiating the deal. We use the proceeds to buy dinosaur DNA, with which the Mol Bio people will create our very own Jurassic Park on the golf course next to Forbes. The grad students can earn their keep as park attendants: and if they get eaten we have fewer mouths to feed.
5. Senior theses should not be wasted, we have a valuable army of researchers and bullshitters working at our behest, non-stop for at least the last two weeks before Dean’s Date. The University Press must organize this potential army. Half of them can be dispatched to write salacious and vaguely legal press reports on a lesbian relationship between Lindsay Lohan and Michelle Obama ’85. Report that Suri Cruz is the love child. This will win us the entire readership of People magazine, US Weekly and the National Inquirer. The other seniors should be redirected to our vampire workshops. There are 27 centuries of classic literature on which we can legally wreak havoc: Let’s get started, people, we don’t want this market to go cold on us.
6. Speaking of classics, I know they have detailed battle plans for the conquest of France, and I have before urged the University to avail itself of these. The prefrosh should be made to prove their loyalty to Old Nassau: inaugurate them as the 13th Legion and dispatch them to Gaul immediately. I’m sure we can find something to loot in the Louvre. This would be a great alternative to Outdoor Action — imagine what camaraderie it would breed! What esprit de corps!
7. Physics is an increasingly useless department — once they gave us the lightbulb, alternating current and air conditioning. Now they just play cat’s cradle with the fundamental stuff of the universe. President Tilghman should order them to immediately discover the Philosopher’s Stone. Get chemistry to help.
8. The politics department should sell the American Constitution abroad. It’s too old to be in copyright, and I’m sure we can get a great deal from Zimbabwe. There is serious demand for this thing: Look, it produced Obama!
9. The religion department: Sell Indulgences. Sure, we don’t a have John Tetzel on staff, but that University Chapel looks really official on a seal that says, “Get out of purgatory free.” Perhaps arrange a 50-50 deal with the Princeton Theological Seminary for their imprimatur.
10. The Program in Finance should be sold as a collateralized debt obligation. Congress is paying way above market rate for these, I’m sure it would net us at least $4 billion dollars.
If President Tilghman implements even half these proposals, I’m sure we could double the current value of the endowment. Hell, we could probably afford to float the University, which would allow us to escape rising water levels from global warming, and relocate to the Caribbean during the winter months. Now that’s a university for the twenty-first century. Heave-ho!
Brendan Carroll is a sophomore from New York, NY. He can be reached at btcarrol@princeton.edu.
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