As Nick During ’06 left the Campus Center Tuesday, he tripped, dropping an open carton of chocolate milk. Then, as he bent to pick it up and a line of hungry students gathered behind him, his fly snapped open. He stood up, chocolate milk in hand, boxer-briefs flapping in the wind, and as his crush tried to sidle past, he waved hello, sloshing chocolate milk down her shirt.
“Sometimes, I think Wesleyan is making me more awkward,” During said. “I don’t know what to do when I emerge into civilized society.”
Don’t worry, Nick. You are not alone.
The Princeton Review ranked Wesleyan University third in its list of Most Awkward Universities last week, just behind the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah. Fourth and fifth place universities were Georgia Tech. and Carnegie Mellon.
According to Mary Ederheim of the Princeton Review, who determined the category’s rankings, Wesleyan’s awkwardness is painfully obvious.
“Watching students relate to one another, it became immediately clear that nobody at this school understands social norms,” Ederheim said. “Sometimes, watching students interact, I myself feel extremely uncomfortable.”
Among the most common awkward interactions are the most ambiguous. Often, said Ederheim, students respond to greetings meant for others and don’t seem able to tell if someone else remembers meeting them.
“I say hi to this girl Madeline I met in psych class all the time, but she gives me a sad face like I’m a loser,” said one anonymous student. “Sometimes, I think she’s waving to someone behind me.”
“This guy keeps waving at me when I’m waving to people behind him,” said Madeline Shapiro ’06. “It’s sort of pathetic.”
In a series of interviews conducted over several weeks, Ederheim said, students expressed frustration because they often found conversations to be a series of interruptions.
“Sometimes, I can’t have a normal conversation,” said the anonymous student. “I start talking to someone, but then I start saying something at the same time as them, and then I try to talk and we just smile at each other and I just really wish I weren’t there at all.”
The University also has a history of students running into glass windows and doors.
“Sometimes, I turn to yell at someone from the car and I smash my face into the window,” said Anjali Saxena ’06. “Once, I ran into the door at the campus center and fell down for awhile. There was some kid at the vending machines who must have been thinking, ‘who is this girl?’”
Some common explanations for the University’s high level of awkward phenomena include its widely known openness and acceptance of deviant behavior.
“When I do something clumsy or uncomfortable, people tend to think it’s endearing. I mean, I have the biggest crush on you. Sh*t. I mean, awkward equals awesome. Sh*t,” Shapiro said. “I have to go.”
Brown ranked sixth, followed by Bard University, the California Institute of Technology, Rutgers University, and Sarah Lawrence.
“At least we beat Brown at something,” said Jerry Baberams ’05.
This rampant sense of awkwardness has many juniors and seniors wondering what to do when they enter the real world after college.
“Right now, I can fall over and things and it’s okay,” Baberams said. “When I’m applying for a job and I can’t figure out how to sit in my chair, they won’t think it’s cute. That’s a sex of concern for me. I mean, a source. Source. It’s a source of concern, or. I don’t know, just make me sound sex. I mean hot.”
In an uncomfortably accurate morsel of truth, Becca Linden ’06 explained the inspiration behind her own pattern of awkward behavior.
“Your mom is awkward,” said Linden. “Awkward like a fox.”
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