College Prep Schools Blog
20 Most Bizarre College Sports Mascots
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Tue, Aug 10, 2010 @ 07:00 AM
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School Sports, boarding schools, College Prep Schools, Day Boarding Schools, Teenage Rebels
You’ve probably heard of the Tigers, the Wildcats and even the Wolverines, but did you know there was a squirrel or a mollusk representing a U.S. college? That’s not all; there are 18 other bizarre mascots, from a banana slug to a boll weevil.
Check out the stories behind the 20 Most Bizarre College Sports Mascots!
An apparent homage to the corn fields surrounding the campus of Concordia College, its mascot, Kernel the Cobber appears to be an angry ear of corn. Putting aside the fact that corn is not the most feared of all vegetables, Kernel does look particularly vicious. And weird.
SOURCE
2. Delta State University's Fighting Okra
2. Delta State University's Fighting Okra
Delta State has long been known as the Statesmen in a nod to State Rep. Walter Sillers, Jr., who was the speaker of the Mississippi House of Representatives for 20 years. However, in the late 1980s, a basketball player and some dorm mates were complaining to each other that a Fighting Statesman was not particularly frightening to their opponents. They wanted a mascot that was "mean and green." The discussion continued and one of the baseball players suggested that since it was green, fuzzy and tough, that okra would be the perfect mascot. Thereafter, the rally cry of, "Okra! Okra! Okra!" could be heard regularly at basketball games, prompting the creation of the unofficial Fighting Okra mascot.
3. Evergreen State College's Speedy the GeoduckIs it an asparagus? A plate with vegetables on it? No, it's Speedy the Geoduck (pronounced "Gooey Duck"), more commonly known as a clam. Why the school chose a phallic mollusk to represent its sports teams, no one seems to know. Although the school's fight song gives some hints: "Go, Geoducks go; through the mud and the sand, let's go. Siphon high, squirt it out, swivel all about, let it all hang out. Go, Geoducks go. Stretch your necks when the tide is low. Siphon high, squirt it out, swivel all about, let it all hang out." Maybe the belief that the burrowing clam is an aphrodisiac has something to do with it?
4. Grays Harbor College's Charlie ChokerGrays Harbor certainly wins the prize for most menacing mascot. Yet Charlie Choker is also perhaps the most misunderstood of all college mascots. Because he actually isn’t a criminal, he is a logger. A choker-setter is a pivotal role in logging operations and is the strong, courageous individual who places a cable with large clamps around a log to remove it from the forest. The explanation doesn’t diminish his creepiness.
16 Most Unbelievable School Pranks Ever Committed
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Thu, Jul 15, 2010 @ 08:00 AM
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School News, boarding schools, CalTech, College Prep Schools, Flip Cards, Harvard, MIT, Placard, Pranks, School Pranks, Switcheroo
In addition to being known for rigorous academic programs, cut-throat athletics or a prestigious history of tradition, the following schools and universities have also earned a reputation for some of the best school pranks of all time. Creative, clever and most of all, unexpected, check out this list of 16 of the Most Unbelievable School Pranks Ever Committed that earned national and even international attention for their respective alma matter.
Check out our list of the 16 Most Unbelievable School Pranks Ever Committed and let us know what you think!
1. There's No Stopping Them
Auburn University is well-known for its football program. Its rivalry with Georgia Tech, which originated in 1892, is equally well-known. That rivalry came to a head in 1896, when Auburn students decided to "grease the skids" of an Auburn football win over Georgia Tech by lubricating the train tracks and platform at the Auburn Train Station with grease and lard the night before the train carrying Georgia Tech's football team was to arrive. The next morning, as anticipated, the train's efforts to stop at the station were a complete failure. The train blew past the station by at least five miles before it was able to stop. After having to walk the five miles back to the station, Georgia Tech's team was easily defeated 45-0 by Auburn.
Source
2. Harvard's Fish Story
2. Harvard's Fish Story
Since the eighteenth century, a five-foot-long wooden carving of a cod fish has hung above the entrance to the chamber of the House of Representatives in the Massachusetts State House as a symbol of the importance of the cod to the region's early economy. The fish hung in its lofty position for years until the 1933 staff of the Harvard Lampoon, Harvard University's monthly humor magazine, decided it needed to be acquired. Despite its importance to the Massachusetts legislature, the cod was left surprisingly unguarded. Obtaining it took little effort. Three Lampoon staffers walked into the statehouse and surreptitiously snipped the two wires holding the cod, lowered it into a long flower box, and walked out. The theft caused quite the uproar in Boston but only 50 hours later the cod was returned without incident and hung again in the state house - albeit six inches higher.
Source
3. Veterans of Future Wars
3. Veterans of Future Wars
When World War I veterans lobbied Congress in 1935 to receive their war bonuses ten years early, to ease the strains of the Great Depression, the Harrison Bonus Bill was born. So was an idea. Princeton senior Lewis Gorin decided that if present-day veterans could get their bonuses early, why shouldn't future veterans be prepaid for their service – before fighting in a war?! Gorin lobbied that all male citizens between 18 and 36 should be paid a $1,000 war bonus on June 1, 1965. The Veterans of Future Wars movement spread quickly, with local chapters springing up on college campuses nationwide, with spin-off groups, such as the Association of Gold Star Mothers of Future Veterans, following suit. (Although it was originally meant to be a satirical look at government, all but two members of the Princeton VFW ended up fighting in World War II.)
Source
4. Placard Switcheroo
4. Placard Switcheroo
Flip-cards seen at football games are generally used to spell out a word or phrase related to the teams on the field. The 1961 Rose Bowl game between the Minnesota Golden Gophers and the Washington Huskies was an exception and one of the first pranks involving flip-cards. During half-time at the game, spectators picked up the stack of cards from their seats and began to turn them over as instructed, revealing a series of gigantic images for people watching on TV. All was going according to plan until the fourteenth image when instead of showing the word "Huskies," the thousands of placards spelled "Caltech," the prank-happy school just down the road in Pasadena. Later, one of the Caltech students responsible admitted that a fellow prankster had posed as a reporter and asked the head Washington cheerleader how the flip-card system worked. Then other team members gained access to the cheerleaders' hotel rooms and switched instruction sheets.
Financial Aid for Students Attending Boarding Schools
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Allison "AJ" Miller
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Tue, May 18, 2010 @ 07:00 AM
tags:
boarding schools, College Prep Schools, Education, Financial Aid, Junior Boarding, Military Schools
With boarding school tuition rivaling that of private colleges, at just under $40,000 a year, many families need some financial assistance to afford it or help with tuition costs. And, in fact, an estimated 30% of all families with students attending a boarding school receive some sort of financial aid, with the average aid amount being around $17,000.Similar to colleges and other private schools, families apply for financial aid when their child applies for admission into a boarding school. In general, families making more than $120,000 in household income have a lower chance of qualifying for aid; those making less should qualify for some form of need-based financial aid.
Boarding schools offer two general types of aid: need based and merit based.
Families with lower incomes typically qualify for help from the school in the form of grants. Grants do not need to be repaid. However, because of the high cost of attendance, most families also need to apply for loans to cover the balance. Boarding schools generally have established relationships with banks and funding sources that will provide educational loans.
Combating Underachievement in Gifted Students
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admin
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Tue, May 11, 2010 @ 02:36 PM
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boarding schools, College Prep Schools, Gifted Students, Int'l. Baccalaureate
Even students who are labeled gifted or talented experience underachievement. When they are performing well below what their parents or teachers recognize they are capable of, they are underachieving. But pointing out the situation is often not enough to spur a gifted child to suddenly increase their level of scholastic output or effort.There are generally two major reasons gifted students can be underachievers: external forces and internal forces. Among external forces are more environmental factors, such as classes and teachers that do not provide a challenge, peer pressure, isolation from peers by being gifted and family dynamics. Internal factors include feelings of anxiety or depression, learning difficulties and rebellion.
Many underachievers are prone to disorganization. They lose assignments, don’t turn in homework, daydream, lack prioritization skills and spend more time on activities like reading or video games than on the work they should be doing for class. Others are perfectionists who are often unable to complete assignments on time because they are so worried about doing a great job; others are more concerned about speed, and being done first, to do a quality job. Either way, the result is the same – performance of a lower caliber than is possible.
How Involved are Parents at Boarding Schools?
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Allison "AJ" Miller
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Tue, Apr 27, 2010 @ 08:00 AM
tags:
Co-Ed Schools, College Prep Schools, Learning Differences , Summer Boarding
Parents of students at private schools, public schools or day schools typically are more involved in daily school life than parents at boarding schools For the most part, this is a function of geographic proximity – boarding schools are often farther away than the local public high school or even the day school a few miles away. Significant involvement in a boarding school that is hours away is logistically more difficult for most parents.That is not to say that parents do not support the boarding school their child attends – far from it. But parents support the school more from a distance.
Advantages of College Prep Schools
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Allison "AJ" Miller
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Mon, Apr 19, 2010 @ 08:00 AM
tags:
All Boys Boarding, Co-Ed Schools, College Prep Schools, All Girls Boarding
Students interested in attending high school away from home have several types of boarding schools to choose from. Military boarding schools can help ready students for a military career, junior boarding schools are 
for elementary and middle school students, therapeutic boarding schools provide a mix of therapy and medical support with academic coursework, while college prep schools are focused solely on training highly intelligent students for admission to and success in college.
for elementary and middle school students, therapeutic boarding schools provide a mix of therapy and medical support with academic coursework, while college prep schools are focused solely on training highly intelligent students for admission to and success in college.Sure, some high schools can achieve the same result, but there are numerous advantages that college prep boarding schools provide that others schools generally do not.
Five Benefits of All-Girls Boarding Schools
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Allison "AJ" Miller
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Mon, Mar 29, 2010 @ 07:01 AM
tags:
College Prep Schools, All Girls Boarding, Junior Boarding
Research in the U.S. and overseas repeatedly confirms that single-sex education is good for both girls and boys in schools. Separating girls from boys in a 1995 school learning experiment in Virginia, the girls showed almost immediate gains in education involvement and class participation. A 2001 British study had similar results, concluding that girls perform better in an all-girls boarding school environment than in a co-ed one.
Which are the Best Boarding Schools?
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Allison "AJ" Miller
on
Tue, Mar 16, 2010 @ 09:00 AM
tags:
All Boys Boarding, Co-Ed Schools, College Prep Schools, Junior Boarding
The top or best boarding schools have a long-standing reputation for academic excellence and selectivity. At the most popular schools, fewer than 25% of applicants are admitted each year, making them the toughest to get into. But that doesn’t necessarily mean they are the best boarding school for your child.
