Name, Hometown, School, Major: Andrew Kisch, New York City, SEAS, Computer Science

Claim to Fame? I was on GSElevator Twitter , I’m the reason Rite Aid cards you, I’ve never had a housing lottery number over 500, and I was the guy in the Knicks jersey standing on the garbage can in all of your Snoop-Bacchanal pictures.

Where are you going? See the above Twitter.

Three things you learned at Columbia:

  1. Columbia housing is proof of Murphy’s Law. Given enough time, anything that can go wrong will go wrong, and Columbia will tell you “it’s not that serious” and they’ll “fix it over the summer”.
  2. Nobody cares how smart you are if you have a bad work ethic. Learning how to work is more important than anything else you will learn in your time here.
  3. If you go to M2M right at midnight and ask nicely for sushi, they’ll probably give it to you for free (they have to throw it out anyway).

“Back in my day…” I have to defer to the wise words of my father (CC ’52): [in response to whether beer pong had been invented yet when he was at Columbia] “Back in my day, we didn’t play with our beer. We just drank it.”

Justify your existence in 30 words or less: I have an app in the iPhone app store called Arrow’d.

Is the War on Fun over? Who won? Any war stories? This question has always bothered me. Nothing is preventing you from day drinking with friends or even throwing keggers (tip: rent a blue bin from Hartley and cover it with towels). Some of the best “memories” you will make in college will be from when your brain has stopped making memories. Also, you live in arguably the most exciting city in the world with the greatest in culture, nightlife and entertainment. If you can’t find a way to have fun here, then you probably should have gone to a school with other not fun people (like UChicago, Yale or NYU).

Would you rather give up oral sex or cheese? Westside only lets you sample the latter (although you used to be able to sample the former at Campo).

Advice for the class of 2016:

  • All of your sexually repressed prayers will be answered during NSOP week.
  • Surround yourself with people who are smarter, funnier, cooler or otherwise better than you. If you hang around them long enough, some of it is bound to rub off on you.
  • Don’t get a crappy fake ID (or any fake ID at all because that’s illegal?) Nobody thinks you’re from Maine, and contrary to popular belief, no state ID has a hologram that says “Genuine Authentic Secure Valid”.
  • Take classes from lots of different majors. As a computer science major, my two favorite classes and the two classes that pushed me more than any other were a music class and a dance class (seriously).
  • If you’re too lazy to go to the package center, order things to your roommates’ mailboxes and don’t tell them (remember to thank them when they come back, confused, with your stuff).
  • When your suite gets too messy, start your own fraternity, design awesome lacrosse pinnies, and convince freshmen that you’re cool enough to justify them cleaning up your mess.

Any regrets? Lots, although few still seem significant (like those three points my TA took off on an exam that I thought was going to ruin my life at the time). Regrets are awesome. You’ll never discover your potential until you are denied something you want. You got here because you are smart and capable (and bold and beautiful). Never let anybody stop you. I love you all. Thank you for a wonderful four years.