You can take the alum out of Columbia, but you can’t take the Columbia out of our alumni. And once they shuffle on from this mortal coil…they’ll be back.

Part of what allows Columbia to lay claim to the tagline of “greatest university in the greatest city” is our extensive alumni network. Yes, maybe some of our most famous former students “dropped out” or don’t look back fondly on their Columbia days (we’re so sorry, Obama). However, that isn’t going to stop Columbia for milking them for everything they’ve got, and we here at Bwog don’t imagine that racket will end after they die. These alums won’t be able to take their fame (or their ability to cash into it) beyond the grave, but that won’t stop the administration from capturing their undying spirit and using that to entice more impressionable applicants through our hallowed gates.

But where should they house these wayward spirits? I have some suggestions:

  • Greta Gerwig – Milstein
  • Allen Ginsberg – Hartley
  • Timothee Chalamet – the ping pong tables in the Hartley Lounge
  • Neale Hurston – Milbank
  • Thomas Merton – St. Paul’s
  • Jim Jarmusch – John Jay
  • Vanessa Carlton – Carlton Arms
  • Martha Stewart – Diana
  • Kate McKinnon – Lerner Party Space during GenderFuck
  • Jacqueline Barton – 6th floor of Altschul
  • Lauren Graham – Journalism Joe’s
  • Cheryl Milstein – Butler, surprisingly
  • Rodger and Hammerstein – Lerner Piano Lounge
  • Alicia Keyes – Carman practice rooms
  • Barack Obama – the Barnard Quad, just to piss off CC boys one more time
  • Jake Gyllenhall – Dodge (the music building)
  • Beto – Dodge (the gym)
  • Federico Garcia Lorca – that plaque that they dedicated to him in John Jay
  • Art Garfunkel – Furnald
  • Joan Rivers – every women’s bathroom at Barnard
  • BoJack Horseman’s mom – elevator in Milbank
  • Alexander Hamilton – Thomas Jefferson’s statue because he’s a petty bitch
  • RBG – Law school
  • Matt Murdock/Daredevil – the horse statue on top of the Law school
  • Langston Hughes – Mudd
  • Ben Platt – Wien stairwell where the acapella groups practice
  • J.D. Salinger – the tunnels
  • Maggie Gyllanhall – Absolute
  • Meghan McCain – the trashcans outside of EC
  • Ezra Koenig – Harmony Hall
  • Tony Kushner – the former gay lounge in Furnald
  • Ursula K. Le Guin – Barnard greenhouse
  • Joseph Gordon Levitt – Carman

but who’s gonna haunt the gates via Bwog Archivve