• Join The Fed
• Advertise with The Fed

• About Us
• Contact

In This Issue

• The Colombia Daily Spectador Front Page
• Spec: Cabinet Secretaries Disappointed With Their Careers
• Spec: Hugs for the Homeless Hopes To Be A Success
• Spec: Unrecommended Student Requests Letters of Recommendation
• Grilled Cheese Honored
• Elliot Spitzer = Sex Machine
• Here's a Fairy Tale That Cracks Us Up
• The Colombia Spec Op-Ed Section
• Spec Op-Ed: Juicy Campus is seriously the Best Thing Ev-ar!
• Spec Op-Ed: I Don't Care About Manhattanville
• Spec Op-Ed: Staff Editorial -- We Have Opinions
• Spec Op-Ed: Letters to the Editor
• They Watch
• The Staff of 23.6

Teachers of undergraduate students at mid-semester department meetings separately discovered that Columbia College junior Alex Grobinski had requested teacher recommendations from each and every one of them.

Grobinski, a former member of Columbia College Student Council, has retained access to the undergraduate LISTSERV, and is now confirmed to have sent a request for letters of reference to the whole of the faculty. Using simple email features, the requests each had a personalized salutation and appeared to be addressed to a sole recipient.

Some minutes of investigation revealed that historically, no summer internships have ever requested an amount higher than three recommendations. The Future Leaders of America, an institute designed to train politically-minded students, once required four, but defaulted to zero after they discovered every reference on record had been forged. With this information, the teachers had another meeting where a decision was made and someone was sent a letter.

The noticably upset Finnegan Teasdale, Margaret Cunningstone Professor of Knitting, remarked that the deception had wasted a good deal of his time, as he normally incorporates a student’s name into his recommendation several times. “Find, replace, find, replace,” he whimpered, adding “I really can’t believe it’s not G-R-U-B-inski. That little typo cost my printer quota dearly.”

These allegations are reminiscent of the 2001 Transcript Scandal, in which SEAS first year Chastity Kim, bathed in a shredded profusion of her immaculate transcripts after ordering hundreds of copies from Student Services Online. She was reported as saying that it felt so good, oh yes, oh yes, damn it felt nice, all over her body.

Neurology professor Ray Bobs, another of Grobinski’s victims, told reporters the student wasn’t even in his class. “I just send out postcards that say ‘Take ‘Em’,” he said.

Still, not all of the slighted writers felt cheated. Calculus I Teaching Assistant Harold Chen said he felt honored when Grobinski sent him an email that read: “yo, geraldo, it’s alex from classand could i get a rec frm you?”

“He sometimes does his homework.” Chen waxed sentimental with a sad smile.

This will not, however, acquit Grobinski or spare him the Dean’s disciplinary hearing for “Deliberate and egregious squandering of professors’ time, first degree,” as his offense was worded by the Office of the Dean in a bulletin. The junior, who is not applying for any positions, showed signs of remorse through partly drawn blinds.

Grobinski had issued only one public statement as of this article’s printing, yet clarified in no uncertain terms the motives behind the hoax. The letter, reproduced on the University homepage, explained that the references were “like E for my self esteem”. Defrauded teachers showered Grobinski with stock superlatives, ever unwilling to neglect a student whose name they might have recognized from one of their class lists.

At present, 540 responses have been emailed, representing almost two-thirds of those propositioned.

The administration has promised effective counteraction during the coming weeks including limiting the number of teachers who know your name, and limiting the number of teachers.