The University has developed several integral traditions over the years that every fourth-year student is obligated to participate in. In fact, these traditions are secret graduation requirements, so if you do not complete them, you won’t even be allowed to graduate. Believe me, if you walk across that stage without completing all the traditions, there will be consequences — to be revealed at the end of this lovely article. If you aren’t a fourth-year, you can stop reading now. But if you are a fourth-year, firstly I apologize, and secondly please keep reading for your own health and safety.
Tradition One — Get the last ticket at Bodo’s Bagels
You may have heard of the marvelous and painstaking task of getting the #1 ticket at Bodo’s — if you haven’t, are you even a Hoo? — but have you heard of getting the last ticket? Believe it or not, you will have to hand in the first ticket and last ticket to Jim Ryan upon your graduation in order to earn permission to leave Grounds — the adult version of an exit ticket, if you will. And if you are wondering how on Earth you are meant to get the very last ticket, you will have to hunker down within the confines of Bodo’s until the clock ticks just a few seconds before closing — 3 p.m. to be exact — and scurry through the zigzag railing, eyes sharpened to make sure no one enters the building after you.
If you do not want the employees to absolutely hate your guts for placing an order seconds before closing, make sure to order something incredibly simple. Menu items such as a pickle spear or fruit cup require no clean up, but will still get you a printed-out ticket.
Tradition Two — Run your own personalized U.Va. admissions tour
After spending approximately four years within this personal purgatory of higher education, it is only fair that you show others a summary of the past four years in less than two hours. All you have to do to run a tour group is look like a typical University Guides member — so make sure to carry a Hydroflask or equivalent. The Prospective Student Events Portal will help you figure out when groups will be gathering in Peabody Hall, ready for you to sweep them away from the inaccurate University-sanctioned tours that could never give them the full scope of the student experience.
Make sure to take your tour group through all the notable locations from your University career — that chair in Starbucks you cried in after your fifth failed exam, the first spread of mold you encountered in your first-year dorm, because it is surely still there, and even the meeting place of that club you signed up for but never actually went to.
Tradition Three — Change your middle name to your computing ID
You are nothing without your University computing ID — that is a plain fact. This string of five to six numbers and letters have followed you since you got enrolled in this joint. It is fair enough to say, then, that this code has been with you since before you even uttered the word “wahoowa” or stepped foot in Newcomb for the very first time. In order to commemorate your undying loyalty to not only your computing ID, but also to the University itself, you must change your actual full legal name to include it. Make sure to emphasize to the desk clerk in whatever office you have to trudge through to make the change that this computing ID is more than a random string of letters and numbers generated by a computer code — it is your very soul, immortalized.
Tradition Four — Sacrifice your last Blue Book to the Statue of Homer
Finally, after your last final, you need to go out with a bang comparable to the Big Bang. What better way to do this than snatching away your last Blue Book from your professor’s office — since they never seem to hand things back in person after finals — and lighting it on fire next to the Statue of Homer? You may have two questions on your mind — why sacrifice it, and why next to the Statue of Homer? To answer the first question, sacrificing your Blue Book will give you a sense of relief comparable to passing that one exam you absolutely — 100 percent swear on your existence — were completely convinced that you would fail. Watching the pages filled with tears and eraser shavings will bring the pre-University life back to your eyes. And to answer the second question, I think Homer would be grateful to see something different than the occasional naked body running at full force towards him. We need to give the guy a break.
So, out of all the things you should do before graduation, these are the four secret traditions you must absolutely complete no matter what — if you want to graduate, that is. Slack on a single one, and University President Jim Ryan will personally, and physically, kick you off the platform. Afterwards, you will be sent to the bowls of Clark stacks for all of eternity. Well, only until you sing “The Good Old Song” enough times to appease the Board of Visitors. Then, and only then, can you try to graduate again.
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