Harvard Wants Your Money

A $10 bill could get you a burrito from Felipe’s and a Bud Light, but the Senior Gift Committee wants you to donate it to Harvard.

With its new 32-second YouTube video, the Senior Gift Committee has begun the yearly effort to convince seniors to give to Harvard. But looking at the video, we think that Hamilton could have been better spent on increasing the teaser’s production values.

As it begins, the camera pans from an empty suite and unreasonably clean bathrooms, only to conclude both ambiguously and ominously with the date "3.8.10." While we know to fear the year 2012, when the world will come to an end, we weren’t sure what we're supposed to feel about this coming Monday is (a plague wipes out Harvard leaving it empty and in pristine condition?!).

In search of answers we spoke to Class of 2010 Senior Gift Committee Co-Chair Mary K.B. Cox ’10. She said the video is supposed to be “cryptic”—a teaser for a follow-up video on Mar. 8. We guess we’re supposed to anxiously await the fate of fair Harvard until then.

We're not so sure, though, about this whole “mystery” tactic. Somehow, empty classrooms don't seem to be that terrifying. The university could probably use the extra space to construct labs or make some more residential housing.

Last year, the Senior Gift Committee released a video parodying the “Don’t Vote” campaign. We didn’t think too much of that one either. But we look forward to this year's full-length video. If you think you can decode this cryptic teaser, feel free to leave a prediction about the next one in the comments.