Week of the living-dead

If college is to prepare students for the cold, ravaged wasteland that lies outside the pearly Sample Gates, then there's one lesson white-collared slaves-to-be must learn during their brief tenures. Freshmen, we hate being the one to break this to you, but it's better that you learn now than have your bright-eyed optimism slowly beaten out by the University's two-by-four of disappointment over the next few years. \nWhat we are about to tell you will hurt more than learning the truth about Santa Claus: the disbelief, the anger, the betrayal. You have to stay strong because the next paragraph will expose the raw malevolence that courses through the veins of the faculty. \nIf you're standing, you may want to sit down. Here it goes: All of that work from last week was no accident. Dead week, as it is so lovingly referred, isn't real. It's a legend, a farce, a damned dirty lie. We're sorry.\nWe know it hurts like a stingray barb to the chest, but think of the risk we're taking by telling you. If staff editorials weren't written anonymously, the faculty would hunt the writer down, rip out his or her still pulsing heart, place it in a doggie bag and hand it to them for carry-out.\nEvery semester, the dead week myth is perpetuated by angry students unable to cope with the grocery list of assignments that pile up as their work ethics plummet. Unfortunately, it's all a deception. There's no official University policy that prescribes the way professors schedule their assignments. The Office of the Registrar's only mandate is that "paper projects may be due only if assigned well in advance." \nWe know the scope of the deception is overwhelming and nearly impossible to comprehend, but everyone lies; even your mother -- even to you. It may not be of any significant conciliation, but very few universities offer their students any respite from their studies. In fact, statistics from the National Institute of Quit Crying You Babies support IU's standing policy -- a full 77 percent of university professors don't give a rat's ass about sniveling undergrads.\nNor should they care. You're in college for goodness sake. If you're the least bit prepared to confront the demands of a bachelor's degree, then it shouldn't seem unreasonable to submit final projects on the concluding week of classes. It goes without saying that the later in the semester the assignment is due, the longer you have to work on it. \nTo put it in terms ingrates will understand, (namely, Family Guy quotes) your whinings are lamer than FDR's legs. \nWe know you've heard the "You're in college now" speech before, but most good cliches come from someone's good advice repeated ad nauseum. The fact of the matter is no one promised this whole college thing would be easy or even structured. Sink or swim, survival of the fittest and all that jazz. \nWe know the lies must be a lot to absorb all at once, but just between us, you always knew Santa was make-believe too.