Barnard College
Hallmarks and Quirks
Things I'm Good At:
- Feminism. I love our ladies, and I'm not afraid to show it.
- English department. We're literary and proud of it.
- Women in leadership. Go get 'em, gals.
- Poli Sci. Get your gov on.
- Having a mandatory meal plan.
My Top 5 Must-Haves:
- Pride, in yourself and in your ability to lead as a lady.
- A MetroCard for getting around New York City.
- Comfy sneakers for walking across Broadway to Columbia and back—several times a day.
- Your ID for getting into every library at any hour of the day or night.
- Knowledge of the various cafeterias' menus for ideal noshing.
Why You Might Have Heard of Me:
- We're all girls, all the time…but there are dudes across the street.
- Love zines? We've got a zine-only collection in our main library that, of course, focuses on feminism.
- Our president, Debora Spar (fondly known as "D-Spar"), gave an important comeback to Lean In.
- Our finals tradition is the best: Midnight breakfast with deans serving you pancakes.
- All students (even part-timers) must pay full tuition. Ugh.
On a regular Saturday night, you can find me...
- Hanging out around Morningside Heights.
- Bouncing around New York City (the Metropolitan Museum of Art, clubs, plays).
- Studying, studying, and studying.
- Complaining about workloads.
- Chilling out in various suites.
Favorite Hangouts:
- The Diana Vagelos Student Center. There are two popular nicknames for this place but we prefer "The Diana." You can use your imagination to come up with the other one.
- Columbia's Butler Library, where everyone and their books sleep over during finals.
- The computer labs.
Quirks:
- Core curriculum? Nah. We have the Nine Ways of Knowing, so get ready for science and gym.
- It's all ladies. The dudes are across the street, but get ready for sister bonding.
- We have lots of Barnard-centric "holidays" but no, you don't get class off. Celebrate our inception at Founder's Day and Spirit Week, better known as the Greek Games. We're Athena. Or Artemis. Or another cool goddess.
- There's a very strong Orthodox Jewish population, so come check out the shul one Shabbat. FYI—that means, "Come check out our synagogue or Hillel one Friday night."
Famous Alumni:
- Martha Stewart
- Joan Rivers
- Erica Jong
- Cynthia Nixon
- Chelsea Peretti