log in  |  want to contribute?

Impact

A personal column about adjusting to life in a dorm

A college dorm is a melting pot, filled to the brim with different people, styles, and cultures, all coexisting and influencing each other. When I chose to write a story on college dorm life I expected to hear nothing but complaints, horror stories about communal bathrooms, terrible roommates, gripes and dislikes galore. Instead, I was surprised to find that people enjoy living the dorm life.

Living on campus in college can be a crash course in self-sufficiency. Mom and dad aren't there to drag you out of bed in the morning, and no one will be doing your laundry for you anymore. Yet despite the shock of sudden independence, dorm life presents a positive side. It allows you to integrate into a community of your peers. It presents the opportunity to make lifelong friends. Living in the dorms can help you learn social skills and ease the adjustment period to life at a new school.

Chethan Sarabu, a freshman at Cornell University, said that dorm life is an amazing experience.
"It really opens up your eyes to the enormous size of the world, she said. You realize there are so many different people out there yet there are also so many common interests. Living in the same dorm provides people with a common experience. There are so many opportunities to meet new people whether it be in the laundry room, bathroom or TV lounge, and it's guaranteed that many of these people will be unlike anyone you've ever met before. Dorm life opens up your eyes to new quirks and different cultures.

I've had wonderful discussions about differences in culture with international students over laundry. I've become good friends with a girl who has lived in Sweden and India, and a guy from Saipan, a Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands. I've danced with a guy from Morocco and learned the varying terminology for "soda" (or "pop", depending on what state you come from). I have been exposed to a myriad of cultures outside and within the United States, all due to the people in my dorm.

Andrea Volza, a freshman at the University of Rochester, sayid the experience is definitely different from high school.

"The dorm becomes your family, she said, "and by becoming a family you really get to know each other and learn how to understand each other.

By walking into someone's dorm room you can get a feel for who they are - via posters, pictures, books, and their CD collection. My roommate has a Harry Potter bedspread and I have my enormous collection of books. A girl next door decorated her entire wall with photos of friends and family.

The sense of both community and freedom are particularly appealing to dorm-dwellers. Stephen Blaker, a freshman at Tufts University said he likes living under his own rules.
"I feel like I'm an adult living within my own rules, he said. "[but at the same time] I think living off-campus would separate me from the community. I really like living in an all-freshman dorm too, because everybody is so ready to meet everybody and make new friends, so it is really easy to be social and loud because everybody else is.

I am a freshman living in an all-freshman dorm and the things I've learned about relationships and interactions between people have been priceless. I learned how important it is to look out for one another when, during the first week at school, I found a girl from my dorm lying on the bathroom floor. She had drank way too much and had passed out. I was glad I was there to help. You can always count on someone to be there.

Dorm life is a once-in-a-lifetime experience. The benefits of living a communal life are really beyond measure, and it is essential for a full college experience.

Imprint Magazine is one of a kind. A national college life magazine, exclusively online, based from Ithaca College.

Imprint is comprised of five editorial sections: Arts & Entertainment, Life & Style, Music, Culture & Politics, and Sports, and one creative writing section, Impact.

There are blogs and features, photo albums and interviews. Sometimes we comment briefly in shorthand, others we report in the form of classic, professional journalism. In our eclectic gathering of prose, genre, ethos, media and intent, Imprint Magazine seeks to capture the multifaceted culture of the undergraduate life. So that's why Imprint, along with everything else over the last eight years on the college scene, has changed immensely.

One thing consistent, however evolving throughout Imprint's history, is our focus on community. We strive for inclusion through writer/reader connections via comments, and our continual expansion into other social media networks. Look for Imprint Magazine on Facebook and Twitter.

And for the first time in our history, Imprint Magazine is successfully expanding our contributing boundaries. Since its inception in 2004, writers from Indiana University, Columbia College Chicago and the University of Missouri have signed on, and Imprint is always open for more.

As a community, we can all leave our Imprint.

Imprint Editorial Board

Alyssa Frey
Editor in Chief
afrey2@ithaca.edu

Katrina Fedczuk
Politics Editor
kfedczu1@ithaca.edu

Lauren Mazzo
Life & Style Editor, Marketing Director
lmazzo1@ithaca.edu

Katie Quan
Arts & Entertainment Editor
kquan1@ithaca.edu

Kelson Goldfine
Music Editor, Finance Chair
kgoldfi1@ithaca.edu

Ross Orlando
Sports Editor
rorland1@ithaca.edu

Lucia Smith
Impact Editor
lsmith8@ithaca.edu

Haley Thorpe
Photo Editor
hthorpe1@ithaca.edu

Steven Gordon
Adviser
sgordon@ithaca.edu

Giant banana slugs and Gorloks and penguins, oh my! Attend just about any sporting event and you’ll spot ‘em. We’re talking about those sometimes outrageous, sometimes ferocious, often goofy mascots and team names.

In college, a time comes when the worries of the week are set aside to engage in a friendly battle of bragging rights and few take it more seriously than the mascots. A mascot is an identity, a source of entertainment, a rallying point. Mascots tell a lot about a certain college culture and values. It’s often these quirky characters, the unusual college mascots, which have the most fun. We’ve searched some college campuses and uncovered our favorite and most unique mascots around. Beware of the fierce banana slug! Campus: University of California at Santa Cruz, Santa Cruz, Calif. Mascot: Banana Slugs Bright yellow, slimy, and tough, this shell-like mollusk is certainly unique, and is the proud mascot of University of Tradition is hardly the word that comes to mind when describing UCSC’s student body, which prides itself among other things, on being iconoclastic and environmentally friendly. At one time, the university tried to adopt the sea lion as its official mascot, but the student body wouldn’t hear of it. In 1986 the students demanded that the banana slug, which frequents the redwood groves of the academe, get the nod as their official mascot. Thus, the banana slug has found its place in history as one of the most original and endearing collegiate mascots. Goldy Gopher! Campus: University of Minnesota Mascot: Golden Gophers With his big toothy grin and plush cheeks, Goldy Gopher looks like the embodiment of Minnesota nice. But behind that friendly smile is one serious sports fanatic. Goldy is at every game, baring his buck teeth and rallying thousands of rabid Gopher fans into a frenzy as he chews through the rest of the Big Ten. Along the way, Goldy has become a Minnesota champion in his own right. He placed third in the national mascot championships this January, and last summer his furry comrades at mascot camp voted him the coolest in the NCAA. "I'm a mascot with an attitude," said Goldy, explaining his popularity. Goldy, who looks like a mutant cross between a beaver and a squirrel, is a ladies man and has some of the best dance moves in the mascot world.

Goldy Gopher Facts Jersey Size: XXL Height: 6'2" Weight: 200 pounds Identifying characteristics: Buck teeth, a winning smile and a zippy electric scooter used to lead the Golden Gophers to victory.

The Geo-whats? Campus: Evergreen State in Olimpia, Washington Mascot: Geoducks pronounced "gooey-duck" If the Geoduck is not a duck at all, you are probably scratching your head as to what this creature could possibly be. This pacific coast clam has found an important role as the symbol of athleticism for Evergreen State. The "King Clam" as it’s also known, grows to epic size beneath the sand along the pacific coast. Lying around in the sand taking it easy, the Geoduck may live up to 100 years. As you may have guessed, Washington’s Evergreen State isn’t your typical institution of higher learning

Our Top 10 Wierdest Mascots: 1. Scottsdale Community College Artichokes 2. Charlotte 49ers 3. North Carolina Tar Heels 4. Purdue Boilermakers 5. Louisiana-Lafayette Ragin’ Cajuns 6. Dominican Penguins (think bird in a tux) 7. Ohio Wesleyan Battlin’ Bishops 8. Nebraska Cornhuskers 9. Syracuse Orange 10. UC Irvine Anteaters

Turn on the news these days and you’re liable to see everything about colleges except academics. You’ll hear about how this college is being sued for discrimination, and that school is bribing its athletes; University of Here is limiting students’ rights while College of Over There is expelling protesters. But rarely do you ever here a word about the state of academics across the country. So iMPrint took up the task. From coast to coast, at party schools and preppy universities, students from across the nation share their thoughts on the current state of academia in America.

The Party School Jacob Patrick, freshman, Indiana University

“Academics are a serious thing at IU," Patrick said. “We do have a pretty big party school but in my experience in the dorms and on campus students usually work hard on schoolwork Sunday through Wednesday. The big party nights are Thursday through Saturday. I think that students make bad judgments sometimes on partying but they usually do a good job of keeping them separate."

The East Coast School Dan Grant, sophomore, Tufts University

“Academics? They’re huge," Grant said. “Anybody who’s coming here knows they are paying a lot to come here, so most people really try their hardest in all their classes. We have a strong international student body, and these students bring a greater work ethic than we have to our school."

The Middle-of-Nowhere Midwest School Christy Munn, freshman, Northern Illinois University

“It’s not real strong," Munn said “It’s really laid back. It’s like not stressed as real important, but there’s not really anything else that is stressed as really important. They’re not saying we should party but it seems that all [the administration] really care about is football."

The West Coast School Nick Heinz, freshman, University of Southern California

“Coming from the Midwest, things are a lot more laid back out here," Heinz said. “At a school like this, everyone really cares about their education. Sure, we have a good time, but here there is a focus on education. Now, I’ve heard that a lot of other schools here on the west coast are really laid back – professors don’t care about grades, students are lazy – but I’ve never experienced that for myself. But definitely the atmosphere is completely different out here."

The Quiet School Elise Eager, freshman, Brigham Young University

“Well, academics kind of take precedence here because we’re not a big party school," Eager said. “Everyone is held to pretty high standards here. But we’re all in the same boat. It’s really unlike anything I’ve seen before. There really is a huge focus on studying here that I don’t think there really is anywhere else. We still have our fun but we do put a lot of time into schoolwork."

The Techie School Matt Hagedorn, freshman, Purdue University “Well, something that comes to mind is that with the technology here so advanced each student has there own little ‘remote’ (we call them clickers)," Hagedorn said. “These teachers are able to take attendance and even give quizzes wirelessly. It makes huge lectures that used to be easily skipped [harder to miss]. While in the short run it’s a pain to have to go to every class, yet in the long run it helps us because it forces it to go if we want to do well."

The population of Castlewood, South Dakota? 666. The population of Tempe, Arizona? 160,000. Besides being the fifth largest city in Arizona and home of the fifth largest university in the nation, Arizona State University, the city itself has eight distinct zip codes. 

So how does a girl from Castlewood find comfort at a university where her class sizes are larger than the population of her high school?

Lindsy Bleeker, freshman clinical lab sciences major at Arizona State University, takes it all in.

"I like being in the city, said Bleeker. "I find people are more open-minded. And just for simple things - there's just more for you to do.

Though Castlewood isn't a town without culture - one local legend claims that Castlewood was named after a place in a William Makepeace Thackeray novel, and each August the town holds a festival aptly titled "Castlewood Days" - the drive to the nearest movie theater is 15 miles. The most popular movie theater at ASU, Harkins Center Point, is just a few minutes off campus.

A second-year pharmaceutical marketing and management major at the University of the Sciences in Philadelphia, Paul Zawislak had the same problems back in his hometown of Clarks Summit, PA. If residents are under 21, they have to travel to nearby towns, where "you'll probably be eating at Perkins or drinking at a coffee shop 'til 3:30 in the morning.

Just north of Scranton, Clarks Summit has its share of stores and restaurants, including a Pizza Hut and a Blockbuster, and is home to the Baptist Bible College and Seminary. In the 5,126-person Lackawanna County borough, it took just 5-10 minutes to visit friends in the area. 

Now living in the Manayunk neighborhood of Philadelphia, a city with a population of 1.5 million, it can take Zawislak anywhere from 30-45 minutes to drive to visit friends or get to the school's campus, depending on traffic.

Despite the time constraint, public transportation is one of the benefits to living in the city. Tegan Williams, a junior at the University of Pittsburgh's Pharmacy School, said she appreciates the different options she has to get around.

Back home in Bernville, PA, about half an hour outside of Reading, she has a car. She doesn't need one in the 335,000 person city of Pittsburgh, where she takes the bus or the light rail, or simply walks to school or around town.

Williams can feel the city life just by walking to the Pharmacy School. Located on top of a hill, she cuts through three hospitals to get to classes.

"At home, where are there just public buildings you walk through to go to school? she said.

That ability to interact with many different people does not occur as frequently in many rural towns. 

"People keep more to the town itself [in Clarks Summit], Zawislak said. "Philadelphia feels a whole lot more diverse. There's a little bit of everything, and because of that, you have a whole array of different activities you can do, like going into Chinatown or into Old City for clubs.

Those same opportunities are why Bleeker opted to go to school in a city.

Bleeker graduated from Watertown High School in Watertown, South Dakota, in 2004. From her freshman to junior years, Bleeker attended school in her hometown, where her entire grade had only 24 kids. She finished her senior year at Watertown. The school, with 350 students per grade, simply offered more. 

"I didn't really like the small town, she said. "It's everybody's life, like nothing else is out there. Some people think there's nothing outside of our town. And there are no secrets. If one person knows, everyone is gong to know.

That 'one big family' atmosphere could also be felt by Williams, whose Berks County town is home to 865 residents. In Pittsburgh it's different, she said.

"People don't know who you are, but you can get to know a lot more people and get involved with a lot more.

But try explaining where you're from to lifelong city dwellers.

"Some people don't know where [South Dakota's] at, Bleeker said. "Someone asked if we have indoor plumbing.

Big city doesn't necessarily mean big school. After going to Bishop O'Hara High School, a small private school in Dunmore, PA, Zawislak decided he wanted to go to a small college, starting at Wilkes University in Wilkes-Barre, PA. When that school didn't fit him well, he decided he wanted a school with a similar population, just in a larger city.

The University of the Sciences is located just outside of the downtown region near University City. The campus, described by Zawislak as a few common areas surrounded by a few buildings, is no more than three blocks in any direction. Like many other schools in Philadelphia, it borders some dangerous neighborhoods.

"Not so much for guys, you don't have to worry about things, he said. "But if you're a female, you really have to think smart, especially when walking at night.

Rural females feel that previously uncommon pressure.

"At home, people leave their doors unlocked, Williams said. "Out here, you gotta lock your doors, you gotta watch out. There's been a lot of robbers lately.

Between public transportation, grocery stores and rent, city life isn't cheap. But according to Zawislak, the experience is like no other.

"The amount of diversity and opportunity that comes to you with living in the city is worth the trade off.

Despite the diverse class offerings and vibrant night life, Bleeker also sees some downfalls to city living. 

"I don't like the noise all of the time, Bleeker said. "All night long there is noise. At home, I lived on a farm.

With 10 other Castlewood locals in Tempe, including her sister who moved to the city about two years ago, Bleeker found that it was nice to have people she knew close by when she made the transition to the city.

Not that it was a difficult transition. Bleeker doesn't find Tempe to be that big. 

"It just feels natural to be here," she said.

Zawislak couldn't agree more, especially when it's time to eat and he's not on campus.

"I like the lunch carts," he said. "They kick ass."

 

Over winter break, I had this little Starbucks epiphany. No, I didn't see the Virgin of Guadalupe in a chai latte. I was just sitting down with my coffee, surrounded by university students and it hit me.

"God, this is boring," said the little epiphany voice in my head. 

"Wha?" I replied, but the voice was gone.

All right, so it wasn't much as far as epiphanies go, but it did get me to thinking. I had only been back in the country for a few weeks, having spent the previous semester studying in Prague. This coffee shop experience was the first time since I had returned that I found myself surrounded by college students, and I was struck with how dull college life seemed. 

What was going on here? How was it that I had been away but a single semester and suddenly college life was a flat, colorless imitation of what I remembered?

To be fair, all of this took place in the course of about 30 seconds. I was shocked, a little repulsed, and then I was shrugging it off. College was not so bad. In fact, I was rapidly remembering, I quite liked college, and I counted many college students as my friends. So, what was this gut reaction, this bizarre response to something that had been, just months ago, so familiar, comfortable and even exciting?

The answer: culture shock. We tend to think about culture shock as sort of a one-sided phenomenon. Student A goes to Country B, encounters some weird custom or cultural peculiarity and has a hard time coping. That's culture shock, we say, and nod our heads sagely. 

But that's only half of it. Think about this: when you go home for break suddenly, your parents are in your life again. They want to know where you are, what you're doing, how late you'll be out doing it. After a semester or two of answering to no one (with the possible exception of your nosy roommate), that situation can be a little hard to adjust to. Going home to parents is just as much culture shock as was Student A's experience in Country B. Culture shock doesn't necessarily have anything to do with leaving your home and encountering a foreign culture; in fact, as my Starbucks experience revealed to me, you can experience culture shock in your own town. 

The next question that leapt to mind, as I was sitting in those cushy Starbucks couches, was: What culture am I coming from, then, if American college culture is such a surprise to me? 

That answer was not as forthcoming as the first one had been. Although, for most of the previous fall I had been surrounded by the Czech culture and language, I was not so pretentious as to think that I had assimilated so completely that Czech culture was now more familiar to me than American. The more I thought about it, the more it seemed that it wasn't the American part that I was having a hard time adjusting to, it was the college student part. 

I did study while I was in Prague, but my academic obligations weren't what you'd call rigorous. School, while it was a part of my life, was really only periphery when you compared it to everything else I saw and did. 

That's the crux of the matter. In general, the lives of most American college students revolve around classes, homework, essays, and grades. My life, for those four months, revolved around the daily discoveries I made in everything from visiting 13th Century wine cellars to buying radishes from a street vendor who spoke only Czech. All of the American students at my university immediately formed our own little subculture, which, while it was based on being American college students, rapidly evolved into something entirely different.

A key element of culture, as any anthropologist will tell you, is a shared history. While all of my American friends in Prague came from different backgrounds and different parts of the country, we all bonded because of the experience we were going through together. Of course, reading that now, it sounds remarkably corny, but that doesn't change the fact that it's true. 

Because all of us were living in the same city, taking the same classes and encountering the same idiosyncrasies of Czech culture on a daily basis, we all had a common frame of reference, despite our various origins. As a result, I became friends with people on whose social radar I probably never would have appeared.

Another obvious affect that Czech culture had on our American frame of mind was the creation of a bizarre little hybrid language we liked to call Czinglish. It was by no means a fully-developed language, but certain words did work their way into our daily conversations. 

Take jemný, for example. Jemný means gentle, which in English doesn't seem like it would be all that useful a word. But not so in Czech. In Czech, you can use gentle to describe anything: Gentle wine, gentle cheese and gently bubbly water (which falls somewhere between carbonated and still). While all of these descriptions sound ludicrous in English, it was a very handy classification in Czech, so my American friends and I adopted jemný into our everyday vocab.

A less obvious aspect of our ever-developing subculture was the difference between our calendar and that of a normal American fall semester. For one thing, Thanksgiving Break did not loom benevolently on the horizon. For another, we forgot entirely about Halloween until the night of, at which point my best friend and I made silly hats out of tin foil and rented Van Helsing.

Stepping in to fill the gaps in our holiday schedule were Czech holidays, like Nov. 17, when we found ourselves freed from classes to honor the beginning of the 1989 Velvet Revolution. Or Dec. 5, Mikulaš Eve, when bands of costumed teenagers visit families to determine whether the children have been naughty or nice that year. There is nothing more surreal than seeing a teenage boy riding a tram while wearing a bishop's hat, a cotton-ball beard and clutching a homemade shepherd's crook.

Perhaps the biggest difference between our lives abroad and our lives at home was the setting. From every single one of my classrooms I could look out the window at the Prague Castle, crowning the hill above the Vltava River. Five minutes from the school was the Charles Bridge, made famous by such fine films as Mission Impossible and XXX, but far more impressive without the Hollywood superstars messing about in the foreground. Every day, when I stepped out of the metro station there was a part of me that was ear-to-ear with all the glorious history and architecture around me.

Despite my brief moment of boredom at Starbucks this winter, my semester abroad has not ruined normal college life for me. Instead, I find myself applying the things I learned in Prague to my everyday life on this side of the Atlantic. Jumping from one culture to another can certainly be a challenge, but the result is a deeper understanding of your own cultural identity, and that is well worth the effort.

"Ya'll," "you guys"; snow, no snow; liberal, conservative; "get in the car," "get in the cah"; there were lots of things I had to get used to when I came to college. A boy from a hot southern town certainly has a lot to take in the first time he sees dandruff from the sky and college club meetings concerning "Bush and the evil conservative social agenda." 

My fear of coping in a new environment has slowly given way to an interest and passion for learning about the various cultures around the country, and when I look for difference, I always find more of the same. 

Gloves and jackets were not part of my wardrobe back home. The first time I felt negative temperatures was one of the only times I ever thought about long underwear (whatever that is, I still have no idea). Snow was also an interesting new discovery. I had seen snow once before in my life and the only thing I have to honor the sad memory of those few flurries was videotape my dad took. That's right, my family actually videotaped the snow. In any case, the first few inches here at college caused a few problems. First of all, I hadn't really thought about how snow melts - the first time I drenched my room from melting snow on my clothes was really disheartening. Second, there are different strengths of snow buildup - unfortunate sinking into the depths became a plague of mine. Third, shorts are now something I only exercise in - the saddest revelation of my snow experience.

I will state firmly and clearly that "ya'll" is easier to say than "you guys" and that "soft drinks" is just cooler to say than "soda" or the dreadful "pop". Different accents and word choice is certainly something to get used to. The first time I said "ya'll", I think people all around me stared in confusion and humorous pity. "Bar" and "bah" are the same thing apparently if one lives around Boston; Long Island is quite different than Brooklyn; and Chicago doesn't have the same consistency as the rest of the Mid-West. I think now, just by hearing someone speak, I may be able to guess accurately which part of the country they are from. At the least, I imagine this will help me with awkward conversations at office Christmas parties, and that is pretty grand indeed.

Coming from a fairly conservative town in the Deep South, I think it might have been a mistake starting college in a northeastern liberal school during a presidential election year. Granted, I am no stranger to the other side of the political spectrum, but believe me when I say that my community before college was fairly red. It was quite a shock when I realized that there were about forty people in the school's Republican club, with the remaining population of the school (teachers included) solidly in the Democrats' column. I learned fairly quickly not to voice my opinions too openly, especially in classes where teachers would look at me as though I was a corporate machine set to destroy the environment. Now, I may be hyperbolizing the situation, but I am certain that any words pertaining to "compassionate" or "conservative" would have gotten me a ticket to a four-hour argument, especially with students who were fast becoming my friends. Nothing lasts forever, however, and eventually I realized that people were not as obstinate about my beliefs if I explained myself in a rational, compassionate (yes, I do put it out there occasionally) manner. Soon I understood that anyone passionate about the nation was open to hearing any voice, regardless of accent. There may have been different sides of a debate, but the hope for a better country was always the focus - and I may have found myself sliding left somewhere along the way. 

Midwesterner, Yankee, Hick - it doesn't matter. In the long run, cultures and accents are not things that separate us, they are the things that make us unique. I may be changed or influenced by different cultures and beliefs, but hey, change is a good thing. That may be the best lesson I learn in college.

Maybe some rivalries attract much more massive crowds, like Michigan-Ohio State. Maybe some rivalries have longer histories, such as Harvard-Yale. Maybe a few rivalries even have schools that are closer geographically than the mere nine miles that separate Duke and UNC.

But few schools can match the passion present when these two schools meet up on the basketball court. It's not merely a game. It's a clash of cultures, a battle between ways of life.

Private school vs. public school. Out-of-staters vs. in-staters. Even the different shades of blue seem to be in direct contrast with one another.

Do you think these differences create any animosity between students at the two schools? UNC senior Neal Patel knows from first-hand experience.

"They chant 'back-up school' to us at the games and we tell them to go back to Jersey in Daddy's Volvo or Saab" Patel said. "We want their women and they want ours... it's the best way to get back at your enemies, isn't it?"

Now that's a rivalry.

Duke University and the University of North Carolina both belong to the Atlantic Coast Conference, one of the premier conferences in college basketball annually. They are scheduled to play twice a year, once at Duke and once at UNC, although they always could meet each other again in the postseason. The two schools are separated by about nine miles on the famous Tobacco Road. Duke, located in Durham, N.C., plays in Cameron Indoor Stadium. UNC is located in Chapel Hill, N.C., and plays their basketball in the Dean Smith Center.

Both teams have rich and storied histories. UNC has the second-most victories in college basketball history, with four national titles and 15 Final Four trips (11 under the legendary Dean Smith, who retired in 1997 as the all-time winningest coach in college basketball history). Duke barely trails UNC in each of these categories, ranking fourth all-time in victories, with three national titles and 14 Final Four trips, including 10 under current Blue Devil Coach Mike Krzyzweski.

One of the major reasons the rivalry is considered so great is because of the quality and importance of every game played. Although UNC holds the edge in the head-to-head series, with a 123-92 advantage, practically every game is close, and almost every game means something. Amazingly, at least one team has been ranked in the weekly Associated Press Top 25 Poll since 1955. Many times, both teams were ranked.

Duke has had the upper hand in the rivalry over the past decade or so, however. Recent Duke teams have been very strong, and conversely, following the retirement of Dean Smith, the UNC program has suffered a bit of a fall. The return of Coach Roy Williams to Chapel Hill, where he had been an assistant under Smith, has helped to resurrect the program, though. The 2004-2005 season followers have seen North Carolina rise above Duke in the national rankings, although both teams have been in the Top 10 for much of the season.

While all of the impressive statistics, records and rankings are what make the rivalry great, it is the passion the fans exhibit that make the rivalry the greatest in the country. With two lackluster football programs, Blue Devil and Tar Heel fans live and die by their talented basketball teams. When the two teams play each other, tickets for the game are hard to come by. Seats in the nosebleed section for the Duke home game last year were going for over $1,000 online.

Since Duke's Cameron Indoor Stadium seats only 9,314 compared to the Dean Dome's 21,750, student seating is especially scarce in Durham. In order to get tickets to the bigger games, such as the UNC showdown, students must wait in line for months, living out of a tent the entire time. Collectively, these dedicated students are known as the "Cameron Crazies," and the area in which they set up camp is known as "Krzyzewskiville."

Life in Krzyzewskiville is a culture in itself. The most ambitious students set up tents in late December, before spring semester classes even start. In the weeks before game time, however, a set of complicated rules is put in place. Once "official tenting" begins, there needs to be 12 people to a "tent," and for the first two weeks, eight of the 12 need to be present in the tent all night (one person must be present at all times during the day). Line monitors actually check your tent; if your tent is found to be lacking in people, you could be forced to move to the back of the line. After the first two weeks of official tenting, there only needs to be two tenters present at night.

The night before the UNC game, however, all 12 tenters have to be in the tent from 9 p.m. to 8 a.m. During this time, Coach Krzyzewski usually makes a speech to the Crazies, rallying them for game time with their arch nemesis. When the students are finally allowed to take their seats inside, all hell breaks loose. Known as some of the loudest, most creative fans in sports, the Cameron Crazies barrage their UNC opponents with clever chants and physical props. Last year, for instance, a group of students dressed up as the characters from "The Wizard of Oz," reminding former University of Kansas and current UNC Coach Roy Williams that "he wasn't in Kansas anymore."

Whether at Cameron Indoor, the Dean Dome, or even at home with Dick Vitale on ESPN, you are guaranteed to see a good game whenever Duke and UNC get together. There will be great coaching, great players, and fans that will talk about the outcome the rest of their lives.

"When tip-off time comes, the rivalry is all it's cracked up to be," Patel said. "Twenty thousand people on their feet, screaming, jumping up and down, young or old, it doesn't matter. The place is going crazy. Regardless of rankings, this game is a fight to the finish. That's what makes it the greatest rivalry."

For the college generation, e-mail has replaced snail mail, AIM and cell phones have taken the place of the room phone and soon the Internet could render televisions obsolete.

More and more people are using the Internet to watch cable TV. Whether to get a sports game the cable provider doesn't carry or to catch up on last week's episode of a show without having to wait for the rerun, students around the country are turning to their computer screens.

Allison Bennett, sophomore at Tarleton State University of Texas, just recently began using the Internet to watch sporting events.

“I watched the OU [Oklahoma University] game online because that channel was not coming in on our TV," Bennett said.

Watching the OU game was the first time Bennett ever used the Internet to watch TV. She said she would use streaming video again if her cable provider didn’t offer a program she wanted to see.

Some colleges, such as Dartmouth College in New Hampshire, are encouraging their students to watch cable through the Internet by providing links and connections.

Dartmouth went wireless in 2001 and introduced the “Video Furnace"— video-over-the-network— system this year. Video Furnace allows students to access cable TV from any computer on campus.

Brad Noblet, chief information officer of Dartmouth College, integrated Dartmouth’s phone and cable lines into their wireless system to save money. The college now saves 40 percent on annual operation costs.

Saving money is just one perk of the Video Furnace system. Students can now watch lectures, news broadcasts or complete their language labs from anywhere on campus whenever they have a spare minute. And, of course, students can have some fun with the system too.

“Students love it," Noblet said. "They can sit in the middle of the Green - our grassy common area - and watch TV or make a phone call from their laptop while doing IM, e-mail or surfing the web at the same time."

Noblet added that he thinks most students are using the technology responsibly.

“The availability of CNN on your laptop adds another dimension to the accessibility of current events," Noblet said. “Its not all about ‘Sponge Bob.’"

Time Warner is also experimenting with cable through an Internet connection. In February 2005, they began a six-month long trial program in San Diego called “Broadband TV" that enables up to 9,000 subscribers to watch cable using their PCs.

Broadband TV offers subscribers the same 75 channels that are offered in Time Warner’s standard package. Instead of getting the channels from the cable to your TV, the feed runs through Time Warner’s Internet service into the user’s computer.

But students don’t need to be in San Diego to watch Time Warner cable through their computer. By using a TV Tuner Card, any PC can be hooked up to cable through a standard cable provider.

TV Tuners are PCI cards that allow users to screw their cable connection directly into the computer. TV Tuner cards can be purchased at most computer stores. The only requirement is a high-resolution monitor, which now come standard with computers.

CNET, an easy-to-follow technology website, has a video that shows how to install a TV Tuner card.

Many desktop PCs today come with cable ports already installed or as options when buying the computer.

External TV Tuners are available for laptops and Apple desktops. A few PC laptops are beginning to include TV Tuner cards as well.

Scott Lipowitz, a sophomore at Ithaca College, gets his cable from Time Warner. But instead of having it sent to a television set, he uses his computer to download TV listings and save programs directly onto his hard drive.

Lipowitz prefers using his computer because he gets digital cable without the added costs of a television and cable box.

“I really like having the TV on my PC; it turns my computer into a full-fledged media center for games, schoolwork, Internet, DVDs and TV," Lipowitz said.

He admits the quality of the picture is not always as clear, but says it’s hardly noticeable. He also thinks that if more college students knew about this cable option it would be more common and very beneficial to students.

Alex Botsios, sophomore at Arizona State University, said he and many of his friends often use the Internet as an alternative to TV.

“In my opinion, the Internet is making basic cable almost not needed because of the vast amount of streaming video offered," Botsios said.

And if programs like Video Furnace or Broadband TV expand, streaming video and television will need to make room for cable directly on the computer.

Browsing through the store you see it, and instantaneously freeze mid-step— your perfect T-shirt, right before your very eyes. This shirt is an extension of your mind, body and soul— it embodies you. This has to be fate, you think to yourself as you pick up your size. The cashier rings up the shirt and you realize that your day is now perfect.

As you’re strolling around campus for the first time wearing your treasure, you can't help but think that you're hot shit. Then your pupils begin to dilate. Your heart pounds. An inexplicable stiffness shoots through your body. There are people walking around campus who have stolen part of your identity - they have the same shirt on.

Most of us have experienced such a tragedy more than once. And it is never just one other person who has the same shirt. Rather, there is always a multitude of people wearing your shirt. A shirt that once sparkled with creativity starts to fade from your mind, until it is a crumpled piece of material in the back of your closet. Let it rest in peace.

There is an alternative to this exasperating scenario. Make your own shirt. No, not painting your own design, but hopping on your computer, opening your Internet browser and designing your own personal shirt.

The Internet offers a myriad of websites that offer such services, and it isn't as hard as you might. All you need to do is go to Google, type in something to the effect of “design your own shirt" and voila! Many of these sites provide many options for you to choose from. For instance, many sites allow you to choose from a variety of shirt styles, fonts, colors, images and layouts.

One of the most creative of these sites is SpamShirt. This Web site allows you to choose your style (a limited selection of male or female) and color of shirt, and then gives you a seemingly endless list of e-mail spam subjects to choose from to print on the shirt (or you can enter your own.) For example, you can choose to have “cheating housewives" or “earn a six-figure income online!" printed on a shirt made just for you, at a pretty reasonable price. CHECK IT.

Markus Boeniger, an internet programmer from Zurich, and Kevin Helas, a graphic and web designer based out of London, are the creators of the Web site.

“The spamshirt concept was born from a basic desire to find a use for spam," Helas said. “Markus had been steadily compiling spam messages for several years, waiting for just such an inspiration. This came about after we had started working on another shirt design project together."

They realized that T-shirts were the ideal platform for recycling e-mail spam.

“Spam is organic. You can’t control it," Helas said. "Why not turn it into something fun?"

A site where you have full creative control over your shirt is ArtApart. This site offers eleven different styles of shirts, along with the options of baseball hats, mousepads and boxers. Once you choose your style of shirt, you then go on to the layout of the shirt. Do you want a graphic on the front or on the back? Do you want it with text? Where do you want it on the shirt and how big? After you make a decision on the layout, then you can choose your image and text. Artapart is also relatively inexpensive. CHECK IT.

Not enough for you? Do you want even more choices in your clothing? Well, there are other sites that allow you to create more than just a T-shirt. For example, at Laciepulido, you are able to design your own skirt. The site is somewhat limited in what they have to offer. You are able to choose one of five different styles of skirts, and then out of six options of print. Another option, making your own handbag, is available at Miss Double Agent. Not only are you able to make your own handbag, but they are also reversible.

So get out there on the web and put a halt to this craze of mediocre T-shirts.

Kaitlin Turner is iMPrint Magazine's style columnist.