Rory Gilmore Would Have Never Done That.

One more reason why Yale remains my Imaginary Ivy Friend of choice--yes, Kaavya Viswanathan.

Apparently, she told the Times back in February, she wanted to be an investment banker when she finished college. She is a college sophomore who has made $500,000 before she graduated for what may turn out to be essentially doing nothing. Which actually, now that I think about it, is what investment banking is. It may be, as has been suggested elsewhere, that the packager who brought her to Little, Brown and who owns half the copyright to the book got a ghostwriter to actually write the thing. This is also a young woman whose parents seem to have had enough money to spend tens of thousands of dollars to buy a counselor who could help her get into an Ivy.

From the Times:

It was unclear whether Harvard would take any action against Ms. Viswanathan. "Our policies apply to work submitted to courses," said Robert Mitchell, the director of communications for the Faculty of Arts and Sciences at Harvard. "Nevertheless, we expect Harvard students to conduct themselves with integrity and honesty at all times."

Harvard's policies only apply to work submitted to courses because until the 21st century, all a college student was expected to do was to...study? Drink, start a band, date the wrong people, listen to the wrong music, get things wrong, in a good way, in an extra-curricular non-credit way-- while getting your academic work (largely) right.