While most students are slacking off and studying in their rooms, Fay Elled ’23 is already making plans for the inevitable moment when she will be forced to tell her parents she did, in fact, fail all of her classes.

While the news may not be ideal, Elled is going above and beyond to show her parents that she is the ambitious, go-getting type they always dream she would be. “Something about being ahead of the curve just feels really good,” Elled said. “All of my idiot classmates are over here thinking they’re going to do fine in all their classes, but when they see that Banner Web notification indicating there’s no way they can graduate in four years, they’ll have no idea what to tell their parents.”

Elled’s scheme is revolutionary in the world of disappointing one’s parents. It’s complete with charts of the campus median GPAs, average hours spent studying and anecdotal evidence from peers, all which aim to prove that her parents did not raise the biggest disappointment, although the race is admittedly a close one.

When asked how long this research project took her, Elled admitted that she has worked on it longer than she has in writing any paper or studying for any test. However, her thinking is only somewhat flawed. “Listen, none of us have super high expectations for me. We all know why I’m here, and you can find it on the University’s donor list. So when I know I’m going to fail all my classes, which I do every semester, I like to tell my parents in a way that leaves them saying ‘Hey, maybe she does still deserve that new car after all.’”

In the instance that you or a loved one are likely to fail a class this semester, Elled’s advice is to remind those footing the bill that “even [insert any name] failed, too, and she’s the smartest person I know.” That is, if you failed to be as ambitious, driven and inventive as Elled in the presentation of defeat.