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If Santa were a student, I wonder who he’d be...
By Helen Sternberg ’20
December 8, 2016
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Santa is one of those people you just can’t imagine being any younger than he is now. Sort of like Ben Franklin or Betty White or your grandma. They’re just old. Santa without a big, white beard is sort of a weird concept, but Santa as a college student is an even weirder one.
Santa was probably a light-sider who spent more of his time eating Opus cookies than he did actually doing work. He was definitely also that kid who violated every fire code regulation at Christmas time, or more likely, all of the time.
A foreword red baseball cap and a big smile always plastered on his face, Santa was friends with everyone. Unfortunately, he was a social butterfly that was failing out of school.
Towards the end of his sophomore year, he realized that there was no way he was going to be able to get through the rest of college with actual success. His plan of becoming a Biochem major wasn’t going to work out; he needed to find an alternative. He considered what life skills he actually possessed, then realized he had few.
As he sat through a lecture on the consumerism of Christmas, he became angered that parents were ruining the true meaning of the holiday by purchasing their children gifts. It was at this moment that Santa realized what he wanted to do.
He declared his major in Religious Studies and his minor in Economics, then set to work on building his empire.
He would come home from class and drive over to the stables where he was breeding special reindeer with help from his friend, a future genetic engineer (Things didn’t turn out well for this friend. He had some failed projects. Actually, you’ll probably know the most famous one as “the Grinch”). Then he’d drive back home, ignore his classwork and start skimming children’s wish lists and vaguely looking over the naughty-nice list.
Based on personal experiences, I’m sure a lot was missed. That’s probably how that horrible kid you knew down the street got everything on his list even though you just got socks.
Santa was burning out quickly with all the extra work he had decided to take on, and at the beginning of junior year, he decided he wanted to study abroad. Sadly, his GPA was abysmal and most of the deadlines for the programs had already expired. The only option was a somewhat-sketchy exploration trip to the North Pole. He took the risk.
After he returned from that, he was a “changed man,” like everyone seems to be after leaving the country for a few months. Senior year he started growing his beard out and joined a bunch of random organizations just to make friends. His favorite club was the Outing Club and he was the president of “People Who Like To Do Fun Things.” He also made an effort to show up to as many Hamilton Conspiracy Theorist meetings as possible.
In the end, college didn’t end up working out. With a GPA of 1.225, he couldn’t even graduate, so halfway though senior year he decided just to drop out. Luckily his side business was growing rapidly, although the profits weren’t fantastic. That was probably because he was too focused on writing fun Christmas songs like “Run Run Rudolph” instead of doing his econ homework. Santa never learned the importance of a marginal cost.
So, perhaps he wasn’t a great student. Santa was no valedictorian or the star of any sport’s team, but he had heart and he had ambition. He didn’t spend his winter break sleeping too much like the rest of us. He spent it working hard for something he cared a lot about, and perhaps that’s truly where all of the Christmas magic really comes from; a college student who worked exceptionally hard over break.
So, perhaps he wasn’t a great