How to Get Into Yale With an Egg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qi5hHGKJwPM

Welcome, dear virtual little siblings! Today, I've got an egg-celent plan to help your butt into Yale, or really any college for that matter using this egg right here.

Okay, but before we get to that, let’s talk about Yale for a second. Aside from having a Bulldog as a mascot and this beautiful dining hall that looks like something out of Harry Potter, what else is this place known for? What kind of students does Yale actually want?

Let’s begin with that first question: Yale is actually pretty famous for a bunch of different academic programs. They have Nobel-prize winning economics professors, some of the most amazing historians on Earth and one of the best political science programs in the world. They’re also incredibly famous for their psychology research and international relations – or as they like to call it ‘global affairs’ – program. 

But something you probably didn’t know about Yale is that there’s a special major there called EP&E, which stands for ethics, politics and economics. First off, let’s just pause for a sec — important college admissions tip for all applicants. When a college has a special major or program, pay special attention! 

I promise it will help your odds of getting in if you say you want to study this one-of-a-kind major, as opposed to picking a super duper common one that’s offered at a bunch of other universities. I mean, think about it- it’s an easy and convincing answer to the question: Why Yale? Well because it’s literally the only place in America where EP&E is offered! 

So simple trick – instead of applying as computer science to Yale, pick the new statistics and data science major, which was made less than ten years ago. Or, even better, the brand-spanking new Computing and the Arts major. From what my friends tell me, it’s even easier than the traditional CS major and you get to explore cool projects related to animation, design, etcetera.

But anyways, back to EP&E. Let’s just pretend for a moment that you’re interested in one of these programs – ethics, politics or economics. Now, let’s approach each of these three subjects through the lens of an egg. 

Starting with ethics: is eating eggs morally eggs-ceptable or a fowl play? Is cracking an egg, equivalent, in your opinion, to killing a baby chicken? And do you think killing chickens is wrong? Some say yes, others argue no. 

Honestly, though, your stance isn’t the important thing – what is important here is how you articulate and highlight this controversy. Perhaps you decide to host a debate between a vegan and a chicken farmer in your community, then stream the whole event on Twitch. Or maybe you decide to write a dozen egg-shaped poems about this topic, with half being in support of eating eggs and half about how cruel the practice is. Like I mentioned in the How to Get Into Harvard with a Potato video, it’s all about creativity and ingenuity. Again, those are just two ways to inspire philosophical egg-changes and discussion in your community, but honestly, the opportunities are endless!

This, in many ways, connects directly to the political— instantly, my mind goes to human eggs and abortion, right? But instead of doing something boring, like writing an op-ed piece in your newspaper, wouldn’t it be far more interesting to combine another discipline in order to bring your point home? What if you used eggs– an ancient symbol of fertility– as a medium of protest? That’s exactly what Martha W. Lewis did, whose exhibit, by the way, was featured in “Nasty Women New Haven” which if you didn’t know, is where Yale is located. Or take a look at how these activists hurled confetti-filled eggs to protest abortion in El Salvador, where the practice is still banned. 

This, by the way, is one of Yale’s favorite archetypes to accept: the activist-artist. Most recently, Yale has also really been emphasizing this idea of “Yale-and”, meaning they’re not looking for kids who are only good at one thing, but really folks who can bridge the STEM and Humanities, as well as fuse together a variety of their interests in order to make the world a better place. 

Moving onto economics— let’s say for your AP macroeconomics class you decided to conduct an in-depth study on egg prices and analyze them through the lens of inflation. By the way, now that I’m looking at this graph, can you believe a dozen eggs were $4.82 in January 2023. That’s crazy. 

Or maybe, another idea, maybe you decide to compare the price of eggs in different countries– like how does the price of eggs in China compare, for instance, to that of Zimbabwe or Hungary? Perhaps the quality and demand is more or less the same, but the supply is different which results in a huge range of prices. 

But wait there’s more! What if you used eggs as a way to show behavioral economics and psychology at play? Quick aside: while I was at Yale, I took some classes at the Yale School of Management and there was this really famous, utterly fascinating class about Persuasion and Influence. At the start of the semester, the Yale School of Management students had to take something really minor and insignificant, like a paperclip, then keep trading it with people throughout the semester. I remember hearing this one guy traded his paperclip for a piece of gum, then traded that for a pencil, then traded that for an old book, then kept going and going until he ended up with a used car. 

You could do the same thing with an egg! See how many people you can convince to trade with you throughout the course of a month or semester. Or how about this? What if you were the one organizing this activity or competition– that way you don’t even have to do the hard work of talking to people. Give all the kids in your AP PSychology class an egg, and see who can trade it up the most by the end of the week! 

At the end of the day, Yale– and really all top colleges– are looking to see students who can blend AC with AC. Academic interests with real-world actions. It's like making an omelet – you gotta mix it up to make it delicious. 

Finally, because I love you all so much, I have one final tip before I let you go: get your teachers involved with these projects. Have them review your egg-shaped poems, ask them to help edit your egg inflation research paper, get them to be a part of your egg trading competition. That way, when they write a recommendation letter for you, they can reference these incredible moments and events. 

Your virtual older sibling,

Kevin