![]() But if your GPA ever drops, you know what to blame.Ī version of this article appears in the Monday, Feb. You may have tested the arch’s will and suffered its wrath - or not. So whether you believe in the supernatural landmark or not, you’ve probably heard the tale. “I think there are better things to bond over as well.” “I think we have enough things to worry about as students that we don’t need superstitions about whether or not we’ll graduate or whether or not there’s a ghost in one of the dorms,” Anderson said. “I don’t know if it’s a uniting factor so much as it’s a common factor,” he said. “I feel like it’s a cool thing that brings people together,” Cowan said. So does the spooky arch spark Violet pride, or is it an afterthought? “I also think that New York has an attitude of, like, ‘Shut up and get to what you’re doing,’ and that makes it hard to spend a lot of time on superstition as well.” “We’re surrounded by so many other New Yorkers, I think that breaks down the NYU sense of inner community a little bit,” Anderson added. We don’t have, for example, one building or one campus tradition, and so it’s very difficult to get everyone on the same page about a superstition or to pass student culture easily,” Harris said. “I think it speaks to the lack of singular culture at NYU. I don’t know of anything like that here,” Cowan said. ![]() “Whenever I toured state schools before coming here, they were like, ‘Oh, don’t walk here,’ but there were also things that you rub for good luck on tests. While the arch seems to be a story everyone has heard, it’s apparently the only one in town. Perhaps the strangest part of this story is the lack of other legends. “I think there’s a big cohort of students that are very into the sort of astrology side of spirituality and superstition,” Anderson said, “and I think that and superstition are kind of two sides of the same coin.” He also reflected that NYU students may be general believers in the mystical. “I think NYU has a reputation as being a really difficult school, and people sometimes do have to take an extra semester, so I think that doesn’t help with superstition,” Anderson said. Anderson thought that some of NYU’s characteristics might encourage students to embrace the tradition. However, enough students believe in the myth, or at least play along with it, that the superstition is ubiquitous. “I think that recognizing that it is a superstition takes the power away from it,” Harris, who hasn’t shied away from the arch either, added. “Both before and after hearing the superstition.” “I’ve walked under the arch many times,” CAS sophomore Kenan Anderson said. “Lowkey, I feel like it might be a little true because obviously I haven’t walked under it since.” But do students actually believe in the power of the arch? It seems to be a trend that upperclassmen warn first-years not to walk through the arch within their first few weeks in Washington Square, and an NYU student who breaks this code is a rare sight indeed. “And I was like, ‘What do you mean, you can’t walk under the arch? I was standing under the arch for like, half an hour one day.’” “I think I was just talking with my friends and they were like, ‘Oh yeah, you can’t walk under the arch,’” Cowan said. “I was about to walk under the arch or was walking under the arch and someone said, ‘No! Don’t do that!’” Harris said. Harris said that he heard of the myth during Welcome Week his first year. “It’s the only NYU superstition,” CAS sophomore Graham Harris added. But it’s okay because I’m supposed to graduate in three years anyways.” “And I found out about that after I’d walked under it. “Basically, if you walk under the arch, you supposedly won’t graduate in four years,” CAS first-year Nadia Cowan explained. The personality of our student body doesn’t lend itself to a typical college culture of traditions and superstitions. NYU students are an independent and motivated breed, well-adapted to their campus without walls. One of the most unique aspects of NYU is its fast pace of life on and off-campus.
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