If Duke University was a haunted house

Welcome to the Duke University Haunted House! We’re so excited that you have come to visit. As a quick warning, some rooms may feel incredibly personal to you; if that is the case at any point, feel free to step out. Trust me, with some of the rooms in here, I wouldn’t blame you. Let’s begin our journey! 

Our first stop is the “Football School” room. Within this room you will find Duke students who claim to be fans of the Duke football team, but instantly run to Sidechat to complain the second our team loses. These are likely the same students who only showed up to College GameDay and never again touched a Duke sporting event. Be careful when you walk past these students, as they sometimes like to jump out at unsuspecting guests and really speak their mind about Duke football. It’s best to just ignore them if you can; don’t let them change your mind about our football team. I mean, we beat Clemson and nearly beat Notre Dame and FSU!

Up next, we have the “Mobile Order” room. It’s honestly a miracle that we’re able to share this room with you, as it has a tendency to suddenly disappear for no good reason. Luckily, it hasn’t done so for the past month and a half, but how do we know that it won’t happen again? Whenever it disappears, it causes indescribable levels of panic, almost like pulling out someone’s seat from under them. If you’re looking to grab a bite before your three-hour chem lab or two-hour physics lecture and this room is gone: good luck. 

Our first two rooms were, in our opinion, rather mild. From here on out, however, the rooms will get much, much scarier. As a reminder, feel free to leave if you feel overwhelmed or uncomfortable in these next few rooms. 

Our next stop is the “Pratt School of Engineering” room. We have designed this room with augmented reality technology in order to make guests feel as though they are walking through the real-life Harrington Quad and fully immerse them in the horrors that come with being a Pratt student. The overwhelming workload of the “Pratt Stars” is enough to make Satan himself (or your malevolent being of choice) quiver with fear. Many of my friends are mechanical engineering majors (scary, I know), and I have sat with quite a few of them as they completed their work. The image of pages upon pages of physics, thermodynamics and multivariable calculus has been burnt into my brain and haunts my dreams at night. Don’t stay in here too long, or you’ll lose an inhumane amount of sleep.

Our tour of the Duke University Haunted House is about to come to a close, and we’ve saved the scariest room for last. Brace yourself as we enter this final room, as what waits behind this door haunts the psyche of many a Duke student. 

Deep breath in, deep breath out. Are you ready? There’s no turning back.

Behold, the “Duke Math Department” room. Notorious for its ability to decimate GPAs and bring students to tears with its weekly problem sets, the Duke Math Department is arguably one of the scariest experiences Duke students face during their four years. If you look across the room, you will see various upperclassmen filled with dread at the mention of Math 122L by an overly-eager freshman sharing their courses for the semester. As a prospective computer science major, there is unfortunately no escape from the Duke Math Department for me. Our future engineers have it even worse, as if they were not already scarred enough from the last room we visited.