PASADENA, Calif.—Ditch Day, that delightful annual day of college pranks at the California Institute of Technology, is today. On one day each spring, kept secret until the last minute, Caltech seniors ditch their classes and vanish from campus. Any senior discovered on campus after 8 a.m. is liable to be captured by vigilant underclass students and summarily duct-taped to the nearest tree.
Because the rooms of absent seniors are now vulnerable to all sorts of mischievous goings-on, the seniors have spent considerable time prior to Ditch Day devising ingenious and elaborate locks and obstacles for their rooms. Underclass students then try to get through these "stacks"—named for the stacks of books and furniture that were used in decades past to barricade the doors—and into the seniors' rooms.
Modern-day stacks can be far more elaborate than just a physical barricade, and often take the underclass students far away from the room itself on scavenger hunts, quests, adventures, red-herring searches, and the like.
One of the stacks this year, for example, is the "Harry Potter Stack," in which students will attend the Hogwarts Institute of Technology for the day and take "classes" in potions and spells, then make primordial goo and attempt levitation.
A Scooby Doo-themed stack will feature an elaborate maze. Many of the Ditch Day activities have photographic potential for print and broadcast journalists, and for this reason Caltech invites the media each year to come to campus and cover the happenings. Media wishing to cover Ditch Day should arrive as early as possible, though events will continue throughout the day. The Caltech Media Relations staff at 315 S. Hill Ave. will be available to conduct film crews to interesting stacks.
Contact: Jill Perry Robert Tindol (626) 395-3226 (626) 395-3631
