Picture this: you’re strolling along Cross Campus, enjoying the crisp autumn air. You’ve just eaten an extra tahini chocolate chunk cookie at Commons, and now you’ve got a few hours until your next class. It’s a beautiful day to be outside, and you’ve already finished your work for the next day. Suddenly, you hear a prospective student on an oversized tour group led by an overqualified guide utter this fateful sentence — “It’s like being at Hogwarts!”
Your peaceful day has been ruined. You’ve suddenly been transported back to the day you discovered Pottermore. You can’t help but wonder: “Which Hogwarts house am I in? What Hogwarts house is my college in? Did I leave my charger in WLH? Is everyone here a Ravenclaw?”
This innocent high school junior from Dallas isn’t wrong. Yale really is a lot like Hogwarts — the architecture, the British people, the high ceilings… we’ve got it all, save for the flying brooms. Who needs flying brooms anyway? Rest assured, though, because not everyone here is a Ravenclaw.
Sure, Yale University itself is a Ravenclaw. Don’t be fooled into thinking that this means everything at Yale is one too!
Even Branford, with all the books on its crest, isn’t a Ravenclaw. Haven’t you noticed that the pages are all blank? Branford is a verified Gryffindor, as are Silliman and Morse.
Saybrook, even though it is only mere feet away from Branford and has many similarities, is in another house altogether. Both Saybrook and Hopper are Ravenclaws. JE and Murray are Slytherin, cunning and shrewd. Franklin, Trumbull and Berkeley are Hufflepuffs through and through. (Pierson, Davenport and Stiles attend Ilvermorny, for better or for worse; TD is a Muggle.)
Various study spots around campus can also be sorted into houses. The students you see in the corners of the stacks, wrapped in blue sweaters and Ravenclaw-esque glasses, are deceptive. The stacks, in their proud, tall tower, are Gryffindor. The law library, with its tall windows and peaceful ambiance, is undoubtedly a Ravenclaw. The divinity library’s wood walls and towering shelves make it a Ravenclaw prototype. Bass Library is where students go to truly dive into their work — this passion and determination make Bass the Slytherin of Yale’s study spots. Not to mention that it’s in the basement, just like the Slytherin dorms at Hogwarts. Dining halls are study spaces for the Hufflepuffs among us.
Now it’s time to get into types of students and their respective houses to help all our readers determine which house they’re really in.
If your dorm is on the fifth floor of your building, you are automatically a Gryffindor. That trek more than once a day is a true demonstration of valor. You may think that if you live in the basement or on the first floor you are a Slytherin, when in reality you are most likely a Hufflepuff. No one survives that environment without having Hufflepuff friendliness.
All English majors and creative writing concentrators are Slytherins. Being that invested in and advanced at creative writing is an obvious tell. Environmental studies majors are Hufflepuffs, but Earth science majors are Ravenclaws. Other Ravenclaw majors include music and urban planning. Economics majors and current or former Directed Studies kids are Gryffindors, for different reasons. I would say economics majors are Slytherins, but I think they’d be too happy about it. Pure humanities majors are the real Slytherins, and so are psychology majors.
Pasta e Basta is a Gryffindor, while Rooted is a Ravenclaw, Lotus a Hufflepuff, and Rostir a Slytherin. Chicken tender Thursdays are Hufflepuffs, grilled cheese Thursdays are Ravenclaws.
Peter Salovey, with his soft touch, is a Hufflepuff. Pericles Lewis, on the other hand, is a Ravenclaw, as is facility dog Heidi. Handsome Dan is a Gryffindor — he is popular and he knows it.
All of these statements were originally declared by the Sorting Hat itself, of course. Its recent visit to Yale was very poorly advertised, and, in a strange coincidence, only students involved with the WKND attended.
The Sorting Hat also issued a statement regarding recent complaints about one house being better than another and took time to address the topic and clarify that all of the houses at Hogwarts are equally respected and admired. Slytherin is only in the basement because green looks best in low lighting.
Fortunately or unfortunately, all we’re missing here at Yale is the chosen one himself — the ghost of Eli Yale. If anyone has particularly good dark magic skills, please let the YDN know.