Katya Agrawal, Contributing Photographer

Late February at the University does not only mark the start of the midterm season but also a new tap class’ initiation into Yale’s numerous fraternities, sororities and social clubs.

New taps and pledges are frequently spotted completing tasks around campus: running relay races in the dining halls, blasting music in the library and serenading passersby at the Elm. Not even classrooms are safe from this flurry of fraternity activity.

Ryan Chao ’28 did not expect much excitement from his regular Wednesday morning “Introductory Macroeconomics” lecture.

“I wasn’t paying a lot of attention,” he said. “And then all of a sudden, a bunch of frat guys run in. They’re like, ‘Where is he?!’”

Chao describes how a parade of students with “masks and bags over their heads” ran through the lecture hall, picked up a student sitting in the front row, and dragged their victim from the room.

“And everyone’s looking over, laughing, filming. And the professor’s just like, ‘another one of these,’” Chao said.

Professor Aleh Tsyvinski, the professor in question, lectures in the economics department for Economics 115 and 116, and is no stranger to such interruptions. These introductory classes usually enroll upwards of 400 students; the large class size makes these lectures a preferred venue for public stunts.

He approaches these interruptions with a light-hearted attitude.

“The social clubs tapping is usually fun — sometimes it does get a bit overboard, but as long as the folks who do it keep it civil and mindful of others, it usually is ok,” he said. 

According to Chao, the momentary chaos caused by the interruption did not last long, and students quickly settled and returned their attention to the material. 

Economics student Jean-Claude Pierre ’28 recalls similar incidents this past fall in his “Introductory Microeconomics” course taught by professor Cormac O’Dea. In this instance, the student stood up during the lecture and began “pushing back” against the professor. The student repeatedly insisted, obviously as a joke: “You’re wrong. You’re actually explaining this wrong.”

“Cormac is funny,” Pierre said. “He just says his rule is: if you interrupt class with a prank, it has to be funny. So, like, he’ll rate the funniness.”

According to Pierre, O’Dea declared: “That one? Wasn’t that funny.”

O’Dea clarified that interruptions are only amusing insofar as they are respectful.

“While I am always eager for members of the class to engage and participate, I don’t exactly encourage interruptions from those outside the course,” he said. “Such interruptions do occur in a large class, and when they do, I think they need to be respectful of everyone in the class and should end as soon as the instructor asks that they do.”

During the last week, classes have also welcomed a different kind of interruption: a surprise singing valentine from New Blue of Yale, one of Yale’s student a cappella groups.

For decades, “since Yale had receiver phones in their rooms,” New Blue has granted members of the Yale community the opportunity to purchase “singing valentines” for their friends, loved ones and even professors. The offering includes a barbershop-quartet-style performance of one of six predetermined song choices, serenading the recipient at the buyer’s choice of location and time between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m.

Amiah Hanson ’27, a business manager for New Blue, described singing in front of large lectures as “definitely hectic” but “fun.”

“Sometimes the people themselves will start laughing, like the people we’re singing to. And so we have to try to keep it together. It’s usually a lot of fun, but yeah, a little nerve-wracking,” added fellow New Blue business manager Jas Hollis ’27.

Hollis and Hanson described that when they receive requests for in-class singing valentines, they will email the professors.

“If the professor says no, then we don’t come. If they say yes, then yes, we come. And sometimes they’re really excited about it, and it’s really cute!” said Hollis.

Hollis said that while many professors are open to their visits, the group has received their fair share of polite rejections. Professors often decline the valentine due to concerns about class time and getting through material. Nevertheless Hollis clarified this “wasn’t the most common response” and, generally, “professors are all really happy” to welcome New Blue.

Professor Paul Cooper received one such email from the group the week leading up to Valentine’s Day and was happy to facilitate the singing valentine’s delivery in his “General Chemistry II” lecture. In fact, he thought to himself, “This sounds kind of fun!”

“I don’t particularly have a problem with it. I think it sort of reminds us that we’re connected to a bigger part of the world,” he said.

“I very much like the Valentine’s Day tradition and think it is very nice,” said Tsyvinski, echoing Cooper and describing the performance as “phenomenal.”

When professors are valentines’ intended target, New Blue still reaches out, pretending that the delivery is for a student in the class.

The students of professor Benjamin Foster’s GRD ’74 ’75 “Earliest Literature of the Ancient World” class ordered him a song from New Blue. He described his pleasant surprise when the valentine turned out to be for him.

“It was not set up by my wife. So I will always wonder … who was it in my first-year seminar who had such a sweet idea?” said Foster.

Foster, who has been teaching at Yale since receiving his doctorate in 1975, has watched the New Blue tradition evolve throughout the years. He recalls how before the age of email, the group had no method of contacting professors beforehand and would show up to lectures without notice. 

“I thought it a beautiful interlude and was not at all disturbed by the unannounced interruption to my lecture,” he said.

“When you’re talking about the history of the Middle East, a few magical moments devoted to love can indeed be salutary,” he added. 

New Blue of Yale was founded in 1969 as the University’s first women’s a cappella group.