Andy Bernard's Academic Career

Andy Bernard went to Cornell University (graduating in 1995 with an unspecified Bachelor of Arts) and is smug about it. He was, by his own admission, not a particularly good student.

Citations

• "I went to Cornell. Ever heard of it? I graduated in four years, I never studied once, I was drunk the whole time, and I sang in the acapella group 'Here Comes Treble'." (talking head interview, Gay Witch Hunt)
• "You should be an English professor at Cor-not University." (sparring with Dwight, The Merger)
• "I started the main Frisbee golf club at Cornell. Where I went to college." (to Jim, The Convict)
• "Football: Cornell/Hofstra: Slaughter." (sucking up to Michael, The Return)
• "I graduated from anger management the same way I graduated from Cornell: On time." (talking head interview, The Negotiation)
• "He's classy. He gets me. He went to Cornell." (Michael, Beach Games)
• "The capital of Maine is Montpelier, Vermont, which is near Ithaca, New York, where I went to Cornell." (interviewing with Dwight, The Job)
• "Three months ago, I was nowhere. I was just a Cornell grad, in anger management." (talking head interview, The Job)
• "That school? Cornell." (talking head interview, Launch Party, deleted scene)
• "I got into Cornell off the Wait List." (talking head interview, Branch Wars, deleted scene)
• "Andy, was that coordinated by the Cornell Study Abroad Office?" (Angela, Dinner Party, deleted scene)
• The rear windshield of Andy's car has a Cornell sticker. (Chair Model, Did I Stutter?)
• Andy introduces himself to the client as "Andy Bernard, Cornell '95." (Job Fair)
• Andy becomes upset when Dwight wears a Cornell sweatshirt. (Employee Transfer)
• "When I was in college I used to get wicked hammered. My nickname was puke. I would chug a fifth of SoCo, sneak into a frat party, polish off a few people’s empties, some brewskies, some Jell-O shots, do some body shots off myself, pass out, wake up the next morning, puke, rally, more SoCo, head to class. Probably would have gotten expelled if I had let it affect my grades, but I aced all my courses. They called me Ace. It was totally awesome. Got straight B’s. They called me Buzz." (talking head interview, Moroccan Christmas)
• "I took a crapload of women's studies at Cornell. I wrote a companion to The Vagina Monologues called The Penis Apologies." (The Inner Circle)

Academic career

It is not known what Andy Bernard majored in, but he says that he minored in History ("The Job").

Andy was not particularly gifted academically.

• By his own admission, he "never studied once." ("Gay Witch Hunt")
• He failed Introduction to Philosophy and had to take it again. ("Business Ethics")

As a high school student, Andy tried to lead a student protest against standardized tests, but chickened out and took the SATs anyway. ("Shareholder Meeting") He scored a 1220, which is the 80th percentile in general, but is a poor score for a Cornell student, putting him in the bottom 25% of the student population. His poor score contributed to his being wait-listed at Cornell, but he was ultimately admitted because his father donated a building to the school. ("Branch Wars")

Cultural references

Andy's identity is tied up in the fact that he went to Cornell.

Cornell is a member of the Ivy League of elite universities in the United States. While it is not as prestigious as the so-called Big Three (Harvard, Yale, Princeton), it is still among the top 20 schools in the nation.

The joke about Andy bragging about having attended Cornell is not so much a joke about Cornell, but rather a joke about Andy: He's the sort of person who brags about having gone to a prestigious school, which is a sign of insecurity and ironically is an indicator that he isn't very successful, because most successful people who go to prestigious schools tend to downplay the fact.

Andy comes from a rich family whose wealth and connections could get him a job as a corporate executive, but he struggles to get by as a paper salesman at an unknown company. His obsession with Cornell is funny because it means so much to him, and he thinks it impresses others, even though it doesn't.

Incidentally, many of the actors and writers went to Ivy League schools: Mindy Kaling went to Dartmouth; John Krasinski went to Brown; B.J. Novak, Michael Schur, Rashida Jones, and Charlie Grandy went to Harvard; and Ellie Kemper went to Princeton. NBC executive Kevin Reilly (who championed the show during its struggling first season) went to Cornell.