Student life
The year on the terrace.
Most traditions at South Hudson Institute of Technology are practical habits that have lasted. A few are older than anyone can explain.
August
Arrival Day and Blank Week
New students arrive at North Dock on a Saturday in late August and carry their own trunks up the Climb to the terrace, as the first class did in 1875. The six days that follow are Blank Week: placement at the slates, the first bench check, a walk of Captain Brannock’s stations, and the Particulars, the four printed pages at the front of every new field book. The week ends on Bell Night.
“Nobody carries your trunk for you. Three Semis walk beside you and say ‘nearly there’ at the bottom, the middle, and the top. It is a lie each time.”
Kofi · Tolliver · Class of 2027 
Arrival Day. The trunk goes up the Climb with its owner. August
Bell Night
The last evening of Blank Week. Each new student draws a brass marker from the surveyor’s chest of 1871 and is assigned to a house. Then the terrace bell rings once for each house.
Bell Night. The new class waits for the first stroke. Every hour
The bell
The terrace bell rings the hour from early morning until ten at night. It was cast in 1908 and recast by students in 2025 from the same pattern. Seniors say the new bell sounds slightly higher than the old one. After a home win, the mule’s student handlers ring it three more times.
“Every class says things were harder in its year. Ours is the first that can prove the bell was lower.”
Owen · Vreeland · Class of 2027 Thursdays
House dinner
Since the 1920s, faculty have joined students for dinner on Thursdays. Students sit with their houses, the faculty fellows take the head of each table, and first-year students take the foot. The meal begins with a moment of silence, and the Terrace Singers sometimes sing before it. Once each October the Fifty-Year Table is set: the class that entered fifty years earlier comes back to dine with the new class.
Fall Saturdays
Home games
When the Mules play at home, students gather on the library steps before the match. Dock, the college mule, stands on the sideline in a plain black blanket. Afterward the Quad Club meets on the steps.
September
Films on the terrace
On warm Friday nights in September, the Founders Players set up a screen against the library wall and show films on the lawn. Students bring blankets from the halls, and the Bread Club brings what’s left from Sunday’s baking.
Early September
Stamp Day
In the first week of their last year, the seniors take their markers to the Tolliver Foundry. The materials shop stamps each student’s initials on the back, beside the class die, which every class designs in its first spring. At Commencement the marker goes back into the chest with the initials on it, so every student who draws it afterward carries the names of the ones before.
October
The Terrace Society receptions
In October, when the far ridge is in color, the Terrace Society opens its rooms beneath the library steps for receptions for families, alumni, and the incoming faculty.
November
The River Match
Since 1897 the Mules have played Fenmore Polytechnic at rugby every November, home and away in alternate years. The winner keeps the Sounding Lead, a river pilot’s lead weight on a knotted line, until the next match. The week before, both colleges allow a certain amount of quiet work, a harmless prank that leaves no mark, and on the Friday night the bonfire on the lower field burns a timber model of a footbridge. After the match the two sides sing each other’s college songs, the losing side first.
November to March
The Pewter
Students call the gray months the Pewter. The season begins when the last leaf falls from the Ellery maple and ends when the ice goes out at North Dock. Each house keeps a custom for it, and the Brannock count on the boathouse door has never once been short.
The view from the library steps, which in October is the best on campus. December
Brief Night
On the first Thursday in December, after house dinner, the seniors gather in the reading room of Founders Library under the green lamps. The Dean of Studies hands each one a sealed brief naming the senior project, the client it is for, and the committee that will review it. The briefs are opened together on the first stroke of eight.
February
The speaking competition and the formal
The residents of Martelaer organize the winter speaking competition. Each house enters speakers, and the judges are faculty from the Division of Letters. The Quad Club holds the winter formal in the dining hall in February, the week after the Midwinter Problem.
February
The Hundred-Day Revue
On a Saturday in early February, a hundred days before Commencement, the seniors stage a revue in the dining hall. It is written by the class and is mostly about the faculty. The faculty attend, sit in the front row, and take notes. Dean Okonkwo has attended every Revue since 2014. In 2019 he issued a memorandum on the margins of the printed program.
“Every year someone plays Professor Finch. Every year she arrives before the curtain and closes the door on the last stroke.”
June · Kessler · Class of 2027 Spring
The Gate, the house fours, and the Terrace Build
The Gate announces its new members on a spring morning, by notes left on doors. In April the houses race fours on the river and put up their structures for the Terrace Build. The Terrace Cup is presented at the last Thursday dinner.
Spring
Senior review
Each senior presents a project to a faculty committee. Reviews are open, and first-year students are encouraged to attend at least one.
May
Commencement on the terrace
On the morning of Commencement, each senior drops the brass marker drawn on Bell Night back into the surveyor’s chest. The degrees are conferred on the terrace with the Hudson behind the platform. The ceremony ends when the President says “Pencils down,” and the graduates throw a yellow pencil each into the air; children from the faculty houses and Highland Falls collect them. By evening the chairs are gone, and the boat club has a shell on the water.
Pencils down.
