Flying with the birds and sleeping with the sharks

It is that time of year, my friends—the time when we ask students employed in the private sector to empty out their pockets on behalf of their classmates with ambitions of public service.  And yes, alcohol does have a role to play in this ritual.  Philanthropy can be fun!

Part of the ritual involves perusing the auction booklet well in advance.  Students (and alumni! Did you know you can put in a proxy bid by emailing 1L Teagan Gregory, [email protected]?) peruse it to find the bid-worthy items and put together their bidding strategy in advance; faculty and administrators peruse it to see what their colleagues got browbeaten by enthusiastic students into donating THIS year, and to laugh smugly.

Of course, not all donations are the result of browbeating, importuning, and coercion.  For example, I think it is likely, since he has donated it for countless years in a row, that Professor Mathias Reimann actually enjoys this activity:

No one ever said that free-fall would be free. You and another student can go tandem skydiving with an instructor and Professor Mathias Reimann. (Drop zone in Tecumseh. Opens early April; may wait until early May, pending weather… . 220 pound weight limit per person. Common sense and strong stomach recommended.)

Now, those of us who had Professor Reimann for class may find the prospect of skydiving with him a little unnerving.  All due respect to the German people (I’m half German!), but years of World War II propaganda movies have made some of us a little intimidated by that accent.  But consider this:  the surprise identity of the kinder, gentler snowperson observer in my last post was none other than Professor Reimann!  That heartwarming interaction left me feeling assured  that it is highly unlikely that Professor Reimann would push you out of the plane in the event you were to get up there and wimp out.  On the other hand—as I learned to say in law school—I make no warranties, express or implied.

Some donations, though, clearly are the result of all kinds of coercion, and possibly, misdirection and even deception.  How else to account for this?:

Zearfoss v. Caminker, 24 Rick’s 25 (E.D. Mich. 2010-2011).
What’s better than a Dean going to Rick’s? How about two Deans going to Rick’s! Dean Evan Caminker and Dean Sarah Zearfoss are each taking 10 lucky students to Rick’s. No, that’s not a joke. These two items will be auctioned off simultaneously in a head-to-head competition to see which Dean you’d rather share a sharkbowl with. Dean Zearfoss (item #24) and Dean Caminker (item #25) will each bring a group of 10 students to Rick’s American Cafe (little do they know how little it resembles the famed Rick’s Café Américain from “Casablanca”) and pay for cover and a round of drinks (up to $100 value for each Dean). Maybe we should repeat that: a Michigan Law Dean will buy you and 9 of your friends a drink at Rick’s.

Not me, I don’t mean—no coercion was necessary with me. What, after all, could be more alluring than a sharkbowl?  Besides, now that I’ve broken down and attended my first Michigan football game (one of the ones they won last fall, for the record—and an event that was itself the result of my winning bid on an SFF auction item–#1 in this year’s booklet!), could taking the Rick’s plunge be far behind?  But I’m pretty sure that Dean Caminker has not the first clue what Rick’s is, and I know for a fact that he doesn’t know what a sharkbowl is. (How do I know? Because he asked me.  I may, or may not, have lied.)  Further, he claims that at the time he assented, he thought we were jointly offering this event, as opposed to going mano a mano in a fierce bidding war.  

All I can say is, thank heavens the SFF auction occurs at the end of March, by which point the vast majority of all admissions decisions will have been made.  Because if I lose, I am sulking for about two weeks. 

-Dean Z.
Assistant Dean and Director of Admissions