Theo Baker’s experience as a freshman at Stanford University was not what he expected: “Over the course of my freshman year, people I got to know in the tech world would admit to me to tax evasion and tax fraud, research misconduct, embezzlement and misappropriation of funds, securities fraud, insider trading, academic dishonesty, operating slush funds and shell companies, hacking, reckless endangerment, and and abetting foreign dictators.” (p. 6)
If you’re a fan of Scott Turow’s classic One L: The Turbulent True Story of a First Year at Harvard Law School you’ll enjoy Theo Baker’s incredible first year at Stanford. Initially, Theo’s plan was to become a computer science major. But, while Theo was the best computer geek at his High School, he was just average at the elite Stanford.
Theo Baker’s parents are two superstars of reporting: Peter Baker of the New York Times and Susan Glasser of The New Yorker. So it comes as no surprise that Theo starts spending time writing for The Stanford Daily (it’s in his genes!) and discovers a story that could rock Stanford University to its core!
Marc Teasier-Lavigne, the famed neuroscientist and multi-millionaire biotech executive, is the President of Stanford University. But Theo finds evidence that Tester-Lavigne tampered with key research studies over two decades. Could Theo bring down the President of Stanford?
Not only does Theo Baker deliver a real-life thriller, but he shows how an investigative reporter works. This story of a teenager shaking up Stanford (yearly tuition: $95,000) is an exciting page-turner! GRADE: A
CODA: Although Theo Baker achieves fame and glory with his incredible reporting, he finds out he has to Pay a Price: “By spring of my sophomore year, I couldn’t leave my dorm room without being harassed. I received numerous death threats, had events canceled over nebulous ‘security concerns,’ and eventually had to leave campus altogether for a spell. Someone threatened to waterboard me, but with gasoline, and then set me on fire; another threaten to gas me like my relatives who died in the Holocaust.” (p. 318-319)
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
YOUR STANFORD POCKET DICT IONARY — xi
Prologue: Fear the tree — 1
Drafted to the war on fun — 15
The impostor — 35
Coupa circuit — 53
Binary bomb — 73
A fucking menace — 99
Rule — 119
Duck syndrome — 141
Harriet the spy — 155
[[NOT FOR DISTRIBUTION]] — 173
The good paper — 197
TreeHacks — 215
Solve for people — 229
Free to speak — 243
No room for error — 257
Money is a rush — 265
Finis origine pendet –279
Coda — 295
Acknowledgements — 303
Notes — 309