Dixon Erss | 2:36 am, Sep 22, 2025
The Yale Humanities Department finalized their annual selection process for the Celin Award in Directed Studies earlier this week; sources tell the Daily News that this is something we should care about.
The Celin Award, first given in 1957, recognizes the efforts of the most competitive and bristly student in the Directed Studies program. The finalists for the award are selected at the end of the spring semester and are narrowed down during a “rigorous summer selection process,” which involves a personalized round of examination at the DS department’s Manitoba summer estate.
According to his roommate, Jason Lindke ‘28 learned he won the $5,000 scholarship this past weekend. “He was over the moon when he heard the news,” noted Kyle Choi-Beurre ‘28. He added, “I get a sense that he was really glad to have somebody to talk to about it that wasn’t one of his internet friends.”
Choi-Beurre was assigned to live with Lindke after all of Lindke’s first-year roommates sought out other arrangements during a particularly-contentious housing lottery. “Say what you will: you can’t deny he’s a hard worker. He spends almost every night between 11:00 PM and breakfast roleplaying with an anarcho-primitivist collective he calls ‘The Doghouse.’ I’m not sure where he finds the time to write all those essays, but it definitely wasn’t during the group’s nightly howl session.”
Further investigation into Lindke’s housing situation revealed a tale of romance and intrigue wholly irrelevant to his academic achievement. “We weren’t sure what to make of him when he showed up,” noted Tawny Wellsworth ’28. “He showed up 3 days before the start of the term and barricaded himself in the only single. We got used to the animal noises quick enough but it smelled like he was eating nothing but cat food in there.”
Eventually, she noted that the whole suite voted to exile him to another college on the first day of housing discussions. “His self-enforced clothing-optional policy in the common room was what really did him in,” she recalled. “One of the other folks living with us was into the whole exhibitionism thing. Then again, his dad works at Palantir, so we thought we should keep him around.” Wellsworth is referring, of course, to Frederick Goodyear III ‘28, who she asked to not be mentioned by name.
Further LinkedIn stalking led us to the profile “MuddyPawz2001,” an anthropomorphic costume and artwork maker who Lindke has commissioned in the past. The News, in the spirit of going above and beyond, unnecessarily pried into Lindke’s personal life by messaging the artist, who obliged “to gain exposure for her rapidly-growing business.”
MuddyPawz2001 divulges: “Commissions start at $1,850, but Jason wanted one with all the upgrades—A/C, an adjustable head, and fully articulated feet. He was very particular about the feet.”
“To him, it wasn’t usually a sexual thing,” she followed up: “He just liked the freedom of not having to wear any ‘people clothes’ underneath.”
The YDN was able to get into contact with Lindke himself, as shown in the following screenshots. Some personal details have been omitted for privacy.
Submitted by anonymous contributor
His mother, Rebecca Lindke ’95, declined to comment on his academic achievement other than to mention the time he crapped himself on his third grade trip to the Ogunquit Marine Museum on February 21, 2017. “It was terrible,” she briefly remarked. “They had to turn the bus around an hour in—the kids and driver said it was the most embarrassing thing they had ever witnessed. That day followed him for the next 3 years, and we had to change schools. He made me promise to never bring it up again.”
Jackson Lindke’s social security number is 616-39-1158.
—F. Bertell
