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SUMMARY:Theo Baker at Harvard Book Store
DESCRIPTION:Harvard Book Store welcomes Theo Baker—undergraduate at Stanford University and the youngest-ever recipient of the prestigious George Polk Award—for a discussion of his book\, How to Rule the World: An Education in Power at Stanford University. He will be joined in conversation by Indira Lakshmanan—co-host of NPR’s Here & Now. \nAbout How to Rule the World\nWinner of the George Polk Award for his investigation that brought down Stanford’s president\, Theo Baker offers a revelatory and gripping account of Silicon Valley hubris.  \nSlush funds. Shell companies. Yacht parties. This is life for Silicon Valley’s favored teenagers. \nSeventeen-year-old Theo Baker showed up for freshman year at Stanford University as a tech-obsessed coder. It seemed like paradise. There were Rodin sculptures next to nuclear laboratories and inventors lounging with Olympians. But Baker soon discovered a culture that embraced corner-cutting\, that vested infinite excess and access in the hands of kids with few safeguards to catch bad behavior. \nStanford\, he realized\, was less a school than a business. Its annual budget was nearly twice that of Harvard or Yale and higher than those of 116 countries. The product? Students. Especially those special few identified as the next trillion-dollar startup founders. For them\, there were secret societies\, “pre-idea” funding offers\, and social calls from billionaires\, all with the expectation that these geniuses would soon join the ruling elite. \nAt the helm of this business was Marc Tessier-Lavigne\, a superstar neuroscientist and wealthy biotech executive. But when Baker joined the student newspaper and started poking around the Stanford president’s record\, he discovered never-reported allegations of research misconduct in studies published across two decades bearing Tessier-Lavigne’s name. \nOnly one month into college and thousands of miles from home\, Baker began receiving anonymous letters\, going on stakeouts\, and tracking down confidential sources. High-powered lawyers and public relations teams were hired to attack his reporting. Stanford opened an investigation into its own leader. And by the end of the year\, Tessier-Lavigne was out as president. \nThis is the incredible journey of a reluctant teenage reporter who uncovered a story that shook the scientific world and became front-page news across the country. It is also an unprecedented inside view of the students learning to rule the world—and what they’re learning from those who already do. \nHow to Rule the World is a shocking\, hilarious\, and moving debut\, showcasing Silicon Valley’s training ground as never before.
URL:https://harvardsquare.com/event/theo-baker-at-harvard-book-store-2/
LOCATION:Harvard Book Store\, 1256 Massachusetts Ave\, Cambridge\, 02138\, United States
CATEGORIES:Author Events
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://harvardsquare.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/Theo-Baker.png
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