Here’s a question about RPI’s alma mater — did the lyrics include the first few digits of pi? The answer is no, but there was a cheer that included it along with some other math lingo. Do you know it?
E to the X – DY -DX
E to the X – DX
cosine, secant, tangent, sine,
3 – point – 1 – 4 – 1 – 5 – 9
square root, cube root, log of pi,
DISINTEGRATE THEM, RPI!
I think nearly everyone who attended RPI in the 50′s will remeber that cheer even tho’ it is a little weird. F DuBois ’56
We still used it in the ’70s
We used it in the mid 80′s and is one of the fun things I tell my kids about to proove just how much of a nerd there mom really was! My son has told me that he had to take enough math just to make sense of the cheer. what motivation.
Loved your comment Glenda. Thanks for sharing!
I remember hearing this in the late ’80s as well.
I was at RPI from 1984 to 1987 and I remember it well – I still have it committed to memory. Even to this day when talking to RPI friends, “E to the X DY DX” somehow always creeps into the conversation.
I graduated in 89 (ouch!) and it was around then. Just now sitting around the table remembering it got us to this page
going over it with our son. Math geeks unite! I remember seeing the cheer printed in Reader’s Digest 
someone made $50 for that!
Actually, this cheer was printed up in a November 1987 issue of Sports Illustrated – then football coach Kevin Earl pointed it out to me. The article talked about how bad RPI’s football team was – since then, 20 of 23 RPI football seasons had winning records.
MIT stole the cheer and got it on ABC – we all know which school invented it, though! Go Bachelors!
I go to RPI now…I nor anyone else has ever heard of this. That’s kind of sad :’(