Jacobs student shares name with supermodel Kate Upton

There’s more than one Kate Upton.

There’s the one on the cover of the 2012 Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition, and then there’s the one who’s an IU sophomore in the Jacobs School of Music.

Though her biography has been used along with photos of the former, our Kate Upton is shorter than the first, has brown hair and knows little about basketball or why Cody Zeller would ask her on a date.

Our Kate Upton goes by Katie.

An Indiana Daily Student reporter sat down with Katie to find out a little more
about her.

IDS Who are you, exactly?
KATIE UPTON I’m Katie Upton. I go by Katie instead of Kate. My full name is Katherine Elizabeth Upton, and her name is also Katherine Elizabeth Upton, spelled exactly the same way, so obviously it leads to more confusion. Yeah, but I’m the one that’s from Des Moines, Iowa, and I was born in 1991 instead of ’92. So you’ll find some articles that say she’s from Des Moines, Iowa, and she’s not. She’s from Wisconsin. So, yeah, I’m the horn player as well.

IDS So people actually use your biography on the Jacobs School website as hers?
UPTON Since I’m a musician, I have my biography available on the Jacobs School of Music website and on my own, so people have taken that biography and put it with her picture instead of mine, actually, on multiple websites. There were two weeks on Wikipedia where my biography was on her Wikipedia page with her picture. My mom got so excited that she printed off like four copies to keep because she thought it was so hilarious. So I think that’s probably where the confusion started, was probably with Wikipedia.

IDS How have you been mixed up with her besides the biography?
UPTON I really haven’t. I mean, there have been people that have emailed me asking me on dates and to Little 500 parties. But obviously there’s not any mix-up in person. I’m clearly not Kate Upton. So it just happened because of the biographies, and people have been sending me emails. So that’s pretty much it.

IDS She wasn’t really in the public eye until the Sports Illustrated cover, which was just recently. Is that about when it started?
UPTON It was a little bit before then because I think I had heard about her a bit before the Sports Illustrated cover thing happened because we share the same name. So a couple of my guy friends who had heard of her before the Sports Illustrated cover were like “this is funny,” so they’d post stuff on my Facebook wall like, “Hey, I know the other Kate Upton.” And so, like, I’d heard about it before, she was on the cover of Sports Illustrated, but the cover has certainly made things pick up with odd coincidences like the emails and stuff. That hadn’t ever happened before until after the cover.

IDS Cody Zeller tweeted that he was coming back next season because he hadn’t gotten a date with Kate Upton yet. If he asks you on a date, what would you say?
UPTON I don’t really follow basketball, so I feel really bad. I know that he’s famous and that he’s really, really good. I mean, free food, I’d go on the date.