University of Mississippi athletics is looking for a new mascot. A local writer recommends William Faulkner.
… I first wrote that Faulkner should be Ole Miss’ mascot in November of 2006. …Faulkner went to Ole Miss as a student, the university owns his home, Rowan Oak, and his Nobel Prize for literature, Faulkner played quarterback in high school, and, most importantly, the alums I’ve heard from all love the idea. It’s impossible to do better than Faulkner.
… Faulkner was a literary rebel, a man who refused to follow contemporary ideas of what a story should look like, and, as a result, millions of people know the state of Mississippi through his words. Are you telling me that a Faulkner mascot, a student dressed up in a tweed jacket, with a pipe in the corner of his mouth, a mustache, and a cane,* wouldn’t immediately become the most iconic mascot in the South? Maybe the entire country?
What’s more, Faulkner actually encourages football fans to read — and if you read message boards, the e-mails I get, or even the comments after these articles, who could be against that?…
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* And a drink.
From an editorial about President Lois DeFleur, responsible for the worst scandal in SUNY Binghamton’s history. The editorial appears in Pipe Dream, the university newspaper.
Tiger [Woods] allegedly only slept with 14 women.
DeFleur fucked us all.
When a great university goes out of its way to hire a cheater, all it has to do is sit back and wait.
Extra point: He’s costing them a fortune.
Nicely written piece in On Milwaukee about the forthcoming basketball arena at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.
As soon as she set eyes on football coach Rich Rodriguez, University of Michigan President Mary Sue Coleman decided to make this trouble-prone loss-leader her mistress.
Before Rich even came to Ann Arbor, she paid his millions in debts to West Virginia University. She overlooked his many legal entanglements, his long history of coaching violations, his tendency to belittle his players. She set Rich up in glorious surroundings and gave him massive amounts of money.
Love does funny things to you.
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Fervent she may be about Rich, but Coleman knows she cannot shout her love from the rooftops. Not everyone approves. So when she meets with trustees to discuss Rich’s latest infractions (the NCAA is investigating Rich for breaking team practice rules) , she makes sure it’s closed door.
But here we go again. When it comes to Rich, you never stop paying:
When the University of Michigan Board of Regents met this month for an update on the NCAA investigation of the football program, they did so behind closed doors. And that, says a lawsuit filed today, was illegal.
The suit, filed by a U-M alumnus in Washtenaw County Circuit Court, accuses the Board of Regents of violating the state Open Meetings Act, which places restrictions on how and why such public bodies can meet in private.
Robert Davis’ lawsuit says discussing the NCAA probe isn’t a valid reason to meet privately. The Open Meetings Act allows such boards to meet behind closed doors to discuss things such as personnel issues, student disciplinary cases and consultations with its attorney on certain issues. The law spells out procedures that must be followed to go into a private session. The lawsuit claims regents did not follow proper procedure…
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When asked to comment, Coleman burst into song:
He will not always say
What you would have him say
But now and then he’ll say
Something wonderful!
The thoughtless things he’ll do
Will hurt and worry you
Then all at once he’ll do
Something wonderful!
From a blogger at Huffington Post:
Here’s the Cliff Notes version: Player pummels student into coma, flees country. Player knocks over woman while shoplifting condoms from Wal-Mart. Team season assist leader arrested for selling cocaine. Academically unqualified basketball prospects given special waivers. Players caught using stolen debit card. Subtle (and unfounded) hints of racism leveled at admissions officers trying to protect the school’s integrity. Text messages which point towards improper petty cash distributions to players. Smear campaigns leveled at a professor and New York Times reporter who had the audacity to rain on the parade. Head coach placed on indefinite leave. Athletic director forced out. University president announces retirement. University reputation in shambles.
In Newsweek:
… Have you ever had a discussion about higher education that wasn’t polluted with babble about the college team and the amazingly lavish on-campus facilities for the cult of athletic warfare? … By a sort of Gresham’s law, the emphasis on sports has a steadily reducing effect on the lowest common denominator, in its own field and in every other one that allows itself to be infected by it.
… are a mite pissed. With the university’s sports-mad president. Because of the recent report on SUNY’s excruciatingly corrupt athletics program. (Background here.)
[President Lois DeFleur was] conveniently out of town when the audit results were released. The hypocrisy is sickening, especially coming from the woman who has continuously touted our claim as the Premier Public University of the Northeast. All the while, she has been privately putting academics second to her NCAA dreams.
And now, after dragging this school through the mud on her quest to D-1 fame, DeFleur is leaving the premises and not looking back, leaving us to deal with the mess.
With all due respect Ms. President, we’ve been taught that it’s honorable to own up to your mistakes, not set up others to take the fall and cover your own ass. Your skeletons are coming out of your airplane hangar, and if you have any respect for the school you’ve claimed to love for the past 20 years, you should show your commitment by sticking around to help us salvage this school and its reputation.
… drags its ass from one scandal to the next, subsidizing the wretched spectacle with your tuition money, what can you do?
Not much.
But all praise to the grad students at the University of New Mexico, who held a special election:
GPSA’s special election about the UNM Athletics Administration saw a record turnout, and all four questions on the ballot passed by margins of at least 30 percent.
“This is an unprecedented number,” said GPSA President Lissa Knudsen. “It is our belief that GPSA has never had this turnout.”
As for the results, 1,163 students voted in the online election, which is more than twice the turnout of the April GPSA presidential election. Students could select “no opinion” on each question.
More than 1,000 students voted to urge the Board of Regents to divert student fees from Athletics. This was the highest turnout of all the questions. Of those who had an opinion, more than 85 percent of students voted to urge the administration to divert student fees away from the Athletics Department to academic programs.
Also, 81 percent of students who voted said they have no confidence in Athletic Director Paul Krebs’ handing of the Sept. 20 Locksley/Gerald Incident.
Roughly two-thirds of graduate and professional students voted no confidence in Krebs’ overall performance as Athletic Director….
Won’t make any difference. But it’s very important to get it said. The place is a whorehouse, and students have a right not to want to get dirtied by association.
… just keeping track.
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Update:
UD thanks James, a reader, for pointing out that MN Daily has taken down this article, which tracks “a slew of off-field incidents” involving Minnesota’s way-bad football team.
UD guesses that the reporter is rewriting the piece — with so many incidents, errors will happen.
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Another update:
Try this link.
UD thanks Bill.
FORT WORTH — A Wedgwood Middle School coach was fired after displaying a knife and threatening to castrate a student, according to documents released by the Fort Worth school district.
Eugene R. Jennings, a social studies teacher and coach who worked in the district for 20 years, has insisted that he was joking, according to the report by the district’s Office of Professional Standards.
According to the report, Jennings entered another teacher’s classroom in September and noticed a student misbehaving. At that point, he pulled a student aside and threatened to castrate him, according to a witness’s statement in the report….
UD thanks Bill for the link.
First Kansas, then Texas Tech, and now the University of South Florida. Where will it end?
Texas Tech fans are outraged, and I’m sure we’ll hear from USF fans shortly as their own beloved sadist is fired. As Texas Tech people have pointed out, violence against your players when they’ve fucked up is a venerable coaching tradition in university football. Bottom line, it works. That’s why university coaches have the highest salaries on campus.
An editorial in North Jersey:
… The same state university that has gone into deep debt to expand its football stadium now is seriously considering a massive overhaul of its athletic center. This is a very bad idea.
The Rutgers Athletic Center has not been expanded since it was built 31 years ago. A bigger and better center may be desired, but now is not the time. The proposed expansion includes a new basketball practice facility, adds premium and club seats, replaces the playing court and scoreboard and creates an atrium that would house retail stores and a hall of fame. New coaching offices also would be built.
To date, there are no estimated costs for the ambitious plan, but Rutgers hopes private fund raising, plus income from the sale of premium and club seats, will pay for the project. Where have we heard that before? Ah, yes, Rutgers’ football stadium.
The expanded stadium was going to be financed with private funds. But the money didn’t materialize and the university had to borrow much of the needed $102 million. Has no one inside the athletics department noticed the recession?…