October 26, 2005 A Day that Will Live in Infamy Strong class shadings in this morning's obligatory keen for the university the University of Georgia might have been [for background, scroll down to post headed "For Paradise the Southland is My Nominee"]. From the Athens Banner-Herald:
[T]he University of Georgia is - and evermore shall be - a party school, a haven for the state's spoiled children of privilege where athletics (read "football") will trump academics each and every time. ...Do you remember when UGA was on the verge of climbing out of its longstanding reputation as a party and football school? Remember just a few months ago, when the Task Force on General Education and Student Learning, a group of two dozen administrators, professors and students, unveiled a list of comprehensive strategies for improving the intellectual climate at the university? Remember when it seemed like the university was going to be able to claim legitimate kinship with the top-flight schools it has long considered its peers? ...[M]aybe you won't mind accompanying UGA President Michael Adams to an upcoming session of the Georgia General Assembly - the state legislature, which exercises significant control over the university's budget. Maybe you can offer some wisecracking explanation to legislators, telling them why it's wrong for them to wonder if, in funding the university, they're simply facilitating ["facilitating" is a bad word choice here -- too official sounding for the context. UD'd go with the nice "W" alliteration the writer has established ("wisecracking...why...wrong...wonder...whims...") and use "whipping up" or something] the silly whims of a bunch of overpaid dilettantes - whims like arbitrarily canceling classes - and doing it on the backs of the state's taxpayers. In the upcoming legislative session, that's exactly what they're going to be wondering, particularly after the events of Oct. 26.
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