Editor:
So, the university shuts down early on a Thursday for a sports event so that the campus can be made to appear presentable to a national TV audience. Students are advised to leave (with the cars they rode in on, no less); heaven knows we can't have students about, getting in the way of ABC cameramen and their equipment. What kind of image of the university would we be projecting if shots of actual students walking between classes or to and from the library on a weeknight were broadcast?
I suppose there is a lesson in all of this for our administrators. If only they had given CBS news the kind of red-carpet treatment that was given ABC sports (plenty of free parking, students and other undesirables shooed off campus during the visit), perhaps they would not have had all those problems with "60 Minutes" last year Ÿ and the university might still have a reputation as a place where teaching is taken seriously. Then again Ÿ maybe not.
James Champagne
Literature Graduate Student