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Fielder’s Choice
By Barry Burleson Ole Miss excelling I
was on the Ole Miss campus Thursday afternoon for a multi-media
workshop and little did I know I was going to see ESPN there, too. TV
crews from the cable sports network were near The Grove filming a spot
for a campaign called – “It’s Not Crazy - It’s Sports.” The hot topic
at Ole Miss is the mascot controversy. Some students were on hand to
get their few seconds of fame in recreating the push last spring for
Admiral Ackbar, a fish-like commander from “Star Wars.” As
an assignment for our class, we interviewed one of the students
concerning the mascot situation and its effect on the college – good or
bad. He believed the mascot change (ditching the
Rebel) is a good thing. And he also talked about how the college’s
purpose is education, not athletics, and Ole Miss is excelling
academically. He’s right. Last week I received an e-mail from a friend who loves Ole Miss. It
included an article – “Are Colleges Worth the Price of Admission?” It
was written by Andrew Hacker and Claudia Dreifus and adapted from their
new book “Higher Education? How Colleges Are Wasting Our Money and
Failing Our Kids – and What We Can Do About It.” In
their travels around the country researching their book, professors
Hacker and Dreifus found some colleges they believed were doing their
jobs well. Atop the list of “doing well” is Ole Miss. They
write – “It is a university where reconciliation and civility are at
the heart of the educational mission. Much of the transformation has
been the work of Robert Khayat, who retired from the chancellorship in
2009. In his 14 years there, he raised academic standards, tripled
African-American enrollment, and banned Confederate flags from athletic
events. Under his leadership the university reached into its past for
different pieces of the state’s history. Think Eudora Welty, William
Faulkner, and Tennessee Williams. Ole Miss has a Center for the Study
of Southern Culture that focuses on the art, literature, music, and
food of the region, black and white. Indeed, of all the flagship
colleges we have visited, we have found Ole Miss the most appealing.
The campus has the feel of a liberal-arts college. Its Sally McDonnell
Barksdale Honors College offers as fine an education as one might find
at Carleton or Kenyon Colleges.” Following Ole
Miss on the prestigious list were – Raritan Valley Community College,
University of Notre Dame, the Cooper Union for the Advancement of
Science and Art, Berea College, Arizona State University, University of
Maryland-Baltimore County, University of Colorado at Boulder,
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Western Oregon University and
Evergreen State College. The authors conclude –
“the institutions that we’ve cited are exceptions to our premise that
higher education has lost track of its original and enduring purpose.
They reinforce our view that college should be a cultural journey, an
intellectual expedition, a voyage confronting new ideas and
information. Many colleges with national names and universities with
imperial plans could learn a lot from them.” The
mascot search has been narrowed to five – a horse, a land shark, Hotty
and Toddy, a lion and a bear. But that’s not nearly as important as
this positive report.
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