Month: March 2023

The headline says it all:  “Shelter-in-place lifted at Monmouth University after curling iron mistaken for weapon” (ABC News Online, March 23).

Don’t fret, Monmouth.  You have plenty of company in the mistaken-identity sweepstakes.  Consider these three incidents from just the past 30 days:

March 2nd:  At Oklahoma State University, a ripe avocado left on a tray in the dining commons was mistaken for a live hand grenade by Mildred Urf, a 72-year-old cashier beloved by students.  Yelling “Save yourselves!” Ms. Urf sprinted toward the tray and jumped, smothering the avocado with her stomach.  She suffered a severe navel bruise and was later awarded the school’s Badge of Courage by OSU President Kayse Shrum.  

March 14th:  Three varsity football players at Louisiana State University, unhappy with their limited playing time last season, mistook a manhole cover on a campus street for the transfer portal to Auburn University.  They proceeded to remove the cover and descend into LSU’s extensive sewer system.  They were found six days later, “stinking to high heaven,” according to the school’s police chief.  “There’s not enough AXE Body Spray in the entire universe to get them smelling decent again.”

March 22nd:  An adjunct instructor at the College of William and Mary was mistaken for a tenure-track faculty member and allowed to sit in the “Professorial Section” at a campus-wide meeting.  When the error was discovered, the instructor, a male, resisted being relocated to the block of seats reserved for part-time faculty and women at the rear of the auditorium.  A scuffle ensued and an officer was bitten, but it’s not clear by whom.   The incident is currently under investigation.  

QUICK!!!  Is that thing in the middle of the quad a stray Birkenstock sandal or an Improvised Explosive Device???

A recent national survey found that 58.5% of college students are reluctant to discuss at least one of the following hot-button topics in class: race, gender, politics, religion, and sexual orientation (Chronicle of Higher Education, March 22nd online). 

58.5% may seem high, but it pales in comparison to 97%, which is the percentage of students who absolutely refuse to talk in class about any of the following: differential calculus, amoebic dysentery, the Code of Hammurabi, the Oxford comma, and Gallium, the 31st element in the Periodic Table.  

Consider the case of Terrance Flish, a sophomore at Florida State University.  He claims that differential calculus is his personal “trauma trigger.”  “Last week my Math professor called on me to explain the difference between differential calculus and integral calculus.  I froze, and then totally lost bowel control right in front of everyone.  The professor made fun of me and joked that my large intestine had emptied so completely that I should go to Walgreens for a free colonoscopy.  I was mortified.  Later, I was even more mortified when I discovered that Walgreens doesn’t perform colonoscopies.”

At Muhlenberg College, an English professor asked Melanie Nulf-Petras what her opinion was of the Oxford comma.  “I passed out,” she reports.  “Now I have nightmares nearly every night about writing sentences that contain lists, and the medication I’m taking for the dreams is causing my eyebrows to grow down the sides of my cheeks.  My life is beyond horrible.” 

An ROTC instructor at Sam Houston State University asked freshman Matthew Capsaicin to recite Law 110 from the Code of Hammurabi.  As Capsaicin recounts the incident, “I panicked and said, ‘Thou shalt not wear white after Labor Day’.  [The correct answer: ‘If a sister of god opens a tavern, or enters a tavern to drink, then shall this woman be burned to death’.]  The instructor yelled ‘WRONG!’ and proceeded to pull a pistol from his pants pocket and shoot me twice in the left leg, right below the knee.  Two weeks later I was cut from the varsity basketball team and lost my athletic scholarship.  My parents were not happy.”

Yes, college students are afraid to talk in class.

And it looks like they should be.  

In recent months, U.S. News & World Report has been taking more body blows than Michael B. Jordan in Creed III, as one high-profile school after another refuses to participate in the magazine’s annual college and university rankings. 

On Wednesday, however, the Report bounced off the ropes and landed a punch of its own, unveiling a new dimension that will, in the words of company CEO Eric Gertler, “help ensure the validity of our college prestige rankings for decades to come.”

Dubbed “G-7,“ it measures the grandeur of a school’s inauguration ceremony for a new president or chancellor.

A college or university’s G-7 score will incorporate the following components:

INAUGURATION VENUE

100 pts.:  Cathedral (at least 300 years old)

50 pts.:  Cathedral (less than 300 years old)

5 pts.:  Anywhere else

WHO ATTENDS THE INAUGURATION IN AN OFFICIAL CAPACITY?

100 pts.:  Monarchs, Potentates, Prime Ministers, Overlords, etc. 

90 pts.:  Nobel Prize winners in STEM fields

85 pts.:  Neil deGrasse Tyson

80 pts.:  George Clooney

75 pts.:  Football coaches from the Southeastern Conference (SEC)

70 pts.:  College and university presidents with a Ph.D. 

65 pts.:  College and university presidents without a Ph.D. 

60 pts.:  Head of the faculty union (not wearing a protest sign)

50 pts.:  Chair of the Core Curriculum Committee

45 pts.:  Emeritus professors (cognitively intact)

40 pts.:  Emeritus professors (not quite cognitively intact)

35 pts.:  Student government presidents with at least a 2.75 GPA

30 pts.:  Adjunct faculty with a minimum of 30 teaching credits

25 pts.:  Live poultry from a neighboring institution’s School of Agriculture (must be wearing ceremonial robes)

15 pts.:  A bucket of KFC donated by a local franchisee

-10 pts.:  Head of the faculty union (wearing a protest sign) 

INAUGURAL MUSIC

100 pts.:  Symphony composed by John Williams especially for the event

75 pts.:  Barry Manilow medley performed by the school’s marching band

50 pts.:  Star-Spangled Banner sung by a sophomore Music major with a head cold

20 pts.:  Pre-recorded “Tunes to Twerk By” played by a local DJ

FEATURED SPEAKER

100 pts.:  Jon Stewart

80 pts.:  Patrick Stewart

40 pts.:  Rod Stewart

30 pts.:  Stewie (from “Family Guy”)

10 pts.:  Martha Stewart

ATTIRE FOR POST-INAUGURATION RECEPTION

100 pts.:  Formal wear featured in the New York Times Style Magazine

70 pts.:  Sweats

30 pts.:  Anything from the “Trailer Park” rack at David’s Bridal

RECEPTION HORS D’OEUVRES

100 pts.:  Shrimp cocktail (with sauce)

90 pts.:  Shrimp cocktail (without sauce)

80 pts.:  Cheese bits (with toothpicks)

70 pts.:  Cheese bits (without toothpicks)

60 pts.:  Hummus (with crackers)

50 pts.:  Hummus (without crackers)

40 pts.:  Turkey jerky

30 pts.:  No-salt Cheez-Its

RECEPTION BEVERAGES

100 pts.:  Wine

90 pts.:  Beer in wine glasses

80 pts.:  Beer in glass bottles

70 pts.:  Beer in cans

60 pts.:  Beer in 20-ounce stadium cups

50 pts.:  Breast milk

40 pts.:  Tap water

30 pts.:  Pedialyte Grape 

Immediately following the U.S. News & World Report press conference introducing the inauguration factor, Harvard and Yale Law Schools announced that they would resume participating in the ranking process.  As Harvard Law Dean John F. Manning put it, “we’re back in the game, baby, with gold-tasseled loafers on both feet!”  

 

Controversy briefly swirled on social media last month after a Latina was crowned Miss Coppin State University.  Coppin State is an HBCU in Maryland, with only 3% of its student body identifying as Latino or Hispanic (The Baltimore Banner, February 4th online).  

Upon hearing this news, Ron DeSantis, Governor of Florida and champion of no-nonsense higher education, issued an Executive Order designed to prevent such an occurrence from ever happening in the Sunshine State. 

Beginning July 1st, 2023, all Florida HBCU pageant contestants must submit, as part of their application portfolio, a complete DNA profile generated by either 23andMe or Ancestry.com.  They will need to demonstrate at least 90% Black heritage in order to move forward in the competition.  

“It’s the least we can do to protect the integrity of these contests,” says DeSantis.  “Indeed, I look forward to the day when a DNA requirement will apply to anyone who even seeks admission to a Florida HBCU.  Let’s face it, the sooner that every college and university in the nation replaces the SAT and ACT with genetic testing, the better off we’ll all be.  It’s time to sort out, once and for all, who belongs where.

“I’m Ron DeSantis, and I approved this message.”