bill stevens said...
First, let me start with something you wrote with which I disagree: "Students don't come here for the administration, the football stadium, or new buildings; they are here to be educated by the professors."
That is true for some of them, but most of them are here to get a credential (degree) and if education occurs in the process, well that's a happy coincidence. Most students I know spend so much time in the Carbondale service workforce that there is inadequate time for both sleep and study. (Yes, they do party, but wouldn't you after pulling a double shift waiting tables?)
I have to agree that Bill has got me, he is correct about the reality of the students that SIUC attracts now (and really, this is a whole generation of the children of baby boomers who largely treat universities as trades schools). But, I was talking about marketing, not reality.
When you build a company from scratch (which is what I do for living - BoundlessGallery.com is my current gig, please buy some art we need the business. :)) you spend a lot of time figuring out the marketing story. I think of this as the "How much is that doggy in the window" view. You know that the dog is cute, but you need to make the customer forget about how bad it is to own it until after they buy. This is marketing and it is really, really important if you want to win (check earlier post, I like to win). I think that SIUC's management thinks that a football stadium is going to make this happen, I don't think it is.
I think that SIUC's marketing message to perspective students and parents of those students is better served by raising standards, quality, jobs coming out of school and real world stuff like that.
For example, if you want to really spin a parents top, doing a great job helping their kid get a job when they graduate is really, really important. Currently, if you go to U of I your kid doesn't come home and live with you for a year and work at Subway while they find their first job. If you want to get parents excited about SIUC, how about starting to get companies to come and interview here? Teach to students to interview before then maybe? Certainly, you need to rethink the Woody Hall career services, that is a joke and has been for at least 25 years (I was a student back then). Check out the one woman placement office in the College of Business, they have as many on campus interviews as the rest of the campus combined. I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think I am.
The problem with this view of the world is that employers really do know when your students know something and when they don't. The rubber hits the road in a technical interview. If your students stink, they don't get hired into good jobs.
So, Bill is right. Once the student is here, they work to much to pay for their car and lifestyle as a player, don't study, treat SIUC as a trade school, etc. But that is just reality of the puppies in the window, as long as their parents (and the child) pay to come here we can deal with that problem next. And really, they are children and are perfectly willing to live down to the expectations their professors set for them (anyone else feeling that grade inflation and professors cheating post coming?). We can all use a kick in the pants once in a while, when you are 18 you need it way more often.
The people want quality, earned through hard work. I'm not saying they want to put the effort in themselves all the time though. The Wendler vision of "The Silver Bullet" never works (included a link, Silver Bullet means you can do one simple thing to fix your complex problems and it will work).
Let me ask, does anyone think that the Southern at 150 or Saluki Way is going to work? Anyone?
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