Whitmire won’t be around forever…we just wait it out and have Renu try again
As I’ve mentioned though. It’s now a virtual impossibility, as they moved over 4,000 undergrads from the College of Technology off campus and, in effect, disengaged them from campus life/made “super-commuters” out of them.
That was a really BONE HEADED move, in my view.
Does any public U in Texas require students outside of 50 miles to live on campus?
When I originally went to Sam in 2001 it was a rule. I lived 42 miles from campus and my parents decided at the last minute I should commute. Talk about killing any kind of college experience.
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TX State apparently has a housing mandate.
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I know LSU requires Freshmen to live on campus, also.
Now would be a good time to steal some kids from LSU!
Schools don’t really care about the first or second list. What they care about are:
- HS Stats (i.e., SAT/ACT scores, GPA, AP tests, etc.).
- Graduation Rates (Six year specifically)
- Post-Graduation employment rates
- Donor giving
Why do they care about these? Because these are what impact school rankings.
Now some schools do some of these things on your list: for example, Miami U requires all OOS students to live on campus for 2 years. They also have Miami U alum come and speak to students regularly. When I was at UH, I don’t remember us doing that, other than the UHLC.
If you want UH students to wear UH stuff, make going to UH worth it. I wear UH stuff whenever I am out; hats, shirts, pullover, you name it. When I do, people always comment: “Man ya’ll got a great squad!” I loved Andre Ware!" “Phi Slama Jama!”, “Keenum was a beast!” etc. I get more compliments out of Texas than I do when I am back in town!
This is the issue.
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Yep, same here!
I get convos whenever I am traveling or at the airport whenever wearing my UH gear.
The rep that UH/Tech is tier behind A&M, UT, Rice etc will never go away inside the state.
Sometimes it is your own people that gives you a bad reputation.
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I think this is a non-issue; I have the same thing happen with Astros and Texans and Rockets gear, and with Auburn gear in Houston. It really has more to do with the fact that the “home team” is relatively boring to talk about everywhere. I’d be shocked if UT and A&M alums don’t have similar experiences.
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I don’t know man, I see a lot of people wearing UT and TAMU all over Austin, SA, Houston and Dallas. Heck I see some of them in Atlanta.
Reduce undergrad acceptance rates by a small percentage as well. That would lower some of that end of the ratio while allowing equal space for more grad students. Plus move up a little in rankings.
Not sold on mandated on campus living. It would at least need an exception for those that live at home - but that discussion was had (last year?).
I still support making the campus worth being on, not forced.
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There were SO MANY exceptions in Renu’s plan that it was a mandate with training wheels.
This telling is ahistorical, especially when it comes to public universities. Most of the Ivies aren’t exactly in the middle of nowhere – Harvard and Penn, the two oldest, are in major metropolitan areas. The first Women’s College in the US wasn’t founded until half Penn had been around for a half-century, and when it was, it wasn’t exactly established next door to the Men’s college. Coed education didn’t really take hold until after the Civil War.
There’s a much more parsimonious explanation as to why colleges are where they are – for most flagship state colleges that were chartered by their state legislature, they were either placed near the state’s Capitol (Austin, Madison, Lansing, Columbus, Baton Rouge…) or halfway between two or more major cities (College Station, Gainesville, Athens…) because those were the places that were easiest to compromise on politically. Schools that were founded as private schools were basically founded wherever their founder wanted to put them, which tends to be where they lived. The idea that this was a deliberate attempt to enforce a social hierarchy doesn’t make any sense if you look at all into the history of schools that were dropped in the middle of nowhere like Clemson and Auburn and Texas A&M.
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Not entirely true (Though I do agree with your post). Economics and political pull had a big influence.
Some moved a few times to get where there were students. Baylor moved to Waco because it was on the railroad line. TCU moved to Waco until the campus mysteriously burned down, then moved to Fort Worth because they were offered a good deal on land by the city. SMU was in Dallas because of church leaders choices to be in a metro area, and had originally considered Fort Worth.
Yes…the Ivies were for the elite of the town, so nearby.
The publics were for the classes below them. So the upper middle class from i.e. Pittsburgh & Philadelphia sent their children to State College, Pennsylvania ( in the middle of the state) for a formal education.
We could / should have a fish camp that is required for freshmen and transfers to really explain why it’s expected and needed for them to stay connected down road. Go over all traditions and make sports an integral part of that fish camp orientation as well as the other reasons.
We could create higher value students.
This is cheap to do also.
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We already do have fish camp.
It’s obviously “wanted” by the school for possible future donations but what benefit is there to the student to be connected down the road?
There are many benefits, from creating a network to helping themselves find new job opportunities to utilizing the University to find new employees/interns to being allowed to use the University to showcase their own work via presentations/lectures, teaching opportunities, mentor opportunities, etc.
Essentially, attending a University “should” be form a LIFE LONG CONNECTION. It should be your family.
I think the University of Houston has failed to leave this impression in the overwhelming majority of students that earn a degree here.
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