Greed – Our University
Barbara Bush acknowledged a number of years ago, possibly when First Lady, what she believed was the most pressing problem in America. “Greed.” We have heard a great deal about greed on Wall Street. Bankers who want to make…
Year 2008
Our University – Concern and Compassion
Bill and Jan, our friends from Murphysboro, were at the Saluki football game on Saturday last week. Somewhere along the way the excitement and workings of time got to Bill. He had a cardiac arrest. It was serious business, his…
Our University – Building Community
The greatest challenge of any university is building a community. This probably could be said for any enterprise, including towns in Southern Illinois that so many of us call home. Individuals sometimes get things done, communities almost always get things…
Our University – Calcification
Calcification is what happens to soft tissue when it is taken over by calcium. It gets hard. It is no longer resilient. It becomes immobile. And eventually, it cannot work or act the way it was intended to. While I…
Our University – Purpose
St. Paul was a brave man. He summed up the purpose of the Christian Church in ten words uttered to the Church at Corinth: “Be imitators of me, as I also am of Christ.” The simplicity…
Our University and Alcohol Consumption
Any good university is concerned first and foremost, now and always, with academic excellence. That is our purpose. 128 university presidents signed onto The Amethyst Initiative, a recent effort suggesting the drinking age should be lowered to 18. The primary…
Our University and the Creation of a Middle Class
I recently had the opportunity to spend time in Vietnam. For veterans who served “in country” Vietnam is a different place today. It is teeming with free enterprise, the entrepreneurial spirit. New business start-ups are everywhere and there is a…
Our University – Dr. Seymour Bryson
Universities are affected by many forces at work in the environment. Location, student population, faculty composition and a multitude of other factors shape what a university is. On occasion, an individual will come along and join a university, sometimes as…
Our University: Reserve Officers’ Training Corps
The idea of coupling military training and university education originated in 1783. New York Governor George Clinton proposed that civilian colleges, one in each state of the union, offer military training to students. The construct is remarkably similar to…
Our University – Lay Leadership
In places of worship we often think about the importance of lay leadership. No matter how powerful the spiritual leader, how driven by God, how adroit at understanding the business of the organization, how gifted in dealing with people helping…
Our University – A Parents View
There are many perspectives that you can take of our university, ways to see it, ways to engage it, ways to experience it. I have had, over the years, a number of opportunities to talk with parents of students. They…
Our University and the Idea of Accountability
In a great university… this could probably be said for any great organization… individuals must feel responsibility for the future, that it rests on their actions and decisions. This creates a powerful kind of accountability, a deep sense of purpose…
Campus Life for Students
The ability of our university to reach full potential and to engender in students a concentrated and powerful academic experience rests with the nature of the campus as a place to live, as well as a place to study. Ideally,…
Our Campus
Campus evokes strong memories for graduates. The word was first used in the United States to describe the ground Princeton University occupied. In a letter Charles C. Beatty 1775 wrote to his brother-in-law Enoch Green 1760 on January 31, 1774:…
Athletics Builds Community
Creating a strong sense of community for students, faculty, staff, alumni and friends is crucial to building a strong university. There are many avenues through which communities are built, but one that is undeniably powerful for public research universities is…
Quality is Our First Job
Wanting our university to grow in stature and importance, because it will be a better friend to our region, is an appropriate and powerful aspiration. There is only one way to do it. Seeking quality, defined and heralded as academic…
Our University – Our Neighborhood
Universities are a particular type of thread in a neighborhood fabric. In cities, neighborhood is a highly local concept, comprising maybe a few blocks, but not so with Southern, nestled between two rivers, and twice that many cultures. Our university…
Robert Reid – Flagman of Southern
I came to work one morning last week and noticed a policeman raising a flag. For those of you who don’t know our campus, this was a surprise because Robert Reid raised and lowered the campus flags every day. An…
