I'MMA LET YOU FINISH
Maybe they were ruining the college's statistics for % graduating and GPA?
They don't believe in affirmative action down in Texas ... all about merit and the "high ground" ... er, well, as of now...
I don't know anything about A&M specifically, but as a former admissions officer I can tell you that this will end legacy admissions only to the extent that any given person in their Admissions Office (or higher up) wants it to for a given student. Which is not to say that there won't be some changes; in general, admissions folks like not having to explain why they made the decisions they did, and abolishing legacy programs gets a lot of people off their backs. But in the final analysis, there is NO school immune to pressure from sufficiently wealthy or politically-connected alums, and there is ALWAYS enough wiggle room in the other numbers to admit virtually any candidate.
Still, it's good news--because most otherwise ineligible legacy-candidates DON'T have someone powerful in their corner, it should make it that much more merit-based overall. Now if only Texas high schools were producing college-ready students, we'd be all set--but that's a different rant.
They interviewed a number of alums last night for the local news, and by god, those ol' boys are pissed about this. Needless to say, they were all white, and they seem to think A&M is their country club, or something. Then they showed the cadet corps marching - looking like nothing so much as the Hitler Youth in those tall boots. My husband said: "who in their right mind would go anywhere near the place." My sentiments exactly. A&M is a state wide joke, but this is good thing. That campus is very white, and they had one of those goddamned "affirmative action" bakesales last year, just like SMU. I just love it when spoiled rotten white kids whine about being discriminated against. Fucking absurd.
what the hell is an aggie?
nora - an aggie is an A&M student or alum. It's short for Agricultural and Military - which is what A&M stands for.
A marble I think. Hehe.
FWIW, the A&M website says the M stands for "Mechanical," not "Military."
catalexis - well I do think they have marbles where there are supposed to be brains.
Truly, being an aggie is like a religion with aggies, and they are not particularly well-liked or thought of outside of aggie land.
It's short for Agricultural and Military
Agricultural and Mechanical. We can assume your other pontifications regarding A&M are similarly misinformed.
HA! They need to work hard and diligently at their homework. Whenever I read about legacies, I think about Animal House. What a funny movie....
By the way Atrios, why didn't you tell us you are FRENCH??? I had to find it out by reading "Jesus' General". General JC Christian is sure is heterosexually manly! He has a really funny account of going to a Church party... whew!!!
FlipYrWhig - Oops - you're right. I always do that - I can never remember that it's not military, since it looks so obviously as if it should be.
And that's how much time I spend thinking about aggies.
A few weeks ago they ended their affirmative action program. The outcry was substantial, particularly regarding the hypocrisy of continuing legacy admissions. So this was their decision. I'm sure they had no intention of doing it for the right reasons.
An Aggie and another college student found themselves in a public restroom at the same time. Both did their business, and turned to leave, but on the way out the Aggie stopped to wash his hands.
Outside, they bumped into each other again, and the Aggie said proudly, "At my school, Texas A&M, they teach us to wash our hands after we go to the restroom."
The other student said, "That's cool. At my school, they teach us not to piss on our hands."
Thanks, folks. I'll be here all week.
Tena, Nora:
A&M usually stands for Agricultural and Mechanical. The Florida A&M and Alabama A&M websites spell it out this way. The Texas A&M websites never spell it out, and they may be different - or their corps of cadets all might be wrong.
A&M universities are sometimes called "cow and plow".
That's un-American! Where would George W. Bush be without legacy admissions? (He got rejected by the University of Texas Law School, btw.)
Now if we can just get the legacy admission out of the RhiteHouse...
FWIW--"A & M", as in TAMU, USED to stand for "Agricultural and Mechanical." So the team is called, and all alum of TAMU are still called, "Aggies."
But at some point after TAMC became TAMU, the kept the "A&M" but dropped the use as initials. So the official school name is "Texas A&M University," and "A&M" are no longer initials for anything.
As for the school's reputation: "Aggies," statewide, are the substitute for "dumb blondes" or "morons" or whatever group you want to disparage by starting a joke that includes them (and everyone knows how the joke will end). On the other hand, it has one of the finest veterinary schools in the country.
It is a school rich with tradition; in fact, it practically chokes on it. When the annual bonfire killed several students many years ago (it's an engineering school, but the tragic joke was none of the students could engineer a pile of wood that would stand up, and it collapsed on several students in the early morning), the school cancelled future bonfires. Ever since, students (with the help of rabid alumni) have built an "unofficial" bonfire. Why? It's tradition.
So ending legacy admissions will probably be like banning the bonfire: a decision more honored in the breach.
Oh, and it was an all-male quasi-military school until the '60's or so. To enter A&M back then was to join the "Corps." To this day, only members of the "Corps" can be in the school band, and Seniors (complete with ornamental swords and leather knee boots) guard the football field during games. At A&M, only the players are allowed on the field. One year, an overzealous senior took after an SMU cheerleader with his sword when said cheerleader left the sidelines and set foot on the hallowed field.
Oh, and all A&M football fans stand during the entire game, remembering the "12th man," a player who (IIRC) stood on the sidelines during an entire game, ready to go in if needed. Why does everyone stand now? It's tradition.
Now you know as much about A&M as ever you need to.
Aggie "tradition" reminds me of Churchill's comment about the traditions of the Royal Navy: rum, sodomy, and the lash.
Robert M Jeffers - Like I said, being an aggie is a religion with them.
And Everyone Else - please don't equate all of Texas with aggies and/or A&M. We think they're weird, too. As Robert pointed out, they have their very own category of joke - the Aggie joke.
Needless to say, they were all white, and they seem to think A&M is their country club, or something.
Every alumni association, I think, has this contingent. Trouble is, they're all rich as hell, and younger alumni, who are poor in money but rich in ideas and energy, often get shut out in favor of Big Pete, whose Pappy went to school here and whose Grandpappy did as well, and now Big Pete owns a paper mill and wants the alumni association to sponsor football trips and cruises instead of , oh, I don't know, helping to raise money for education so the university doesn't become a completely research-based, government-grant dependent factory for academics. Meanwhile, here we sit, the over-60 and the under-30 crowds, remembering the days when education meant something ...
[/rant]
A.
Tena-
Tha's the most succinct way of putting it I know. My brother is an Aggie, although normal in most respects. My wife and I visited A&M almost 20 years ago when he was there. She still considers the people there completely lunatic. In a very scary way.
"Religion" is almost weak. "Cult," although objectively unfair, comes closer.
Robert,
The Corps was also a commissioning program, originally. When the university "modernized," they not only made Corps membership optional, but separated the ROTC program from it. So it was thenceforth insulated any test of functional usefulness whatsoever, aside from guarding its asinine "traditions." I used to know some non-Corps ROTC's who referred to the Corps turds as boy scouts.
The level of sadism within the Corps resembles that of the British public schools more than the typical American frat boy type of hazing.
TAMU certainly deserves some of what it gets, but not all. I got a great education there and I'll never forget it.
Also, land grant universities (the former and current A&M schools) are symbols of democracy at its finest. The land grant act made it possible for anyone to get a higher education regardless of their personal wealth, and the land grants took on the role of creating and sharing knowledge that would directly assist their communities prosper. Although things have changed a fair amount, and specific institutions are still laden with racism, sexism, heterosexism, and ethnocentrism, the land grants still serve their states in significant ways that other universities simply do not.
So sayeth a professor at a land grant!
Athenae - I really love the university my husband attended - they play football for fun, instead of for profit. Anyone who wants to play can, which I think is cool. So they aren't in the big leagues - and I consider that a plus.
The school is very much about education, and it shows - he got a real classical education. To me, that's what it should be about.
He went to what is now called Rhodes, but was called Southwestern when he was there. It's a Presbyterian liberal arts school in Memphis, Tennessee, of all places.
Robert M Jeffers - You're right - cult is much more like it. But it's also true that that applies to the cadets more than the general student body, I think.
I almost mentioned the veterinary school earlier. There are very few vet schools in the country, and that is one of the best.
OT, but from the Thanks for the Votes, Suckers Dept...
When he was campaigning in September to become governor of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger criticized then-Gov. Gray Davis for signing a budget that contained "more special effects than 'Terminator 3.' "
The line drew easy laughs from a sympathetic audience, a meeting of the California Chamber of Commerce in Orange County. But when he unveiled his 2004- 2005 spending plan on Friday, his budget contained many of the very same borrowing and fund transfers -- though administration officials have sought to explain away some of them as being different.
"This is the same kind of hocus-pocus that got Gray Davis fired," said state Sen. Don Perata, D-Oakland.
Schwarzenegger said Davis' last two budgets "were shell games, using tricks and gimmicks to put off the hard decisions.'' The new governor said his budget doesn't use such gimmickry and tries to take more innovative approaches. Too many people believe there are only two ways to balance a budget, "either cut programs or raise taxes,'' Schwarzenegger said. "But there is a third way or a fourth way. We just have to be creative.''
But there are few signs of that creativity in his budget plan. In many respects, the spending plan could have been written by Davis...
Instead of the painless elimination of "waste and fraud" that Schwarzenegger continues to pledge, there were the difficult choices of further restricting access to higher education, slashing funding for poor children's medical services and a $400 million cut to state prisons.
Administration officials said Friday they would make use of $3 billion in one-time savings, primarily from using part of the proceeds of a proposed $15 billion bond measure this year to cover part of the deficit.
But the governor's critics say there are at least $6 billion in one-time fixes plus a temporary suspension of funds that are supposed to pay for transportation projects and a deferral of payments to the education system.
The critics' point is not merely an academic one about intellectual honesty. By using the one-time fixes, they say, not only is next year's budget not truly balanced, but the state will face a deficit the following year as well.
State Treasurer Phil Angelides estimates that Schwarzenegger is using one- time tricks to paper over about $8 billion, or 57 percent, of the deficit.
"This budget has more one-time fixes than any spending addict could dream of," he said. "This budget does nothing to resolve the structural imbalance that we have had..."
"It just amazes me that when these things were suggested last year, we were the Antichrist, but now that they are suggested this year, it's OK," said Assembly Speaker Herb Wesson, D-Culver City.
But the administration's plans go far beyond that. Also contemplated is a one-time "rebasing" of t
(cont)...the administration's plans go far beyond that. Also contemplated is a one-time "rebasing" of the money owed to the school system under the state's constitutional educational funding requirements. The change will lower the money otherwise owed to schools by $2 billion.
Schwarzenegger Finance Director Donna Arduin sought to explain this as not being a one-time fix by saying that savings from the change will still carry out over the years, even though the money must eventually be repaid.
"It's not a one-time savings," she said. "You get savings over a number of years."
Schwarzenegger also has a plan to issue $950 million in bonds to cover roughly half of the state's cash obligation to state workers' pension funds. Davis' budget last year contemplated a $2 billion bond issue to cover the state's pension fund contribution -- which itself was supposed to be a one- time fix -- but the move was blocked by a state court.
Asked for an explanation as to why that isn't exactly the kind of one- time fix Schwarzenegger previously railed against, Arduin said only: "This is replacing a liability within the pension system."
The budget also contemplates using nearly $1 billion from funding for transportation projects, which Davis' last budget did. Arduin acknowledged that it may indeed be a one-time fix because the administration is planning to take the money permanently rather than borrow it.
Godammit Kevin, it was "rum, buggery, and the lash" that made the Royal Navy great. Scans better that way, doncha know.
dave - well, no surprise there, as far as I'm concerned.
What the hell did Californians expect when they elected him? It's a good example of what can happen when people decide that "career politicians" are the problem, and elect a completely unqualified candidate.
I feel sorry for California - it looks like they are in for a very bad ride.
I actually like A&M. I have friends and family who went there. But I wouldn't send my daughter there, unless she insists (she has dreams of being a veterinarian, but she's 11, and loves animals, and that's as far as it goes at the moment).
To me, the quintessential Aggie moment was the collapse of the bonfire, a monstrously huge pile of lumber (telephone pole size lumber, mind you; I mean, it takes heavy equipment to set up this thing) that was so poorly built it collapsed and killed several students.
Rather than mourn and reconsider the wisdom of this "tradition," zealous alumni and tradition besotted students set up another bonfire almost immediately, and still set one up every year.
Worshipping tradition above human life is just a bit creepy to me. And no, not everyone at A&M is that crazy. But still, it's scary.
Jeffers,
Lets get our kids together sometime. I have a ten year old. Not so coincidentally she loves animals too. Any idea where I can get a real cheap horse?
Robert M. Jeffers, "Rather than mourn and reconsider the wisdom of this "tradition," zealous alumni and tradition besotted students set up another bonfire almost immediately, and still set one up every year."
Although I went to A&M, I'm not wedded to the bonfire. I thought it was a bizarre ritual, myself. But I don't think the bonfire is inherently dangerous. With the proper oversight, I think it could be accomplished without loss of life or limb.
"Although I went to A&M, I'm not wedded to the bonfire. I thought it was a bizarre ritual, myself. But I don't think the bonfire is inherently dangerous. With the proper oversight, I think it could be accomplished without loss of life or limb."
I kept thinking the A&M Administration would do just that, but apparently they either didn't want the liability (understandable), or couldn't get the size of the bonfire limited to some that would be less dangerous (IIRC, Texas Monthly ran an article analyzing the structure of the "classic" A&M bonfire, and it was highly critical of the design, and dubious anything safe could be engineered).
Either way, I figured they knew what they were doing when they banned it. What's scary is the people who desperately wanted it to continue, without apparent regard for those who died for the "tradition."
"Lets get our kids together sometime. I have a ten year old. Not so coincidentally she loves animals too. Any idea where I can get a real cheap horse?"
If I did, I'd have bought it already. I haven't been on a horse since MY childhood. And I miss it.
Maybe my problem is that I am not a big adherent of "tradition," so I think it's insane to keep doing something solely on that basis.
The bonfire ritual had gotten so huge - the one that collapsed was ridiculous. I could see a bonfire, but they were building a BONFIRE. It was tragic when the 12 students were killed. And it boggles my mind that they can't let go of the tradition in the face of that tragedy.
Aggies are weird, but they do have a great vet school. My current vet was educated there, and they have the best lab in the state. The engineering programs are pretty good to.
As for the bonfire, if my kid went to school and got killed by an oversized pile of firewood, I'd be mighty pissed. It's stupid. They have some idea that they have to out do the University of TX, another stupidity, because UT couldn't care less about the bonfire.
Anyway, aggieness is kind of a religion. We were in East Texas last summer for a funeral, and someone egged my brother's truck because he had a UT decal in his back window. Pretty silly.
I don't really have any friends who were aggies, so maybe my outlook on it is not as positive as it would be if I actually knew someone well who had gone there.
I have a classic outsiders view - aggies are a joke. But I know that can't be the whole picture, because otherwise it wouldn't engender such loyalty.
Since I'm in the company of Texans here, I have to ask: Do Texans see anything slightly effeminate about Bush owning a ranch but being afraid to get up on a horse?
Just wondering.
Sorry, effeminate was the wrongest damn word I could have used. Perhaps chickenshit would be closer.
Someone once said that if the universe made sense, only men would ride sidesaddle.
I have a close relative with inlaws who are some of those Aggie traditionalists. Two of them gave money to endow chairs at A&M. The boys in that family are all expected to go there. Her husband went for a year, then went to another college, so he's not a "proper" A&M graduate. I know the pressure is on her oldest kid (the one with the sterling grades who plays football) to go to A&M. The kid himself is not that interested; I think he's got his sights set on Harvard.
Me? I'm a graduate of University of Texas and I regularly give these inlaws the high sign "Hook 'em Horns!"
I don't know that it's effeminate for him not to get on a horse if he owns a ranch. I do think it's stupid to call that property out in Crawford a "ranch", but a lot of rich city slicker Texans do the same thing (buy a few hundred acres, build a bigass house on it, and then call it a ranch).
Personally, I think he's a chickenshit, but then we already knew that.
Legacies... affirmative action for the white elite's mediocre children.
Best example? .... The Shrub.
As a liberal aggie, I must ask...are any of your characterizations based on first-hand knowledge of student life there?
Or am I seeing the reverse of the "all universities are hotbeds of communism etc, etc" from conservatives?
As to not understanding the traditions, there are many, many more traditions than just bonfire. There's saying "howdy" to everyone you see. There's not walking on the grass around the student center to show respect for the aggies who lost their lives while at war. There's silver taps, a ceremony held the first tuesday of every month to commemorate the students who died in the previous month. There's muster, where current and former students get together once a year. There's The Big Event, a day when all the students go around the town volunteering for people (usually older or lower income households). There's Replant, a day when all the students go around town planting trees.
Now, IMHO, bonfire got too big for its own good and we focused more on the actual bonfire than what it was about, which was a way to have all the students get together.
The reason there is not yet an "official" bonfire is that the school doesn't want to do that while there are still lawsuits pending re: the collapse.
I was just wondering, as I said. We're not big horse country here in North Carolina (unless you're wealthy and run steeplechase or trotters, even a few polo ponies in the higher income zip codes) so I was curious what Texans, with their cowboy culture, thought of that. Has Bush ever said why he won't ride? Hell, even Reagan got up on a horse and he was just a Hollywood cowboy.
cosmic grappler - Ok, let's go through this one more time, very very slowly. None of the Bushes are Texans.
The "ranch" is just some acreage. Anybody can buy some acres and call them any damn thing they want to, but Bush is not a Texan, he is not a cowboy - he just is playing a game.
I'm pretty sure there are maybe some real cowboys in Texas, but I haven't met any. I have been privileged to have known a real live cowboy, when I was a kid. He was in Colorado, and he was old then. I don't know how many are actually left there, either, because there seem to be fewer and fewer working ranches there.
Bush is a total spoiled little slacker Mama's boy and I would expect him to be scared of horses. He's a fucking Ivy League frat boy - please quit thinking that he's a Texan, let alone a cowboy.
Ah, Tena, I stand corrected.
But Bush lives there, and people vote for him, so I thought maybe, just once, someone had asked him the horse question.
As for Texas, being a musician I gotta love it from Bob Wills to the Lizards to Lyle, Willie and Buddy Holly. Oh yeah. You guys must have something in the water.
cosmic - well, thank you so much for saying something nice about Texas, since we really take the abuse lately. I know he spent time here growing up and I know he was governor. But none of the Bushes are Texans. They seem to have grown up in a number of places, and then fanned out across the country to claim different territories - Jeb has Florida, George was here, Neil thought he'd take over Colorado, until he got caught being a criminal, which is what they really all are. A crime syndicate. As far as I can tell, Poppy doesn't have an address, and I've said many times that I truly believe that Babs hangs from the ceiling of Cheney's cave.
>UT couldn't care less about the bonfire.
T-sippers are not above caring about the football game in a huge way. And they are not very nice about it, either. If anyone thinks UT is classier than A&M, think twice. It's Texas fercryinoutloud!
On the other hand, Mr. Willie Nelson. 'nuff said.
Tena, I say let's have someone ask to see Bush on a horse.
You can't be a real cowboy if you can't ride a horse and ride it well.
pie - since he wants to be Reagan, he really should get up on that horse and ride.
I ride exactly like a sack of potatoes. My daughter rides like Annie Oakley. Go figger.
Tena, it would be a Segway moment.
Ouchier.
I'm not really a native Texan, having been born in Hawaii. My parents weren't from here either. However, my husband was born here, and I don't think he's been on a horse in his life. However, he also has never pretended to be a rancher.
Yeah, Bush is pussy. But then, we knew that. So, Pie, I wonder how much it would cost to bribe a reporter or someone to challenge him to get on a horse sometime when he's "down at the ranch?"
Tena, he wouldn't do it. (Why do I think he's getting riding lessons as we speak?)
The cowboy from Connecticut.
A movie title, I think. Comedy.
Real cowboys have the bullshit on the OUTSIDE of their boots.
.
If Bush is a Texan, then I'm an Aggie...RIGHT!
Now if only UT would follow suit and abandon their legacy admissions. I honestly think that these mediocre students are tainting our education. Courses are dumbed down, so that these kids have a chance to avoid scholastic dismissal due to poor grades. I know that I only have average to slightly above average intelligence, but on this campus, I feel like Carl Sagan. Compounded with recent tuition deregulation, our great state institutions are becoming social playgrounds for rich, subaverage kids.
but but but what will the GWBeques of Texas gonna do?
There's another side to this story people.
No institution should denounce legacy admissions. Admitting (and, yes, giving preference to) legacies has a dramatic impact on fund-raising, and, therefore, a dramatic impact on the quality of education and facilities a school can offer. As a development officer at a small college that often struggles to raise enough money to operate, we must cultivate legacy admissions in order leadership level donations. Everyone thinks that fund raising is some sort of shady operation, but it's essential to ensure a quality educational product. If an admission office lets in a few clunkers because their fathers are rich and give a lot to the school, it's in the spirit of the greater good for all because those donations can be funneled to financial aid and make the college more accessable to medium and low income students.
Legacy admissions are often a very good thing in other ways: they promote a sense of lasting family pride in an institution. The also help create a sense of tradition and history at your institution.
Now, of course, there are exceptions to my opinion. Maybe Yale should have looked a bit harder at George W.'s transcript.
Since I'm in the company of Texans here, I have to ask: Do Texans see anything slightly effeminate about Bush owning a ranch but being afraid to get up on a horse?
I'll tell you what I find effiminate... having a goddamned scotty dog. What kind of rancher has a scotty dog? I guess the answer is that he's not a rancher. Tena is right, it's just acreage. It's nothing even close to being a working ranch. He doesn't have any kind of livestock, the cows you see on newsfootage actually belong to other ranchers who lease grazing rights. I didn't know he was afraid of horses but it doesn't suprise me. The man is phonier than a 3 dollar bill. And while I'm bitching let me take a shot at Crawford as well. Why in the world would someone choose that area for a vacation home? there are actually some pretty places in Texas... but that thing that shrubbie is a rancher just pisses me off. I'm not much of at Texan, but he's an embarrassment.
Ah yes, Sue, I thought we'd get through a thread without someone using the stupid "t-sip" monicker. At least UT doesn't have those totally gay yell leaders. And doesn't say gig'em. I always thought gigging was about frogs. And in fairness, yes UT is way obsessed about football, but bonfires are retarded. Huge waste of time, money and trees.
If Bush had taste, he would have purchased acreage near Salado or in the Hill Country, instead. Those are some pretty places, and even closer to Austin and Ft. Hood.
For some reason, my family and family friends in Central Texas are just beside themselves about Bush. Possibly because they're upper-middle to upper class evangelicals (mostly Southern Baptist). It made for some serious self-censoring while home for the holidays.
Call a spade a spade, -- or in this case a shovel.
Bush is NOT from Texas. He is a classic example of the word "carpetbagger."
Okay. Sing it with me, world:
Hey hey ho ho! aWol Wastrel's got to go!
A&M is a public university. It was the only one in the Texas system to have a legacy admissions policy. So all the rot about the value of legacy admissions is moot. The value of alumni fundraising is at as important as the value(s)of affirmative action (which reflexive white supremacists always assume involves unqualified colored folk, this is because AA for white women worked and has benefitted white men immensely), no , maybe the goals of AA are nobler and more materially beneficial. Land grant schools are indeed examples of democracy, though not at its finest, since they reflected American democracy (ie., this utopia was only for a select self-appointed group, white men, sometimes white women, or segregated accomodation for blacks if they were adequately served at all.)
dude, what are you talking about?
first of all, just because a school is a state school or a land grant school doesn't mean that it is fully funded. for instance, penn state is a "state school" that gets less than 25% of its funding from the state of pennsylvania. i don't know what the funding levels are at a&m, but they're probably similar.
so again, letting in a bunch of idiots who have rich daddies is a necessary evil because the rich daddies end up paying for poor people to go to school. would you rather have a school that allowed some rich kids in because they are rich and could afford to bring diversity to campus, or would you prefer to kick the rich kids out and have no money to spend on financial aid and tuition discounts for middle and low income families?
let's be real about this people.
It's Texas fercryinoutloud! Sue Generous
Oh Sue, you should let me introduce you to some other real Texans -- born and bred, through and through! Liberals, musicians, alternative lifestyles ... not everyone is a knee-jerk bushite, altho' too many are. Big Bend Nat'l Park is a place of incredible beauty and diversity --- Santa Elena Canyon is beyond description -- these pictures don't do it justice: Santa Elena Canyon and Big Bend Nat'l Park.
If he's not a real Texan (or cowboy) how did he get elected? The Texans I know set a high standard for"authenticity". As for ending legacies, it's probably a vaccination against having to ever adopt anything resembling affirmative action. As for alumni money, much of it goes to unproductive uses at many universities. Some universities have "hideaways" for alumni, club houses, club areas at stadiums, etc. Much of the external funding for universities is generated through research grants. I suspect that making nice with NIH and large non-profits is more beneficial (and for public institutions, more appropriate) than chasing after wealthgy alums who want to give money for frivilous things.
Characters Remaining:
Commenting by HaloScan
