Not quite up to the level of 160over90’s “VD” logo, but they’re trying. Thanks to an anonymous reader for the photo and explanation, if you can call it that, from the CAS Dean’s office.
Sent: Thursday, October 02, 2014 1:21 PM
Subject: Stencils – coming to a sidewalk near you…
CAS Heads and Department Managers,
As you heard at our most recent heads retreat, a challenge to helping audiences understand and appreciate CAS is that we don’t have a single location — we are everywhere. Rather than see that as a disadvantage, we are going to embrace this reality with the “It’s Elemental” design. Starting this Friday afternoon, we will use the departmental “elements” to identify all of the main CAS buildings, meaning those that house department offices.
This “signage” will be done using an environmentally friendly, cost-effective approach that is paid for with private donations. Starting Friday afternoon, a team will be powerwashing stencils of the CAS elements on sidewalks outside CAS buildings. The resulting images will be produced by washing away grime. The aim is to complete the project over the weekend, so when you come to campus on Monday, you will likely see your department’s element outside your building. It’s possible, however, that the project will need to be completed the following weekend. The powerwashed stencils will disappear over several months due to rain, weathering, and foot traffic.
We anticipate this will generate a fair amount of buzz around campus, so we will be engaging students in a social media campaign involving the stencils. The intent is to raise students’ awareness about the relationship between individual departments and the larger arts and sciences mission. These stencils will also help us convey the scope and importance of CAS to parents, alumni, and donors visiting campus on Homecoming (October 17 and 18).
I hope you will enjoy the publicity for your departments and the celebration of their place in the arts and sciences.
[Author redacted, on the grounds that he’s probably more embarrassed at having had to write this than we are by reading it.]
the stencils near the front door of Willamette Hall are almost
invisible now. Seems unlikely they will be lasting for “months”.
But the “fair amount of buzz” will last a long time.
An early plan to powerwash department stencils onto the side of PLC fell through when they realized the grime is load-bearing.
Comment of the week. Run to my office during the next seismic event and you can huddle under my desk and share the last drops of my bottled water, as we wait for the search and rescue dogs to do their triage.
ouch! This is really primative. Are the stencils the Excellence? As UOM, often says “you can’t make this stuff up!”
It’s not enough to shortchange the faculty on merit raises. Then they have to demonstrate their absolute power, by conspicuously wasting the money.
We have found a more important use for Ed Awh’s retention raise. Does anyone chose to object?
I believe the initial cost of this project to be 15K (but I don’t k now for sure, its just a number I overheard while sniffing around). I wonder if every week now we have to refresh the grime excellence?
Administrator faces, etched into the sidewalks of campus, walked on with abandon. We could accept payment from those in JH who would rather not participate in the community building exercise. (Of course, the price for Gottfredson is $940,001.)
I like where this thread is going. I suppose we should run it by legal first though – does the CBA cover this?
I’ll talk it over with noted first amendment expert Tim Gleason, before breaking out this 3000 PSI big boy: http://www.northerntool.com/shop/tools/product_200324565_200324565
You missed the all important caveat, this project was “paid for with private donations.” Loosely translated from admin speak, this means they can literally piss the money away (or in this case, spray it on the sidewalk) and you can’t say jack shit about it.
Hello Sir,
Ummm…yes. Ummm…we’d like to thank you for your past donation to the university. Go Ducks!
Well, ummm…we’d like to, well, we’d like to…ummm…powerwash some logos in the grime outside our buildings. Would you, well, would you be interested in donating to this worthy cause?
Huh? Oh, it’s $15,000.
No. It won’t be permanent per se.
No, the grime will come back. No, this is more about excellence.
Huh? Well, forget about excellence. No. Not excellence necessarily, it’s more about buzz. Would you be interested in us generating some buzz about the College of Arts and Science?
What? No, we think it will be positive buzz.
Not this time? Well, thank you for your time sir and, as always, go Ducks!
Recently, we had KUNP, a Spanish television station in Portland, come to campus to film our UO sponsorship segments, which highlight campus life, our academic programs, and campus organizations. One problem is that we greatly lack general footage with Latino students doing science. By chance, is there any way we might be able to film in a lab or class that may take place between 2:00pm-5:00pm on Tuesday, October 29th? The footage would be silent in the sponsorship segments and only used for visual purposes. We have a couple volunteer students who we’d like to have attend the class as models, if at all possible.
That seems to be part of a consistent administration strategy:
“[UO Admissions Director] Rawlins says that showing inflated diversity can actually be a step toward creating a more diverse campus.”
http://www.npr.org/2013/12/29/257765543/a-campus-more-colorful-than-reality-beware-that-college-brochure
I can’t stop laughing about this. Lordy, lordy, lordy, what the hell have I gotten myself into by becoming an academic.
This is seriously funny:
Administrator faces, etched into the sidewalks of campus, walked on with abandon. We could accept payment from those in JH who would rather not participate in the community building exercise. (Of course, the price for Gottfredson is $940,001.)