How to reduce your college’s enrollment in 3

Filed in National by on April 10, 2009

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  1. anon says:
    April 10, 2009 at 7:59 pm

    The university decided against awarding Obama the degree because it is customarily awarded for “lifetime achievement,” ASU spokeswoman Sharon Keeler told POLITICO.

    ASU is run be a-holes. I don’t think that will effect applications.

    When I read this kind of story I can’t help but imagine the wingnut spaz attack that would have followed GWB being the non-recipient of an honorary degree given the same circumstances.

  2. cassandra_m says:
    April 10, 2009 at 8:27 pm

    Besides, the University of Arizona is the much better party school.

  3. Unstable Isotope says:
    April 10, 2009 at 9:56 pm

    That’s crazy! Becoming president isn’t a lifetime achievement? Is this part of the great conservative freak-out of 2009?

  4. Dana says:
    April 11, 2009 at 8:16 am

    Maybe ASU is simply commenting on just how much achievement they think Mr Obama will have in his hopefully only four years as president! 🙂

    Still, it seems a bit ridiculous not to go with the honorary degree. They really don’t mean anything, and the controversy drummed up by not doing so is a lot worse than giving him the sheepskin.

  5. cassandra_m says:
    April 11, 2009 at 9:42 am

    You are also talking about a part of Arizona that didn’t want to support Martin Luther King’s BDay as a holiday.

    Politico is reporting that ASU is rethinking its stance. I love this part:

    Past recipients of ASU honorary degrees included an aloe-vera magnate, the director of “Victor Victoria,” a Chinese official, a Canadian politician, and lots of donors and fundraisers.

    They also say they don’t give degrees to sitting pols. No matter though — they still look awfully silly, but they should be completely free to be as silly as they want to be.

  6. Joanne Christian says:
    April 11, 2009 at 11:33 am

    But cass- one of the first campuses to get behind Obama, AND nearby newspaper of Arizona Republic to endorse with McCain in the backyard. Leave this alone, for the students sake, they were getting a stellar speaker, and revisit.–the honorary degree would mean NOTHING to Obama–only the flippin’ “adults” are pointing this out, and cause distraction. Why make everyone uncomfortable at this celebratory time? Now if they give it–there go his remarks…”You know I almost didn’t graduate…

  7. cassandra_m says:
    April 11, 2009 at 12:09 pm

    Which is another way of saying that the Kids Are Alright — it is their parents’ and prior generations that re making the decisions on the degree. And those (some at leat) were involved in the MLK business there. A thing that they still have to live down. The degree itself doesn’t mean anything to Obama, certainly, but when the adults Are Behaving Badly I don’t see why it could be harmful in pointing that out.

    As I noted, they are free to behave badly in this. And the rest of us are free to note the pattern in their behavior.

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