Quad View: As seen from the Alumni Office

Thought it might be a fun exercise to open the blog up for questions.  If you are a reader, and have a burning question about anything Wake Forest, serve it up.  I will respond to as many as I can. 

Lastnight there was a crazy, freakish storm in The Dash.  Around dinnertime, a sudden storm popped up and caused madness and mayhem in about half of the city.  Ardmore, which is a section with wonderful cute bungalows built in the 20s-40s near the hospital, and Buena Vista, which is the area where the landed gentry lived back in the heyday of tobacco and textiles in the same general timeframe, had a lot of wind damage, downed trees and power lines, you name it.  It’s a shame, too, because both areas are so pretty and the trees are so old and gorgeous.

Our family had to run an errand lastnight and cut through BV, and we had to take at least 3 detours for downed trees and power lines.  I have never seen so many firetrucks and police cars in one place.  It was so strange. 

When I got to work this morning, I could see that campus did not seem to be affected.  MSD is closer to the NW part of the city, which seemed to come off relatively unscathed (I live about 3 miles away and all we got was a sprinkle, compared to the hail and wind the rest of the city took). 

Many Deacs live in Ardmore and BV, so please send some positive thoughts their way that they are OK.  

I am out of the office for a couple of days.  Will resume blogging Weds.

Go Deacs!

There was a lot to admire about Rusty LaRue when he was a Deacon.  He played 3 sports - football, baseball and of course basketball - had a difficult double major (computer science and math), even got married and had his first child while a student.  Talk about multitasking.  I get tired just thinking about it.

Beyond just his athletic and academic prowess, he was known as being one of the good guys.  Polite.  Respectful.  Ambitious in the best of ways.

After Wake Forest, he went on to play ball with the Chicago Bulls and even was on one of their championship teams.  And then he found his way back home to NC and has been at Forsyth Country Day as the athletic director there.  During his tenure, he has instituted a pro-am summer basketball league that is quickly becoming the talk of the town.  

Here is a bit from the W-S Journal about Rusty and the league.  Enjoy!

“Rusty LaRue’s eyes always light up when word comes that Chris Paul is in town and wants to drive out to Forsyth Country Day School and play basketball.

LaRue’s Triad Pro-Am Summer League, in its fourth year, is the best summer-basketball league in the area. And when CP3 makes a guest appearance, it’s doubly good.

That was the case Monday night when Paul showed up and played with FCD players against a team that included Wake Forest’s L.D. Williams and Al-Farouq Aminu. That could be the case again Thursday night if Paul wants to get in one more summer-league game before heading off to train with the U.S. Olympics team in preparation for its trip to Beijing.

Twelve teams play in the Pro-Am, with games on Mondays and Thursdays.”

The rest of the article is worth your time.  Here’s the link:  http://www2.journalnow.com/content/2008/jul/16/larues-league-is-a-good-thing-for-deacs/ 

So this morning I am strolling down the Quad to my office, only to see a movie crew filming something.  There were a bunch of college-aged guys posed strategically on the wall on the Quad nearest Poteat (the old Sig Ep wall for those of you in college during the 80s-90s heyday).  There was a boom camera, people with those reflective boards to bounce the light off in the right way, the whole deal.  As I got closer, they were giving them direction to laugh and talk and look like they were having a great time, which the young men did. 

And so the question:  what is being filmed?  Is it a movie?  Rampant rumors that a Jon Abbate movie is being made on campus right now.  Some think it might be a video to advertise one of the summer camps that is being held on campus.  I have checked with a couple people here and I can not substantiate anything yet.  If you have the inside scoop, please comment and tell me.

—————

Edited to add:  today’s gold star goes to blog reader David, who had the answer about the movie being filmed:

There is a movie being made for the big screen called the Fifth Quarter - The Luke and Jon Abbate Story.   Its the story of Luke’s death and the inspiration for Jon taking the #5 to honor his brother and how the Wake Forest team rallies around this tragic event to have the best season in school history and win the ACC championship! It is a great story and is being filmed in part in Winston-Salem - due out in theaters March of next year.

David, to quote Stephen Colbert and The Colbert Report, you are one of the “heroes” out there : )  Thanks for the scoop!

——–

Edited to add:  I just received some additional scoop.  Evidently there is going to be an Abbate movie filmed, but it looks like it will start in late fall.   What I am told is going on today is the following:

Worldview, the organization that has a camp going on this week here. A video production crew is working on a promotional video for Worldview, which has been bringing campers here for many years.

Thanks to Kevin (also a hero) for the update - and David, it seems like the Abbate movie is going to be filmed here, just later this fall.  They are finalizing the releases now for film rights.  (You are still a hero too!)

Today in my mailbox here, I received a tiny, crisp, white WF envelope.  Handwritten.  The old fashioned kind of note that we get all too infrequently these days.  It was from Ed Wilson.  And once again I am reminded how very, very lucky I am to work for MSD and to have the chance to work with him.

I sheepishly confess that every time I get a note from Ed - always handwritten, always generous and kind and encouraging - I save it.  One of the greatest joys of my job is that I get to work with him from time to time.  We had some joint projects this past year - mostly for the financial aid initiative that he and Mr. Palmer are championing.   And so now I have another little note to remind me of this very special gentleman and scholar.  It has made today a good day.

There was a lot of activity on the Quad yesterday.  Lots of teens playing frisbee and running barefoot on the Quad grass.  I think they were the students from the international program - seems to me that when I walked to my car yesterday, I heard people speaking English with distinctly non-American accents.  I hope that some of them find their way here permanently as students. 

It is a beautiful day in the forest of Wake, as Skip Prosser would have said.  Speaking of, there has been a bit of momentum toward rolling the Quad at midnight on July 26th, in honor of our Skip, who used to say to students after games “See you on the Quad at midnight!” when they’d all roll the Quad.  I think it would be a wonderful tribute to a man that we still very much mourn and miss. 

As promised, I said I would let you know about the Annual Fund goals that we were trying to reach.  We had already met our dollar goal before June 30th (and the end of the WFU fiscal year), but we were scraping to reach our donor goal.  But we did it!  And I am very, very grateful.  I have no idea how many of you gave, but I am assuming that you did and I want to tell you how thankful we all are.

There is other news to share on campus.  Yesterday I was at a departmental staff meeting and Martha Allman, Director of Admissions, was there.  She talked about plans - a couple of years down the line most likely - to build a new admissions building.  I did not realize this before Martha told us, but they had 13,000 students visit last year.  That number is just students - not including their parents, siblings, or great Aunt Minnie who came along for the ride.  So the admissions house is seeing an awful lot of traffic and from plumbing to parking could use an upgrade.  Makes sense to me.

The house - named Starling Hall after the late great Bill Starling, our much beloved Dean of Admissions who died suddenly (at the Alumni Admissions Forum, which I was running - the worst day of my professional life) - is a major piece of WFU history.  Until 1989 it had been the president’s home.   Some of you perhaps don’t know this, but after Bill died, Martha chose not to use his office.  She made it into a conference room or a place where you could hold admissions interviews.  It is a big beautiful room, paneled walls, tons of bookshelves.  When Bill was alive, his office was notoriously messy - one story goes that when admissions was still located in Reynolda Hall, someone reported that his office had been broken into and the campus police called him to come in and survey the ransacking that the burglars had done to it - and in reality it was just as Bill had left it - stacks of paper everywhere, piles, ashtrays, you name it.  Martha told us yesterday that finally she has moved into Bill’s office.  Because of expansion of their staff over the years, her old office is now housing 4 people. 

Since I am reminiscing about people who have since passed on, I can tell you something I learned at the Summer Leadership Conference this past weekend.  Our great Trustee Al Hunt was doing a session on presidential politics, and to introduce him, there was a video montage of some of his more memorable TV moments.  The final clip was of him at Tim Russert’s memorial service. 

When the clips ended and Al Hunt took to the podium, the first thing he talked about was Tim.  He said that Tim was a real Wake Forester - that he was a sports fan and would always call Al whenever WF won a big game - and would not ever call when we lost…until Luke Russert started at Boston College, then all bets were off if BC beat us : )   Then Al Hunt disclosed that part of Tim Russert’s Wake Forest connection was that he had been scheduled to be the commencement speaker for 2009.  You could have heard a pin drop.  It was just so sad.

————

Edited to add:  There was a great story in the W-S Journal yesterday about our alumnus and friend Jamie Dean, who graduated in ‘05 I believe and is finishing his JD/MBA here.  He is a rower (and actually rowed with my niece, an ‘05 grad) and will compete in the Paralympics in Beijing I think.  Jamie is the real deal.  Wonderful and gifted human being.  (Side note about Jamie, I was in love with his old guide dog, Paul.  Paul was this fabulous yellow lab - who had broken a tooth and actually had a big silver tooth in its place.  He was a great dog.  I should have offered to keep him after he got too old to guide - I would have loved it.  Jamie, if you read this, put me on the list as a caretaker for your new dog!)  http://www2.journalnow.com/content/2008/jul/14/from-carolina-to-china-blind-wake-forest-student-t/

Apologies to all for not blogging from our conference.  My wireless was not working properly and I ended up having very little downtime.

The conference was fantastic.  We had about 300 people total (including spouses) join us for a weekend of information and updates on Wake Forest.  Select highlights:

Martha Allman gave a really stirring presentation on the SAT optional decision and why this is the right move for Wake Forest.  I will not do it justice here, but I may try to get her to let me have the text to post later.

Deans Morant (Law) and Reinemund (Business) had a conversation about their backgrounds, philosophy, and more as part of our meeting.  It gave a lot of insight into what makes these two leaders tick and what they feel their roles are in educating attorneys and businesspeople, respectively.

We had a program on Saturday with Al Hunt, our Trustee and famed political journalist.  He gave a very candid insider’s perspective on the election this fall (he thinks that all signs point to Obama winning, unless there is a major incident).  Mr. Hunt was just as I remembered him - brilliant and charming and funny and self-effacing and genuine.  One of the biggest thrills of my weekend was to get introduced to him again, because I am an admitted political junkie, grew up in the same neck of the woods as he did.  And in my book, anyone who is that smart and that good to Wake Forest is someone I want to have the privilege of knowing. 

What most people will talk about from the weekend was the banquet program, featuring two other iconic Wake Foresters:  Ed Wilson and Arnold Palmer, who were interviewed by President Hatch.  Someone who was present posted a synopsis of this on the unofficial WFU message boards (thank you, BeachDeac!  I have a guess about who you are but you are welcome to out yourself to me if you want).  I will post it at the end of this blog entry.

I got to have my picture taken with Mr. Palmer - another huge thrill, and will make my widowed mother’s entire year if she gets a copy, since my late father was an enormous golf fan.  I got to shake his hand, talk to him in a pre-banquet walkthrough.  He is the personification of a gentleman.  Kind to all, funny, charming.  Amazing.

We walked through the lobby of this hotel and it was like the parting of the Red Sea.  People saw Mr. Palmer coming and they’d stop and sort of almost bow to him and say “Mr. Palmer” with a little bow of the head - or would say “Good evening, Mr. Palmer!”  I felt like I was in the president’s entourage.  As we continued walking, we saw a young man with 2 beautiful daughters, maybe 2 and 4 years old, and Mr. Palmer stopped to pat them on the head and smile at them.  It was really a lovely moment to watch this man, arguably one of the most famous in the world, play with these two angelic girls.

Here is the recap of the banquet - again, with thanks to my friend BeachDeac:

Last night at the WFU Summer Leadership Conference (for the members of all the advisory boards of WFU) Dr. Hatch conducted a ‘conversation’ with Mr. Palmer and Dr. Wilson. To call it a ‘magical’ moment might come close to claiming the feeling of the moment.The first query was to ’tell us how you came to Wake Forest’.Arnold told of his friendship with Buddy Worsham, who had already decided to come to Wake. They were at a junior tournament in California when Worsham asked Palmer to join him at Wake. Turning down offers from Pitt, Penn State, and Miami, Palmer asked ‘can you play golf year round down there?’

 Hot off the presses: ”Jonathan Reid, a rising junior on the track and field team, has qualified to compete for his native Canada in the Beijing Summer Olympics. He joins Hunter Kemper (’98), who earlier qualified to run the triathlon for Team USA and will be competing in his third Olympic Games; field hockey standouts Kelly Doton (’04) and Lauren Crandall (’07); and basketball star Chris Paul.”  www.wfu.edu/wowf  Congrats to all our Deac Olympians! 

Campus is host right now to a large number of students from Europe as part of the Benjamin Franklin Transatlantic Fellows Initiative.  There are 70 teens from 37 countries here - broken into groups of “Founders” and “Diplomats”.  One of the professors teaching them is the excellent John Dinan, who was our lunch speaker one day for Katy Harriger’s Lifelong Learning course on “Winning the White House” - he was fantastic and so interesting, and made me wish I’d been one of his students.  Here is more on our foreign students visiting:  www.wfu.edu/news/release/2008.06.25.p.php

We are still awaiting our final year end totals (as WFU’s fiscal year ended June 30th) to see if we reached our fundraising goals for the year.  We were tracking very strong on dollars - ahead of schedule even - but we needed some additional alumni donors to meet our goals.  We should know by this Friday.  Many thanks to all of you who contributed - whatever the amount.  Your participation is so appreciated!

I will be slow to blog over the next few days, as I will be at our Summer Leadership Conference, where we gather together the alumni councils and boards of visitors for all the schools of the Reynolda Campus.  We have probably 250 people coming and it should be great.  With any luck (and a good wireless connection), I will be able to keep you apprised of interesting news from the conference.  A couple of key highlights:  the legendary Ed Wilson and Arnold Palmer will be our banquet speakers, reminiscing about their days at Wake Forest and talking about their role as public spokespeople for our financial aid initiative.  (Brief aside: my late father would have given his right arm to meet Mr. Palmer.  He was so excited that AP was the commencement speaker in 2005, when my niece was graduating from WFU).  Then on Saturday, our Trustee Al Hunt, whose career in political journalism is legendary, will be our keynote speaker on Saturday, presenting a panel on presidential politics. 

Can I confess that I sat up tearfully to watch the Tim Russert memorial, in which Mr. Hunt did a lovely speech?  He got the greatest line of the evening in there, about Tim Russert’s much adored son Luke.  He said something about when Luke was born, he and his wife Judy went up to see “the most celebrated baby in 2000 years” - no doubt true.  Anyway, I have such admiration for the way he carries himself on television and he is such a gracious person for one so famous.  I met him once and he was just lovely to me. 

Finally, the last bit of news - I have a new job.  I am moving from the Alumni office to the Development office to become the Director of Volunteer Leadership, which means I will have strategic responsibility for programming and messaging for all of our volunteer boards and councils on the Reynolda Campus. 

Even though I will not be in the Alumni Office, I am still going to blog.  (I have decided to take a page from the esteemed show “Melrose Place” and bill myself as “Special Guest” - as they did for Heather Locklear).  Emily Smith - our incredibly talented and multifaceted Assistant Director of Communications here - also has rights to the blog, and I hope that as she is able, she will add her own posts here.   So you will still see me here, just as a “Special Guest” : )

I can’t believe it is already July - where on earth is the summer going?  Or the year for that matter.

Apologies for the lack of blogging. We have been swamped in our office with fiscal year end and prep for our summer conference.

It’s been unseasonably cool in the forest of Wake.  4th of July weekend was mostly rainy or overcast and in the mid 70s.  Not at all normal for this time of year.

Work continues in the Green Room of Reynolda Hall.  Our offices are 1 and 2 flights up, but you can hear this intermittent, whining buzz while they are working - sounds almost like you are near the center of an active beehive.   There are times you can ignore the sound, other times it sounds like the drilling is in your own head.  I know the room will be beautiful when finished.  I would be pleased for it to be soon.

The end of the fiscal year is a crazy time at work - we are trying to finish out the financial reporting from the 07-08 year and simultaneously prepare for our Summer Leadership Conference, where we invite our volunteer board and council members for a weekend retreat.  I have been working hard on that - hence the lack of recent blogging.

As I was leaving campus today - not far off Reynolda Road - I saw a silver sports car (convertible) with the license plate “GO4GROBE” - and it brought the hugest smile to my face.  What a great school/town/fanbase we have if folks are making license plates after our football coach.

(Side note: it does not appear to be Coach Grobe’s car, but that of some other gentleman who must be his #1 fan.)

Well, not really, but since this is the first day of Wake Forest’s new fiscal year, it feels a little like New Year’s Day.  New beginning, new students to arrive in another month and a half, new projects and possibilities. 

Closer to August, you will see more of the new logo being a visible presence on campus too.  And speaking of logos, not sure if anyone out there saw the new Walmart logo.  They are refreshing their brand as well.  And as much as I hate to admit this, my first thought when I saw it was “wow.  I hate that.”  That experience gave me some insight into our new logo and some of your reactions to it.

Having been a part of the Visual Identity committee, I got to have a lot of involvement in the new logo and brand and for me, the new logo works so well and I genuinely love it.  But I saw a lot of evolutions of the design along the way - which reminds me of the old joke a friend told me recently about “How do you boil a frog?” 

If you want to boil a frog, you can’t throw it into a pot of boiling water, because he will just hop out.  Too uncomfortable, too hot.  So to boil him, you put him in a pot of cool water and gradually raise the temperature, bit by bit, so he doesn’t notice that it’s a shock. 

I think it’s that way for a lot of us - be it the WFU logo, Walmart or whatever.  Change requires adjustment.

In other news, this week is All Sports Camp at WFU, which means gaggles of kids of all ages coming for a week of varied sports.  Typically you can tell when it is a major camp week because you get a lot of parents driving very slowly trying to follow the signs and drop off their kids in the right spot : )    Our coaches and athletic and recreation staff do a tremendous job with these camps - literally a lot of “happy campers” here.  If you have children and have not considered bringing them to a WFU camp in the summer, give it some thought.  I see lots of happy kid faces here.

All - today is the last day of MSD’s fiscal year, and if you have not already donated to the College Fund, please do so today.   http://www.wfu.edu/giving

To make your gift count in our goal for total # of donors, you can make a gift by credit card before midnight tonight, or you can write a check and send it to us at P O Box 7227, Winston-Salem, NC 27109.  Checks must be dated June 30 in envelopes postmarked June 30th. 

If you have already made your gift - THANK YOU!  If you have not, please make a gift today, and share this message with other alumni and friends. 

Your gifts will be used effectively to strengthen education here, and they will help us lead the alumni participation rate in U.S. News and other university rankings.

We are now in the Q&A session of “The Transition from High School to College” and some intrepid alumnus just got a belly laugh out of the whole parent contingent.  He asked how registration for classes is done now - and reminisced that back in the day, it was all alpha and heaven help you if your last name started with an S!

Lots of head nodding and recognition.  Very funny look back to the past.

Here I  am, surrounded by 280ish Wake Foresters - lots of parents from the 70s and 80s, and lots of kids.  It is a fun group - the kids look a little excited, but also a little nervous.  The parents look happy to be back on campus and some look quite eager for their kids to fall in love with the place. 

To give you a sense of the crowd, we are in Pugh Auditorium and nearly every seat has been taken.  So far, lots of smiles.  A good thing.

We are in a presentation right now about “Beginning the College Search Process - Choosing the Right College For You”.  Lest my typing be too loud, I am going to stop blogging here : )

There is an updated series of Frequently Asked Questions available on the WFU web page today regarding our SAT optional policy:  http://www.wfu.edu/admissions/sat-act/faq/ which I hope everyone will take the time to read. 

This new FAQ addresses some of the feedback expressed to Wake Forest after our initial announcement.  You - our alumni, parents, and friends - are the front lines in our unofficial army of ambassadors.  So the better you understand things that are happening at MSD, the better you can help others who might have questions or you can clear up misunderstandings.

———————-

In other news, tomorrow will be a very busy day.  We have about 100 alumni families coming to campus for the Alumni Admissions Forum.  It’s always great to see parents here with their high school children - you get a lot of reminiscing, reconnecting with classmates that you hadn’t seen for years (and didn’t know had kids the same age as yours).

The W-S Journal had a great piece on our beloved Chris Paul today:

Chris Paul got the word last week that he had been selected to the U.S. Olympics basketball team.

Yesterday, the news became official.

Paul, the former West Forsyth and Wake Forest star who recently finished his third season with the New Orleans Hornets, was on the 12-man roster announced by USA Basketball.

He’ll leave Winston-Salem next week to start training camp in Las Vegas, and eventually it will be on to Beijing for the Olympics starting on Aug. 8.

“This is the best feeling I’ve ever had,” Paul said. “I’ve always said to play in the NBA is a blessing. Don’t get me wrong, it’s great, all good and well. But there’s so many guys that have that opportunity to play in the NBA. To play on the U.S. Olympic team and represent your country, I don’t think there’s any greater honor than that. There’s so many people who fight every day for our freedom out of this country. And I get to play basketball and say that’s my way to stand up for the USA. I’m happy. I’m proud.”

http://www2.journalnow.com/content/2008/jun/24/paul-will-help-represent-us/?sports

Hometown boy makes good.

I had the pleasure of meeting Chris a number of times.  His parents were members of our Parents’ Council, which I helped support, and Chris and his parents were some of the nicest, most polite, most grounded people I have ever met.  Chris probably does not remember me, but in all the times I ever talked to him at our events, he always called me “Ma’am”, always spoke to me, always smiled.  Forget how insanely talented he is, we should all be lucky to raise kids as polite as he is.  That is no accident either.  His parents are rock solid individuals.

CP3 and Hunter are the two Deacs I know so far who are in the Olympics.  If there are others I have left out - please tell me so I can add them to our “Root for” list here on the blog (and my apologies to those folks).

Two Wake Foresters have sent me a copy of this article about our alumnus Billy Ray Barnes, who was part of our NCAA world series winning baseball team in 1955.  This is definitely worth a read.  http://www.newsobserver.com/2759/story/1118258.html  Nice to see that WFU is still the only ACC team to have won the college world series since our victory in 1955.

Too bad, so sad for the Carolina folks.

It brings up a good topic - one that gets debated heartily during BCS championship and NCAA Tournament time -  is there ever a reason to root for Carolina? or Duke? 

Some will argue that you want to support the conference no matter what - that a high tide rises all boats, and any exposure the ACC can get on a big win is of benefit to all.  Those on the other side of the fence might say they’d rather root for a starting 5 consisting of Stalin, Hitler, Hussein, bin Ladin and Idi Amin before they’d root for a Coach K team. 

Which side of the fence do you fall on?

I wonder what our late friend Doc Murphrey would say.  Actually, I think I know : )

One of our very own is going to the Olympics again!  Hunter Kemper (’98) was a very successful triathlete at MSD and has gone on to represent the US in the Olympics twice.  Hopefully the third time’s the charm!  (As an aside, not only is Hunter an incredibly gifted athlete, he also routinely smokes the competition in fantasy sports, to which I can personally attest).  Here is one newspaper’s blurb about Hunter:

Triathlon

Hunter Kemper, the 32-year-old athlete from Colorado Springs, Colo., earned the last of three berths on the U.S. team by finishing well ahead of his top rival for that spot, Andy Potts, at the Hy-Vee Triathlon in West Des Moines, Iowa, on Sunday.

“It’s tremendous,” Kemper said. “This is what we live for. I’m a very blessed boy.” http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/olympics/2008012041_oly23.html

The other news item came this past Friday.  There had been some concern among alumni about a change in how Greek organizations lounges would be recognized.  Dr. Hatch emailed Greek alumni on Friday to announce that in addition to the special plaques that had been designed for each lounge, they would also get a set of Greek letters too.   If you are Greek and did not receive that email, let me know (chapmaea@wfu.edu) so we can correct your email address in the records system and get the letter to you as intended.   

One of the great joys of working in the Alumni Office is that we have a ton of interesting things here - promotional items, bumper stickers, old Howlers, marketing material for our events - and what we have found is that when things in the office are busy and we are doing a lot of events, we tend to clutter the office quickly. 

And then you reach breaking point where something has to be done.  That was today.

We all chipped in and straightened our area out, got rid of outdated materials, etc.  The place is much more presentable now.

Next Friday we host our Alumni Admissions Forum, with 100 alumni families coming to campus with their high school children to learn more about the admissions process at selective colleges and universities.  If any of the folks find their way to our office now, at least we look really presentable!

As a reminder - if you are an alumnus or alumna and you are on campus, PLEASE stop by to see us!  We are in 230 Reynolda Hall (in the wing closest to Kitchin dorm).  We love visitors!

There is a bit of news coming out of campus today - but need to let it hit the official channels first.  Monday I will say more.

“The Quad is alive, with the sound of campers….”

There is no mistaking, it is summer camp season.  I walked onto the Quad this morning from the big parking lot by Huffman and you could hear screams of glee, shrieks, mayhem, from the Chapel.  It was the cheerleaders.  What they were so excited about I know not, but boy could they make some noise.

Out my window I can see at least 20 kids playing frisbee.  Lots of others walking around.  The sports field near the watertower and Worrell Professional Center was full of field hockey players this morning, part of Jen Averill’s camp.  I share a very special bond with Jen - our sons were born just days apart from each other; I think she still might have been in the hospital when I was admitted.  If I had a daughter, she’s the kind of coach I’d want to entrust her to.  I think the world of her.

Lucky for our campers, the weather here feels like June as opposed to the August-like meltdown we’d been having.  It’s sunny and no doubt warm, but low 80s and a breeze instead of the mid-90s, which is always a little scary for outdoor camps.

I passed a huge gaggle of young campers at lunch - kids in the 6-8 age range I’d guess - and was struck by a very familiar smell:  it smelled like my son’s daycare.  And then I realized, the smell is sunscreen.  Just like I slather it on my boy before he goes to school, these young fellows (or their moms) had slicked them up too.  Funny to have linked the smell of sunscreen with the idea of large groups of kids, but that association exists in my mind.

It’s great to see a Quad full of young kids.  As much as I enjoy the advantages of parking during the summers, when the students aren’t here, we do miss them.

It’s June, and that means that Wake Forest is nearing the homestretch in terms of the College Fund for this fiscal year, which ends June 30th. 

And we need your support. 

I have said this to some of my college friends over and over, but your gift *really* does help.  Any size gift, whatever amount you choose to give, is important.

If you gave a dime a day to Mother So Dear, it would equal $36.50 over the course of one year.  That’s just pocket change on a daily basis. 

If I chose to forgo one venti cinnamon dolce skinny latte a week for MSD, that would add up to $213.20 for MSD.

If I decided to skip lunch out one day a week, that would be about $468 a year for MSD.

You get my drift.

I guess what I am saying is that for many of the friends from WFU that I talk to, one of their barriers to giving is that they don’t think about giving until they are solicited, and then it seems like a big deal to cough up $100 or $200 or $500 or whatever the figure is.

But if you use online banking, you can set it up to send a check to WFU every paycheck - even if it’s just a small amount.  Comes out of your bank account before you ever miss it.  Similarly, you can do bank draft through WFU.

For me, it’s just easier to send a little at a time.  It adds up.  It helps real students.  Everyone wins. 

If you haven’t been making a gift - or if you want to make another one! - go to www.wfu.edu/giving or you can send me a message or email me and I can help you.  chapmaea@wfu.edu

Thanks for all you do for MSD!

Today as I walked onto the Quad from the parking lot, I saw several small groups of people - one set on the Chapel steps, one on the steps up to Reynolda Hall from the Quad (which, by the way, a friend of mine calls the “Diva Stairs” because it looks like you could be at the top of the steps outside the Mag Room addressing a large crowd of people or singing, a la Evita).   But I digress.

It looks to be some sort of summer conference group, and they all looked contemplative and reflective.  One of our guests in the Lifelong Learning program “Winning the White House” actually suggested that we consider doing some sort of contemplative retreat weekend, where we bring people to campus to stop being so hectic and rushing around and really take time to think, and learn, and reflect, and appreciate.   It sounds to me like a worthy idea.

Field hockey camp is also going on - saw tons of teenage girls with their hockey sticks yesterday.  I think perhaps there is also some sort of cheerleading/dance team type camp here too, because earlier this morning I could hear waves of girlish squeals and shrieks on campus.  And short of Brad Pitt making an appearance on the Quad - something I admittedly would shriek for - the times we most often hear a chorus of female shrieking is on Bid Day or if the cheerleaders are here. 

I was on a break from our class on Winning the White House when I saw the terrible news that NBC’s Tim Russert had passed away suddenly and unexpectedly. It was shocking and so sad, of course. For very selfish reasons, I felt especially bad because Tim Russert was someone who we very much wanted to speak on campus and with our many political contacts in DC, we had reason to hope we could secure him as a speaker. Alas, now it will never be. What a loss to political journalism, as well as his family and friends - some of whom are Wake Foresters in DC. RIP.

It also reminded me of the sudden and unexpected passing of Skip - which I had heard about halfway around the world on vacation. Good men, taken too soon.

Our Winning the White House class ended on Saturday and hats off to both Katy Harriger, our excellent professor, and our lively and engaged classmates. One of them had the suggestion at breakfast on Saturday to do an anonymous vote on ‘if the election were held today, who would you vote for?’ 29 people voted, and it was an overwhelming win for Barack Obama: he got 19 votes, McCain 9, so it was a 66-31% split (we did have someone who voted for a write in, which is why the percentages don’t add up to 100%).

This was a surprising result for the class - and just looking at the demographics of the class as well as some of the comments people had made, it did not seem to be a generally Democratic group. What we should have asked too was ‘which political party are you a member of?” just to see if we in fact had a room full of Democrats (so the Obama win would not have been surprising) or if we had an equal mix of Republicans, Democrats, and independents. It made for a lively discussion, no doubt about it.

If you have not been following the Alumni Office’s lifelong learning class offerings, our staff member Patricia Boone is in charge of the program and is planning several classes through the 08-09 academic year: one on landmark trials of the 20th century, one on emotional intelligence, one on Happiness (see the WF Magazine article on it). More info will be available in the coming months, or you can email Pat for more information at boonepm@wfu.edu

Our class is having an interesting discussion on presidential politics and the astonishing amount of money spent on them.  Dr. Harriger referred us to opensecrets.org, which is a website that tracks campaign spending and fundraising.

As of the moment that opensecrets.org published their #s, in this presidential race Barack Obama has raised $264 million and John McCain nearly $96 million.  There are estimates that total cost will be around $800 million before the race is over.

We are talking about public funding and how the nature of political fundraising has changed.  In years past, many people made contributions to public election money via the income tax form’s optional check box.  When Dr. Harriger asked the class who checked the tax box to contribute, only maybe 5 people raised their hands.  When she asked us who has given to a specific candidate, it was nearly everyone.

When some of the class seemed surprised/displeased that we are spending $800 million on an election, Dr. Harriger told us that she has seen a figure about how much Americans spend on potato chips each year - and it exceeds $800 mil. 

What’s more important: chips or an election?  Interesting food for thought…

I am so excited today!  Our Lifelong Learning class on “Winning the White House” has started. I am in class - which is being taught by the wonderful Katy Harriger of the political science department - with about 28 alumni and friends ranging in age from an ‘03 grad to folks in their 70s, and everything in between.

Over the next 2 days we are going to be learning and discussing politics and figuring out who votes and why and how.  We have a really diverse class and I am so eager to learn with these folks. 

Will blog as I can : )

For any of you who are reading off campus and want a little glimpse into campus, Google Maps has now done something that I find amazing - it basically lets you look at a map, click on it, and you get a picture of what you see.

Here is a link to campus - taken in front of Bostwick and Johnson dorms looking toward Reynolda Hall:  http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&ie=UTF8&om=1&layer=c&ll=36.132817,-80.275855&spn=0.001025,0.00235&z=19&cbll=36.132304,-80.27607&panoid=hxuBpuMINtNpd0mhUokZUw&cbp=1,323.8263665594856,,0,6.736334405144688

Enjoy your drive-by trip down memory lane!

Not sure if most of you have found this already through WOWF (Window on Wake Forest - the headlines section on top right of main wfu.edu home page), but there is a link to our Visual Identity website.  http://www.wfu.edu/identity/

The Visual Identity committee (of which I am a member, in the interest of full disclosure) is the group that worked with a design firm to agree on standardization of our visual elements, including the new logo, photography, the kinds of words we use to describe Mother So Dear, etc.  There were I think 23 or 25 of us, representing all areas of the campus (academics, athletics, administration, merchandising, undergrad and professional schools, student representation, legal, you name it).  Anyway, for those who are truly interested in the enormity of the project, you can look at the visual identity manual online and see some of our group’s thoughts about graphic standards, etc.

One of the big misconceptions from the alumni I have heard from is re: the use of ‘complementary colors’.   There are 8 complementary colors in the official visual identity palette, including a couple shades of blue and green - as well as red, purple, gray.  (Sidebar: yes, we were VERY careful not to be too Duke or Carolina with the blues). 

To debunk a myth: no, we are not making red an offical part of our logo, our uniforms, whatever.  These extra colors can be used in magazines or brochures or other print material to add a little bit of kick to what otherwise would largely be just black and gold.

There were some who saw the new admissions search piece - which shows the new logo with a bar of red running along top or bottom.  And the WF sports boards were up in arms about us having red as part of the logo.  Here is what really happened:  that admissions piece got designed before our standards were completed.  It had the new logo on it, but we had not finished all the other standards that dictate where you can and can’t place color next to the logo.

So rest assured that in future publications, there will be a ‘no fly zone’ around the logo - where no other colors would penetrate.   Old gold and black will always be our school colors!

—————————————-

And on an unrelated note…yesterday I was in a meeting and looked at my Treo and saw that I had 60 new messages - which is certainly not the norm for me.  Most of them said “failed message” or something strange.  And when I looked at them, I realized that some spammer had been sending out emails (about ‘exquisite replica watches’ and - much to my absolute horror - adult material) using my email address as the ‘reply to’.

After nearly having apoplexy thinking that somehow my entire email address book would be getting watch and adult spam from me, our IS Help Desk assured me that any spammer or phisher out there can find email addresses and use them to send their spam.  It was nothing against me personally, someone just found my email (since it is out there pretty frequently).

Heaven forbid any of you get any spam - let me just state for the record that neither I nor Wake Forest sent it. 

Just in the past week I have heard from a few dear friends who have been reading the blog and wanted to ask questions about something I have said.  It’s wonderful to find connections that you didn’t realize you have with people.  So please, keep writing and commenting.  I love to hear from you!

My own best friends from WFU are doing an email chain about funny things we did in college.  I will confess that when I first got here (as a somewhat naive girl from PA), there were certain southern expressions that I had never heard of.  “Pig pickin’” for example.  I had no idea what this meant - or that there was even something called a “pig pickin cake” that one eats at a pig pickin’

So sometime during my freshmen year, we are all driving somewhere and we see a bulletin board that just says “Ham Horton” - and so in all of my infinite wisdom, I say “Oh, is a Ham Horton the same thing as a pig pickin’?”

At which point my southern friends almost laughed themselves right off the road.  And then told me that Ham Horton was a political candidate and not a social event. 

I’d love to hear some of your funny stories from your time at WFU - either cultural differences, roommate differences, whatever they may be.  If you give me permission, I will share them in the blog : )

I am not sure what kind of Miracle Gro our intrepid groundskeeping staff is putting on the hydrangeas around Efird and Taylor dorms, but these are the biggest, fullest, most lush plants I believe I have ever seen.  They are in that light-blue/slightly purplish variety and are absolutely divine looking.  And enormous. 

I think the heat has kept the campus relatively quiet this week.  I don’t see a ton of summer school students walking around and it is way too hot for most students to try and play frisbee or ball on the Quad.  Most of the traffic I see from my window is sports camp kids. 

When I was leaving work yesterday, I saw a father picking up his daughter from a camp (from the looks of the uniform, probably soccer).  She could not have been more than 8 or 9 years old and she was telling her father quite earnestly about someone who no longer plays for Wake, but has graduated. 

I have to say I was impressed to see a kid her age following our sports teams so closely.  It is an excellent example of WFU parents raising their children right and “inDEACtrinating” them while they are young : )

It’s another steamy day in The Dash.  Mid 90s and lots of sun. 

Someone got married in Wait Chapel over the weekend, as there is still a sign from the wedding posted near the stairs up to the Quad.  Brings back good memories of my own wedding in the Chapel on a surprisingly-cool day in July.  The Italian Olympic team was on campus to train before the Atlanta 1996 games - so we got to see an Olympic flag over Huffman and some very fine looking young men.  I worried for a minute that some of my bridesmaids would defect in favor of their company, as we had an Italophile among my bridal party.  But alas, she stayed.

If you got married on campus, write a comment about it for the blog.  I’d love to hear your story!

I grew up in a suburb of Philadelphia and our local Accu-Weather anchorman used to refer to the hot summer days as HHH - hazy, hot and humid.   We are definitely in the HHH days here.  It’s been in the 90s this week, which means everyone is moving a little slower, with that certain glow that comes from the sweat you break walking from your car to your building.

It’s Summer Sports Camp time at WFU.  This is a wonderful series of programs that brings local (and not so local) kids back to campus to attend camps with our outstanding coaches.  Next week is overnight basketball camp, and I must confess that part of me wants to sit out at the pick-up/dropoff spot in hopes that I can catch a glimpse of my all time favorite Demon Deacon, Randolph Childress.  I had the distinct pleasure of spending some time with him and his family back in 2005, when he graciously agreed to come to campus to be involved in a shoot for an inauguration video for Dr. Hatch.

You are never going to meet a nicer person than Randolph.  Unless you meet his wife, the lovely Jenai.  Or their two boys, who were incredibly polite and well mannered for little boys.  Meeting Randolph was an absolute highlight of my time at WFU.  The day that I finally met him (which I had been lobbying to do for the previous 6 years) I said that I quit, because there was nothing left to hope for in my job : )  Anyway, the Childresses are a delightful family and perhaps now I should just shift my great hope to the goal that one day he comes back to WFU to work here. 

So in the coming weeks of basketball camp, if anyone sees the great #22 on campus, your job is to alert the Alumni Office right away!

My dad passed away in December of 2006.  He was a very organized person and had all his business affairs kept neatly in files in his big rolltop desk.  There was a file for lots of things - will, insurance, one on each of his kids, etc.  On a visit home recently, my mom gave me the file dad kept on me.

I dug through it lastnight and there was a separate “Wake Forest” file in there.  In it were all sorts of things that I had not seen in years - tuition bills and dad’s notes on what he paid when (as an aside, tuition was dirt cheap in the late 80s!), announcement cards for when I made dean’s list and a press release that could be sent to the hometown paper, a commencement program, various notes I’d written him, a letter to parents about a security issue and how Student Life was addressing it.  Four years of my life.  End of semester grades.  Parents’ newsletter.  Note from me about wanting to go abroad. 

It was nice to take a brief archeological dig through the past.  My dad never went to college, but he *loved* Wake Forest.  This place represented all that he thought a school should be - excellent academics, intimate setting, kind and caring people.  I honestly think that my coming here was one of his proudest accomplishments.

A belated thanks to Mom and Dad for all they did to help me get here.

This morning, the power on campus went off about 8:15.  I got a call driving in to work that the power in Reynolda was out and that everything was super dark on the 3rd floor.  I got in, and sure enough, it was plenty dark - and the AC was obviously not on.  Today is in the high 80s.  *sigh*

Of course, nothing works - no lights, no AC, no fan to keep cool.  Our laptops work, but you have to run off battery.  Nothing will print, since they need power, etc.

So at about 9:15, our team decided to do an offsite meeting at Cloverdale Kitchen over breakfast.  We got back to the office - still no power - and I began hearing rumors that a squirrel got fried in a substation downtown and that’s what caused the power outage.   That rumor is still unsubstantiated, I might add.

Power came back on a little before 11, so all was not lost.  But it was a very strange way to begin the day.  And it was a reminder of how tied we are to electronics, especially email.  I kept waiting to get an email from Kevin Cox, our director of the news service, who is the official spokesperson for things like this.  But had to settle for voicemail, alas.

I had to go to the library today and it is all full of construction.  They are converting one of the all night study rooms (I forget if it is the one on the left or the right immediately upon entering the building) to a full-service Starbucks, and I believe on the other side they are adding restrooms.  I have to confess it will be delightful to be able to take a quick walk to ZSR to get the latte of my choice (venti skinny cinnamon dolce latte, if you care to know my favorite!)  This should be operational sometime in September I am told. 

Campus is filled with visitors, but this time it is not prospective students.  In the summers, we lease our space to conferences and other summer camp type activities - some are run through WFU, like the sports camps for kids or our Lifelong Learning classes - and some are from external companies or other schools.  In years past, we’ve been the home for an accountancy retreat, some conferences on religious music and hymns, cheer and dance teams (imagine hundreds of ‘tweens’ all squealing with delight at the same time!), a Lego camp, and so on and so on.  It’s great to see people who are not ordinarily exposed to Mother So Dear on campus.  Hopefully they will send some good students (or faculty, or support) our way.

I snuck a peek at the Green Room today.  It has large plastic sheeting covering the doors to the lobby of Reynolda - but I went to the Mag Patio and peeked into the windows.  Right now there is scaffolding inside.  I had been told one of the things they were fixing is the lighting - which if you’ve ever attended an event or reception in the Green Room, you know is a problem.  If it’s dark or overcast, there are only a few very dim lights way overhead.  Heaven forbid it’s evening and you are trying to make remarks from a podium - you can’t see it.

Right now all the art is off the walls and it is very white.  My hope is that they will do a warmer shade on the walls to give the room some life.  One big question - are we destined to have green carpet (since it is, after all, the Green Room?).  Part of me likes the legacy of the room’s name and part of me wants desperately to have something more in the line of black and gold.

That’s one of the struggles the Alumni Office often has with public space on campus.  When we bring alumni and friends to campus, they wonder why the decor is in colors that are not our school colors.  The Benson Center renovated its largest public rooms on the 4th floor a couple of years ago and they were kind enough to ask our opinion - and we begged for Wake Forest colors - and got them! 

When I was in college, the Sig Eps had a tshirt that read:  “Loved or hated - but never ignored.”  That has been my experience in the past few months with some of the decisions and announcements from here - be it the logo, the SAT-optional policy.

Our Wake Forest family may love a major decision or hate it, but they never ignore it.

And you know what - I am grateful for those on both sides of these issues.  Why?  Because it shows that you are remaining a) involved and b) passionate about the future of Wake Forest.  We want and need you to be engaged.  I like hearing your voices.  What I have learned in my time here is that there are times and decisions that will cause reasonable people to disagree.  But the vast majority of our disagreements and discussion have been polite discourse, and I am proud of our Wake Foresters for that.

Thanks for keeping one foot (literally or figuratively) in the soil of Mother So Dear.   

I have close to 200 emails now from alumni, parents and friends weighing in on the SAT issue.  Interestingly enough, a lot of people are emailing our admissions office directly, and they are getting a strong quotient of kudos - proportionally more than I have seen.  Even so, I still have more applause than boos coming in.

I was on the Quad a few minutes ago and was stopped by a gentleman who was asking directions.  He and his collegue were college counselors and were visiting campus.  I asked how they liked Wake Forest and they said “We LOVE it.  We have been sending you students for years - this is a great place” yadda.  I asked if they had heard the SAT optional decision and what they thought of it.  They said they think it is a huge positive.  Interesting to hear an outsider’s perspective.

One of the recurring themes of the emails I have been getting is about whether we are going to let less qualified students in if we eliminate a mandatory SAT.  This has not proven true according to the analyses of the other schools who have done this - the difference between college GPA for SAT submitters vs. non-submitters has been very small.  There is research, particularly from Bates, that disputes this.  http://www.wfu.edu/wowf/2008/sat-act/

The point I wish to make is that there are a lot of kids who have excellent GPAs and high school records in AP and IB courses who may not be great test takers - and some of those kids would not apply here because they don’t fit the SAT score that we list as our average.  I was one of those kids - and from the emails I’ve read, a lot of you were too! - so I am proud that we are giving people the option of not sending those scores. 

Story developing…

I am literally flooded with emails from alumni and parents about the SAT announcement we made yesterday, so this will be short.

So far the opinion of those who have written in has been strong support of this policy.  I’d say we are around 70% who strongly favor the SAT optional, 20-25% vocal opponents, and a stray 5% with other questions related to (such as, are we also dropping LSATs or MCATs etc).

I have more to say on the SAT thing - but am very pressed for time.  Hopefully later or tomorrow. 

Today is a big day for WFU.  We announced - via the New York Times, USA Today, and many other outlets - that WFU is the first school in US News & World Report’s top 30 national universities to have an “SAT optional” policy.  Meaning that students can choose to send their SAT score to us - or choose not to - without advantage or penalty.

I think this is going to be a good thing for WFU.

I was one of those kids who did poorly on standardized tests but excelled in the classroom and took the hardest courses I could in high school.  I got wait listed at places that I should have gotten in (in my humble opinion) because of my SATs.  Yet I graduated Magna Cum Laude here with honors and a kickbutt GPA. 

There is growing research that the SAT does not accurately predict success in college - and I think my own SATs are proof of that.  There is more information and an FAQ online here: http://www.wfu.edu/wowf/2008/sat-act/

The other thing to consider here is that WFU is not lowering its admissions standards.  I work closely with the admissions office staff on the Alumni Admissions Forum and alumni children admissions, and I can tell you they have always stressed the importance of the following (in this order):  high school curriculum strength (are you taking AP and IB courses?), performance in your classes/GPA, admissions essays and what they reveal of your intellectual curiosity and character, and - last - SAT score.  I know our staff reads every single admissions application - some are read by 2 people and some by the whole admissions committee - so they are still going to be treating each admissions application with great care and the same critical eye.

I also personally believe that this move will help counter one of the fears some alumni have expressed - that Mother So Dear is becoming too homogenous.   If the SAT does favor those from the most affluent families through some sort of inherent bias, by eliminating the SAT as a requirement, we are going to encourage kids from more rural areas, kids who represent socioeconomic and ethnic diversity, to apply. 

Watch in the next several months and see how many other t0p schools follow our lead.  I think we just launched a great and revolutionary thing in higher education.

My dad did not like
the “Vincent with Open Mouth”
painting in Green Room

Back during my freshman orientation weekend, my father sat in wonder at the giant painting hanging in the Green Room of Reynolda Hall.  It was a close up of a boy’s face, mouth hanging open. 

“Do you know what this painting is called?” he asked me incredulously?  “Vincent with Open Mouth!”  This clearly was not high art to my dad.  But every time we were on campus, he’d check to see if it was still there.  And it always was.

Until today.

What most people don’t know about Wake Forest is that the chairs have barely left the Quad following Commencement before we begin doing major projects over the summer.  The summer makes sense - a lot of the people are gone, fewer interruptions, yadda yadda.  This summer, the Green Room is getting a face lift.   And as a result, Vincent with Open Mouth, as well as the other art and a lot of the furniture, are finding new homes elsewhere.

Another ‘insider’ tidbit - any time we have a renovation, if there is surplus furniture available, people come out of the woodwork to grab it.  Our own office managed to get a couple of up-for-grabs items, including a very nice sideboard that is now in a colleague’s office. 

I have heard some talk about what is to be done with the Green Room:  better lighting, perhaps a sound system built in.  Also doors - since often we hold programs in there and currently there is no way to shut out noise or traffic from the rest of Reynolda.  I eagerly await the finished product later this summer!

Is the only trace of Commencement available on the Quad.  Because of all the foot traffic, there are some worn, brownish spaces, but everything else is as neat and tidy as it ever was.

It was interesting for me to see a Commencement at another school.  My nephew graduated from Villanova in PA and it really was a lovely ceremony.  They had individual school graduations on Saturday (where you saw the student walk on stage and shake hands with the dean of their school) and on Sunday they had the large Commencement where they officially conferred degrees (each group stood up by school to be recognized, but no one walked - just too big).

As lovely as the Villanova commencement was, I still much preferred ours : )  It is wonderful to see every undergraduate student walk the stage, and the setting for ours is simply superior.  I doubt highly there is a prettier Quad in the nation than ours.

I kept track of our Commencement through my friends here and have looked at the photo galleries on Window on Wake Forest (www.wfu.edu/wowf)  If you have not done so, please check it out.  I have heard exceptionally good things about our Baccalaureate speaker.  Her speech is not online, but I hope it will be.  She was getting rave reviews.

One change to Commencement this year was to have screens on the back half of the Quad (on the Reynolda Hall side).  This was to allow families seated in the back half to see their children as they walked the stage.  It is something we have long wanted to do, and this year we were able.  Though I was not here, I heard good things about the screens. 

Glad to be back on campus again.  Will have some interesting things to blog about in the coming days - how’s that for a teaser?  Check back!

I am going to be missing Commencement for the first time in the 9 years I have worked here.   My nephew is graduating from college the same weekend as WFU’s graduation, so - alas! - I will be there instead of here.

My colleague Emily Smith, whose handiwork you have seen on our web site, in the Meineke blog, and in numerous print and email pieces you receive from WFU, will be guest blogger for the next several days.  I hope you enjoy her reflections and perspectives.

Congratulations to all our seniors and their families.  We are going to miss you terribly but have a huge sense of pride as we see you off to your next destination in life!

Today when I walked on campus there were about 20 columns of chairs - these are on pallets, with the chairs stacked at least 6″ high, way over my short head.   Our friends from Facilities are breaking the pallets down and are beginning to lay out the chairs on the Quad today.  This is down to a science.  The areas of the ground are measured out, the chairs placed just so. 

It reminds me a little of the vineyards in Dijon (where I went on the WFU exchange program).  You can walk through the rows upon rows of chairs and they are all in perfect order, symmetrical, beautiful.  I am a huge fan of the Georgian architecture here, so any time we can get balance and symmetry it makes me feel good.

The sky is ominously cloudy.  I just dared take a peek at the 10 day forecast.  Because I am superstitious by nature, I won’t say what it is.  I don’t want to jinx anything.  But if you are reading this, please find a reverent moment to ask for good weather. 

Commencement is only 5 days away and we’ve now moved into the stage where we are putting finishing touches on a million small things.  For example: new coats of paint are being put on railings on the Quad, the lampposts on the Quad, and even the speed bumps.  We pay attention to the small things and big.  I like it.

For some strange reason, the chapel bells are ringing now, at 10:51 on a Wednesday.  I guess this is practice time for the carilloneur for Commencement.  Funny to hear the bells tolling now.

Out my window I can see what appears to be some sort of high school tour.  It’s about 30 kids and maybe 4 adults, which seems to be a dangerously low adult-to-high-schooler ratio.  Then again, my spouse and I have a 3 year old and we much prefer having a ‘zone defense’ on a toddleras opposed to a ‘man to man’ defense : )

Our office is busy stuffing welcome packets for the Class of 2008 today.  They get a small goody bag with information about the Alumni Office, the WF Clubs program, how they can keep their email address, how they can connect with other Wake Foresters in whatever city they are moving to.  1,000 goodie bags in our office area - good times!

PS - I just found this great link online with WFU Commencement trivia.  Enjoy!

http://www.wfu.edu/wowf/2008/20080514.trivia.html

Ok, it’s not a real skeleton, but rather the skeleton of the giant Commencement tent that is going up.  The metal frame for the top of the tent has already been assembled and is sitting on the north end of the Quad.  If I get self indulgent for a minute, it seems a bit like some sort of archeological discovery - like you’ve stumbled across the unearthed remains of a large, geometrically shaped dinosaur, maybe of the Tentasaurus Rex species : )  The outer shell of the tent won’t likely go up until next week, when they also put the “legs” on it so it can stand.  So much of this depends on weather forecast - will there be rain? will there be wind? - so you can not erect the thing too soon.

Another big event is coming up for us this Thursday - All Access Greensboro will be held at 6:30 p.m. at The Empire Room.  We are going to have the Provost, Jill Tiefenthaler, there, as well as Coach Gaudio of the basketball team and our current student Trustee, Carolyn Harbaugh. 

If you have not signed up yet and are reading this blog - please, sign up today!  www.wfu.edu/allaccess   This is your chance to get an insider’s view of what is going on at Wake Forest and your chance to ask questions of our top leaders.  Join us and make your voice a part of our conversation!

It’s fun to have a behind the scenes view of big events on campus like Commencement.  On Friday, I took lunch to three Commencement office staff members, who were offsite creating the ticket packets for the graduates.  Imagine a mountain of various tickets - parking passes, Baccalaureate tix, Commencement tix, brunch and lunch tix, etc. - all spread out on a floor and one by one we create a packet for each graduate. 

The phones are ringing off the hook for Commencement.  Mostly parents with questions - what should I wear? how early should I arrive? where are the best seats?  All good questions, all with a lot of merit.  Unfortunately there is no way to have a standard answer.  Some parents dress to the nines (suit and tie) - but others wear something cooler since they will presumably be sitting in the heat for 3 hours.  “Early” is in the eye of the beholder - my own parents arrived at 6 am when the Quad opened; other parents stroll in after 8.  There is no ‘right’ answer.

Today is very windy and its a good thing the Commencement tent has not gone up yet.  It would not be a good thing to have it blow over (which it had done once in the past, I am told).

And for all who read this, please say a prayer that we have good weather and no threat of rain.  No one wants to move the ceremony to the Joel.

I received a great comment from a blog reader yesterday that I wanted to respond to.  The comment was about the logo, and suggested that WFU needs to get moving and update the web site, since some believe it is looking old and is in need of a facelift and to make navigation easier.

I could not agree more.  And the good news is, my colleagues feel the same way!

We actually are involved with a project to overhaul the web site.  It is considerably complicated, as there are literally thousands of interlinked pages on the WFU site.  We are working with an expert web company to work on redesign and navigation - which will include elements of our visual identity - new logo, new standards, etc.

Realistically, this is going to be a work in progress for some time.  I suspect what will happen is that we begin to work on the “main” pages - the home page and the first level down, and gradually begin to get the new web site together.  However, this is still in discussion with our web masters and mistresses, and as the summer unfolds we will know more.

It will take some time to overhaul everything, but IMHO better to do it right the first time than do a spit and bubble gum and have to fix it again.  So bear with us - it *is* coming.

——–

In other news, there was terrible bad weather here lastnight.  I have heard of a lot of storm damage, like downed trees, power outages, etc. - possibly from tornadoes - in Clemmons, which is a suburb of W-S - as well as other surrounding areas.  Rest assured that the campus looks fine and we seem to be all in one piece.   Our thoughts to anyone in the vicinity who has been affected.

The staff here is busy preparing for commencement.  10,000 chairs will be delivered in just a few days to the Quad, along with a tent and speakers.  I always like seeing the empty chairs the day or two before commencement - it reminds me of the fun that is to come.

Commencement is by far the best day of the year on campus.  It is a day of near-universal happiness.  Never can you find so many happy and proud parents, nor as many beaming students, all at once.  It’s a time to reflect on what I hope was 4 (or 5!) years well spent, lifelong friendships formed, and a time of fun and learning.

Students are playing frisbee on the Quad right now.  It’s a great day - high 70s, light breeze, lots of sun.  I would argue there is no prettier campus in the nation than Wake Forest in May.  Everything seems beautiful and perfect.

It’s hard to say who won the attendance game.  For the Hillary Clinton event a couple of weeks ago, we had 400 spaces saved for the College Democrats group - and probably 320-330ish came to claim their seats.  Somehow John McCain’s campaign staff gave us a much, much larger allotment of seats - 900! - but maybe only 500-600 of them came. 

I think there were three major factors hurting attendance on the College Republicans side:  1) finals are still going on, 2) most students today do not want to get up before 9 am if at all possible, and 3) lastnight was Cinco de Mayo and it was a time to party : )

In all seriousness, I was as impressed with the organization and dedication of our College Republicans as I was with the students in the College Democrats.  Their student leaders put in a lot of time for the event and did everything from directing traffic to checking guest names off the list, to stamping hands for admittance.  We managed to get a few top College Republicans in for a private meet and greet with Senator McCain, and I was so glad for them to get that opportunity.  Once again, Wake Forest offered an amazing opportunity for some hardworking students.

The Chapel was not full when I left the McCain event (sadly I have a meeting and could not attend the whole thing) - which was something of a surprise.   I snuck a peek at Senator McCain’s VIP guest list and one of the gentlemen on the list was a fellow guest at the Hanoi Hilton with him.  I wish I had had the chance to meet him and say thank you for his brave service.  No matter whether you are a Republican or a Democrat, I have to believe most people respect the extreme duress those poor folks went through.

Presidential candidate John McCain arrives on campus tomorrow, and I have a 6:30 a.m. report time to Wait Chapel to help greet guests and provide logistical support.  Thankfully there will be diet soda and sausage biscuits in the morning to help me wake up.

Because of the McCain visit, Facilities has taken down the temporary ropes that have been keeping people off the Quad grass (ropes that mean nothing to a 3 1/2 year old, I found out this weekend while walking with my son on campus).  Facilities has mowed the grass in the kind  of back and forth striped pattern you see at big league baseball stadiums and it looks wonderful.  Between the Clinton and McCain visits and soon to be commencement, we are putting our best foot forward.

Looking out my window, I see two students holding hands.  They obviously are a couple - and it makes me wonder if they are seniors who are lingering on campus before Beach Week (or post-exams, or whatever the term was in your time).  I wonder if they are like so many other senior couples who are wondering what will happen after graduation - will they stay together? get married? find out that a long-distance relationship doesn’t work?   As commencement draws near, there are so many questions about what the future will bring.

For now, they look happy.  May they stay that way.

Tomorrow is the last day of exams, and it is very, very quiet on campus.  Many of the students have already left - those who are here still are obviously in full throws of exam fever.  I have seen an oddly high proportion of unshaven men and people who look like they didn’t shower before rushing off to their finals.

As quiet as it is now, Tuesday will be another day of madness with the visit of presidential candidate John McCain.  He is scheduled to speak at 10 a.m. Tuesday in Wait Chapel.  I will be here at dark-thirty in the morning, since I will be one of the staff to help work crowd control and serve as a resource to the McCain staff, just as we did for Hillary Clinton. 

I feel very fortunate to have heard from 2 of the 3 major presidential candidates on our campus.  In what will no doubt be a very interesting and competitive election, I am glad Wake Forest is on the map for these campaign stops.   We are a force to be reckoned with these days!

As for the new  logo…it has been very interesting for me to see the response to it.  I have heard from people who love it, those who hate it, and a lot of ground in the middle.  I am told that when the old “bar logo” was introduced in the mid-80s, there was a great uproar about it and so many people complained that we had changed and abandoned our past.  We are getting some of those same comments now, which is ironic to me since so many people did not like the bar logo. 

Today was training for new volunteers to the pool of faculty advisors who get a group of freshmen and act as their advisors, helping them choose their classes.  I decided to sign up (even though I am not faculty, they do let some folks on staff serve in this role) and I am so excited.

Several things have changed since I graduated in the early 90s.  We are now on an hours system, not a credits system.  It takes 120 hours to graduate - which is approximately 15 a semester.  A couple of years ago, the faculty and administration changed the divisional requirements; they lowered the number of divisionals (you remember - that is the “you must take 2 classes in biology, chemistry, physics, math; 3 classes in history, political science, philosophy, etc.)  Students now have fewer divisionals, which allows them to explore electives sooner and helps with study abroad.

Speaking of, we are in the mid to upper 60s in terms of percentage of students who have some form of study abroad experience while at Wake Forest.  I am really happy to hear that.  My semester in the Dijon program was a transformational one and I really wish every student could have a similar opportunity.

I will have a group of 11 students to advise come August, and I think it will be a terrific experience.  One of the great joys of Wake Forest is that we are small enough that we can give our students such personal attention - and I am glad to have a more direct role with students than I have had in the past.

Today we held a forum for students about the Visual Identity project, which was formed to review and update Wake Forest’s graphic identity – how we represent ourselves in words, photos, fonts, logos, etc. I am part of the Visual Identity committee.

Probably the most recognizable deliverable of this project was a redesigned Wake Forest logo. If you have not yet received an email from the University about the logo and the visual identity, you can check out the links below:

www.wfu.edu/logovideo

http://www.wfu.edu/wowf/2008/20080501.identity.html

The process of the creation of the logo and related materials was a little like giving birth – it took a long time, we had some pains along the way, but at the end of the road, our committee was so pleased with the final result.

See what you think.

I will have more about the logo in the coming days - but just got back from a 2 day road trip.  We breezed into Atlanta Monday afternoon to hold the “All Access Atlanta” event - which was a ton of fun - and left this morning so I could get back for the meeting to reveal the logo.  I did not even get to see my friends from Atlanta - since I knew i would be there for about 18 hours and would be working most of it.

So tonight I am tired.  More blogging once I am over my car trip-lag.

Is leaving Wake Forest.  Charles Kimball of the Religion dept, who has been here I believe 12 years, is going to Oklahoma U. on June 1st.   Charles is famous for his studies of Islam and was one of the premier commentators on Islam following 9-11.  He did countless alumni and parent programs for me and he is one of the best minds I know.  And funny as heck too.

I was fortunate enough to attend a small party for him lastnight.  It was a great group - top administrators, some trustees, faculty, some athletics colleagues (because if you know Charles, you know he is a big sports fan and a great supporter of our Deacs).  As a matter of fact, it was Charles’ class that helped both Josh Howard and Chris Paul decide to be religion majors.  That’s how good he is.

So we roasted him - and bless him, he is a very good sport - with a goodie bag called his Oklahoma Survival Kit, replete with toy sheriffs badges (because there is a new sheriff in town), a shovel to dig the storm cellar, and a variety of similar things.

The evening closed with Charles being asked to do a dramatic reading of the OU fight song, which has remarkably few words - Boomer, Sooner, Boomer, Sooner, Boomer, Sooner, Go OU! or something like it.  He is a great speaker and carried it off with aplomb.

I will miss him a lot.  He is thoughtful and kind and so smart.  His family is in Oklahoma and he grew up there.  He and wife Nancy have a lot to look forward to.

But we sure will miss him.

We had a great turnout for our event in Charlotte yesterday - 200ish people came to see Dr. Hatch, dean-elect Reinemund, and Coaches Grobe and Gaudio.  We had a luncheon and program in Founders’ Hall of the Bank of America building; for those of you who went to the Meineke Car Care Bowl, it was the same place as our Paint the Town Black party.

I wish I could do justice to some of the stories told by Dino Gaudio and Jim Grobe - but I know that I can’t.  They are accomplished storytellers with such interesting perspectives.  We heard a little bit about Dino growing up in a very blue collar town in Eastern Ohio and a town meeting about giving someone an important job with the meeting held in the fire station.  Coach Grobe talked about sleeping very soundly at night knowing that Ron Wellman is our AD.  Good times.

I am very excited that our “All Access” roadshow will be tomorrow (it’s not too late to sign up:  www.wfu.edu/allaccess)  Found out late yesterday that our new business dean, Steve Reinemund, is planning to attend.  This will be your first chance to meet this exceptional man, so I hope to see you there.

If you read the blog and you are in Charlotte, I hope you will stop by and say hello.  I will be at All Access and will most likely be working at the nametag table as you arrive.

Also - for those of you who will be there - you will be seeing a sneak peek of something new.  This will be the first time publicly that we are showing something we are very proud of.   Can’t wait for you to see it!

Big announcement for WFU today:  the new dean of the Babcock and Calloway schools is Steve Reinemund, former CEO of PepsiCo.  He has an incredible resume as a leader - and you will be able to go to http://www.wfu.edu/ and read an announcement about him.  But I got to meet the man at the WFU Summer Leadership Conference in 2006 and was so impressed.He was the keynote speaker for our conference and talked a lot about ethics and leadership.  I remember he told a story that someone had illegally come by the recipe for Coke and had offered it to some employee at PepsiCo, as it would have been a big coup to find out a secret recipe for their top rival.  It was also of course illegal and immoral.  Steve Reinemund said that the Pepsi employee who had been offered the information called the authorities.  It was the right choice - and what I recall was that Steve Reinemund was proud that across the company, people were moved to do the right thing because that was the corporate culture they built.

M