Category Archives: EMU Images

“Guest column: Eastern Michigan University has not socked it to students during tough times”

Posted on December 2, 2011 by | 1 Comment

An alert EMUTalk.org reader sent me this link, “Guest column: Eastern Michigan University has not socked it to students during tough times,” which is an op-ed piece by our own President Susan Martin which appeared in the Jackson Citizen Patriot.  For the most part, I agree with Martin:  EMU has done a lot– probably too much, frankly– to cut costs in light of state cuts.  Though I think the money could have been spent better than on the football team and such.

→ 1 Comment

Posted in Administrator Life, EMU Images, EMU President, In the media...

Proof that we should have been the Emus a long time ago

Posted on October 26, 2011 by | 4 Comments

A loyal EMUTalk.org reader sent me this first page of an interesting little article the other day, something I think of as a bit of a “smoking gun” in the never-ending discussion about EMU’s mascot.  From way back in April 1991 (I think) comes at least part of the column “Call them the Emus of EMU” by then Ann Arbor News sports editor/now EMU PR/media guy Geoff Larcom.  That link will open a PDF of the clipping.

I am assuming this is referring to some kind of survey/poll conducted by Larcom et al around the name change.  It doesn’t look like there was a whole lot of voters here, but the mascot winner back then by a landslide was the Emu.  Which again makes me wonder: how the heck did we end up as eagles?

Incidentally, second place was “the Hurons,” though not necessarily after the American Indian tribe.  A quote:

[John Bulmer] prefers that name ["The Hurons"]: “1. In honor of the lovely river of that name that flows by the campus; 2. In honor of the Huron valley, in which EMU is located; and 3. It’s a practical name that comes from the name of the main street that runs from I-94 and downtown Ypsilanti to the lovely EMU campus.”

Oh, if EMU had only listened to Larcom and his readers so long ago….

→ 4 Comments

Posted in College Fun, EMU Branding, EMU Images, In the media...

Just want to point out: I’ve been saying we ought to be the Emus for years and years

Posted on September 18, 2011 by | 2 Comments

While looking for an article in the Eastern Echo about the new head in my department, I came across an op-ed piece by Michael Cassar,  “Eagle overused as a mascot; Should Eastern reconsider?” It’s dated 2010, but I have a feeling that’s an error– you’d think someone would do a little proof-reading over there….

Anyway, it’s kind of a gentle suggestion that as campus is being renovated, we ought to consider renovating the mascot.  I say “gentle” because Cassar isn’t saying we ought to go back to the Hurons nor is he suggesting what is the obvious choice of the Emus.  He does have a good point about the problem of being the Eagles:

According to my count, based on a list compiled by Adam Joshua Smargon, there are no fewer than 59 different colleges using the eagle as a nickname, and this doesn’t include variations like the 15 schools named the Golden Eagles. Bluntly, donning the eagle is so generic and bland that EMU might as well have for its motto “Because you’d rather be a Spartan.”

Good point.

Anyway, I have of course long advocated for a change to the Emus, though not the wimpy logo advocated by the folks behind thingsemu.com I’m talking an emu logo that is more in line with the news items I post here which usually involve an escape involving one of these birds that are notoriously tough and difficult to catch.  I’m talking a bad-ass emu kinda logo.

 

→ 2 Comments

Posted in College Fun, EMU Images, Emus (the bird), In the media..., Sports

My own parody/contribution to the TRUEMU campaign

Posted on August 12, 2011 by | 6 Comments

Just a chance to play around with some imaging software.  And kidding, of course….

→ 6 Comments

Posted in EMU Branding, EMU Images

Congrats, graduates!

Posted on April 17, 2011 by | 3 Comments

As I mentioned before, I went to EMU’s Commencement yesterday– the morning session, with the College of Arts of Sciences– and I had a nice time.  A few highlights/notes:

  • I took a lot of pictures, but only a few turned out.
     

    EMU Student Body President
     

    Here’s the EMU Student Body President speaking.
     

    Lots of people
     

    A shot of the crowd from my vantage point. You’re unlikely to see that many people in the convo center for anything other than a graduation or a concert of some sort. 

  • There’s a decent enough article in Annarbor.com summing up the events.  It is definitely true that there is a vibe of students triumphing through various “struggles” at EMU in order to graduate, which is actually one of the reasons I like working here:  not to be too sentimental about it all, but I feel like I have a chance to make a difference.
  • I hadn’t been to a commencement in a number of years, but some colleagues who had been more recently suggested that some of the logistics of the event were a little more disorganized than they were in the past.  I didn’t notice, really.
  • I did see a few graduates who I recall from my own classes, but the truth of the matter is that the sea of faces moves by so quickly on the platform that it’s hard to tell.  That and I have a bad memory for students from the past.  In any event, if you saw me and I didn’t see you, congratulations anyway!
  • All in all, I would say it was a pleasant and relatively painless task, one that I think more faculty ought to volunteer to participate in.  It didn’t take long– I got there about 9:20 and I was eating lunch with a few colleagues by about 11:45– and EMU provides all the regalia and such.  Faculty march in (almost) last and get good seats, and they march out (almost) first and can thus more or less quickly exit.  Not a terrible way to spend a Saturday morning by any stretch.
  • And really, as the budget screws are tightened and as contract negotiations for next year heat up, I think it’s important for faculty to be visible and involved in these kinds of activities.  A lot of people show up to these things, and those people– graduates and their friends and family– translate to alumni, voters, and other stakeholders in the process.  Faculty presence at events like this are important, and it seems to me that if even half of the faculty were to show up to graduations (and more than half would be better, of course), then that might symbolically matter some when it comes time to talk about contracts, the importance of faculty, how we work for our money, etc.  It certainly wouldn’t hurt our cause.

→ 3 Comments

Posted in College Fun, EMU Images, Faculty Life, Student Life

Four thoughts on this billboard

Posted on August 23, 2010 by | 6 Comments

Brain cheer?

I guess you’d call this a billboard; it’s hanging on the Student Center right now.  Anyway, my four thoughts (please add your own in the comments):

  • I would really prefer if our students did not cheer their brains out as they might need them for classes.
  • As an overweight white guy myself, the green body paint on this gentleman is not exactly “selling” me on this kind of fandom.
  • It occurs to me that the eagle on the “E” football logo could easily be turned into an emu with minimal effort.
  • Only one night home game, and it appears to be coming up next week against Army.

→ 6 Comments

Posted in Buildings and Grounds, EMU Images, Sports

EMU rolls out new web site– thoughts?

Posted on July 25, 2010 by | 4 Comments

I don’t know when this happened because I don’t often have a reason to visit EMU’s homepage, but it looks like they’ve rolled out a new site.  My 2 minute poke around impressions are positive.  I don’t like the front page Flash animation for all kinds of different reasons, but I do like that users can chose their own color scheme, a feature I wouldn’t mind adding to EMUTalk.org  And I’m not sure about this, but it appears that the site might finally be powered by some kind of content management system instead of being static web pages.

Anyway, what do folks think?

→ 4 Comments

Posted in EMU Images, EMU Technology

Pray-Harrold No Smoking “pilot” zone

Posted on October 27, 2009 by | 6 Comments



This was new to me today (mainly because I have been working a lot at home lately): as this flyer taped to the window indicates, there’s a “Entrance Pilot” program at Pray-Harrold right now to enforce a no smoking zone entrance.

My pictures are not that great here for giving perspective, but the zone includes a sign by the trees kind of in the “square” of the southeast entrance area, and this red “line in the sand” (or paint on the pavement).


On the one hand, I applaud the effort.  But how come these same rules don’t appear to be in place at the northeast entrance of the building, the one that is nearest to the College of Education and far busier than this entrance?  I mean, having this southeast entrance a non-smoking zone and the northeast entrance a smoking zone is kind of like being in a restaurant and being sat right on the borderline between the smoking and non-smoking sections.  (Oh, and when is Michigan going to join radical states like North Carolina and ban smoking in restaurants and bars, anyway?)

→ 6 Comments

Posted in Buildings and Grounds, EMU Images, Uncategorized

I kinda like a parade (and does anyone want to be in it next year?)

Posted on July 4, 2009 by | 5 Comments

But I didn’t love it this year– and by “it,” I mean the annual July 4 parade. I thought it was a little on the short-side, it featured too many cars with no decoration or indication at all why they were in the parade (perhaps they just got stuck in traffic), and it had too many church groups. As I overheard one person saying, “When did the Fourth of July become a religious holiday?”

A few images:

Right back at ya, Elvis
It’s as if Elvis were posing just for me! (Note the EMU construction in the background.)

Ypsilanti Underwear Shipped Worldwide

Apparently, this was an industry of sorts in Ypsilanti back in the day. Now that the auto industry has cleared out, perhaps we can rise in the underwear business again.

And then there’s this, which I think was about the weirdest float of the day:

This was a float for a church group of some sort, and the theme was Jesus/God as carpenter and also something about “building for the future and our children.” But all I saw was that rather disturbing hammer march scene in Pink Floyd’s The Wall (watch all of this on YouTube or skip ahead to about the 4 minute mark to see what I mean). My guess is that this particular group of church goers missed that movie.

Anyway, not to rehash stuff that came up last year about this time, but once again, there was no EMU presence in the parade– well, no direct presence. I am sure there were many people who are tied to EMU who were in the parade for other organizations/purposes. There are a lot of logistic reasons why the Heritage Day Parade is a little more workable for EMU schedules in terms of things like the band or athletic teams or whatever. Still, it’d be nice if EMU did something more than nothing.

So that got me to thinking: anybody interested in an EMUTalk.org float next year? Or maybe something a little broader than that, like Ypsi bloggers? Maynard, what do you think?

→ 5 Comments

Posted in College Fun, EMU Branding, EMU Images, EMUtalk.org News, Ypsilanti

Dear woman who rudely cut me off in the student center parking lot because “I have to go to work:”

Posted on April 8, 2009 by | 11 Comments

I hope you got my note.

I was the guy pulling into a spot in the EMU Student Center parking lot this afternoon, fair and square, when you cut me off by going the wrong way and took it. My jaw appropriately dropped onto the steering wheel, I pulled up next to you, rolled down the window, and asked “are you serious?!” To which you got out of your car and announced “I have to go to work.”

Hey, we all have our bad days. Lord knows I have mine, and maybe you were having one of yours. I followed you in to see where you were working, but I’ll leave out what door I saw you go into. But I believe you were going to work. I understand. I too was going to work and I too was on a tight schedule, which is why I was parking in the guest lot. I was at the Student Center to meet some of my students and to go to the annual first year writing program’s “celebration of student writing.” But I don’t know, maybe it was more important for you to take the spot I was pulling into for some reason.

I thought what you did was super rude, but I don’t really care that much that you were rude to me. Like I said, I work here too, so being rude to me is not really that big of a deal– well, other than the fact that it’s not a good thing for co-workers to be rude to each other.

No, what I really care about is who you could have been rude to. See, this was in the guest parking lot at the EMU Student Center. I’m pretty sure that most (at least many) of the people who park in the Student Center guest parking lot are guests at EMU, and being rude to guests is never cool.

I mean, what if you had pulled this stunt with someone visiting EMU who was thinking about coming here in the Fall? What if it was a parent? What if it was an alum coming back to visit the new Student Center? What if it was one of the hundreds of people who had come to the ballroom for today’s “celebration of student writing?” Heck, what if it was someone who was interested in donating money to EMU? That wouldn’t be, good would it?

Anyway. No harm this time, but could you do me a favor and think a little more about this sort of thing next time? We’ve got enough image problems at EMU without trying to cut off potential guests to the school just in the name of a parking spot. Thanks for thinking and thanks for reading,

–Steve (aka, sitedad)

→ 11 Comments

Posted in Administrator Life, Buildings and Grounds, EMU Branding, EMU Events, EMU Fund Raising, EMU Images, Parking, Staff Life, Student Life