Readers of this blog might be interested in the latest from our sister campus in Columbia: The University of Missouri-Columbia is considering a name change of its own.
The Columbia Tribune reported on Friday (Aug. 3) that the Columbia campus -- more often referred to as MU or Mizzou than UMC -- is considering dropping the "-Columbia" from its name. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch also reports on the proposal, quoting MU Chancellor Brady Deaton as saying, "Our aim is to properly brand it as the major university in the state. It should be the University of Missouri, period."
Deaton isn't billing the change from "University of Missouri-Columbia" to "University of Missouri" as a name change, but a "name restoration." That's because, until the creation of the "University of Missouri System" in the early 1960s, there was only one "University of Missouri" designation - one university with several schools located in two areas of the state. The first campus was established in Columbia, and it housed several of schools (medicine, agriculture, journalism, etc.). In 1870, a second campus -- the first technological school west of the Mississippi -- was established in Rolla and was called the University of Missouri School of Mines and Metallurgy.
The proposal to alter the Columbia campus' name, Deaton notes in the Post-Dispatch, is "really a restoration of the original name of the university."
Is it just a coincidence that so many schools in Missouri are changing their names? Truman State, Missouri St., Missouri S&T, and now Mizzou? Is this the new trend for colleges?
It'll be interesting to see if this plan for Mizzou goes through. Honestly, if I had known that this was in the works and thought that it was likely to pass, I would have been MUCH more supportive of a name change. I never felt that the "branch campus" excuse for changing the name was a good excuse, since Mizzou technically used the hyphen as well (actually, I thought all the excuses were pretty lame). But I could've understood this reasoning if Mizzou was pushing to be the only school in the system that was without the hyphen. However, I still would've pushed for MSM, similar to Mizzou pushing for the restoration of their original name.
In many other systems, the flagship campus does not use a locational indicator (for example, U of Arkansas, U of Alabama, Texas A&M, Penn State, etc.) I suspect that one reason, perhaps the major reason, Mizzou wants to drop the "-Columbia" is because of the UMR name change. I doubt we would be hearing about this if UMR was not changing its name.
I attend University of Missouri-Rolla,. The name changes are unnecessary and usually only hurt the prestige of the school. There are still two other schools that are called "University of Missouri..." the only thing dropping the Columbia off of the name is going to accomplish is to diminish UMKC and UMSL and make them seem like lesser schools.
I now live in Maryland. Visiting Washington, D.C., at cherry blossom time this year, my wife and I were approached by a young lady who spied my MSM-UMR Alumni cap and asked if I had indeed graduated from "Rolla" and was visiting. She had also graduated and was amazed to see someone wearing an alumni cap. We had a nice visit.
This was after I had learned of the name change. Made me wonder if it was all worth it. I know it isn't official, but I can't help but wonder if MUST will be be the acronym used by most people and Rolla will become that Musty Little Old Campus in the Hills.
As a current Mizzou student -- and also quick to point out pretty much every time that I say that, '03 and '06 UMR alum -- I really can't say that I'm opposed to a "name restoration" up here.
While I do sort of follow the part of the name change argument that's purely to avoid being confused with my current institution by the media at large, I can't help but wonder why we couldn't have decided to just go with a similar kind of "name restoration" ourselves. Kind of going along with Mr. Besancon's first comment, it just seems to me like UMR is trying to lump itself more with the (meaning no offense, if that's possible) lower-tier schools who are picking out random new names instead of sticking with something tried and true like the big-name ones around here want to. I guess we'll just have to hope that the current approach doesn't backfire too much?
I agree with you completely Lisa. Instead of being a university that offers an excellent, specific education at a low cost we are now trying to become a bigger university that offers a mediocre education at an unreasonable cost.
Oh and we have a fun new name to go with all of this as well. Good for us.
Needless to say, not only will I not be giving back to MUST, but neither will a good portion of the alumni I know.
My, my. Isn't this turn of events interesting. The people who wanted to change the name of UMR were just too clever by half, weren't they?
When all is said and done, the mechanical school of the oldest land grant college in the country will be associated with places like Michigan Tech and South Dakota Tech with a MUSTy name--and only UMC will have the full University of Missouri name.
Is it too late to stop this madness of a name change?
By the way, in Wisconsin, the official name is UW-Madison. And, all University of California campuses have a city designator.