Oh man, is it football weather outside! 57 at 8:30, getting up into the seventies today. There’s a welcome fall chill on the air, yet the sun is bright and warm on your face. If I wasn’t pumped about tailgating/football before today, I am now.

I guess I’m not the only one. Last week, we got a MASSMAIL that, once again, to thank the university community for its dedicated service in this dismal financial period when real compensation is “hard,” the university admins are giving staff two tickets to the football home opener. A game over Labor Day weekend that no one is going to go to anyway. With a brand new coach after a pitiful season last year. Gee, thanks guys. I’d rather have had Friday afternoon off. But Cantor never did such things for us, so I still think Dick Her Man is a-okay.

Sometimes he makes me laugh, especially with today’sm ASSMAIL about the chief, included below for those who can’t look them up. Ah, politics… the art of saying something without saying anything at all…

Dear Members of the University Community,

The Presidents and Chancellors on the Executive Committee of the National Collegiate Athletic Association recently adopted a new policy to “prohibit NCAA colleges and universities from displaying hostile and abusive racial/ethnic/national origin mascots, nicknames or imagery at any of the 88 NCAA championships.” As those of you in the University of Illinois community know, we have been debating and discussing the Chief Illiniwek issue for many years now. The Board of Trustees has been actively engaged in addressing the matter and 18 months go set about an effort to reach a consensus solution to the issue. The Board is now considering what response it will take to the University being included on the NCAA list of schools with imagery deemed “hostile and abusive.”

To those who honor and revere the Chief, these harsh words will seem a terrible distortion. To some of those who oppose the Chief, these harsh words will ring true. The NCAA recommendations also seem to argue that the very names “Illini” and “Fighting Illini” are themselves hostile and abusive references. I believe that this is an unwarranted extension of the debate. We are evaluating the NCAA recommendations now and will seek all necessary clarification in what appear to be ambiguities in the decision. In the meantime, no change is being made in the use of the terms “Illini” or “Fighting Illini” or in the Chief Illiniwek tradition.

The University of Illinois is dedicated to an environment of respect and dignity for all individuals. Exactly what that means, of course, is the nub of our long debate. As a great university, we cannot shrink from freewheeling debate. That commitment is at the core of our mission, the core of our nation’s value of free speech, and the core of our national character. Yet let us acknowledge that our varying beliefs about the Chief are sincere matters of the heart and the head, and let us resolve to continue to work respectfully across our differences to find common ground.

Very truly yours,

Richard Herman
Chancellor

This mailing approved by:
The Office of the Chancellor