Image Is Everything For UNC

For years as a University Desk reporter, I've been meaning to write a column like this -- giving readers some needed insight into our University's tangled web.

Since freshman year, I have done a pretty good job of keeping my mouth shut and being professional -- except for the excessive grumbling to friends and relatives about our ever-growing metropolis of a University and my ongoing battle to get an education and a parking space.

My fellow journalists got so tired of hearing me complain that they gave me a column to express my angst.

Since matriculating in August of 1999, I have seen University history repeat itself several times, and I feel ready to break my sacred silence as a University Desk reporter and reveal what I have really learned.

The days of suffering in silence are over! I will no longer allow my bitterness to fester. From now on, I will call issues like I see them and watch the letters to the editor pile up. (Old habits are hard to break -- I write this with trepidation.) It will be an honor to share my weekly University Desk reality check with you all. So let's get this party started.

What's in a name?

William Shakespeare proposed that names ultimately are arbitrary labels, but Chancellor James Moeser's recent decision to drop the UNC-CH abbreviation in favor of a standardized "UNC-Chapel Hill" on all future UNC-CH documents is a calculated decision.

Although it does seem troubling that our administrators have placed "integrated marketing," as Provost Robert Shelton put it last week in The Daily Tar Heel, so high on their priority list, I think it's reasonable to cut down on the University's number of names. It's fine -- for clarity's sake -- as long as our distancing from UNC-system abbreviations does not imply Chapel Hill distancing itself from the UNC system.

Sprite might advertise that image is nothing, but in our media-centric age of commercialized universities, consistent marketing matters.

In both media soundbytes and casual conversations throughout the country, Moeser needs UNC-Chapel Hill to be immediately recognized. Like a fashion designer creating his own unique label, Moeser has a responsibility to control our image.

But that's the problem -- what is our image? What is the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill?

How do we reconcile UNC-CH's identities as the flagship institution of a 16-campus system and a public research university claiming and aiming to be the top public college in the nation?

Are we just a basketball school? Or a former basketball school?

As Moeser forges ahead with his predecessor's Master Plan, the importance of solidifying our evolving identity intensifies. As Moeser contemplates expanding the UNC-CH franchise in the Middle East, it's more important than ever that the University community is clear on what this franchise guarantees.

What are our priorities? How can the University guarantee a solid education as we continue to expand? Dilution of a liberal arts education is not the answer.

UNC-CH is not the only University with an identity crisis, however. Down the road at the University of New Jersey at Durham, Duke University President Nan Keohane is concerned about the way admissions markets itself. According to the Duke Chronicle, Keohane has created a high-level task force to examine how Dook presents itself to potential students. And get this -- Keohane is worried that incoming Duke students aren't aware of their hard-core educational opportunities. They have money coming out the wazoo, and Dook is losing sleep over its "work hard, play hard" image of well-rounded students.

Is it just me or isn't that UNC-CH's image?

So that's another front UNC-CH needs to watch -- image stealing.

The buzz in academia, it seems, is that universities need to build distinctive images in order to attract a distinctive student body. And vice versa.

So basically we need to retain UNC-CH's original style while improving as we grow.

Only then will everyone know our name.

Columnist Katy Nelson can be reached at knelson@email.unc.edu.