When I dejectedly departed Kenan Stadium Labor Day weekend 1998 with the scoreboard displaying a loss by the 12th-ranked Tar Heels to Miami of Ohio, I realized that the University I had desired to attend since I knew what colleges were was letting me down. Around that same time I rode the elevator in Hinton James one night with Antawn Jamison, who was not a fellow student but someone with nothing better to do during an NBA labor dispute. Without him (and Mr. Carter), the 1998-99 Tar Heels fell in the second round to Weber State, a school whose location I still do not know.
The demise of a top 10 football program, the end of the greatest run in the history of college basketball and only two out of four women's soccer NCAA titles have occurred under my watch. Please note however that this is not a criticism of the national prominence of our varsity sports. Every glance at The Daily Tar Heel reveals the University taking away our fun or one of our conveniences, be it camping for tickets or parking on campus.
They moan about grade inflation yet enroll larger and brighter freshman classes every year and then moan about our overcrowded dorms. The list never ends. However, the class of 2002 is about to receive the worst slap in the face. The last thing my family and I want to hear this May is one more speech from some bleeding-heart university professor, especially one focused on the Sept. 11 attack on the United States. While all of our lives have been irrevocably altered by that event, Commencement at UNC is not about the role of multiculturalism in our ever-changing society but rather a time to have a national celebrity, with or without previous ties to the University, to come pat me on the back and tell me how the world is my oyster.
How did this happen? An 8-5 Peach Bowl Championship, a record-breaking 112-79 loss to Maryland and one more lecture after my finals were not what I hoped for in 2002 when I rode home with a friend for that long weekend in 1998. The University is about to hand its graduating seniors their biggest disappointment yet, and Carl Torbush isn't the scapegoat this time.
Did anyone think that the former leader of the free world, Jimmy Carter, might need a little notice to fit us into his agenda? I admire that we set our sights so high, but settling for one of our own is absurd. If I had wanted to hear the world according to Chuck Stone I would have taken his class.
Robert Cummings
Senior
History and Political Science
The length rule was waived.
