I"m hearing that the recent pool of applicants to Mizzou has dried up after all of the racial tension that flared up in November. I’m wondering what effect this will have on the school long term. I hope that the school can get its act together. It was once a great school with an amazing journalism program. Sadly, the journalism program will probably take the biggest hit after the negativity publicity.
Where are you hearing this?
Not surprising at all.
I think a lot of recruiters are going to put applications from certain schools in the automatic deny pile. Corporations don’t want trouble makers.
Are you joking? That is ridiculous.
First off, applications might be slightly down compared to years past, but let’s keep in mind this is the state flagship of Missouri and a large school, so it’s not like they’ll be hurting for applicants. Second off, the journalism program hasn’t been/won’t be affected at all, and I don’t see why it would be. If anything, there’s never been a better time to be a student journalist here at Mizzou with everything that’s been going on–lots of opportunities to report on these national issues. Thirdly, since Thanksgiving break it’s been relatively quiet and it’s pretty much back to normal.
@scubadive it’s possible you’re closer to the situation than some, but from the standpoint of someone in industry, it seems more likely that the attitudes of a small subset of students will come across in their interviews, and a natural selection process will take place where troublemakers get their due.
I don’t see seasoned recruiters throwing out the baby with the bath water by lumping together in a negative light all applicants from a university that size, given the J-school’s reputation. Considering how many more schools, including Ivies, that this disruption is beginning to spread to.
Some might say if there’s a smaller incoming class (which is only loosely correlated with the size of the applicant pool), it may be composed of a higher proportion of students truly committed to attending there. Too many schools’ application pools seem to be going in the opposite direction.
Coincidental timing - admitted students and their parents received an e-mail today from Chuck May and Barbara Rupp with a link to “The State of Mizzou” http://news.missouri.edu/2015/the-state-of-mizzou/
I thought it was pretty well developed and presented.
@scubadive, I hope that your statement that recruiters will “put applications from certain schools in the automatic deny” column is not a veiled reference to discriminating against minority students. If so, then you might be thoroughly disappointed with Mizzou’s reaction in its “The State of Mizzou” plan. The last point states the following:
“Protests have quieted down, and some top administrators have stepped down, but Mizzou is just getting revved up. We’ve held a listening session, during which students talked to the Board of Curators. We’ve held a teach-in, during which hundreds of Tigers talked with a panel of black faculty about race and diversity issues. We’ve created a new vice chancellor position for inclusion, diversity and equity (currently and temporarily occupied by Chuck Henson, associate dean in the School of Law). We have a new Office for Civil Rights and Title IX to combat discrimination. We’re reviewing mental health services to make sure students’ needs are met. We have dedicated funds for hiring and retaining more diverse faculty and staff — and training for those doing the hiring. We’re starting two new lecture series — one on academic freedom, hate speech and social responsibility and the other on the African-American experience in Missouri. We’re also requiring diversity training for all faculty, staff and students; diversity classes for incoming students; and, effective immediately, the Diversity 101 course for senior administrators. And this is just the beginning. We want our students to be ready for the world.”
Sounds to me like Mizzou is taking this issue straight on in a proactive manner to ensure that the protesters understand that they have a voice. That’s a smart strategy, its kind of hard to justify protests when administration is giving you a seat at the table.
I’m just visiting this forum because I’m interested in what’s going on. I saw a recently released Youtube film today in which several black students expressed dismay at how “white” the campus was. And yet the campus’ student population actually is a pretty fair representation of the state of Missouri at large. Missouri is 82.8 percent white and 11.6 percent black. Mizzou is 77 percent white and seven percent black. So blacks are slightly underrepresented, but the campus is going to be overwhelmingly white in any event.
Perhaps it’s a culture shock for blacks who come from urban areas that are virtually all black. But I really don’t see how they expect a flagship that is in an overwhelmingly white state to not be overwhelmingly white.
I suspect a few students will decide not to attend a university where they are required to take “diversity” classes which some see as political indoctrination.
Which “troublemakers” do you mean? The ones that feel free to make racial slurs against fellow students, or the ones that protest against that? I’d hire the second before I’d hire the first…
@intparent There was one reported incident of an on-campus racial slur. In addition, the student body president said someone had called him a slur off campus, but he was caught in some pretty outlandish lies. There was also a swastika drawn in poop, but the police report says they think they know who drew it. After reading it I was left thinking it was drawn by a black student.
My impression was that the campus was a pretty tolerant place, but it is certainly less so today. There are a lot of disgruntled students on both sides, and I suspect the protests will continue no matter what, just because the protesters like protesting.
Sorry, Mizzou has never had a reputation as tolerant. It is a bastion of the old South.
Lots of schools require diversity classes I’ve found lately. It didn’t appear to be new.
@intparent I have never stepped foot on the Missouri campus. I can tell you that those of us who are actually from the South do not consider people from Missouri to be Southern unless they hail from the boot heel or thereabouts. I have never in my life heard of Mizzou being called a “bastion of the old South.”
I’m not saying the Mizzou students are perfect. But overblown rhetoric that portrays them in a false light is not helpful.
Lol… divert, redirect, obfuscate. As usual. Missouri is the south to the rest of us, and has had racial issues for a long time. “Who… US???” Yup.
I consider MO to be in the midwest, I have friends (from Missouri) who consider it to be the souther and others who consider it to be the midwest. But whether it’s in the south or not is irrelevant, in my opinion. That makes it sound like only the south is racist and all other regions are the best example of tolerance. It’s no secret that the south has had its issues with race, but it’s not JUST a southern problem.
Clearly Mizzou isn’t perfect, but I do think it is a tolerant place overall–it’s a very liberal university (which seems to have become synonymous with tolerance). Because the state itself is very conservative, opinions and ideologies tend to clash sometimes, so maybe sometimes it comes off as a certain way. But coming from Virginia knowing that Missouri is a conservative state, I was surprised at the number of people who are liberal and have extremely tolerant views. There are many resources for marginalized students and there are a lot of students who are passionate about diversity and tolerance.
It seems like many are treating this as a black and white issue (no pun intended), and maybe as outsiders who haven’t been on campus during the events it’s easy to see it that way, but there isn’t a clear right and wrong here–these are multi-faceted issues that aren’t easily solvable. I think it should also be noted that this also wasn’t completely about race–it started off as complaints about the university as a whole, between grad student health insurance and the educational planned parenthood contracts that had been cut. Eventually that was all seemingly forgotten about and the focal point became about race.
There were a couple reported racial incidents, not just one. The student body president said he was called a slur on campus, not off campus, and while yes, he was untruthful at a later point in time, there’s no evidence to suggest that he wasn’t telling the truth about being called a slur. His was also the very first incident to be reported, back in September, I believe, so it wasn’t like he decided to make that up to further stir the pot.
There haven’t been any protests since November.
@CE527M The reason I visited this forum section is because the Chronicle of Higher Education just published a story called “What’s it’s like to be black at the University of Missouri” (behind a paywall). There is also a new “film” by the 1950 group that is several minutes long. So the protests have not stopped.
I should point out that one of the points that is raised in the film is that some of the students are not happy that the university is overwhelmingly white. Yet the state is overwhelmingly white. These students are apparently coming from urban areas, perhaps from all-black high schools. I understand they may be experiencing culture shock. But there really isn’t much way to make the campus a lot “blacker” than it currently is, a fact which ought to become evident to anyone who takes a look at Missouri’s ACT scores broken down demographically.
I’m sure many blacks have suffered ugly slights at the hands of some whites on the Missouri campus. It happens on all campuses, and when it does, it’s wrong. And believe it or not, sometimes blacks do ugly things to whites, too. Back in the day a (white) member of another fraternity prefaced an insult hurled at one of my fraternity brothers – a Hispanic – with “Hey Chico!” He wasn’t amused and we weren’t amused, but we never dreamed of protesting over it. There was beer to be drunk!
The real problem that Missouri has is that are being raised as a reason for the protests are just pretexts. The students are really protesting over things that are beyond the university’s ability to solve. It has the potential to make everyone pretty miserable.
By protests, I meant that literal protests–marches, signs, groups of people congregating–had stopped on campus. I agree that there is still discussion, etc. going on and the Concerned Student 1950 group is far from broken up. I don’t disagree with any of your observations, I just wanted to clarify a few things as a student on campus during the protests. I also agree with your point that the school represents the state’s demographics. It would be hard to equalize the demographics when the state is largely white (and even with OOS students, it’s still naturally overwhelmingly white).
Part of the reason for the protests may be because of what some would say is “overt political correctness” – those on campus who disagree with the protests have called it that. Another reason is that many are truly frustrated and feel that they’ve been discriminated against…now whether the university can do anything to change that or not is up for debate.
I can’t really speak to the consequences on campus as a result of this but I do know that between the protests and everything that went down with former President. Wolfe and the faculty that pressured R. Bowen Loftin to resign as chancellor, the state legislature is really trying to run the school now. Sen. Kurt Schaefer is known for trying to have a hand in how the school operates (between cutting the educational Planned Parenthood contracts and threatening to cut funding) and now they’re really wanting to make changes. Decreased funding in the coming year is practically guaranteed because down in Jeff City they now think the school is run by a group of students.
Overall Freshman applications are down 5%; African American applications are down 19%, while grad school applicants are also way down (19%).
Deposits are down “significantly”, which is likely going to lead to a lower yield rate (accepted students enrolling).
http://www.abc17news.com/news/mizzou-fall-enrollment-down-since-last-year/37297852