Michelle Obama Highly Critical of UC

Colleges & Universities A-Z University of Chicago ✅
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<p>@FBla la land
I’m also an international student but had a completely different experience when I visited the University. I didn’t have internet connection either, so I called the office and whoever picked up was very friendly. She stayed on the phone for about 20 minutes to tell me when the tours are, how to get to Hyde Park, where the admissions office is located, etc. After the tour, they even gave my mother and me a suggestion for a good place to eat around there.</p>

<p>Also, re: viewbooks… Maybe it’s just me but I never found the particularly helpful. Most of the information on the viewbook is available online, so I never bothered to ask for them.</p>

<p>However, I do know that Chicago was the only one that UPSes every document they send to Korea (my country of legal residence). Even the Chicago Chronicles they send out weekly (or bi-weekly can’t remember) they sent it via UPS. Overall, I was very impressed at their effort to accommodate my needs as an international student.</p>

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<p>Hunt this is the quote:</p>

<p>By using what you have learned here, you can shorten the path perhaps for kids who may not see a path at all. And I was once one of those kids. Most of you were once one of those kids. I grew up just a few miles from the University of Chicago in my hometown. The university, like most institutions, was a major cultural, economic institution in my neighborhood.</p>

<p>“My mother even worked as a secretary there for several years,” said Mrs. Obama, highlighting a point of mother Marian Robinson’s biography that is not well known.</p>

<p>“Yet that university never played a meaningful role in my academic development. The institution made no effort to reach out to me –- a bright and promising student in their midst –- and I had no reason to believe there was a place for me there. Therefore, when it came time for me to apply to college, I never for one second considered the university in my own backyard as a viable option.” </p>

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<p>I’m sorry Hunt, how does this show that Mrs. Obama changed things at Chicago? Or should I ask…How.does.this. show.Mrs.Obama.changed.things.at Chicago?</p>

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<p>Hekau, read the next two paragraphs, which are handily quoted upthread.</p>

<p>I appreciate your defense of the University of Chicago, but having a long and proud history of nondiscrimination, on the one hand, and affirmatively reaching out to and encouraging smart young African-Americans on the South Side (not in Woodlawn) in the late '70s, on the other, are two rather different and not logically inconsistent things. In general, I think that is not regarded as a great period in the history of the University. Among other things, it came close to bankruptcy, it considered leaving the city altogether, and it did not have a great reputation for good community relations. I don’t know enough about the specifics to have a real sense whether MRO’s complaint is fair or not, but it’s not impossible that it would be valid for her time and place.</p>

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<p>Always check the context. JHS has explained it very nicely.</p>

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<p>Very confused as the OP’s link doesn’t support Hunt, Are we discussing this:</p>

<p>"Yet that university never played a meaningful role in my academic development. The institution made no effort to reach out to me –- a bright and promising student in their midst –- and I had no reason to believe there was a place for me there. Therefore, when it came time for me to apply to college, I never for one second considered the university in my own backyard as a viable option. </p>

<p>And as fate would have it, I ultimately went on and accepted a position in student affairs at the University of Chicago more than a decade later. What I found was that working within the institution gave me the opportunity to express my concerns about how little role the university plays in the life of its neighbors. I wanted desperately to be involved in helping to break down the barriers that existed between the campus and the community. </p>

<p>And in less than a year, through that position, I worked with others to build the university’s first Office of Community Service. And today, the office continues to provide students with opportunities to help reshape relationships between the university and its surrounding community. Students there today are volunteering in local elementary schools, serving as mentors at high schools, organizing neighborhood watches, and worshiping in local churches. "</p>

<p>So sorry, didn’t realize that Michelle Obama played such a powerful role in turning around the University of Chicago. So no one before her ever volunteered…would that include David Axelrod?</p>

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<p>"I appreciate your defense of the University of Chicago, but having a long and proud history of nondiscrimination, on the one hand, and affirmatively reaching out to and encouraging smart young African-Americans on the South Side (not in Woodlawn) in the late '70s, on the other, are two rather different and not logically inconsistent things. In general, I think that is not regarded as a great period in the history of the University. Among other things, it came close to bankruptcy, it considered leaving the city altogether, and it did not have a great reputation for good community relations. I don’t know enough about the specifics to have a real sense whether MRO’s complaint is fair or not, but it’s not impossible that it would be valid for her time and place. "</p>

<p>Well sure, but you have to at least entertain the notion that M. Obama was making politcial hay here?</p>

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<p>I got a kick out of Obama’s obvious respect for the University in the Saddleback debate with McCane:

Of course he is brilliant he taught at Chicago.</p>

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<p>Yes, yes, yes I dad!</p>

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<p>Hekau, I think you are being a little obtuse.</p>

<p>First, Obama was speaking at the University of California - Merced. In that forum, there wasn’t a whole lot of political hay to be made by attacking the University of Chicago. There isn’t really a lot of political hay to be made ANYWHERE except perhaps Woodlawn and Chile (in some circles) by attacking the University of Chicago.</p>

<p>Second, on the whole, she didn’t attack the University of Chicago. I’m sure some people would beg to differ with her characterization of the bad old days, but this wasn’t an attack, and an analysis of Chicago’s community relations was not the point of her speech at all.</p>

<p>Third, MIGHT it POSSIBLY be true that lots of people like David Axelrod could volunteer their asses off without having a significant impact on the surrounding community, and that redirection of volunteer efforts by someone intimately familiar with that community MIGHT JUST POSSIBLY increase the effectiveness and impact of students’ volunteer efforts? I’m not saying that’s the case here for sure. But I am saying that, if it was, it wouldn’t be the first time that had happened. The world is full of well-meaning and ineffective volunteers, and that’s especially a risk in cross-cultural situations.</p>

<p>Re Scalia (whom I knew back when): He wasn’t actually regarded as brilliant by the brilliant conservative academics at Chicago and elsewhere. He had none of Dick Posner’s or Richard Epstein’s flash and breadth, he couldn’t talk economics at all, and his interest in administrative law was not interesting to them. They thought he was a pedestrian guy who cared too much about partisan politics and too little about theory. Basically, he was a B+ academic. Students tended to like him – he was a very good, engaging teacher, even if you disagreed with him – a lot more than his colleagues.</p>

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Now that was interesting! Always nice to get an insider view.</p>

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<p>You haven’t seen the UChicago viewbook right? The http version is online, like those of all other universities, but I really want a paperback version. Unlike other universities’ viewbook, UChicago’s viewbook does not have all those fancy rankings and show-off alumni. Instead, it contains the life of a student. It is absolutely fascinating and “uncommon”.</p>

<p>It is the only viewbook I found useful, but unfortunately… UChicago does not send the paperback viewbook to international students.</p>

<p>Hopefully UChicago will step up its recruitment effort starting next year, and have someone on the phone when others are drinking coffee.</p>

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<p>Apology accepted. It’s fine to attack her for self-importance, as I said before.</p>

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<p>JHS, I may be obtuse. Heck, let’s say I’m obtuse.(And I have fever and strep throat to boot…) Firstly, do we really want to say that a speech given at UC Merced shouldn’t be given the same weight as say, a speech given at ND? I might be mistaken, but these speeches do seem to be given weight wherever they’re held, they’re thoughtful words that should be pondered.(IMO) Yet, if the words are based on blurring of facts, a willful ignorance of history, than should it be okay that the speech was given to a ‘lesser’ school, does that make the fudging okay? I say political hay was made because points were gained by making the school seem far less than it is…she ignored it’s very rich important history and tried to make it 'EVERY" school. Nice politics, but not quite reality…shouldn’t kids know that some schools valued every intellect from the start? Wouldn’t that help the argument that all kids sould take pride in their intellect and strive for the best?</p>

<p>Hey, maybe those were really bad times at the UofC(IDK), but do we really think they were worse than what was happening at the same time at Princeton? Was there a dearth of black scholars during that period at Uof C? Do we really believe no one from the university ever reached out to the community? You have to admit, M Obama, while not attacking(no one said attacking) the university, made it seem as if the university never was about reaching equality of scholars, never about reaching out to black scholars or the community. Again, she never addresses the school’s history.(And IMO, would have made a far more powerful speech if she did…and then went on to make her point) </p>

<p>And, well, I find it hard to believe that M. Obama and other black scholars fled Uchicago for schools like Princeton because they found more welcome ground. Is there proof of this? If Chicago was so unwelcoming, are we to suppose Princeton and other places were better? How so…considering her reported experience one wants to emphatically ask…how so? Are we not to wonder that like many kids she just wanted an ivy experience rather than her own back yard?</p>

<p>Secondly, again obtuse here…but considering our President and many, many others across the political spectrum feel that outreach and volunteering is extremely important, actually vitality important…do we really want to say that volunteering doesn’t work nearly as well as someone from a community changing things? Why bother volunteering then? If David Axelrod hasn’t made more of an impact working to get candidates elected nationwide then M. Obama working at the school then doesn’t that hand libertarians all the proof they need that politics should be small and local? If we believe in empathy, then we must believe that caring people across the spectrum and across the nation can bring about change, big change. It’s not about where you live but about what you give…right? If volunteers matter little, then why the concerted push for volunteers? Why do they matter?</p>

<p>And sorry, the cynic in me finds it ‘strange’ that Uof C, regardless of it’s foundations, never got itself right until M. Obama set them straight.(I know it works as a story, but political stories drive me crazy…they’re too self aggrandizing and transparent…Uof C has just as a compelling story as MO, perhaps greater in the long run but she would like to usurp it to further her own story…that doesn’t seem right.)</p>

<p>And Hunt? I wasn’t apologizing. But I think you know that…but I also expect you feel apologies are owed to you. Constantly.</p>

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<p>JHS: Interesting view on Scalia, since he is almost always the consensus figure on the “sharpest at oral arguments” axis - even amongst the liberal leaning scholarly crowd who vehemently disagree with his opinions. At the same time, I could definitely see (early in his career) his general demeanor causing him to hold considerably less rank vis-</p>