It behooves this university to advertise the academic success of its undergraduates to the whole student body. Yet, to its own detriment, this university keeps the honors of academic success insular, and in doing so misses out on a chance to create academic role models.
This year, a number of students will or have been inducted into either Phi Beta Kappa, Phi Kappa Phi or Mortarboard—all honors societies of repute. A small swathe of seniors will graduate summa cum laude, magna cum laude or cum laude. And additionally, some well-deserving seniors will graduate with honors in their respective departments.
But who will know of these honors? At academic convocation, at each society’s induction ceremony and on the commencement flyer, these honors will be duly noted. In each case, the audience will consist of family and friends, graduating seniors or, more limiting, other seniors (and some juniors) who have received the same academic honors.
Perhaps even a story will appear on the school’s website that numerates the honorees.
Yet the glaring irony is that while the administrative wing of our school will advertise these honorees repeatedly to current and potential donors with the explicit aim of bolstering our school’s academic reputation, most undergraduates here will never know who got into what academic honor society, who received honors in what major or why such honors matter.
Of course, some may say that honor societies only foster a certain sort of exemplarity, that learning is not displayed in GPA, that academic success is an artificial construction. Indeed, I know a few remarkably intelligent people who are passed over by honors’ selection committees. But, lest we forget how much time and effort goes into manicuring one’s GPA, it should be said that these honors above all reward academic work ethic.
Nor should civic and department honors define the parameters of academic success. But, in the highly contrived university setting, these honors are potent currency by which academic achievement (the result of hard work, or so one hopes) can be measured and from which subsequent academic role models can be built.
Perhaps one might say that academic role models, rather than igniting a desire to emulate, polarize the student body by elucidating lines between good students and otherwise. To me, it seems this concern is part of a larger discomfort with the promotion of individuals who succeed academically.
What is it about individual academic success that causes this university to wax so humble to its undergraduates? Surely we advertise individual (and team) success in sports—as multiple stories on the school’s website and two pages of this newspaper evince (see a recent headline on the school’s website, “Matt Kitto leads Logger Golfers to Tournament Title”).
Are we afraid that naming academically successful individuals will antagonize academically unsuccessful or mediocre individuals? But rampant mediocrity and lack of success are just the things we should be combating!
By promoting academic honorees, we place them metaphorically on a podium (as athletes are literally placed on podia) with the express intent of explicating what and who a successful student is, of what and of whom this university should consist.
To hide success is to hinder the road to exemplarity. And, in an era of increasingly corroding apathy, flaccid ambitions and students who “just don’t care” to try, we need strong, academic examples. We need to promote the students who work hard in their studies, who spend four years toiling. By promoting civic and departmental honorees, we can do just that.
The university has proved itself capable of promoting individual academic success in the cases of the two Watson fellowship winners, Margaret Shelton and Jacqueline Ward. These two well-deserving individuals, however, are but the tip of an iceberg. Why not promote departmental honorees outside their departments, to people other than those who already know of their effort?
Indeed, I’ll conclude by suggesting that one might push the argument further. What about summer research recipients, in either the Humanities or Sciences? What about Fred S. Wyatt scholarship winners, George J. Matelich winners, or Peter Wallerich Scholarship winners? What about Fulbright fellowship winners? They all deserve such recognition for their achievements, a recognition that would inspire others to reach for the same heights.
[PHOTO COURTESY / thruquest.org]