University of Virginia Library

Walter Bardenwerper

Wanted: A Real University

What's in a name? Very little if
you are talking about this
University. For merely calling a
place a "University" doesn't make
it one. Indeed there was once good
reason for speaking of the Rotunda
and its family of buildings, faculty,
and students as a "University".
Regrettably, that day has almost
passed.

What we have is an institution
which allegedly is in the business of
supplying people with means to an
education and of supplying a state
with educated people. Well, this is a
joke-but not a very funny one.
The University has deviated so far
from any reasonable relation to
education that the two words are
not even compatible.

Lest any big-shot gets offended,
let it be here recorded that we are
far from the status of non-existence
as are some (former) other
educational facilities. We are still
kicking, whereas the Behemoth U's
rolled over and died long ago.

That is what makes it so
imperative that something be done
to revive the University of Virginia
before it becomes only a quaint
collection of buildings. The thrust
of any change should be toward
re-creating a truly educational
institution. Now, it is impossible to
foster free inquiry in a University
just as it is for the media (as Walter
Cronkite has indicated) when the
state must sanction its existence. So
our modest proposal has as its
foundation the immediate and
unconditional Declaration of
Independence from the
Commonwealth of Virginia.

We will accept or reject
applicants on the basis of
intellectual curiosity and desire to
learn regardless of place of
domicile. We will replace the
present administrative apparatus
with a unified body known as the
Board of Interested Persons, not
merely "Visitors." The board will
be manned by representatives of
the faculty, and student body an
arrangement somewhat akin to the
University Senate proposal.

How can this new University
survive without state funds? It can't
So we will be so brash as to
continue to request allocations just
as we have before. Preposterous?
Absolutely not. The best interests
of the state are served by a fine
institution of higher education.
This is undeniable.

As long as the Commonwealth
can supply funds for the
enforcement of laws, the
maintenance of highways, and the
care of the mentally and physically
debilitated, it should logically want
to produce educated people.
Assuming that Virginia is a nice
place to live, some of those people
will stay here, thereby helping solve
some of the Commonwealth's other
problems.

The one and only goal of this
new University will be to establish a
mecca for inquisitive and
education-seeking people from
around the world. New Yorkers can
learn from Virginians.
Washingtonians can learn from
Iowans, Waynesboroites can learn
from almost anyone.

No longer would there be a
higher council of planners who
decide that it would really be
impressive to have the largest
collection of mediocrity outside the
Big Ten. I may be the first to go,
but if that is what it takes to make
this into a University. I suggest all
of us rejects pack up and head out
on the first Trailways to Alabama.

With an independent University
there will be no political pressure to
relieve faculty members or students
who hold unpopular views. The
University can decide itself whether
a member is undermining its goal.
The governor will not appoint the
Board, the other scholars will.

Of course one can not take this
proposal seriously. In the best of all
possible worlds there would be
sufficient reason to believe that
such a conception of the role of the
University makes sense. In reality,
however, politics and the power
that accompanies the purse render
this idea powerless.

Yet, one must sense that there is
more than a grain of truth in the
claims that this proposal makes. At
the very least, our overriding
ambition in this period of
confrontation with the expansion
issue should be to redirect the
considerations of the powers that
be from politics and prestige to the
free pursuit of knowledge.