Ad campaign cheapens Rice's reputation

By Jake Nelson     9/25/08 7:00pm

Who knew we have an official motto: "Rice University: Unconventional Wisdom."? The only other school I can think of with an official motto is University of Phoenix Online, and their slogan, "Thinking ahead," is not dissimilar to ours. I don't want a motto. I know of no other elite school with a motto. If Rice is unconventional, this should be evident to anyone familiar with the school. Otherwise, the slogan only serves to cheapen our reputation by suggesting a slogan is required to enhance it.Who Knew is one increasingly ubiquitous example of mottos on our campus. Rice's promotional campaign of banners and slogans which trumpets our fitness as an unconventional research university has even made its way onto our police cruisers. Who Knew is campy, but if Rice wants to announce its credentials with on-campus and online banners and slogans, phrasing them as questions is preferable to just stating them. "The prestigious Shepherd School of Music is at Rice" would be an embarrassment. So instead we have "Who knew the prestigious Shepherd School of Music was at Rice?" I worry, however, that this campaign and related efforts by Rice to create and expand its reputation has the effect of presenting Rice as insecure in its confidence.

To the credit of Who Knew, the underlying content behind the slogans is interesting and related to university programs and goals. By contrast, consider the slogan on the coffee sleeves of the much visited Brochstein Pavilion. The new coffee sleeves, which feature our academic shield, read 'Hot Coffee, Cool Conversation'. What reaction is this supposed to elicit? Are people outside of Rice supposed to see these sleeves and slogans and believe that a coffee shop at Rice University has cool conversation to accompany its hot beverages? And this couldn't be accomplished by putting "Rice University" on a beverage sleeve?

The slogan inadvertently creates the reputation it intends to counter; namely, that the Brochstein Pavilion needs a promotional campaign to enhance its social atmosphere. A slogan, no matter how used, can never replace the function and truth of what it promotes. There is a lesson for the administration in 'Hot Coffee, Cool Conversation': talk to students. If Rice University wants to advertise the Brochstein Pavilion as cool, they should share their ideas with actual students through the Student Association. Or they could work at improving the reputation of the pavilion by improving the pavilion, which wouldn't have been a corporate coffee franchise in the first place if students had been genuinetly consulted for its creation.

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Even the James A. Baker III Institute is defaced with similar phrases engraved in stone on its outer walls, announcing to any passerby, "To Make a Difference" or "To Lend a Meaningful Voice." Does our public policy institute really need to articulate this? Can you imagine "The Shepherd School of Music: To Make Music/To Make Meaningful Music"? Most importantly, though, is 'making a difference' or 'lending a meaningful voice' supposed to distinguish us from other public policy institutes? Like the sleeves at the pavilion, these engravings suggest to unfamiliar visitors that the Baker Institute is merely aspiring to function without doing so.

Further proof of Rice's insecurity in its reputation: our drainage covers. "Rice University" is printed on them. Like the coffee sleeves, they showcase our academic shield, apparently to reinforce that the academic shield being showcased over a sewer at Rice University is indeed associated with Rice University. I can't even begin to seriously conjecture as to why our drainage covers display our academic shield, let alone our name. I hope they're not intended to enhance our reputation.

Overusing mottos and images to garner attention eventually cheapens the product. Rice should not have to feel as though its distinguished reputation depends no longer on its education and reearch, but on a campy ad campaign.

Jake Nelson is a Baker College sophomore.

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