tony

Maybe you had a hard time discerning my tone (decidedly jocular.) I guess my sense of humor is different than UND fans because, let me get this straight, calling some teacher a liar is "just joking" and coming up with Farmers Anonymous is oh-so-serious? My punchline wasn't that the only way that a UND grad could own a farm would be to inherit it because, honestly, that's about the only way a non-corporation can own a farm nowadays regardless of where (or if) they go to college. I simply imagined a kid going to UND where just about everybody acts like the words "ag", "agriculture", and "farmer" are pejoratives and being so ashamed of owning a farm that he joined FA (I'd guess that the only chapter of FA in North Dakota would be in Grand Forks so, in that respect, if a guy was already ashamed of being in the ag business, then UND would be a much better school choice than NDSU). Anyway, see how much funnier stuff is when it is explained? If you ever come down to tailgating at NDSU, stop by so I can finally meet a UND-educated farmer! You'd definitely get a free beer or two outa the deal.

Yeah, I know. I've never seen a farmer or rancher from UND. I'm sure that they exist and that they hold very important positions in the ag industry (like the President of the Grand Forks Chapter of Farmers Anonymous): "Hi, my name is Chipp and I'm a farmer but only because I inherited it." "Hi, Chipp." "I'm realy struggling. My family wants to me to make our vast tracts of land productive but all I want to is SING!" "We've been there, Chipp. Sing, you empty suit, sing!" "I'd also like to... DANCE!" ".... er, yeah, let's just stick to the singing for now." Anyway, why not apply the same standards of irony to Hollister's comments? I bet that he knows that being the "biggest" school in ND is terribly important to UND folks. Oh yeah. There appears to have been a miscommunication. I never said that UND folks got huffy about the nonsensical statement, "If you want to own the farm, etc." What I meant was that some guys were getting huffy about the NDSU guy saying that NDSU was bigger than UND (which, I'm pretty sure that a reasonable person could agree with) when, easily, the most ridiculous statement in the article was started with the words "If you want to own." Of course, reasonable people can agree to disagree.

Well, I suppose that was partly because they knew that they were hitting you where it hurt. After all, UND got caught inflating enrollment numbers once... turned out that UND had been doing it for 17 straight years before anybody called them on it. If enrollment numbers weren't important to UND, why did successive UND adminstration feel the need to do that? Besides, if you are going to get huffy about inaccurate statements, why ignore the biggest fib out there (i.e. "If you want to own the farm, go to UND. If you want to work for a farmer, go to NDSU?") Shouldn't that be "If you are ashamed of agriculture and mock everybody associated with it at every opportunity, go to UND. If you are serious about the industry, go to NDSU?" <== That's a heckuva a lot more accurate.

Well, I never said that bigger was better. Some posters were calling Mr. Hollister a liar and I presented an argument, with supporting evidence, to refute that claim. You've opened another line of discussion. I'll grant you that distance learning is fine and dandy; however, the two primary purposes for a university are to grant degrees and conduct research. Online courses sound suspiciously like extension work.

NDSU could be considered bigger if it has, say, 1000 or so more full-time students and 1000+ more full-time equivalent students. The number reported by the state is pretty much just window dressing designed to make everybody feel good, but in some ways it distorts the reality that almost all the schools in the ND university system are reporting record enrollments while actually having fewer students on campus than a decade ago. Here's how I think North Dakota higher ed works: University X has 5000 full-time students on campus and 5000 students taking two-credit online classes. University Y has 9000 full-time students on campus. I think that according to state the North Dakota, University X is said to be larger, and I guess by one metric it is. There are lots of different ways to measure things, some are more accurate than others. I'd say that the guy who you said was lying is being more accurate than you think. http://www.ndsu.edu/...11_Modified.pdf http://und.edu/resea...edback-2011.pdf

Hehe, think hard. When did the Jayhawks play their first game of the 2009 season? Was it before or after June 10, 2009?

Just for the record, I don't post as "Tony" on areavoices (I'm snowmiser.) If I'm going to get crap, I'd prefer it to be for something that I actually wrote - more enjoyable for everybody that way. Nor do I ever recall criticizing NDUS schools (other than UND and occasionally NDSU.) My criticism of the NDUS centers on it's clearly-broken funding model. If UND is not overfunded, then what does it say about NDSU's funding when UND is getting 40% more per FTE than NDSU? Much as NDSU students are mocked on this site for "milking cows" and "riding tractors" (or doing anything related to farming or ranching), I don't think that even those people are seriously using that kind of smack to justify treating NDSU students like dirt. Nor do I object to online education as a complementary delivery method. Heck, I took an online class while attending NDSU over 20 years ago (some 1 credit UNIX class) and it definitely has some advantages. My objections are aimed at the hypocricy of legislators who complain that NDSU has too many Minnesota kids while saying nothing about students who will never step foot in North Dakota. I also think that legitimate questions can be asked about the state subsidizing some Texan's desire to learn Norwegian without it be painted as an attack on the concept of online education. I think UND is going in the right direction and your enrollment increase is a sign of that. PS I thought that perpetually angry people with no identifiable sense of humor were stroke risks but thanks for your concern, star2city! BTW, it's a loft not a confo, but I'm considering a move. What address would make my views more acceptable? Note: Refrain from suggesting Hell (no broadband there.)

I'd argue that the SBoHE never should have gotten involved with the issue in the first place. The Board should be setting policy, not micromanaging things that have nothing to do with an institution's mission.

Why, you.... (shake fist) : Hehe, well Paulsen is not on the board anymore so that's an old picture. BTW, Kupchella was supposed to be in that photo, but, as was his wont, he was nowhere within 1000 miles of Grand Forks at the time.

So UND's excuse is, "We spent $500,000 on site prep but that doesn't really count because part of that was for work on a project that doesn't even have authorization, much less a dollar limit." Using that logic, NDSU can just say, "Well, the $500,000 are for additions to the house - a totally separate project that has not yet been approved." I don't know what NDSU's excuse is going to be for their cost overruns but it would seem fair to say that NDSU's house cost $1.8 million and UND's cost $1.45 million with another $226,000 for a related, unauthorized project. So NDSU's cost of construction was 82% of the total bill while UND's cost of construction was a mere 62% of the total project cost (or 53% of the total if you count that full $506k of "site prep"). Maybe NDSU should review their totals and slide some items into "Site Prep."

"Plays for the same team?" I don't get it....OOOOH! You are saying that she is a LESBIAN... well, you didn't actually say it, you said "we all know" she is, didn't you? HAHAHAHAHAHAHA! That is funny, funny stuff - you, sir, are a genuine wit! Naw, the guy who got banned was considerably more crass than that. Sublime humor like yours is welcome anywhere. Edit: "didn't actually saying"?

Oh, I see, UND spending $1.7 million on their president's house is prudent and frugal, but NDSU spending $1.8 million is preposterous. Sounds like "your" house is made of glass so you might want to put down the rocks, sunshine. BTW, you are banned on bisonville? I can't imagine why unless you were the fella who went after Ruley in a rather offensive way. That hardly seems possible because you appear to be a genuinely thoughtful person who could add a lot to a discussion, but unfortunately bisonville.com allows smack and I think you might find that too low brow.* * This paragraph may contain sarcasm.

I'd vote for him

Hey, I'm actually pretty mellow towards UND since President Kupchella went away. That said, I do kind of rush to defend Chapman because he is an amazing college President, but if he bears the blame for cost overruns, he should feel it - perhaps through a pay cut. So far, what I've seen is that NDSU's construction, site prep, and furnishing totals up to $1.8 million. UND's total cost, including site prep and furnishings, looks like it added up to $1.7 million because it was just disclosed that UND spent $500k on site prep and planning that was not included in this morning's stories. I'll grant you this though: It turns out that both UND and NDSU spent a lot of STATE MONEY on furnishings. That is completely unacceptable and I would hope both development foundations would pledge to pay that back.

You missed this bit: