SDSUFAN

Star2city Dont be putting words in my mouth. I have never said anything disrespectful of President Miller. I have no reason too. I do respect her vision, as sketchy as it has been on some occasions. I appreciate her as much as the Late Hilton Briggs, Sherwood Berg and Robert Wagner. Those are President Miller's predcessors. I guess I need to explain something to youse yungins from Nord Daktoa. USD and the outhouse reference goes back a long ways and I dont know if in PCM's days at SDSU, the SDSU students used to sing a little jingle to the tune of a serious alma mater song. It went like this: Far cross from the plains of Brookings Stands an old abandoned outhouse Called the University. (Meaning USD). I may not have the exact words, but it went like that and used to pissed the USD students off. This jingle kind of died after SDSC became SDSU in 1964. Before that there was clearly STATE AND U. Now its SDSU and USD. My point is that USD despite having all the professional schools has not had as good track record of adminstrators over several decades and most USD grads will admit that. The enrollements speak for themself. Despite the 4 years of professional schools of law, and medicine and the Business School, USD has lagged behind SDSU in enrollments and thats been going on for a long time. Abbott might be the exception to the piss poor adminstrators at USD. He wants to build a strong school of medicine and there certainly nothing with that goal as it would benefit the entire state of South Dakota. Its fullfilling a need. USD is not even close to being a UND and thats a compliment. They have no research center like the one PCM works in. The other thing there is no town/gown relationship in Vermillion. Grand Forks seems to have much more of that than Vermillion. The town folk in Vermillion could care less about their University. The USD athletic department only had 100,000 in season ticket revenue last year all sports. Why, because they owe the donors for the new roof and they get freebees and usually on the 50 yard line. Higgins is remembered for catching the winning touchdown against NDSU in the 1970's but other than that he is no Fred Oien. In other words there is little vision in the athletic department as far as I can tell. Again Status Quo Is good just as Guam is Good. Having spent 18 months on that crappy island in the service, Guam is not good and neither is status quo. No I have no problem with USD and their vision. The problem seems to be that USD has little or no vision other than status quo. Four of the current Board of Regents have degrees from USD. The Regent Chairman is a USD trained attorney who lives in Aberdeen, named Harvey Jewett. Harvey hails from Flandreau. What is the hometown of Governor WILD BILL JANKLOW. The answer is Flandreau, 27 miles south of Brookings. Who has the most to lose from SDSU making its move D1? USD and NSU in Aberdeen. So this week will be indeed interesting. Another thing that Star2City does not understand the significance of 2.5 and 5.5 million talked about in the article. You guys from UND accuse me of being me being clueless. ("") The 2.5 million is endowed money raised from people like myself. I have my own scholarship in my name at SDSU. What this means is that only the interest from invested endowments is used to fund scholarships. The 2.5 million will be around longer than REA in Grand Forks. Assuming a 5% return on invested endowments, there would be enough income to fund 28 to 35 scholarships every year from the 5.5 million. This funding would be there each year before one ticket is sold and one student activity fee is collected. There is a rich lady in Chicago, named Mildred Stoker White. She just died and left at least 2.7 million. Only the interest for that will be used. The prinicpal is held in trust forever or until the institution ends women sports as I suspect thats the scholarships that she designated to the gift to be applied to. The interesting thing about Mildred and Roger White is that they had very little contact with South Dakota after they left. Roger enrolled at SDSU in 1928-1929 and ran track one season. He dropped out of school due to the bad times of the big crash and the depression. They moved to Illionios and somewhere in time started a furniture manufacting that made a ton of dough and the Whites sold firm it at retirement age. Roger died first and Mildred was a widow for many years living in a nice brick home in Winnetka, near the shores of Lake Michigan and Norwestern University. She gave gobs of money to Northwestern and often hardly got a thank you. She always remembered her husbands account of running track at SDSU. It was best experience of his life so she has told people at SDSU. She contacted SDSU and offered to give $100,000 for scholarships. SDSU just fell in love with lady and we treated her very gingerly and have often expressed our gratitude. She then gave $450,000 more for endowed scholarships while she was still living and that is part of the 2.5 million. She appreciated all the attention she got from SDSU. Its not now surprising that she has given at least 2.7 million in her final will. Something tells me it could be more. When your wealthy die, it takes a lot of time to complete that final 1040 form for the Uncle Sam. I would expect you will not know what other gifts Ralph Englestad had given to UND and not announced for some time. My attorney showed me the final return for his mother who had a good sized portfolio. It was about an inch and half thick. He was only one person and worked day and night for several weeks to complete. So not all of the money going to the Jackrabbit CLub is used in an operational year. Many have like myself set up a scholarship fund and donate to it monthly or annually. Its not easy to get on the Foundation Board at SDSU. You have do two things before you are even considered. You have to give at least $50,000 and you have to know others with money who will be generous. So the report in the Argus does not explain fully what is going on in the Foundation. The fact that the movers and shakers showed up last week with genuine promises is good enough for me. Those that testified would not say what they did without backing it up or knowing they could back it up. Thats where I have confidence and encouragement.

There is an eight page article explaining the two different directions that SDSU and USD are going. USD is going to become the Ivy League of the Plains, and maybe the Outhouse of the Plains too. http://www.argusleader.com/news/Sundayfeature.shtml

Nodakvindy said: "That's the thing I find most disingenuous about this whole debate. The proponents of a move to IAA bring up all this prestige that will come, but invariable mention schools like Michigan, Notre Dame, Minnesota, and Nebraska or for actual IAA schools the Ivy league. That is just totally unrealistic. The real comparison is with your Valparaisos, Louisiana-Lafayettes, Southern Utahs and the like. I don't honestly believe these schools have any enhanced national, or even regional reputation." I yet to have an offical mention or imply that we would have Notre Dame and Minnesota on our schedule nor that we would immediately partner on research in big time manner. I dont think anyone at SDSU is selling this move as some kind of "penis enlargment device" so I think the word disingenious is a little harsh but not offensive as some on this board who have called me a moron. All these new things are not going to happen real soon. Possibly a higher level of athletics will improve the possibilities of partnership. The big thing that is driving this is that D2 membership is gaining new members. Schools you have never heard of and with enrollments of 500 and less. These new members have a vote on all D2 matters. A resolution to cut scholarships in Football from 36 to a lower number is certain to come in the next 5 years as the Executive President of the NCAA D2 is the president of Indiana of Pennsylvania. His school is a member of the Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference (PSAC). There are two divisions and something like 17 state schools located in Pennsylvania and they are controlled by a Board of Regents that has set football scholarships at 22 or some number like that. Since he has this new position it seems like he would be wanting to act in a way that would benefit PSAC and he may have the votes even one from the NCC in the form of Augustana. It costs Augie nearly $20,000 to fund one full ride. There are other changes in D2 that will happen that will move the current funding of programs to a lower level. This makes one choose between going forward or going backwards. If you stay put, chances are the programs at SDSU will go backwards. We do offer 20 sports men and women and there are no plans to drop any of these sports going forward. So research and other forms of image are hard at this point to be seen as part of the equation. Over a couple of decades, a number of things could develop.

Vindy: Daschle is a SDSU grad and we are extremely proud of him. Johnson is a USD grad but has tons of friends in Brookings. Peggy Miller always has a athletic event ticket for Tim. Johnson is also on the US Senate Appropriation committee and has help SDSU on a number of items. I suspect Johnson has done the leg work for the Sun Grant. Janklow is in love with his power and himself, and he has crapped on his own alma mater more than once(USD). i.e disallowing out of state alums from sending their dependants to state assisted schools at in-state tuition rates. USD's enrollment dropped the most because of Wild Bill. The funny part is when Tom Brokaw was on Tim Russert to talk about his book, he mentioned the instate tuition thing thinking it was in effect. Some one should clue Brokaw in here on the change that his buddy Janklow steamrolled through the legislature. Russert by the way was curious about the North Dakota Tax credit that was on the ballot. Janklow did give 4 million of the state tobacco suit settlement to USD to help fix that roof that was about to fall in and that might have taken a arm twist or two. Staying D2 will never help research either. My bet is that it opens opportunities for new partnerships especially amongst the Agriculture land grant colleges. PCM and ScottM spoke of partnerships at UND and I am sure they are important. The distance for travel may and may not be a problem. There may be a way to form a partnership with a charter airline. Give them the advertizing exchange for air travel. The major airlines are all in trouble due to 9/11, but that does not mean it will be that way forever and maybe smaller firms that charter might bite on some opportunity like this. The move to D1AA makes for re-thinking on how everything is done in the Athletic department. So many in South Dakota seem to think that the athletic department should be run like a Lutheran Church. "We do things this way because this is the way we always do things." or "Its never been done that way before". Such fear towards change and thats the part I can not understand and is determintal to economic development with or without D1 athletics. Even though, the North Dakota delegation were UND grads, Dorgan, Conrad and Pomeroy take calls from NDSU and President Chapman I am sure. Being on the agriculuture committees an near to these issues, they dont let a one day football game rivalry from them from getting things needed by NDSU.

Yes its true I suppose that anyone can defend subtle racism and an offensive mascot in the name of six national titles in D1 Hockey. It must feel good to be associated with University of North Dakota and full of denial. I guess as long as you can go to the REA with your digital camera and watch the brutality, what more could you want? Life does not get any better does it?

: Is this study to re-classify purely an athletic one? A: This is a decision that requires entire institutional consensus. The divisional status of South Dakota State has far-reaching effects on every aspect of the campus. Enrollment management, grant receipts, collaborative research, etc., may all be affected by a potential move. Recently, SDSU has been classified as a doctoral-granting Tier 3 institution. SDSU and the University of North Dakota are the only NCC schools to achieve this academic status. Division I institutions with this status include: Arizona State, Ball State (Ind.), Illinois State, Kansas State, Mississippi State, Montana State, Oklahoma State and Oregon State. This classification could have an enormous impact on the academic activities on the SDSU campus. PCM: Note the collaborative research etc. Is that folly?

Dahl: I get the feeling I am not welcome here so you can take your board and shove it up your ass.

I believe UND did have a wrestling program up until a few years back when the hockey got a little expensive and some sports were cut. Wrestling being one of them. SDSU got your best wrestler and he did very well for us. I dont recall the name. The point is that I dont think UND fans should be pointing their fingers at NDSU wrestling when in fact you no longer have a program period. So NDSU can't compete for a national title for four years, its better than having no program and not competing at all.

Let me ask a stupid question... Does UND have a wrestling program?

So Scotty, are the presidents at NDSU and SDSU dishonest? That a kind implication from an UND egghead.

So Scott: Should I be impressed?

JBB: Apparently PCM has not had a chance to attend a Cereral Bowl at his Alma Mater, SDSU. What usually happens at Half time is about 4 crop organizations turn over big checks for research projects going on at SDSU. These checks are the carboard kind that are photo opportuntities The Pres of SDSU accepts these checks for research in their area of concern. The checks this fall totalled about $400,000. Moving up to D1AA and bringing in more people for the game, this opportunity will only broaden for SDSU. I dont know why they do this at a football game, we should be like UND and do it behind close doors so as not to offend someone. Do these Crop groups care about athletics? I think they do otherwise the Cereral bowl game would be a big flop. Its an event thats growing. I think with land grand universities, SDSU and NDSU, with the emphasis on Agriculture there is an opportunity to honor providers of research dollars at athletic events. Maybe research at UND is different and if so, so be it. They seem to be missing an opportunity to grow in athletics and research.

PCM: So you can spell-- what else can you do?

PCM: I am willing to make truce here on this issue and maybe I am confusing corporate sponsorship with research. With corporate sponsor ship, the firm is using the athletic events to advertize their products or to give their firm image. Selling industry and government both on research dollars I sure is not an easy job. From what I understand, the chances for being a particpant in grants and research which deal primarily with agriculture and agri-business will be better with a higher level of athletics. Wishful thinking yes, but it sure can not hurt. Why should SDSU hang around D2, when there are schools like Sacremento State and Cal-State Northridge that are D1AA and have no where the athletic programs that are at SDSU and NCC. I just think this issue is about the future and what it can do for SDSU, be it academics or research. I think there is some relationship in there somewhere.

dbarker: Sorry about misinterpetation. I guess we will just have to wait and see. Lennon just strikes me as a guy who likes challenges. I would agree that the Sac State program is nearly in shambles. I dont know what kind of fund raising has been in place at Sac either. I do know from the Big Sky board, maybe three years ago there was mention that Sac State finally got their funding of football scholarships up to sixty or there about. With an acting AD before, who also doubled as a womens bb coach prior to Wanless's hiring, its hard to say where their funding of the football program is at this point. I have heard from a reliable source at SDSU, that the Big Sky is about about to kick Sac State and Portland State out of the Big Sky because they have no made progress in facilities and improving their attendence records. Portland has averaged 500 for basketball. Another thing I recall from the Big SKy board was talk about football tickets at Portland state where they would literally give their tickets away to businsess in order to claim a sell out. Tickets were given to some business at 5 bucks a ticket and then there would be no butts in the seat. Portland would then claim attendence of 15,000, when in reality maybe 5000 butts in the seats occurred. You cant fund a program at 5 bucks a seat. You have to make up the difference somewhere else. Wanless has got a challenge ahead of himself and maybe it will take a Lennon or a Behrns to save the day for Sac State. I think the NCC is far ahead of some of the Big Sky members. Maybe the Big SKy commish privately wishes some new members. Possibly from the NCC.

dbarker: What does Behens have to do with not preparing for making a post? Say some thing that is contrary to GF thinking and wow you get criticism. About the only place there are more thin skins now days besides GF is in Vermillion. We all know why that is. I just presented my scenerio and yes some more UND fans will call it wishful thinking. What makes you want to think Lennon is content to coach at UND for ever? Just because he played football and a alumus? Thats wishful thinking too. Behrns is a very intense person and I think he may have gotten his program as far as he can take it. After his third year, he had ran off a number of his predecessor (Tom Muellers) recruits and had about 30 scholarships available and it happen to be a year when a great deal of talent was available. Most of the that talent has now come and gone. He might just be looking for a new job, I dont know. Wanless is not a stranger to Behrns either. The coaches and AD's in the NCC all get to know each other so Behen' s interest is not unusuall by any means. I guess I dont know everything. Lennon was an assistant when Wanless was AD at UND, so they are not strangers either. Whether he hired him or not is not point. During the time Wanless was AD he no doubt got to know his employees including Assistants. So hiring does not mean jacksh#t when it comes to future positions. Its who you know and not who you......

Its not possible to read Coach Lennon's mind. I suspect he will be considered for the job. Sacremento State is in trouble with the Big Sky from what I heard and who is to say Lennon did not have a good working relationship with Wanless. If there was bad blood, Wanless would have never mentioned his name to the Sac Bee. The single mention should suggest that Lennon has some interest. I dont doubt that there is a good working relationship with Roger Thomas. Lennon also had a good working relationship with John Stiegelmiere when he was a grad assistant at Northern in Aberdeen SD and they remain friends. It would have been nice to have Lennon as an SDSU asssistant when Stieg was hired in 1996, but that never happened based on good relationships. Mr. Lennon is probably looking for the best opportunity for himself and his family. After all he left Thomas to be head coach at Dickenson or Minot , or was it College of Mary, not sure of which school it was, before he came back as head coach at UND. Do you remember that? To Coach Lennon's credit, he does build good working relationships along the way as well as forming friendships. This has to be a big plus for a resume, and it may take more than a raise to keep him at UND. When you consider Volek's relationship with the players, I think Dale will do very good with the selection committee at Sac State. As far as the Wanless firing when the former coach was out of town, the former coach probably knew he was going to get his walking papers and made a point of leaving town so save himself and family embarassment. I dont think Wanless was that thoughtless about a job that obviously needed to be done. A team like Sacremento should not lose to D2 UC Davis, but has now two years in a row. I think if SAC State offers the right price, Lennon may be packing his u-haul on an icey morning for a more balmy temp in Sacremento. The recruiting at Sacremento area will be much easier than in the upper midwest, so a crabby condition of Sac State should not be intrepretated as not reversable. It can be reversed with the right kind of head coach and staff. Your coach Schweigert may find himself head coach and doing some interviewing himself since some of the staff would follow Dale out the door. Not scaring people but this scenerio has possiblities.

Just another tidbit about the Brookings Register. Rod Thomsagard, who has been very negative about the move to D1, started a poll at the Register about D1. The question was" Should SDSU make the move to D1 for athletics?" I checked last evening November 27 at 11:00pm and of the 416 responses , just a little over 50 per cent favored yes. This is a significant jump from the Argus leader poll a month ago and also another poll of the same question that was run this summer by The Brookings Register in which the response of "No" to the question was running nearly 70 per cent. These polls have a lock on them by email address so you can only vote one time. RT is mentioned in the two speak outs column noted in the previous post and is severly criticized for not giving this issue proper coverage. Instead of doing interviews, RT has blasted away from his column and has attack President Miller and Dr. Oien both. A night and day comparison with Jeff Kolpech of the Fargo Forum.

Mr. Dahl: I understand your concern about copyright law and no problem. Again I must state that The Brookings Register has done such a horrible job covering this issue. There are two Speakouts submitted and published on Nov 16 and again on Nov 20 that are critical of the Register's coverage. The two individuals who submitted the speak outs were Keith Jensen and Eric Lingren. I know Mr. Jensen. He worked for a while as news reporter and then was SDSU Alumni Executive Director for a few years and finished his working career as Executive Director of South Dakota Newpaper Association. I do not know Mr. Lingren. If you would send me a fax number to below email address I will be more than glad to fax you copies. These columns are not on The Register website, and after reading these two columns you will see why. Both writers are supportive of many of the arguements that I have made, but were stated in a more rational and logical format. Also I would be willing to fax a copy of Chuck Cecil's column that is not on the site either, but thank god for print versions. Otherwise I would not have been aware of these articles. cdhusby@megavision.com

PCM: Maybe everyone has not taken the time to look. Does Kupchella hope to get those dollars by not inviting the politicans to a athletic event when they are in Town? I dont think so. My guess they are free ticket holders, since they have to do the leg work in Congress to get these dollars funded. Kupchella does not get his research funding over the next five years by himself. Maybe my thinking and JBB'S is wishful, but I have no doubts there are some connections. Why are both Presidents at SDSU and NDSU leading the charge to D1AA? What prompted them to think in this fashion? Are they just misinformed and stupid? I don't think so. Kupchella instead of learning from his experiences at Southeast Missouri State University in moving to D1, is bad mouthing the whole idea. Obviously Kup was not part of the solution down at SEMO, but more of a problem and could that be why he was looking for a new place like Grand Forks to hang his hat? Think about that for a while!!! Why would you trade balmy Cape Girardueau for frosty Grand Forks? One hand washes another and thats what I am thinking in terms of athletics and research. Maybe that is wishful thinking. Wishful in your mind but not in my mind. What sort of proof do you need for a correlation between athletics and research dollars? A thesis with complicated statistics that only eggheads can comprend and of course throw in those stupid graphs. Now that's another way to look important. I know I sound anti-intellectual but I am not exactly dazzled by your career in research what ever may be. Maybe your research has to do with perserving flickertails for all I now. Yes PCM,.you know more about research than I do, but maybe there is status quo in research in terms of quality and quanitity and maybe it is not uncommon. I think research departments are like all others on campus and if it were not for the publish or perish prinicple a great number of people would only be found on campus on pay day and anywhere and elsewhere the rest of the pay period.

PCM: I forgot to mention Fed Research. Yes Daschle and Johnson both have made it possible to get more dollars from the Fed, but its also takes the faculty and staff to do their part and once you get your foot in the door, it stands to reason that repeat research dollars will follow with prudent use of the research dollars. So yes its hard to tie research dollars from the fed to Athletics. Fed agencies do not have the budget dollars to be corporate sponsors except for the US Post Office and its stupid commerical" Stamps Stamps..... You dont see fed agencies advertizing. Having worked for the fed now 22 years, I know how it is. Johnson, Dascle and Thune always have a free ticket for any SDSU event. So thats how that part works in terms of athletics. Tell me Dorgan, Pomeroy and the other senator don't get free Fighting Sioux tickets when they are in town. AND DO THE the politicans kids and wife get fress passes? You bet they do. Even those aides with cell phones in their ear get a free pass. The relationship between research and athletics-hmmm. It would be a good topic for President Miller to discuss, but my guess she could find a link in their some where. She is a very smart lady. She seems to be the driver on this issue, but has been very quiet.

PCM: Research is a partnership between university and industry and I hardly have to tell you that since you said you have been involved in research for 11 years. Athletics are the bridge between industry and education and that's when image starts to have some value. Having the best programs in athletics are a great investment in image making. The hard part is putting quanitities and percentages to athletics and their affect on research dollars. Its hard to see bacteria but scientists tell me that bacteria is all over the place. Because I don't see the bacteria, it does not mean bacteria does not exist. I do not believe that athletics are just a operational expense that expire at the end of certain period of time. There are others besides Ralph who may have invested in the hockey program at UND over the years. I understand the facility used right after WW2 was very humble but apparently it was felt that additional investment would be good for UND. So its about national championships and ESPN, and UND does have something that SDSU does not have in their D1 hockey program. Investment and image, yes thats what athletics can do for a Unversity.

Jim: Sorry, I guess you are entitled to one kick to my rear as I am probably no better than the guy in the elevator who did not read my entire sweatshirt. No I have not read the petition, but why would this young student say what he did in the article that they included facts that were not accurate? The students down at SDSU at least the student leaders have studied this issue more than all the old farts that drink coffee and know everything. You know the ones who bitch about excessive property taxes but yet want no income tax, the ones who want no out of state hunters etc. These same people are also experts on how the Athletic Department should be run at SDSU. They most likely have signed Ms. Jost's petition. Believe me. if she, (Ms. Jost) gets the floor at the open forum of the regents and starts to quote this stuff, she will not go unchallenged and thats what I am saying. Fred Oien by now will be able to refute all those statements that are not accurate. Tired as it may sound, I think he knows what its all about.