Football's Struggles Are On This Trustee Candidate's Mind

Stephen Smith '88, a former freshman football player at Dartmouth and a law professor at the University of Virginia for the past seven years, is an independent petition candidate for Dartmouth's Board of Trustees. High on his list of priorities: "I want to rededicate Dartmouth to undergraduate education." On his web site, Smith also writes:

For years now, “Big Green” football has finished at or near the bottom of the Ivy League. Seasonal variations in win/loss records are to be expected; perennial last-place finishes that threaten to make us – the team with the highest historical winning percentage in Ivy League football – the laughingstock of the Ivy League aren’t. In my day, Dartmouth Football aspired to excellence, and excellence should again be the goal, and it should be the goal not just for the football program, but for all Dartmouth athletics teams. Excellence in athletics is not inconsistent with excellence in academics.

The Concord Monitor has 5 Questions with the Dartmouth sophomore Ibrahim Elshamy, who wants his high school in Manchester to drop its Indian symbol and another school in New Hampshire's largest city to stop using the nickname Crusaders. (See earlier Green Alert post.) The piece includes this:

Will you be involved with similar discussions at Dartmouth?
No. At Dartmouth, there's a large native community, and they're doing a great job facilitating discussion on their own. I have a lot on my plate with Manchester. But it's the same issue. It's a symbol that's hurtful to a certain group of people. Another group doesn't seem to care. Their concern is pride and history.

From the Minneapolis Star Tribune:

Norries Wilson, an outstanding offensive lineman for the Gophers in the 1980s and now the coach at Division I-AA Columbia, said he isn't going to apply for the Gophers football coaching job but he believes he has the correct qualifications.

Winter is making a belated arrival in the Upper Valley. We're expecting 4-8 inches of white stuff ... and it's about time. Given the forecast, I finally put our basketball backboard away for the season this morning. The kids are hoping against hope that the snow total exceeds the forecast and they are rewarded with another day off tomorrow. It's exam week at Hanover High and I can think of one freshman girl who would appreciate having another day to study after spending a good deal of the last three days with her nose buried in a book.