TO THE EDITOR:
After having seized every opportunity, in print and otherwise, to sing the praises of my alma mater, I find myself embarrassed for the first time in 60 years — especially by the wan official reactions to the recent letter from distinguished retired faculty members, many of whom I am pleased to count as friends.
There is an old and not very polite term for this reaction. It is pussy-footing. The show and tell at the recent trustee meeting was especially embarrassing, through no fault of the “student athletes” recruited to perform. Have the UNC trustees heard of Potemkin Villages? They can look the term up.
Meanwhile, I have a modest proposal. The University can regain its balance, and a measure of lost respect, with a simple one-sentence declaration: “Every applicant for admission to UNC, without exception, will meet the threshold academic qualifications imposed on all other applicants.” Period. No ifs, ands or buts.
Edwin M. Yoder Jr. ’56
Chapel Hill
