Mississippi University for Women renaming saga continues

[Hawks88]

So the board outage occurred during a big part of the current MUW renaming events. I have a cousin who is a '70's grad so I see a good bit of the info on her social media. Besides a failed try at renaming the university in the 90's they are currently in a process to find a much needed new name since they now have men's sports. Let's just say it's not going well.
In early January a new name of Mississippi Brightwell University was announced. This was pretty much universally rejected by all alumni, people threatening to stop donating, etc. The renaming was quickly paused in order to redo the process.
In the last couple of weeks another name was announced. Wynbridge State University of Mississippi. Since MUW is a public university the name change has to go through the legislature. Apparently this latest name doesn't have the support to pass so the renaming has again been paused.
They have sent surveys to alumni over the last year or so but apparently they didn't or weren't able to find anything useful info from those.

[Gregory Sager]

I took an interest in this story, so I've been tracking it online.

The choice of "Wynbridge" really puzzles me. On Feb. 13 it was picked from among three choices -- Wynbridge, Wynbright, and Welbright -- after "Mississippi Brightwell University" fell flat on its face. As well it should've, since the school's branding centers around its nickname, "the 'W'", and there's no capital 'W' in "Mississippi Brightwell University".

None of the three post-Brightwell choices, including Wynbridge, seem to have any sort of historical or geographical relevance at all to the school or to Columbus, MS in general. I did read one article in which some school official made a stab at "bridge" having a metaphorical meaning for an institution of higher learning, which really seems like a reach. This same source said that wyn is the Old English word for "bridge" ... which it isn't. The Old English word for "bridge" is brycg (verb form brycgian) from which our Modern English word is derived. The prefix "Wyn-" means either "pure, fair" in Welsh or "joy" in Old English.

Since it's obvious that the school's alumni are going to insist upon a new name for the school that wholly or in part contains a word that starts with 'W', so as to keep the school's traditional nickname (and, thus, its branding) intact, best find an appropriate word, and soon. It would be perfect if the school could've been renamed Welty University, after famous novelist and Pulitzer Prize winner Eudora Welty (who attended the school for a couple of years about a century ago), but Welty's heirs do not want the school to be named after her.

So that leaves ... what?

Well, there's a Washington Avenue just to the east of campus, but if there's one thing that this country doesn't need it's another college or university that has "Washington" in its name -- especially another one that isn't located in the District of Columbia or the state of Washington. (We've already got four of those in D3.) A few blocks to the south of the W is a garbage collection company called Waste Pro USA, but something tells me that "Waste Pro University" would be about as welcome as a landfill dump on the campus quad.

Here's my suggestion: About three-quarters of a mile west of campus is the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway, a canal built in the '70s and '80s that bypasses the Mississippi River. The canal is now a major feature of Columbus. Why not call the school "Waterway University" or "Waterway State University"?

[Kuiper]

I don't know the right solution for the naming issue, but I do think this is one of the best cases for renaming a university that I have seen.  It is a downright misleading name.  I thought this might have been a recent change to admit men (probably because they only re-started sports in 2017 in DIII after having no sports at all for 14 years), but I was surprised to learn that men have been admitted to the Mississippi University for Women since 1982 after the Supreme Court struck down the nursing school's single sex admissions policy as a violation of the equal protection clause.  They currently have something like 23% men.  It's got to be crazy hard to recruit guys to the school with the current name, let alone for the men's teams.

[Kuiper]

This escalated quickly.  A bill to change the name was revised in a last minute amendment in committee to merge Mississippi University for Women into Mississippi State University and change the name to "The W at Mississippi State University."

https://www.mississippifreepress.org/40363/mississippi-university-for-women-could-merge-with-mississippi-state-under-surprise-bill

Not sure if this just makes it a regional university and its sports teams could stay in existence and remain in DIII. The amendment was reportedly made "to the surprise of officials at both universities" 

It sounds like the committee chair decided he had a brilliant idea to fix one controversy related to the proposed re-location of a residential public high school for gifted students (that was on MUW's campus) and all it required was a massive merger of two universities that no one had done any of the prep work to find out if it made any sense.

MUW: Effort 'Was Unexpected'

Mississippi University for Women officials said lawmakers blindsided them with the bill yesterday.

"We became aware of the last-minute amendment made to Senate Bill 2715 yesterday. The proposed action to merge and rename the university 'The W at Mississippi State University' was unexpected, but we are fully committed to ensuring our university's health and sustainability and its 140-year legacy in the state of Mississippi," MUW President Nora Miller said in a statement to the Mississippi Free Press this morning.

Senate Education Chairman Dennis DeBar, R-Leakesville, authored the original bill, which he introduced on Feb. 19. He offered the amended version as a committee substitute during the Senate Education Committee's March 5 meeting.

The original bill would have only relocated the Mississippi School for Mathematics and Science—a residential public high school for academically talented students—from the MUW campus to MSU's campus in Starkville. But it would not have merged MUW with MSU.

Officials from the City of Columbus, Lowndes County and MUW previously said they opposed the original idea of moving MSMS to Starkville during a press conference on Feb. 28. That same day, MUW released a statement listing the mutually beneficial relationship between the two schools.

"The W's relationship with MSMS goes all the way back to 1983 when the director of the MUW Center for Gifted and Talented and the faculty in that Center wrote the proposal for the creation of MSMS," Miller said in the statement. "We are proud to house MSMS on our campus, and we look forward to being able to address their facility needs."

The amended bill to merge MUW into MSU would leave MSMS on the campus of "The W at Mississippi State University" in Columbus under the control of MSU.

The legislation would require the Mississippi Institutions of Higher Learning Board of Trustees to develop a plan to administer the process of transferring ownership and control of the Mississippi University for Women to Mississippi State University beginning July 1, 2024. The transfer would be completed by July 1, 2025.

According to another article, the bill would then give MSU a year to decide whether to move the public school to its Starkville main campus or keep it where it is.  So, the merger wouldn't even ensure the public school stays in its current location, which was the original issue in the bill.

[Ron Boerger]

About what you expect from a legislator in that state. 

[Hawks88]

Mind boggling. I want some of what the person that came up with this was smoking.

[Kuiper]

Surprise, surprise.  There has been pushback on the bill to merge MUW and MSU

https://www.wlbt.com/2024/03/12/senate-bill-that-would-merge-2-mississippi-universities-receiving-backlash/

"I just don't think it's a good idea," said District 7 Senator Hob Bryan. "It's not a good way to legislate. Two committees meet on deadline day, and within a couple of hours, without any public debate or discussion, they suddenly, basically, want to close one of our institutions of higher learning. That's not good — that's not the way to go about doing business."

This, however, is probably a depressing, if reasonable, political take of what happened.  It was effectively a shot across the bow that they didn't think would actually get passed, but was designed to be a warning about colleges. 

While the future of MUW remains in the hands of lawmakers, Karriem remains hopeful that Senate Bill 2715 won't become law.

"I think it's a volley," Karriem explained. "I don't really suspect that they believe it would've gone anywhere this session. However, it's a warning shot for what's to come in the future. Every president, every alumnus need to get with their respective colleges to make sure that's not a reality."

I would add that anyone who thinks that state schools are more secure than private schools on issues of college closings and mergers hasn't been paying attention to what is happening in state legislatures lately.  Universities are not exactly popular right now and the demographic cliff is going to make them even less popular.

[Ryan Scott (Hoops Fan)]

Worst possible thing would for this to get politicized and have one group pass it out of spite.  Let's hope cooler heads prevail.

[cush]

The W at Mississippi state university sounds like a hotel

[Gregory Sager]

The W at Mississippi state university sounds like a hotel

I was thinking the same thing.

I'll say it again, I think that "Waterway University" is a winner. I've already got the perfect merch idea: A picture of Ody the Owl above the slogan, "Waterway to go, Owls!"

[Kuiper]

I just realized no one updated the story about the bill that added a merger of MUW and MSU as a last minute amendment.

It died in the Senate.  However, another Mississippi Senate Bill means that the future of Mississippi University for Women is still in doubt. 

A proposal to merge one of Mississippi's smallest universities into one of its largest ones died Wednesday in the state Senate.

But the future of the small school, Mississippi University for Women, could still be endangered by a bill that senators passed Tuesday, which will go to the House for more work. It would create a group to study whether Mississippi should close some of its eight public universities.

Senate leaders have questioned whether the state can afford to keep all the universities open as population trends show that a decrease in birth rates has caused a drop in elementary and secondary school enrollment, which could lead to fewer students pursuing higher education in the coming years.

[Gray Fox]

Interesting:  They just qualified as the conference champion for the NCAA Men's golf championship.

[DagarmanSpartan]

Well, consider this.

Texas Women's University (a state U. in Texas) is still called Texas Women's University (or "Tessie," its nickname) even though it is now co-ed.

[Hawks88]

Well, consider this.

Texas Women's University (a state U. in Texas) is still called Texas Women's University (or "Tessie," its nickname) even though it is now co-ed.

It doesn't look like they have men's sports though. It's been a few years now and I still get a chuckle when Huntingdon makes a social media post about a baseball game against Mississippi University for Women.