Earlier this year, the Athletic Department sponsored a giant, quarter-million-dollar billboard in New York City and, more recently, similar and presumably less costly ones in Los Angeles and San Francisco. That these ads, featuring University athletes and views of Autzen Stadium, are intended to promote the glories of Duck football there is little doubt. But the department’s claim that the billboards are also intended to celebrate the University of Oregon as an educational institution on the 125th anniversary of its foundation stretches the imagination out of bounds.
Surely, our Californian neighbors are too savvy to know that these ads were set up for boosting ticket sales given their location outside the local market. Can Californians conclude otherwise when they see Oregon ads? Way at the bottom right-hand corner of the billboard, in small letters, one reads “University of Oregon, 125 years of excellence.” What are Californians supposed to conclude from all this? That Oregon has been playing football, and excellently, for 125 years? One wonders why the word “academic” could not have been placed in front of “excellence”? That simple act might have lent some credibility to the claim that the recent advertising blitz was also meant to advance Oregon as a venue for learning.
Many people subscribe to the idea that big-time athletics are a tool for attracting donations and students to the University. The fact is that no university really needs a massively expensive sports program in order to prosper. Those who think that athletics are a necessary adjunct of the “college experience” might thus consider dropping the Duck program to a lower division — one we can better afford. A small portion of the savings could then be used to mount an ad campaign to promote the University’s academic mission.
In a recent letter to the Register Guard (Aug. 26), a reader suggested that one way of publicizing the University in a balanced manner would be for fans to also sponsor billboards showing, for example, pictures of “UO valedictorians, a UO teacher of the year” and the like. What about a wide-screen billboard with pictures of ten instructors under a caption identifying them as “Teachers of the Year”? At the bottom it could read “University of Oregon, 125 years of excellence.” That would leave no doubt as to where the excellence and purpose of this University lie. I can’t imagine that a billboard featuring teachers, professionals who are seldom publicly celebrated, would not attract the attention of parents searching for a suitable college for their children. Also, I can’t imagine that potential donors would not be drawn to a university that boldly places academics on the front burner. Let us begin to recognize that there are ways of safeguarding and funding education in Oregon that are less costly and more effective than reliance on big-time sports. By what they show, by what they say and don’t say, and by being placed out of state, the recent football ads have succeeded in creating an image of a university more interested in demonstrating pride in its new-found athletic prowess that in publicizing its academics strengths. We need a course reversal.