10-13-99 Eastern Echo

Eagle spirit, we need to believe

I'm an Eagle and proud of it. It doesn't have anything to do with the football team winning or losing. It doesn't have anything to do with my willingness to wear green and white. It doesn't have anything to do with the scholarship the university has graciously given me for being an "exceptional" student. I'm an Eagle, not because I couldn't be a Wolverine. I could've worn the maize and blue but chose not to. I'm an Eagle because I chose to be. And so when I hear the complaints about our school having no spirit I want to ask, "What should the Eagles be? Should we merely be green and white Wolverines?" We are NOT Wolverines. And the shadow we dwell beneath, the shadow that creates the insecurity of the "next-best" school attitude is only a trick of the eye. It is only a construct of our vivid imaginations to think we are less than the big M down the road. There is no room for two University's of Michigan. Eastern Michigan has what the other U has not. No, it isn't phenomenal sports teams. It isn't nationally recognized apparel sold worldwide. It isn't the brightest and most affluent students from around the country and world. We have the largest commuter population of any state university. That fact alone changes the equation of school spirit in ways I think we are all aware of. We don't have sold-out sports events. We don't have the "all-out" attitude that lends itself to students painting their half-naked bodies with green and white and losing their voices to the cheering before half time. We are the commuter school. For the majority of students that means we drive to our daily classes, do our time in the classroom and head home to our individual lives. This provides invaluable experience for our future employment. Get to work, get it done, get home and try to forget it. There is no shame it that. Our lives do not revolve around campus and various student activities. Sure, it'd be great to have a little more participation from students when Homecoming rolls around. But we cannot base our perceptions on the quality of our school experience by how many football games we attend, or how often we buy an Eastern Michigan University sweatshirt. We are getting a good education at Eastern. Of course we are afraid to say it is as good at what we might have gotten down the road, since our average SATs and GPAs profess what we cannot; we are not the cream-we are the milk. But in many ways, for many people, it IS better than what we would've gotten at the ol' U of M. Eastern offers programs that Michigan does not. We have some outstanding faculty that U of M would love to steal away from us. We are not the top scholars of the state. But a good percentage of state elementary and secondary classrooms will be filled with graduates of Eastern's teacher education programs. We will likely never win a national championship in any sport. But we will find our experiences at Eastern have molded us to be confident without assuming the arrogant tilt to our heads that so many Wolverines display. We will be the ordinary people. The world cannot be filled with Wolverines. There is not enough room for all that ego in one place. We should learn to see the beauty in being the "average Joe" and the "average JoAnne." There are many more of US than there are of the classic U of M overachievers with their 6-figure incomes and monster SUV's. I'm not saying that some of us won't go on to some sort of exceptional career or make some kind of outstanding contribution to the world. We have our share of accomplished alumni and will continue to graduate some remarkable students. What I'm trying to say is that we should take pride in our own personal lives and accomplishments and not rely on the mob-induced hysteria of school pride and academic arrogance. The world does not revolve around the sun because of those who reside in the top 2-percent of academic achievement. That 2-percent may run the world, but the world runs because of the effort we "average Joes" put forth. We, who get up every morning and go to work, do our jobs, come home and drop into our La-Z-Boy loungers exhausted at the end of the day. We should always strive for excellence. We should always remember the purity of doing a job well, with little fanfare. We should all take pride in our accomplishments and acknowledge the role Eastern played in our success. Perhaps we won't be wearing the green and white over our middle-aged sagging stomachs in thirty years, singing our school spirit in horrible renditions of the fight song. (What is the name of that song again?) But one thing is certain. Our time at Eastern will give us the skills we need to live a fulfilling life. And what better way to show our spirit than to become productive members of society, successful individuals who don't depend on the honor of a school name or colors to define our self-worth. Be an Eagle and be proud.