Archive for October, 2009
Use Of Mascots In Colleges And Universities Helps To Bolster Spirits
Dating back to the 1800′s the use of mascots in colleges and universities has helped to foster pride and raise the spirit of fans. At the earliest incarnation mascots used on college and university campuses for sports were largely live animals. This has become a tradition and some campuses still practice this even today. Mascots for hundreds perhaps thousands of years have been viewed as symbols of luck.
This is why some college and universities will still bring out a live animal onto the field as a mascot to get the crowd involved. Animals such as: lions tigers buffaloes and bulldogs have been used as live mascots to name a few. The Colorado Buffaloes will often bring a buffalo out onto their home field during halftime. Boosters at most campuses supply the necessary funds for the feeding and upkeep of live mascots.
Use of Live Mascots a Controversy for Colleges and Universities
However the use of live animals as mascots on college and university campuses has been fraught with controversy. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals PETA has had much to say about the use of animals as mascots over the years. Many people in the group feel that it is unethical and perhaps unhealthy to keep animals in captivity for the sole purpose of being a mascot. Their concern arises amid some animal mascots dying such as a tiger from renal failure.
PETA argues that the cages that the animals are kept in are barely large enough to allow for free movement. Also sometimes temperatures can be extreme and having thousands of fans in one place near the animal can cause it distress. Rival schools will at times steal the mascot of other schools. This is an ongoing controversy that hasn’t come to a clean end. Some colleges and universities view using live animal mascots as a long standing tradition that is harmless. Animal rights activists feel it is inhumane and unethical and needs to end.
Many Mascots Resemble Those in Professional Sports
Several colleges and universities don’t use live mascots. Their mascots are very much like the ones seen at professional football soccer and basketball games. Someone wears a suit and becomes the personality for the team. A lot of intense training can go into becoming a mascot for a college or university. The person has to have a high level of energy be enthusiastic and engaging be able to give the mascot “personality” and adopt gestures befitting a mascot.
Many will learn dances mime perform skits waves flags with the crowds or hold up signs to get the crowd involved. It is quite the acting job and demands that the person performing as the mascot maintain consistent upbeat and positive behavior. It’s not only important for the mascot to interact with other college students. A mascot needs to be accessible to all college and university fans such as alumni community faculty and children of fans.
College and University Mascots aren’t Always Stereotypical
The use of mascots in colleges and universities do not always fall along stereotypical lines. Mascots are often patterned for characteristics of the school or the students attending the schools. The boll weevil has been used in college sports as the mascot for The University of Arkansas at Monticello. Some would argue that it doesn’t look like a formidable foe. Yet it is one of the biggest detriments to cotton crops in the U.S.
The Fighting Okra is the mascot representing Delta State. Fans of the school’s team were opposed to using the vegetable because they didn’t feel it portrayed the right image. Some argued that it was mean green and indigenous to the Southern region of America. Given this reasoning the mascot name has stuck.
The University of HawaiiHilo has taken a different approach with their mascot. They have emulated the Vulcans of Star Trek fan and made them their mascot. Their reasoning is due to the large amount of volcanic activity through the islands the name fits perfectly.
About the writer: Loonie Times is a full service mascot company that specializes in the design and creation of custom designed Mascots Costumes and Characters.
US Colleges And University
US colleges and university offer ample opportunities to any knowledge seeker for the academic pursuits in any field of study. They are equipped with the state of the art infrastructure and have conducive ambience to foster and nurture scholastic aptitude.
Many of the US universities offer both online and campus based courses of various levels such as Bachelors programme Masters or Doctoral programme. The programmes offered pertain to different disciplines of study such as pure science medicine engineering and technology business management and liberal arts. There are two sessions winter session and fall session in an academic year.
US Universities can be classified into three categories private institutions public institutions and community colleges. Private institutions are basically managed and run by nongovernmental organizations or private owners. Public institutions are managed by officials who are appointed or elected by the public. These institutions are supported by the public funds. Community colleges are institutions supported by the local communities. Community colleges operate two kinds of curriculum Transfer and Terminal. Under Transfer category one can earn two years of work towards the Bachelors degree. Terminal category is aimed to provide vocational training to the candidates to groom them and make them suitable to seek employment in different technical and quasiprofessional fields.
Admission in US colleges and university are held on the basis of merit. Different institutions may have different eligibility criteria for admission. Admission requirements also vary with the level of the course such as Undergraduate study or Bachelors programme Masters or Doctoral programme and the discipline of study. Most of the institutions require a valid score card of the appropriate tests held for the admission in US colleges and universities such as SAT ACT GMAT. Some of them also conduct their individual admission tests. References from the persons of repute and standing in the relevant discipline of study are given due weightage. Admission fee and tuition fee are different for different institutions but many institutions offer scholarships and parttime work opportunities to meet the expenditure.
Most of the US colleges and university maintain reasonably high academic standard. However some of the prominent US colleges and universities are the Princeton University Harvard University Yale University Stanford University University of Pennsylvania California Institute of Technology Massachusetts Institute of Technology Duke University Columbia University University of Chicago and Dartmouth College.
US universities maintain a very tough academic regimen for the students. The ratio of the Faculty members to the students is high by any standard. Strict quality control has helped the US universities to earn a place of distinction on the globe.
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About the writer: Taken a good decision about your career by pursuing US colleges and university by collecting information searching through University Search in US.
University Of Sao Paulo Is The Best University In South America
The University of Sao Paulo is the best university in South America according to the Academic Ranking of World Universities ARWU. The ARWU is produced by the Institute of Higher Education at the Shanghai Jiao Tong University and several indicators of academic or research performance are used to establish the ranking these include highly cited researchers articles indexed in major citation indices and staff winning Nobel Prizes.
There are nine South American universities in the Words Top500 universities 2008. Six are located in Brazil two in Chile and one in Argentina. The Top5 universities located in South America are: University of Sao Paulo ranked 101151 in the world University of Beunos Aires ranked 152200 University Estadual Campinas ranked 201302 University Fed Rio de Janeiro and the University Federal Minas Gerais jointly ranked 303401.
The University of Sao Paulo has been the best university in South America in every year since 2003 according to the ARWU. Brazilian universities dominate the topuniversities in South America: four of the Top5 universities in South America are located in in Brazil.
The University of So Paulo USP is the largest higher education and research institution in Brazil. It is a public and free university with open access for students selected by the vestibular the Brazilian entrance exam for universities. USP was established in 1934 it started with some already existing schools the earliest of which was established in 1827. USP has seven campuses four of which are located in the City of Sao Paulo five hospitals and five museums. The total number of students is 86187 53.5 male: 54361 undergraduates and 31826 postgraduates graduate students. USP has a faculty of 5434 and employs 15221 persons. For more details about the USP.
About the writer: AllAboutUni.com was founded by John Paget and launched in November 2007. He has been visiting university campuses around the world since the 1980s and wanted to share this information with others. John Paget was brought up in Switzerland where he attended the International School of Geneva and was exposed to the growing demand for international higher education studies. John Paget studied Economics at the London School of Economics and then completed graduate studies in the United Kingdom and Switzerland.
