Letter to the Editor: UMW should get back to the basics

by BRADFORD ELDER

Contributing Writer

It’s really sad to see that Mary Washington is on the Virginia’s Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission’s list of at-risk universities. The trouble started with President William Anderson’s lying about changing the institution’s name in the early 2000s and his feverish push to turn a great college into a large university, something that literally and figuratively did not fit the institution. From there, Mary Washington’s beautiful campus has been overbuilt with bloated and drab buildings, including a dubious “Convergence Center” that bears another former administrator’s name. I’d like to see Mary Washington get back to the basics: solid academics and smaller classes taught by tenured professors. Those things will stand the test of time. New buildings and shiny objects won’t, and we’re seeing that bear out now.

Bradford Elder

Mary Washington Class of 2005