The makings of a new school slogan

On Jan. 12, Vice President of Alumni Relations Bob Alig told The Daily Pennsylvanian that our president, Amy Gutmann, had spent the last two weeks in Mumbai, India trying to improve Penn's international reputation because, last year, University officials focused on building Penn's domestic reputation.

Fair enough.

I am all in favor of trying to improve Penn's reputation worldwide. But if Gutmann and Alig think that much has changed domestically, I think they are somewhat mistaken. Why is Amy Gutmann thousands of miles away in Mumbai when half the people in America still think I go to Penn State?

But fear not.

Our president can embark upon her Asian tour this coming March with peace of mind, continuing her international work without feeling that there is still far too much to be done in the Western hemisphere. I have a plan.

I promise this is the only time that you will ever hear a New Yorker say this, but I have to admit -- maybe we should follow the example set by our neighbor to the east: New Jersey.

In order to get Americans to look past things like the "unique" scenery along the Turnpike, former Acting New Jersey Governor Richard Codey turned to the masses to find a new slogan for his state.

The campaign was a success, and Codey chose his new ideal state slogan: "Come See For Yourself." Maybe that's what Penn needs: a few catchy words at the top of our letterhead to show people who we really are. And preferably something slightly less tacky than our latest unofficial catch prase, "Not Penn State." I mean, come on. A little subtlety, please.

Granted, Penn already has a motto, "Leges Sine Moribus Vanae" -- "Laws without morals are in vain." Sure, it's pretty impressive-sounding, and the fact that most of us can now translate four words of Latin makes us feel smart, but does it really have anything to do with life at Penn?

Not really.

College freshman Dave Weinreb even went so far as to say, "I feel like it would apply more to law school than to us."

I'm willing to admit that coming up with a new slogan won't be easy. And we don't need to officially trash Leges Sine Moribus Vanae. After all, we do need to maintain some shred of Ivy League dignity, and re-doing the coat of arms seems like kind of a pain.

So I followed Codey's example and turned to the populace for ideas. After all, 10,000 undergraduate minds are better than one, right?

Weinreb had one simple request for my new proposed slogan -- that it "at least be in English." College freshman Lizzie Ross suggested the cliche-yet-accurate "Work Hard, Play Hard," and other students seemed to agree. "That's what they told me ... on my tour," College sophomore Lauren Hurwitz said.

"We're an Ivy League school, but we're not nerds," said College freshman Marissa Steinberg. "We know when it's time to do work and when it's time to have fun."

College sophomore Shayne Wagman had a slightly different slogan suggestion that not only emphasized the intellect of the student body but our vast resources and aptly high price tag: "Where Mind Meets Money."

Correct me if I'm wrong, but none of these ideas say anything about laws, morals or vanity. So maybe the solution to Penn's reputation problem doesn't lie in Mumbai. It lies in New Jersey, of all places. We need a new slogan to show the world that even though we may come in fourth behind the Evil Triumvirate of Harvard, Yale and Princeton, we still have much to offer.

It appears that many students believe that what we have to offer is not just a beautiful urban campus with unparalleled resources, but a student body with an uncanny ability to balance astounding intellect with fulfilling social lives.

And I agree. It may seem superficial, but I do truly believe that what sets us apart from other top institutions is our well-rounded, down-to-earth student body. We don't live with our noses buried in textbooks, and we don't party every night (well, most of the time). We experience everything our campus and surrounding city have to offer, from world-renowned professors to Restaurant Week at Alma de Cuba.

So I propose this for our new slogan: "Penn: Ivy Pride, Top-Notch Minds,and Good Times." Slightly corny, a little pretentious, but relevant and relatable. Just like us.

Liz Hoffman is a sophomore political science major from New York, N.Y. New York Minute appears on Mondays.

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