If you build it will they come - or, how much can a campus change?

[honeychile]

Originally Posted by KillarneyRose

Ugh; where do I begin to list the ways Pitt has changed since I graduated? The Powers that Be saw fit to replace the script Pitt logo with generic block letters. They changed our school colors. They got rid of our freaking football stadium! Sure, the building that stands where Pitt Stadium once stood is a very nice facility and all, but the students have to take busses to the beautiful but cold and impersonal Heinz Field (an NFL venue) to watch home games.

Pitt owns most of the real estate in the Oakland neighborhood of Pittsburgh (where the campus is located) and they opted not to renew the leases of some of the mom and pop type establishments that gave the neighborhood its flavor. Instead, Pitt chose to rent the spaces to fast food chains. Everything is just so sterile now, it's like the campus I loved doesn't exist anymore.

I'm jealous of my husband, a Naval Academy graduate, who can go back to his campus and find it as well as the school's colors and logos unchanged from when he was a midshipman.

Oh, and as long as I'm whining... I don't know if it was Pitt or the other schools who decided we wouldn't be playing football against WVU and Penn State on a regular basis, but I think it was a bad decision. Students today know nothing about those rivalries, and they were fun!

As an alumna, I hesitate to make donations to a school I can barely recognize

Agree, agree, agree, especially the bold part - but what are the school colors now??? When did this happen, and better, WHY??

[KillarneyRose]

Originally Posted by honeychile

Agree, agree, agree, especially the bold part - but what are the school colors now??? When did this happen, and better, WHY??

Honeychile, it's not as drastic as perhaps I made it out to be but remember back in the day (think Danny Marino's uniform) it was a medium blue and something my husband snarkily described as "mustard yellow". Now, they're a navy blue and a more metallic gold. You know, navy blue just like WVU and PSU

[MysticCat]

Originally Posted by KillarneyRose

Honeychile, it's not as drastic as perhaps I made it out to be but remember back in the day (think Danny Marino's uniform) it was a medium blue and something my husband snarkily described as "mustard yellow". Now, they're a navy blue and a more metallic gold. You know, navy blue just like WVU and PSU

It may not be a factor in this case, but television has sometimes had an effect on school colors because some of the traditional shades didn't show up well or provide adequate contrast on TV. Carolina blue, for example, is noticeably darker than it often was 50+ years ago for that reason. And some colors just don't "translate" well on TV. Perhaps that was the case with the "mustard yellow."