Remember those high school days when the top priority for Homecoming was finding a date to the dance? Almost everyone in the school attended the dance, game and parade. Last year’s seniors would return for the festivities. In the week preceding Homecoming, students showed their spirit-or at least their willingness to look funny, on various “spirit days” like ’50s Day, or my favorite, Bad Hair Day.
Contrast this with Homecoming at Mississippi State. It’s a big deal for the alumni. However, from a student’s perspective, it’s less meaningful and less personal than Homecoming was in high school. Of course, with a campus of more than 15,000 people, it’s difficult for it to be personal.
Nevertheless, activities that involve the whole campus are less personal than they could be. The Homecoming Court is a prime example.
In high school, the Homecoming Court was selected by their peers and friends. The voters and the candidates knew each other. Each voter could select their favorite candidate based on whatever criteria they chose.
While, for some, the only factors are popularity or clique membership, voters had the option to place their votes based on personal character, kindness, work ethic or a host of other positive attributes.
In college, it’s difficult to know even one of the candidates, much less all of them. While limited rsums and a picture are provided by the candidates, they limit the criteria the voter have to make their selections to a cold statistics like GPA and group affiliation.
GPA is in no way an indication of character, and while group membership sometimes gives a clue to the candidates’ personalities, it is only a slight hint.
Because most students have no good basis for making a judgment, most simply do not vote. Instead, the remaining voters tend to vote by group association, voting for their fellow members or a member of a group that has negotiated the vote.
This adds a level of politics that should not exist in an election that should be based on individual character. As a result, the election degrades into contest between groups-usually the sororities and the Black Student Alliance-where the size of the group is the sole determining factor in the election.
While its possible for a candidate to be well-known enough to be elected across group lines, it is doubtful that any group running a candidate would support them. Furthermore, a candidate of character, but without sorority or BSA membership, stands almost no chance of election.
There is no reason to elect a court because they have high GPAs or are members of the largest sororities on campus-they do not represent the school.
Because the size of the election makes the positions of MSU Homecoming Court essentially meaningless, the court should be disbanded and replaced by smaller courts specific to college, major or organization.
This way the electors will likely know who they’re voting for and candidates can be elected on basis of character and school spirit, even if they’re not a member of an organization.
Nathan Alday is a senior aerospace engineering major. He can be reached at [email protected].