George Washington University - Cherry Tree Yearbook (Washington, DC)

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Rick Santos G.W.U. 21

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GW: Shape, Form, and Content Year after year in Apirl or May, as frisbees take to eerie flight, weekend philosophers launch into new efforts to discover the identity of GW and its students. There are many faces to GW and each has its own claim to reality, but the composite lies somewhere beyond the obvious images that GW conjures up. GW is perhaps not even best described as a sum of its parts. At times it appears almost as a working contradic¬ tion: Tearing down historic and pleasant row houses to use the bricks in a new concrete and glass behemoth, or passing along to students two large tuition increases in the attempt to attract more and a higher caliber student clientel. Yet the University has its kindly side. There was the recent Gymathon for Miriam’s kitchen and the canned food drive. Increasingly there have been efforts to reclaim many of the excesses of students and put them to use for the poor or homeless. In some cases we are clearly less than we should be, while in others we can indulge a bit of pride in the University. So then what is GW? And what does it mean to be a student here? People have tried to describe GW as instrinsically linked to DC. For many in the student body this is true. Those who hold jobs or internships see the best and the worst DC has to offer and many come to love it. There are, however, far too many who barely leave campus; excepting trips to Georgetown for shop¬ ping or Dupont Circle nightspots. Because of this, there must also exist a GW separate from DC. Then what is it that is most memorable or remarkable about GW? For me the one most noteworthy aspect of GW is its constant state of change. Barely a year goes by without some new building going up or another major improve- 20 G.W.U. John Hrastar

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ment being made. The University as a whole has moved twice before choosing Foggy Bottom as its final resting place. But not only the superficial outer face of the campus has changed; most of the programs have been revised and the faculty has taken various different shapes. Many of us remember fondly our first experiences in GW’s experimental programs. These were single ex¬ perimental classes, or residential experimental pro¬ grams such as Politics and Values, or Utopian Ideals. For a long time to come I will remember my freshman year spent with a perhaps pretentious, but always fun, group in Politics and Values. Through my years here I have watched that class change and noticed the subtle shifts in focus and intensity. The Utopian Ideals program is gone now (as one friend said, “that is final proof that Utopias can’t really work”), an experiment left behind. It is somewhat ironic that, as in the real world, the Utopian Ideals program was replaced with a program on Computers in Society—another example of the technologi- calization of our society. The faculty and Administration have also changed. The new academic year will present us with a new Dean of Columbian College, a new Dean of the School of Public and International Affairs, a new head librarian, and a new Vice President for Academic Affairs. To those who have left us we can only bid good luck and ask some forgiveness for any undue pains we caused by storming into your office to rearrange our lives. But what about being a student here at GW? This is perhaps the most far-ranging question. Because of the Dave Rifkind Bill Smith 22 G.W.U.