[Vision2020] Save The Starburst

[Tom Hansen]

Save the UI starburst logo.

Came a tribe from the north brave and bold . . .

Seeya round town, Moscow.

Tom Hansen
Moscow, Idaho

"Here We Have Idaho"
http://www.tomandrodna.com/HWHI.mp3

"I-D-A-H-O Idaho Idaho Go Go Go"
http://www.tomandrodna.com/Vandals.mp3


-----Original Message-----

From: vandal-admin at uidaho.edu [mailto:vandal-admin at uidaho.edu] On Behalf Of
Phil Corless
Sent: Saturday, November 18, 2006 11:04 AM
To: vandal at uidaho.edu
Subject: [Vandal]Save The Starburst

Students protest demise of "daisy" logo at University of Idaho
by Jesse Harlan Alderman, Associated Press

To some, it's a groovy throwback to the sunny seventies. To others a 
textbook example of symmetrical design. But to most, it's the instantly 
recognizable symbol of the University of Idaho.

The school's "daisy" or "starburst" logo, an interlocking circle of five 
large yellow "Us" linked by small "Is," as in "UI," or University of Idaho, 
will soon start disappearing from the Moscow campus as part of an 
aggressive new marketing campaign.

It's been erased from university letterhead and will eventually be painted 
over on the large mural outside the Kibbie Dome, the school's indoor 
football arena.

The starburst icon light fixtures in the Student Union will stay, for now, 
but the relic of the "old" University of Idaho is being phased out, a 
casualty of a Madison Avenue-meets-Moscow image makeover.
	
Jonathan Gaffney, a University of Idaho senior who spearheaded a "Save the 
Starburst" campaign said most students bristle at the school's new 
promotional materials showing photographs of hikers on mountain tops and 
Birkenstock-wearing professors.

Selling the University of Idaho's prairie setting as a Rocky Mountain 
paradise is "awkward," Gaffney said, but his beef is with the school's 
decision to scrap the 36-year-old starburst.

"It's the one thing that screams U of I," he said. "It's a reminder of the 
U of I as a whole to so many people - of the four or five years you spent 
here, these great college years. It's nostalgic."

As of Thursday, more than 488 students, alumni and faculty members had 
signed Gaffney's online petition. He will present it to the school's 
president once he gets 500 signatures.

Gaffney is amazed how many students have signed the petition on the campus 
that is annually rated among the least politically active in the country by 
The Princeton Review.

"We don't have protests or anything like that," he said. "This isn't 
something that usually happens here. Just having a petition is unusual in 
the first place and then the fact that it's gotten this response."

The icon goes by many names - starburst, sunburst, daisy, snowflake and in 
Generation Y lingo, "that U of I circle thing."

The logo first appeared on the school's 1970-71 staff directory, 
supplementing the traditional "Lady of Knowledge" seal of a woman stroking 
a harp and looking onto fields of grain, said university archivist Nathan 
Bender.

In the 36 years since its first appearance, the school has splattered the 
icon across the campus, if not the state, on billboards, classroom trash 
cans and tuition bills.

Sandra Haarsager, a University of Idaho professor of journalism and mass 
media, said the school is wrong to completely erase the type of immediately 
recognizable trademark that most colleges and corporations spend millions 
of dollars trying to invent.

"There is a real value in the kind of corporate identity we have with the 
starburst," she said.

A new logo could take years to catch on, Haarsager said. While some schools 
are easily identified by their mascot, very few people associate the 
Vandal, a bushy bearded Viking, with Idaho.

But the marketers counter that the starburst has turned stale. The school 
is reeling from a 6 percent dip in enrollment, budget cuts and a scandal 
over a botched land deal in Boise. It needs a symbol that is modern, not 
retro, said Wendy Shattuck, the assistant vice president for marketing and 
strategic communications.

The new ad campaign, which also changes the old university slogan "From 
Here You Can Go Anywhere" to "Open Spaces. Open Minds," uses bold font 
types that don't match the 1970s print of the UI starburst.

"It was looking its age, yeah," Shattuck said. "We're also moving away from 
referring to ourselves as UI. That could be Iowa, Illinois, Indiana - we're 
trying to stop abbreviating ourselves."

Tara Roberts, editor in chief of the university newspaper, The Argonaut, 
thinks the marketing team miscalculated the pulse of the students.

A hip-hop version of the university fight song that school officials made 
available for download as a cell phone ringtone became a particular campus 
laughing stock, Roberts said.

"This schizophrenia has left people wondering what UI is trying to be 
during its mid-life crisis," Roberts wrote in a recent editorial. She said 
the school should spend money on keeping students happy and updating 
academic programs; not on the fickle tinkerings of marketing.

"It's funny, this branding campaign is trying to make us look more iconic, 
but it's taking away the most recognizable icon to three generations of 
students," she said. "It seems like such a trendy thing."

---

On the Net: http://www.savethestarburst.com

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