University plans centennial events

The year 2010 will mark the 100th anniversary of the University of Southern Mississippi, and President Martha Saunders and members of a newly formed Centennial Committee held their second Campus Conclave in the Thad Cochran Center Friday to gather new ideas from an audience made up of students, faculty and staff for what will be a year-long celebration.

The Alumni Association began working with the department of marketing and public relations more than a year ago, said Bob Pierce, executive director of alumni activities. As the university was managing a transition between presidents, the upcoming centennial remained a priority, and when President Saunders came last year, "she completely embraced it," Pierce said.

In her opening speech for the meeting, Saunders invited students, staff and faculty to openly share their ideas and encouraged them to be "as wild and as crazy as you want," since cost and manpower was of no cost during the brainstorming session.

Centennial Coordinator Jennifer Payne, a Southern Miss graduate of speech communications from Jackson, presented the centennial plans so far, along with research she had done of other universities in the nation in regards to their anniversary activities. She said the first conclave, WHEN, had generated some good ideas, including the theme for the centennial celebrations: "A Treasured Past. A Golden Future."

The Centennial Steering Committee is made up of 50 members- appointed by Saunders- made up of students, faculty and staff. The honorary chair is President Emeritus Aubrey K. Lucas, and there are two co-chairs, Alvin Williams, interim dean of the College of Business, and Rex Kelly, a former president of the Alumni Association.

Payne said the committee is broken into five sub-committees that will focus on five areas of interest during that centennial year: academics, arts, athletics, Founder's Day, and history and education. She said the celebrations would last an entire calendar year from January to December 2010.

There are three main events that will draw much attention that year said Pierce, including Founder's Day, homecoming, and the spring commencement. While the committee is looking for ideas to make those events remarkable, Pierce said there will be numerous opportunities to enhance activities that take place throughout the year.

One student in the crowd, Tyler McLeery, a sophomore physics major from Mobile, Ala., suggested inviting a Nobel prize winner, along with distinguished alums, to speak at a conference that will be hosted by the Society of Physics during the centennial year. McLeery said the alumni could bring the past perspective to the attention of current students while helping Southern Miss in its recruitment efforts.

"That's a prime example of what we're talking about with all these things that are going to happen in between those three sort of cornerstone events," Pierce said. "That would be a perfect way to take something that's already existing and elevate it, and truly make it a special event."

The SMAC May Crawfish Festival was another example, and several attendees encouraged events like picnics-on-the-lawn or festivals that families and members of the community could enjoy. Others suggested changes to Golden Eagle Welcome Week activities for incoming freshmen that highlighted USM's history and traditions.

Ideas for sports events included fireworks displays, a reunion of Pride Band alums, and displays of the alma mater and fight song on the big screens in the Rock during football games.

Brick and mortar projects that would literally cement the centennial celebrations were considered, with everything from a bronze statue of the recently retired Brett Favre to a clock tower that might mark the passing of another hundred years. Pierce reminded attendees that no plans had yet been set in stone, especially regarding the idea of a future live mascot.

The only circumstances being considered for the possibility of a live mascot, Pierce said, were if the eagle was actually owned by the Hattiesburg zoo, housed at that location and allowed to visit the Southern Miss campus only for game day celebrations and things of that nature.

"It's sort of a win-win, in that we get the live mascot, but we're not responsible on a day-to-day basis for it, and it also gives us a promotional opportunity down at the zoo," Pierce said.

Melanie Fowler, a freshman elementary education major from Gautier, went to the Centennial Conclave as an unofficial representative for the Honors College Ambassadors, and said she was surprised to hear so many suggestions in such a short time.

"I think it needs to be planned years ahead of time," Fowler said, "I mean, we were sitting in there for an hour, and we came up with ten million things that are going to take two years to budget alone."

"I think the challenge with a celebration like this is, how do you celebrate everything and how do you incorporate everything amazing about the university?" Payne said. "So the variety of the ideas that we got I think is very encouraging."

Pierce said there is also a representative from the Gulf Park Campus in the Centennial Steering Committee. The last meeting will be held April 30 on the Gulf Park Campus in Room 103 of the Advanced Education Center. Saunders said the kinds of ideas she heard in the meeting made her wish such conclaves could be held every day on every issue.

"I have been just really thoroughly impressed with the students' ideas on this," Saunders said after the brainstorming session. "You know, they view all this from a very different perspective, and I would love to hear some things that they would like to see go on in that year."

Payne said that even though there will not be any more conclave sessions after the meeting at Gulf Park, students are strongly encouraged to e-mail all ideas and suggestions to Centennial@usm.edu or go to the website at usm.edu/centennial.