LSU Priorities Questionable

As LSU prepares for another football season its fans are all a buzz about the prospects of another great one; maybe even a win over Alabama.  They also love to brag about men’s and women’s basketball, women’s gymnastics and men’s and women’s baseball.

However, these same exuberant fans apparently couldn’t care less about academics and some of the deplorable conditions that currently exist outside the athletic realm at our state’s premier institution.  Leaky roofs, mildew-stained ceilings, threadbare carpets, unreliable heating and air conditioning systems, potholes, and aging pipes are just a few of the signs of the current dilapidated state at LSU.  LSU’s infrastructure is falling apart, to the tune of $718 million in deferred maintenance.

If one looks at the entire LSU system that figure climbs to over $1.7 billion in overdo maintenance.

The essence of the infrastructure problems at LSU is best epitomized by LSU's Middleton Library.  According to LSU’s website, “LSU Libraries support the academic mission of the university by fostering teaching, learning, and research. Through their commitment to excellence in collections, services, and spaces, the Libraries serve as an indispensable intellectual resource for the state of Louisiana…”

Obviously these are simply hollow words because Middleton Library is so disgusting that prospective students aren’t even given a tour of it. To put it mildly it is a dump disguised as a library.  The basement is so covered with mold and mildew from water leaks that it is totally unusable.  Plywood boards are placed on its floors as a means to travel through the water in its corridors after a rain.  Additionally, the College of Science buildings  at LSU with critical and immediate needs include Howe-Russell-Kniffen, Choppin Hall, Foster Hall and Lockett Hall.   Within these buildings, aging infrastructure, inadequate accessibility, and outdated teaching and research laboratories  are limiting  the university and its faculty and students from achieving their fullest potential.  The list of academic needs goes on and on.

Ironically, all these buildings stand in sharp contrast to another building used only 10 or so times a year, Tiger Stadium.

This is where the soul and priorities of LSU NOW reside, and students and faculty know it.  "If you want to understand what's most important to a society," the scholar Joseph Campbell once observed, "don't examine its art or literature, simply look at its biggest buildings."

The backsliding of LSU doesn’t just apply to its physically decaying academic infrastructures but also to its technology support systems.  LSU relies on an old outdated IBM mainframe system that utilizes COBOL to handle its tuition, payrolls, student services and other critical needs.  Those with tech savvy will understand the COBOL reference, for others let’s just say the system is over 43 years, and when parts are needed for repair, they must be purchased on line from eBay.  Even one of their own IT specialist warned, “the current IBM mainframe was placing the university at a high risk of collapse.” 

Obviously the priorities at LSU need an immediate adjustment, but it hardly seems likely as long as the Tigers continue to appease their fans  by having winning football seasons.   This continued shortsightedness will eventually catch up to LSU for it is rapidly becoming less and less of a premier state university.

All should be ashamed of what’s going on at LSU.

But who cares?  Go Tigers!