In case you hadn’t noticed, the people that run this University care a great deal about maintaining a very specific image of BU. To some degree, this makes perfect sense.

We attend a public university that feels like it has a lot to prove with only limited resources. But it’s gotten to the point where the administration finds it necessary to constantly remind students and the public about where US News and World Report has placed us in their rankings year after year.

While it certainly gives us all a warm, fuzzy feeling to know we attend one of the top public schools in the country, it shouldn’t be allowed to act as a smokescreen for the University’s very obvious shortcomings.

The administration is not alone in shouldering the blame; students are equally, if not more, responsible for the campus-wide obsession with pretending that Binghamton University is something that it is not, namely a private school with a full piggybank. But since we insist on being Number One, I’ve graciously compiled a list of areas in which BU takes top slot:

#1 School Whose Administration Trades Integrity For A Buck: We’ve been hearing since last spring about President DeFleur’s seat on an M&T Bank executive board; a position which grants her a yearly stipend. The bank continues to maintain a monopolistic grip on student financial transactions, and Madam President’s place on their payroll does not suggest any sort of change in the near future. Such a glaring conflict of interest does not instill in me a sense of confidence, as I was under the impression that the administration was, if not legally, then morally responsible to the students of BU. M&T Bank is just another example of the surprising lack of choice we are afforded, to which most of us respond, “Whatever. Wanna smoke a bowl?”

#1 School At Which To Perpetuate One’s Delusions: This may come as a surprise to some of you, but calling our school “The Ivy of the SUNY’s,” doesn’t necessarily make it so. I can crown myself the King of All Jungle Beasts, and have actually done so in the past, only to meet with grave disappointment and a startling case of rabies. What that name does do, however, is create an air of indifferent snobbery that is personified by those insufferable tools that insist on wearing Cornell University sweatshirts around campus. Thanks guys. Your immature need to pretend you’re a part of the Ivy League gives the administration a great excuse to propose the building of expensive recreational complexes that serve as a detriment to the academic reputation of this school by diverting money away from departments that took big hits after the budget was cut.

#1 School to Take Part in a Cold War: The value of student cultural, political and ethnic groups is indisputable, but the manner in which they are operated has created a social stalemate. I’m not asking that we gather around the campfire while singing “Kumbaya,” but while those organizations and members of student government squabble over petty, personal rivalries, the tuition goes up, professors aren’t being replaced and more of our money is being dumped in to things we probably don’t want. Wake up: nothing gets fixed as long as our self-important, ego-driven feelings of entitlement control the way we interact with one another.

Matt McFadden is a junior English and Arabic major.