I completely agree with owning the Cal and California terms. But in 1868 when the school was established, it was the first and only public one in the state, if I'm not mistaken. So taking the name California and Cal for short was a natural. But in the over 150 years since then, the number of public schools bearing the California and C…
I completely agree with owning the Cal and California terms. But in 1868 when the school was established, it was the first and only public one in the state, if I'm not mistaken. So taking the name California and Cal for short was a natural. But in the over 150 years since then, the number of public schools bearing the California and Cal terms has grown to 33, not to mention private schools (e.g., Southern Cal, Cal Baptist, Cal Tech), and the dreaded Cali reference for the state from Spanish. Somewhere during that time, Berkeley had to be used or added to avoid confusion with one of the other entities. I'm from SoCal and graduated 40 years ago and the confusion has been ever-present from then to now. So while we can feel smug in continuing to just use Cal, I think it's only a inside-joke on us. Unless we find a way to connect the two --- Cal and Berkeley --- to the rest of the audience, I'm afraid the disassociation will continue to be a drag on both academics and athletics by not connecting the great history and prestige together.
The issue was ever bending the knee. Should have always been left as The University of California- the end. You don't see this issue with Michigan or Oregon or so many other schools because they branded academics and athletics together.
I completely agree with owning the Cal and California terms. But in 1868 when the school was established, it was the first and only public one in the state, if I'm not mistaken. So taking the name California and Cal for short was a natural. But in the over 150 years since then, the number of public schools bearing the California and Cal terms has grown to 33, not to mention private schools (e.g., Southern Cal, Cal Baptist, Cal Tech), and the dreaded Cali reference for the state from Spanish. Somewhere during that time, Berkeley had to be used or added to avoid confusion with one of the other entities. I'm from SoCal and graduated 40 years ago and the confusion has been ever-present from then to now. So while we can feel smug in continuing to just use Cal, I think it's only a inside-joke on us. Unless we find a way to connect the two --- Cal and Berkeley --- to the rest of the audience, I'm afraid the disassociation will continue to be a drag on both academics and athletics by not connecting the great history and prestige together.
The issue was ever bending the knee. Should have always been left as The University of California- the end. You don't see this issue with Michigan or Oregon or so many other schools because they branded academics and athletics together.