Hoot

On Saturday, my wife and I went to SunTrust Park here in Cobb County to watch My Beloved Owls (MBO) play the fighting game birds of Jacksonville State University.

The announced attendance at the game was 16,949 people. 16,949 people gathered to watch a game that involved Kennesaw State.  Kennesaw State began playing college football in 2015.  Give us another 5 years and we may even make ESPN's Gameday.

Kennesaw State won their second Big South Conference Championship last week. Again they have played college football for only four seasons.

I looked around and was pleased to see people wearing (now get this) Kennesaw State spirit wear. Spirit wear is a fancy way of saying t-shirts, sweatshirts, and hats.  When I was a student at Kennesaw State, I never saw anybody wearing any Kennesaw State t-shirt, sweatshirt, or hat.

Maybe it was because, back then, Kennesaw State was Kennesaw College.

Kennesaw State, according to Wikipedia, has a 53% acceptance rate.  Kennesaw College had an open, rolling admission. This means, whoever applied, was accepted.

This meant Kennesaw College was either a "safety school" or your only hope to obtain an affordable degree.

What Kennesaw College was not: a place to rehab your grades.  Back then, you could transfer your grades from another college but it wouldn't count against your Kennesaw College grade point average.

I remember walking to class one morning and hearing some guy tell a friend,  "Man, I flunked out of Clemson, so I came here to Kennesaw and I'm flunking out here too".

Before it was Kennesaw College, it was Kennesaw Jr. College and this gave the school a complex. They tried their very best to make sure it wasn't an easy place to gain a degree. In fact, a lot of times, it seemed like they went out of their way to make it difficult.

I remember the first morning of an Algebra I class. Hey, this ain't Tech and I needed some sort of math for my degree.

The professor walked in, Dr. Khan.  He spent the first class telling us that "he didn't care" about your grades. Your grades were your problem. He went over every possible scenario  and his answer, if you didn't do well, was "Big deal"

Student:  "Dr. Khan, you can't flunk me, I'm a straight A student"
Dr. Khan:  "What's that to me?!"

Student: "Dr. Khan, don't flunk me!  If you do, I will flunk out of college."
Dr. Khan:  "So? You're the one flunking, not me."

Student:  "Dr. Khan, my parents were killed in a fiery automobile crash two days ago, my sister has leukemia, and I got shot in a holdup attempt last night. Please don't flunk me."
Dr. Khan:  "What's that got to do with the price of eggs in China?"

This went on for an entire hour.  I dropped the class.

One time, in my major, I had a test that had four questions on it.  One question was over tobacco production in the South.  I will give you the short answer: tobacco production was very difficult.

I had this same professor for another class. We had to submit a paper that was 50 percent of our grade. After the class turned our papers in, the professor announced that he didn't award "A's" for papers because he didn't believe in it.

Somehow, a great and merciful God allowed me to complete the requirements for graduation. I graduated and spent a fair share of the next 15 or so years explaining that Kennesaw College was not a Jr. College and that I had a Bachelor's degree and not an Associates.

I also had a lot of people look down their noses at my fair school.  I can understand the people that went to Georgia Tech, Harvard, Yale, etc doing it, but I have had people that never even step foot on a college campus give me that look that said, "Oh you bought that degree with a coupon."

Well, those days are long behind me now.  Kennesaw College is now Kennesaw State University and is the third largest university in Georgia behind UGA and Georgia State  Kennesaw State has dorms.

I beg your pardon. Kennesaw State has student housing.

And now, we have spirit wear. We have students that look like college students. And we have a football team.

Kennesaw State beat Jacksonville State in a 5 overtime quarter game and it was probably one the most enjoyable games I've seen in a long time.

Say what you will about Kennesaw State University, but it is good to see that people give a hoot about it.