William and Mary yesterday filed an appeal with the NCAA, which last month ruled that the nickname “Tribe” coupled with a logo including feathers could be viewed by Native Americans as offensive.
“Present NCAA determinations of mascot policy – what is allowed and what is forbidden – are neither comprehensible nor capable of being sensibly defended,” Gene R. Nichol, W&M’s president, wrote in a cover letter addressed to Myles Brand, the NCAA president.
In the appeal, W&M points out that the NCAA has made exceptions to its policy, allowing Florida State to remain the “Seminoles,” Utah to remain the “Utes,” and other schools to keep Native-American nicknames or imagery because those schools were granted permission to do so by specific tribes.
“To put it bluntly, the NCAA is now a complicit partner in the practices it seeks to condemn,” states a W&M-produced summary of the 21-page appeal. The appeal contends that W&M’s “nickname and logo are a natural expression of the College’s unique history and location.”
W&M established a school to educate Native Americans in 1697. That school operated for seven decades.
…“Few will understand why the College – where athletes regularly don Phi Beta Kappa keys at commencement, gain admission to competitive graduate and professional programs in unusually high numbers, and avoid the corrupting misconduct that too often mars university sports programs elsewhere – has made it to the top of the NCAA’s regulatory agenda,” Nichol wrote to Brand, the NCAA president.
“It would make more sense to study and export William & Mary’s approach to athletics than to penalize it.”
Jill and Emily, official daughters of NewMexiKen, are alumnae of The College of William and Mary. Jill was employed in the athletic department for several years.