In last night's State of the University, President Brian Casey mentioned an off-script, deeper concern he wants to change at DePauw.
"What I don't think you have here is the ability to sell yourselves. I don't think there's enough of a culture of ambition here," he said while speaking of recent changes to the Civic, Global and Professional Opportunities offices.
Graduate schools like Harvard Law, University of Chicago and Johns Hopkins are within reach but aren't reached for often enough, he argued.
But we feared that point might be lost among sexier images of renovations around campus. We think it was.
Developing the CGPOpps office to help students become more future-minded and end successfully in a career is an important change, especially at a small liberal arts colleges. But this is one of the only headlines this semester that shows investment in programming and additional faculty.
Investment in departments and programs - the foundations of our core educational experience - lead to more ambitious grad-school applications. More competitive programs will also attract a student more likely coming to DePauw with intentions of even higher education.
We've thanked the Hoovers, and we hope our last editorial shows our thanks to the Welch's as well. These buildings will certainly bring "oohs" and "aahs" to our campus.
But new fitness center or dining hall will not make us better grad school applicants.
Lilly and the new Hoover Hall may help fix current problems and unite the campus for current students, but the bigger issue that will affect all of us for the rest of our post-grad lives is how far we dare to stretch our education.
If post-grad ambition is currently a fundamental problem, there's a subtle message to be seen in its debut presentation as an issue in the same breath as wildly generous donations to physical structures.
In the future, we would hope to see more headlines declaring larger investments in programming that will enrich a grad-school or otherwise successful career track.
Of course, we are on par intellectually and talent-wise, comparable to the institutions, as Casey mentioned. Over 60 percent of us graduate from DePauw with an internship under our belts, numerous extra curricular activities and a greater understanding of our world thanks to the liberal arts context.
But until we make a greater monetary investment in our academic programs, the competitive bar won't be raised.