It’s been said that inside every cynic is a disappointed idealist.

I think this is an important idiom to keep in mind when evaluating Nancy Cantor’s tenure as SU chancellor. “Bird by Bird” was a terrific representation of the highs and lows of Cantor’s leadership on campus. However, I feel that in retrospect Cantor will be remembered not for her quasi-revitalization of the city of Syracuse, but for her detriment to the university’s national reputation.

As an idealist, it would have been wonderful if Cantor could have accomplished all the good she has done in the city while simultaneously enhancing or maintaining SU’s reputation. However, as a realist (and some might say a cynic) the bottom line is that we can quantifiably show that her focus on improving the city hurt the university as a whole.

I believe professor Joel Kaplan said it best in the article stating, “She snuffed the rankings off by saying they’re going to be obsolete, but they’re not going to be obsolete.”

As a native of a city in similarly dire straights as Syracuse (Cleveland), I can appreciate the chancellor’s urban-revitalization efforts, but at the end of the day Chancellor Cantor’s duty was to provide the best possible product for SU students and alums, not to aid the dying city.

While it would be nice if these were not mutually exclusive, at the end of her tenure we can demonstrably show via our national rankings that our reputation has taken a hit, and with it some of the value in our university. I hope Chancellor-designate Syverud will take note of this distinction and work to restore value to the SU degree for the students who are sacrificing so much to attain it.

Bob O’Brien
School of Information Studies
Class of 2014