{"id":2100,"date":"2010-07-12T11:57:47","date_gmt":"2010-07-12T16:57:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/?p=2100"},"modified":"2010-07-21T03:00:47","modified_gmt":"2010-07-21T08:00:47","slug":"were-no-37-yeah-school","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2010\/07\/were-no-37-yeah-school\/","title":{"rendered":"We’re No. 37. Yeah, School!"},"content":{"rendered":"

BLOOMINGTON, Ind., Wednesday, July 7, 2010 — It was a travel day, where I wouldn’t normally post anything, but some one-sheets<\/a> in the airport terminal surprised me.<\/p>\n

A college or visitors’ bureau — I forgot which and couldn’t find it again on the return to the airport on Monday, July 12 — mentioned it was No. 16 in the country for some best-of poll. In a poster, mention means boasting, else why would it be in the corridor welcoming you to the region?<\/p>\n

Proud of 16th place?<\/p>\n

Another placard, for West Baden Springs (Ind.) Hotel<\/a>, proclaims it is ranked No. 15 as a destination hotel by Conde Nast Travel<\/em>. Ooh, 15. Say I’ve got a couple or three thousand bucks to fly to then use the facilities of a resort spa. Wouldn’t I aim for one of the 14, probably hit a Top 10? (Caught my eye because we did stay there Sunday night the 11th. We were very happy with everything about the place, a top-shelf spa-resort whose staff are professional without being snooty, and my is that rare.)<\/p>\n

Indiana Southeast University wants airport travelers to know it has the ninth best part-time MBA<\/a> program.<\/p>\n

These are bragging rights? I’ve never seen anything like that, not on highway billboards or news articles I edit.<\/p>\n

Here’s a trick from Arkansas, which places often in two lists — among the most poor, most illiterate, most uninsured and the other list comprising the least wealthy, least literate and least sufficient medical insurance.<\/p>\n

Round ’em off.<\/p>\n

The resort hotel, if it were in my home state, would be in the top 15. Think of all the resorts around, and that’s high praise. The business school would shout it’s in the top 10. Colleges like being in the top 10.<\/p>\n

On a scale of 1-1,000, Brick has a Technorati<\/a> Authority of 110. No. 1 most weeks is Huffington Post with a TA of 921. If you poke around in there, most blogs have an authority of 1.<\/p>\n

On the other hand, a town up the road, Rogers<\/a>, is No. 10 on the CNN\/Money<\/em> list of 100 Best Places to Live. Doesn’t need an “in the top 10,” not when there’s thousands of similar cities considered. Doesn’t need fluffing at all.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BLOOMINGTON, Ind., Wednesday, July 7, 2010 — It was a travel day, where I wouldn’t normally post anything, but some one-sheets in the airport terminal surprised me. A college or visitors’ bureau — I forgot which and couldn’t find it again on the return to the airport on Monday, July 12 — mentioned it was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[33],"tags":[29],"class_list":["post-2100","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bloomington-2010","tag-columnist"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":326,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2007\/06\/philadelphia-phreedom\/","url_meta":{"origin":2100,"position":0},"title":"Philadelphia Phreedom","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"June 21, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"PHILADELPHIA -- The annual conference of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists begins Friday at 8 a.m. Well, Thursday evening is the informal mixer that has become more organized over the years. Most conferees have arrived, as have some speakers, including Dave Barry. Little thus can be reported yet. The\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Philadelphia Phreedom"","block_context":{"text":"Philadelphia Phreedom","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/nsnc\/philadelphia-2007\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2143,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2010\/07\/uphold-or-hold-up-standards\/","url_meta":{"origin":2100,"position":1},"title":"Uphold, or Hold Up, Standards","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"July 18, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"BLOOMINGTON, Ind., Sunday, July 11, 2010 -- Indiana University feels bigger than my hometown's University of Arkansas. Yep, 1,933 acres versus 345 acres. It has a journalism school not a department, a music school not a department. It is a handsome forested campus, full of sculptures (even a huge Calder)\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Bloomers"","block_context":{"text":"Bloomers","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/nsnc\/bloomington-2010\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"NSNC Oath of Office","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/07\/Swearing-in-300x225.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":7334,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2022\/07\/3-cheers-for-nea\/","url_meta":{"origin":2100,"position":2},"title":"Three Cheers for NEA \u2014 Ra Ra\u00a0RA","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"July 27, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"UA Takes Its First Seat at NEA Convention By Ben Pollock, Local 965 secretary This report first was published in the July 2022 newsletter of UA-Fayetteville Education Association \/ Local 965. Lots of us this summer have had to consider both mass shootings and reproductive rights. I ended up diving\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Brick Bats Reportage"","block_context":{"text":"Brick Bats Reportage","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/brick-bats-reportage\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Ben Pollock of UA-Fayetteville Education Association \/ Local 965 takes the minutes July 3, 2022, (left) of the morning Arkansas caucus meeting July 3, 2022, at Chicago\u2019s Drake Hotel. 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Pollock","date":"June 28, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"Tuesday, June 28, 2005: I am writing together so many odds and ends that I've been taking notes on for more than a week that they qualify for placement under various dates, not just today. This riff has as its genesis the 29th annual conference of the National Society of\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Grapevine Lines"","block_context":{"text":"Grapevine Lines","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/nsnc\/grapevine-2005\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":325,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2007\/06\/travel-plans\/","url_meta":{"origin":2100,"position":4},"title":"Travel Plans","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"June 19, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Wednesday, My Beloved and I head to Philadelphia for the annual conference of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists. It starts with a Thursday night reception, but I need to be at the hotel at 2 for the board meeting. I have created Brick subsets for two previous conferences, in\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Technical Difficulties"","block_context":{"text":"Technical Difficulties","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/briefs\/technical-difficulties\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":205,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2006\/06\/you-can-get-there\/","url_meta":{"origin":2100,"position":5},"title":"You Can Get There","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"June 25, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"THE AIRPORT -- We got to Northwest Arkansas Regional Airport before 7 a.m., because My Beloved Wife and I are experienced post-9\/11 travelers. Northwest Airlines, however, no longer behaves like an experienced carrier. Elaborating will just make me mad all over again. But we arrived at the airport in New\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Boston Blotter"","block_context":{"text":"Boston Blotter","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/nsnc\/boston-2006\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2100","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2100"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2100\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2110,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2100\/revisions\/2110"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2100"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2100"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2100"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}