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The seas can be rough sometimes
Over the summer, Bwog shed a silent tear when the acronym for Columbia Engineering was changed from “SEAS to “CE.” All hope seemed lost when the powers that be drilled the inferior acronym into our youngest minds. But the tides turn for the better! A tipster forwarded us the following email this morning from Margaret Kelly, the Executive Director of Communications of… SEAS (feels so good just to use it again). Emphasis is theirs:
Dear Columbia Engineering Senior Staff Members,
Following a number of rounds of discussion with senior staff and exchanges with students and alumni, the dean has decided that the preferred acronym for our School, when abbreviated as a series of letters, should be SEAS. This means that there should be no further references to CE or EN as identifiers of our students or alumni.
Our logo is cobranded with the University, and we will continue to use Columbia Engineering as the preferred identifying name of our School in any written context, as short-hand for the legal name of the School.
Our School logo bears the full name of the school (The Fu Foundation School of Engineering and Applied Science). In all communications from the School, there must be, somewhere on the first page, recognition that The Fu Foundation School of Engineering and Applied Science is the official name of the School, as well as indicating the identifying name of the School as Columbia Engineering.
When using the full name of the School, please remember that, despite any style guide to the contrary, we must honor the donor’s preference and ALWAYS capitalize the “T” in The Fu Foundation School of Engineering and Applied Science.
I hope that this e-mail serves to clarify usage of the School’s name and abbreviation. Please share this with members of your staff so that, going forward, we are all using the same nomenclature for the School.
If you have any questions about implementing these new guidelines, please feel free to contact me.
Thanks,
Margaret
The email gives no reason for this sudden change, although some have been speculating “CE” could potentially conflict with the School of Continuing Education, which is abbreviated “SCE” (and soon to be “PAX”), but is still found on the web at http://ce.columbia.edu/. We just think that the dean ran out of “CE” puns.
Perfect storm of metaphors via Wikimedia Commons
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10 Comments
@Anonymous SEAS FOREVER
@Anonymous call it the “e-School”
@Yes please. To the renaming, that is. I’m supposedly getting \financial aid\ from GS — I don’t have $10 to donate.
@My Life Is SEAS So glad I don’t have to reconsider my own branding
http://twitter.com/mliSEAS
@Z.Y. Fu As per the conditions of my gift, I insist that no graduate of the school be taught proper grammar or correct style.
@GS Perhaps GS can get a new name instead? Anyone have a few tens of millions sitting around to donate?
@Anonymous sounds like SEAS can’t decide what its name should be. wtfish going on
@... What the heck is this. I am more confused now than before. When do you use which name where??
@Three names It has three names:
1) The official name that must be used at least once every time officially is “The Fu Foundation School of Engineering and Applied Science.”
2) The identity/branding they want you to use anytime you shorten the official name is “Columbia Engineering”
3) The abbreviation is “SEAS” whenever you would use CC, BC or GS instead.
@THREE PARTS HUH SEAS IS GOD