What A Show!

Last night we had two spectular shows. During the NCAA Men's Basketball Championship we got hit with a spectacular thunderstorm with lightning that made the lights flicker once and the Direct TV system went down several times.

I haven't had time to check the rainfall totals or damage yet, I am glad we didn't get a direct hit on the farmstead.

Duke and Butler put on one of the best basketball games I ever watched. It was hard to see either team lose but one had to. Butler will learn great lessons from their feat I hope they can keep for a lifetime. Never say quit, prepare and do your best. What a fine coach!

When I saw Myles Brand name on the floor sideline I remembered what he did at Ohio State.

Myles Brand Biography
Myles Brand assumed his duties as president of the National Collegiate Athletic Association January 1, 2003. He is the fourth chief executive officer of the Association. During his first five years, Brand has presided over passage of the most comprehensive academic reform package for intercollegiate athletics in recent history - a package that refocuses the attention of student-athletes, coaches and administrators on the education of student-athletes. Brand has also changed the national dialog on college sports to emphasize the educational value of athletics participation and the integration of intercollegiate athletics with the academic mission of higher education. His tenure has helped reestablished the indispensable role of university presidents in the governance of college sports.

Brand was himself president of two major universities. From 1994 through 2002, he was president of Indiana University, an eight-campus institution of higher education with nearly 100,000 students, 17,000 employees and a budget of $3.4 billion. Brand also served as president at the University of Oregon from 1989 to 1994.

Born May 17, 1942, Brand earned his BS in philosophy from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in 1964, and his Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of Rochester in 1967. Brand's other administrative posts include provost and vice-president for academic affairs, Ohio State University, 1986-89; coordinating dean, College of Arts and Sciences, University of Arizona, 1985-86; dean, faculty of social and behavioral sciences, Arizona,1983-86; director, Cognitive Science Program, Arizona, 1982-85; head, department of philosophy, Arizona,1981-83; chairman, department of philosophy, University of Illinois at Chicago, 1972-80. He began his career in the department of philosophy, University of Pittsburgh, 1967-72.

Brand has also served on the Executive Committee of the Board of directors, Association of American Universities (AAU), and as board chair, 1999-2000; a member of the board of directors, 1992-97, and executive committee, 1994-97, of the American Council on Education (ACE); and a member of the board of directors of the National Association of State Universities and Land Grant Colleges (NASULGC), 1995-98. He served too as a board member of the American Philosophical Association and of the University Corporation for Advanced Internet Development, the umbrella organization of Internet2.

His academic research investigates the nature of human action. His work focuses on intention, desire, belief and other cognitive states, as well as deliberation and practical reasoning, planning and general goal-directed activity. He has also written extensively on various topics in higher education, such as tenure and undergraduate education.

Myles was so impressed with agriculture and the need for every student to have a knowledge of it, he recommended to the board of trustees that every student at Ohio State should have at least one course in agriculture for graduation.

Of course they turned him down. He was soon gone to his next venture.

What a guy, what a game, and what a thunderstorm!

Ed Winkle