Today’s rant is about Baylor University graduates. Now, I’m probably about to tread on dangerous territory here because wifeGeeding graduated from Baylor and comes from a long lineage of Baylor graduates. Heck, even her grandfather has a class named after him at Baylor Law, H. Hart Nance Course in Trusts and Estates II. Other than the fact that wifeGeeding went to Baylor, I married up.

There is something I have noticed about all Baylor graduates that I have encountered, and I noticed it at my friend’s birthday party the other night. For the last five or so years, I have given Bone an autograph photo of a celebrity (usually just local celebs). I always ask them to draw a “Bone” and write happy birthday. This year’s celebrity was Sarah Dodd, an anchor/reporter for KTVT CBS 11 – and yes, a Baylor graduate.

When I gave Bone the autograph, a Baylor Alum just happened to be right next to him. When she saw the pic, the first thing she said as any Baylor Alum would say was “You know, she went to Baylor.”

Why do Baylor graduates feel they have to tell the world that someone else went to Baylor? This drives me nuts. When wifeGeeding was just girlfriendGeeding, she use to do this all the friggin time. There is nothing wrong about being proud of your school and all, but it’s as if they are inferring that Baylor is a small school and someone has made it big. Well, Baylor graduates, I have news for you – – – – your school isn’t small. So it should be NO surprise to you that Baylor graduates are all over the place and some may actually be in the public eye. As a matter of fact, I would expect Baylor graduates to be very successful as their institution is very top notch.

I can understand if someone from Sul Ross State (enrollment of 2,043) pointed out to me that Dan Blocker (Hoss Cartwright) of “Bonanza” fame is an alumni, or that someone from little known Chabot College told me that Tom Hanks is a graduate. But it is no surprise that someone from Baylor has a successful career. So please, stop with the “you know, ___________ went to Baylor” talk because it only makes you look snobbish. It’s even worst when the famous person in question didn’t attend Baylor, but a relative did. “Did you know that Billy Graham’s granddaughter went to Baylor?” “Were you aware that Stephen Curtis Chapman’s daughter is currently a Baylor student?” It’s like your reaching just to point out that your school has some sort of national significance, but the funny part is, you already do. Just stop trying so hard to prove your point. And yes, I do know that Olympic gold medalists Michael Johnson and Jeremy Wariner are Baylor graduates and so is former Governors Ann Richards and Mark White. I also better include Mike Singletary or someone going shoot me.

Large schools have people in the public eye. You know you are a large school when:

• You are referred to as the world’s largest Baptist university and oldest university in Texas.
• You have an undergraduate enrollment of just under 12,000 and ranked as #78 in theU.S. News America’s Best Colleges 2006.
• You are a member of the Big 12 Athletic Conference. If the name of your conference has the word “big,” then your college might just be a big redneck.
• You are a finalist for the George W. Bush Presidential Library. Which I’m sure it will end up winning, if anything, just so W can stick it to Ann Richards one last time.
• A total of 4 graduates have become governor.
• You hosted a Presidential Economic Forum.

All this just to say: Baylor folks, you have a great school, one to be proud of, just don’t work so hard at trying to flaunt it.

In case anyone is wondering, I attended Hardin-Simmons University. I blame all gramatical, spelling, and typos on them. Our most famous graduate is Oprah’s boyfriend.