Odds and Ends

Being #1

138 Comments


(Image Credit: CollegeRank.net)

Finally, my alma mater has made it to #1.

No, it’s not top ranked for best graduate salaries…

It didn’t make first place for how well the staff and faculty are educated or compensated…

It certainly didn’t make it to the head of any list of sport achievements…

But they do have the very best…swimming pool.

So there’s that.

138 thoughts on “Being #1”

  5. A fellow PCC graduate excitedly posted this on Facebook today. All I could think was, yeah, this isn’t something I’d be proud of…
    I graduated 15 years ago from PCC and this still wouldn’t make me want to go back.

        2. Wasn’t that about the time they had the whole Student Voice thing going on?

        3. I almost got kicked out my Junior year. Looking back, now I wish I had been given the boot after all. :p

        4. And, yes, I do remember the Student Voice deal happening my Freshman year, too. They made it seem like such a scandal. 😉

        5. Well, when you’re a Fundy, having your whims questioned may as we’ll be witchcraft.

        6. This is true!
          I think that was also the same year some guy stood up during one one of the morning services after Mrs. Mutsch sang a solo and yelled the verse about women being silent in the church. It was pretty hilarious. If I remember correctly, he was just causing a distraction so his buddy could steal money from the offertory. Good times! 🙂

        8. Actually, I don’t think they were students, which made it even more funny. 🙂

        11. I remember being very glad I didn’t pay for an e-mail account cause I would’ve likely gotten booted for Student Voice, but then I got booted anyway. BLEH.

      2. RobM – Word has it that you were expelled because you couldn’t meet the rigid academic standards at PCC. Any truth to that?

        😉

        1. Absolutely true! I was aware of who both Holden Caulfield & Karl Barth were and wasn’t scared of either. That’s far afield of the academic desirabilities they have.

        2. We just talked about Karl Barth and Neo-Orthodoxy in my Revelation class the other day. (:

        3. Oh, it is so true. The library, for example, had a few theology books by (conservative) authors like Poythress, and kept them locked up in the staff only room. Don’t want people who think differently poisoning the masses…

    2. #1 pool?! Woohoo, let’s celebrate by getting a group of our friends together and having a pool party…oh, never mind.

  6. I just don’t get it. How much money does the school have that this becomes the thing with the highest marginal utility? It looks like the inside of a Rainforest Cafe. How much did it cost and how much is the upkeep I wonder. But really, how nice to have a great pool 15 minutes from the ocean.

    1. Exactly. It looks like the old culottes might take a beating on that million dollar wave rider.

        1. I’ve been skinny dipping a few times with girl friends (not girlfriends). It is pretty harmless. It reminds me of the saying, “To the pure all things are pure; to the corrupt, nothing is pure.” Here’s a hint: mixed swimming does not cause anyone to burn with lust.

        2. Dr. – True and this is proven by nude beaches and communities – not about lust

        1. George, put my posts where they belong.

          My above post was supposed to go under Miriam’s comment about sammich making.

      4. What? No bandaids?

        You know, when I clicked that link on my phone earlier I got a 404 message. At first I was confused and then I chuckled because clearly a female in a bikini at FU is a 404. Then I said I’d have to look at it from my laptop.

        I’m not sure I should have looked again.

        2. Yeah, I really wish I hadn’t. It was posted to the email though, so I couldn’t really avoid it. Thanks, Bald Jones… ;-;

        7. Big Gary, that was a step too far! This is a family-oriented Christian group! Shame on you!

        8. I would post pictures of me, both on a mankini and a thong, but I would not want to cause any lady to stumble. Isn’t that Godly of me?
          😉

  8. Let me give you a piece of advice. *Never* wear a pair of white swimming trunks at a public swimming pool. Not even when they are “doubled-lined to preserve modesty” . I did that once, with new swimming trunks, not long ago. As soon as they were wet they pretty much disappeared at the back and were just-about-legal at the front. Not exactly a great Christian Witness. I didn’t stay long and probably won’t go back.

  9. If you can get all your recreational needs met on campus, then you never have to leave…and you only engage with people in artificially constructed situations sponsored by PCC. So much for “reaching the lost.”

  10. Probably no co-ed swimming. I’m sorry but that’s just dull, no matter how great the pool is

    1. As long as the guys aren’t wearing shirts, I’m in!

      (never mind that there’s not a snowball’s chance in hell of me ever coming near PCC, but I’ll pretend for the sake of posting silly stuff on the internet)

  11. Knowing PCC, they’re probably only allowed to swim in the pool when prospective students visit. Gotta draw the poor suckers in somehow!!

  12. When my daughters were in the church youth group, PCC traveling groups would come to our church. After the second or third visit, my older daughter asked me if they had academics or just played. It seemed the expensive “toys” were all they heard about.
    They weren’t impressed, by the way.

    1. There are also economic factors in play. Community college is less expensive and gives one ties to the community where he or she will likely be pursuing employment. State college is often less expensive with various grants, scholarships, etc. And the ROI is measurably higher. At the end of the day, PCC cannot compete on standard education metrics, so they have to resort to gimmicks. It is sad, too, because they are communicating certain values and perspectives to students which will set them up for failure later.

  13. At first, I thought
    “Because that’s why people go to college. So they can swim in a giant kiddie pool with slides and stuff. Super duper summer camp experience all year around naturally trumps proper training in your chosen field of study and career.”

    And then, I saw that my university was also on the list, and I got excited. I’m such a hypocrite.

        1. You’ve never heard of the Marriage and Motherhood “major” at HAC?

        4. It’s hilarious how many pages of that manual are wasted on statements of doctrine, glorifying all the head faculty, and listing all the part-time faculty.

        6. The HAC catalog has pictures and bios of every past president of the college … except Jack Schaap.
          Obviously an oversight.

        7. They have a “crock pot cooking” class and a “cooking for guests” class. Yea, I want to spend 40,000 dollars so my daughter can learn that.

  14. Wait, is PCC ranked at number one for graduate salaries, or is Darrell just jesting?

    Is the punchline that the school is ranked #1 for a swimming pool?

  15. Did anyone else here notice how juvenile that place looks compared to the other pools? It’s almost like PCC looks at young adults like junior aged campers…big I goofy tree

  16. Hmmph. What you spend your money on shows your priorities. As well as what you don’t spend your money on.

    Thou hast the best swimming pool of any college, but thou still forbade mixed swimming. Thou pourest money into water, not into your underpaid teachers. Verily, verily I say unto thee, Thou art all wet.

    2. If thou shitteth in thine pool, the water has become defiled. Thou must remove all men from the defiled water and require thine women to find the dung and remove it. Thou must take thine dung outside and diggest thou a hole to bury it outside the camps. So does command the Lord.

  17. What makes me sad is that this was constructed after my 4 year incarceration…

  19. The school my son went to has a pool. I asked how often they went swimming and was told never. It only used once s year for some small children. I asked “why don’t you shut it down, fill it in, and make usable space out of it”? The answer was “what? Having a pool is awesome”! I never understood…

    1. My alma mater has a pool, but I only saw it used by athletes who swam laps. There didn’t seem to be a way to use it recreationally without getting in someone’s way and probably pissing them off. Not that I minded too much; the pool was nowhere near the top of my list of fun activities to fill the time I gained from procrastinating on homework…

    2. Then there’s the story about the guy who cleaned up after the elephants at a circus and who was complaining about his work. The person listening asked why he didn’t just get another job. This question was quickly answered by the amazed reply, “What, and leave show business?!”

  20. I’m going to assume the people doing the ranking were unaware of what the term “no mixed bathing” meant, or the kinds of swimwear permitted in said pool.

    Also I think it’s the only one that is represented by an artist rendering, and not a picture. An artist rendering that is devoid of any humans, which is the way PCC prefers their facilities.

  22. It’s only appropriate that a Fundamental Baptist college would have the biggest, fanciest baptistry.

    My university had two good swimming pools (it had a top-ranked swim and dive team), but I never swam in them while I was a student there. I was too busy studying. Well, OK, studying and going to parties.

  23. Somehow I don’t think spending a million dollars on a wave rider alone is an appropriate use of funds at a “Christian” “college.” Especially since it’s use is probably strictly regulated. I remember at my tiny FU we had intramural (sp?) volleyball teams, but we weren’t ever allowed in the gym to practice. I sucked and would have LOVED the opportunity to get better. But nope!

    (And to be fair, most of the pictures in the link didn’t show students in the pools.)

    1. And there are plenty of grammatical errors in those comments.

      One guy claims that he is a doctor. How can one get into an accredited medical school from an unaccredited undergraduate college?

      Oh, maybe he has an honorary doctorate from PCC.

      1. The grammatical and spelling errors occur most frequently in those comments that praise the school’s excellent education. I also noticed that many of the comments about graduates already having a job lined up state that the graduates are going to stay in Pensacola. I wonder where they intend to work. Any guesses?

        1. Hmmmmmm……I just…I can’t think of anywhere…..OH OH OH!! I know!!!! Well..naw, it couldn’t be PCC??

        4. Since every one of those comments relates to PCC, I can only conclude that students and grads were encouraged to post, by school officials.

          In politics it’s called “stuffing the ballot box.”

      2. Those who received no real benefit perceive the value of their experiences to be great indeed! The still-blind insist they see.

  25. By the way, I don’t quite understand what the photograph is showing me. What is that thing which looks like a pulpit in the bottom right corner of the photo? And where does one actually swim? From the photo, it looks like an indoor mall pond with an artificial waterfall.

  26. Serious question: I’m guessing that at PCC, the pool is only used by me men at certain times, and women at other times. Are the women allowed to wear normal human swimsuits? Or is it required to be more like the muslim swimsuit.

  27. Water, Slides and Sri Lanka

    Dear SFL Reader:

    Water is fun and so are slides. But when heavy monsoon rains produce landslides and life is lost, that is not fun.

    I could be wrong about this, but I doubt that you get the number one pool by accident. It seems to me that considerable foresight and design go into something like this.

    How many people at that fine school are aware of the danger that water poses to people of Sri Lanka? Reporting on this is an article recently posted on a socialist website which can be found here: http://tinyurl.com/mzr2vtd .

    On one hand, there seems to be no connection between these two stories. On the other hand, they seem profoundly related in that our objectives, self-awareness and satisfaction with pleasure seems to cut us off so completely from those whose lives are so very different from our own.

    When this pool was named number one, was this noted to the student population? Is this mentioned in school promotion campaigns? I don’t know. But if so, how many at this school are aware of the Meeriyabedda disaster last October, or of the continuing danger to the population, or of the extent to which human behavior contributes to these realities?

    Were this pointed out to the board, I suspect that profuse horror would be expressed. But if this awareness is not even present, I find it difficult to believe that the souls or even the lives of Sri Lankans matter to them.

    Christian Socialist

    PS: Please pray for the people of Sci Lanka.

      1. If things need to be hidden to protect a way of life, then it should be obvious that that way of life is wrong. If the subjection of women and the entitlement of men creates and environment where sexual abuse happens then the solution is not to hide the abuse but to fix the environment. Girls need to be given power. Boys need to be taught responsibility. My experience of fundy homeschooling is that boys are taught that they are little gods and girls are taught that they are there for the boys. What could possibly go wrong with that?

        2. Just in case I wasn’t being clear, that was sarcasm. What could go wrong is legion.

        3. I realize that…but we now have it on TLC, in living color. And, it’s very sad.

        4. It is heart breaking and stomach churning as all abuse is. The damage done to the girls is life long and can be generational. Punishment and accountability do not repair the damage but it is a start. If people only understood the irreparable damage done to these precious girls. I am heart sick over this.

        2. But it’s okay, because IF the abused woman/girl was not at fault for the abuse — let me repeat that: IF the victim was NOT AT FAULT for the ABUSE — she will become “mighty in spirit”. So it’s all good.

        3. Fundamentalism’s sins have a long, long reach. Gothard was very good at blaming the victim, putting the victim in a place of having to accept his or her victimization as “God’s will”. If you didn’t accept it as God’s will, you were sinning by being rebellious. You weren’t allowing God to work in your heart.

          In other words, you weren’t being compliant, controllable, and quiet.

          Abusers actually get a big chance to rise to the top. In fact, all other things being equal, an abuser is much more likely to get a position of authority than a non-abuser. Think about it. The abuser doesn’t mind taking advantage of others. They don’t mind cheating, dishonesty. A person who doesn’t abuse has much more conscience.

          Abusers may go into a ministry in part to salve their conscience. They may think they have a way to prevent abuse from happening to others. But usually, their abusive nature means their solutions are are also abusive. They blame others for what they did, but they often place blame on the wrong people.

          Abusers are often people who have been abused themselves. But instead of placing blame on their abusers, they blame their victims. A parent who is abusive in discipline will blame their children. They won’t blame their own parents who abused them. They have spent a lifetime justifying their parents. And blaming his own upbringing would mean he would have to change. So the children must have been what took control away from him. He doesn’t have to change, they do.

          And what better way to make sure children are raised happy and compliant than by teaching them that no matter what happens, they have to be happy about it and praise God? After all, God is in control, and if God’s Control meant you were abused, then you must have deserved it. Try harder to be obedient and compliant.

          Sick. But there it is.

        4. rgtmath, you have described a sociopath and a several members of my family and many, many MOGs that we are aware of. These people are so dangerous. The discovery of abuse should cause outrage and an outcry, not the lifting of carpets to sweep things under.

  29. Note that the one thing you couldn’t do in that pool is use it to get fit and build up your stamina.

    1. Well, you know His doesn’t actually want us to spend time being healthy. We are to burn out, or gorge out, or something for him. Just as he does not want us to care for the environment.

      2. Every time a Fundy gets into the pool how much does the water level rise? I hope the designers of the pool allowed for that.

  30. Pensacola Christian College used to send recruiting brochures along with our A Beka books. Their photos of beautiful white sand beaches nearly lured me from Arkansas when I graduated in 1989. Thankfully, I joined the Army instead. The ironic thing is, 25 years later, I’ve ended up in Pensacola anyway. Of course, now I’m a liberal atheist on the autobahn to hell.

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