A private university in , oddly enough,
Jacksonville Florida.
In the beginning Jacksonville University was an all womans school dominated by the fine arts and general
liberal arts education. As the school slowly grew the board of trustees wanted to cultivate a "
Harvard of the South" image.
Today, Jacksonville University is a coed university of around 2000 students offering a general liberal arts education dominated by the Fine Arts department at Harvard prices.
Other than that, the university has no distinguishing features or achievements other than the campus is reasonably pretty and the city of Jacksonville is passable a place as any to spend your time while going to college.
Jacksonville University is referred to by its students as simply JU. It is referred to by the faculty as " The Hardest University In The World to Get Fired From"
It is the college students in and around the Jacksonville area. " went to once" or briefly considered while attending the famous JU Student Center Keg parties, before they sobered up of course.
Like most colleges, JU has a bunch of fraternities...rah rah rah. Unlike most
universities JU has no sports programs to speak of and almost no community support for the programs that do exist. JU had a brief fling at national exposure in men's basketball in the early 70's. Like all things JU, the team lost to UCLA in the NCAA tournament final and rapidly faded to obscurity as the citizens of the fair city of Jacksonville droped JU
like a bad habit.
Other than that...nothing.
JU could have been a great school except that the short sighted Board of Trustees have a good comfortable thing going as do the faculty. Just as a sports or academic program seems to be taking off, the Board pulls the rug out and puts the money back in the fine arts department.
As they say, JU put the "ME" in mediocrity.
Go Dolphins.
