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From The Morning Call

Lehigh debates changes to school logo
School defends simplified symbol panned by students.

By Genevieve Marshall
Of The Morning Call
January 16, 2002

Take the heart out of Lehigh University’s logo and some students feel like the heart of the university is being ripped out along with it.   A proposed new logo was the subject of debate at a student senate meeting on Lehigh’s campus Tuesday, the students’ first day of classes after winter break.

Student senators labeled the proposed logo “too modern,” and “more appropriate for a school in a sunny state.”  When word leaked last month, students and alumni went into an uproar.  They sent hundreds of e-mails protesting the change, and started a Web Site.

At the student senate meeting, Brad Drexler, vice president of university relations, addressed the misconceptions:

• The school’s colors will change. (False. They are still brown and white.)
• Lehigh’s university seal, circa 1865, also will change. (False.)
• Other universities haven’t changed their logos. (False. New York and Cornell universities are just two schools that have recently changed logos or seals.)
• The logo is historic and has been around more than 100 years. (False. It was created in 1997.)

Lehigh will continue to use its university seal on official documents and for formal communications, Drexler said.

Officials have said they need a simpler logo that can be more easily reproduced.  They hired an expert from a nationally known design firm, whose name they have refused to release.

They also won’t say what it cost the university.  Lehigh planned to start using the new logo this month, but that’s on hold until the school can get more feedback from students and alumni.  A decision will be made by mid-February, Drexler said.

An ad hoc committee formed by the student senate has received more than 300 e-mails from students and faculty in the past month.  About 95 percent of the respondents didn’t like the proposed logo, senators said.

The biggest complaint: the absence of the heart and book.

To make the logo simpler, it was necessary to remove two of the three symbols, Drexler said.

Courtesy of Frank Sgambelluri