The California State University system has 2 campuses with the word “Polytechnic” in their names. One is officially California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, while the other is California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo.
Why is the word “Polytechnic” placed differently within the two names? Why aren’t they both CPSU or both CSPU? I’m looking for the official story, not speculative reasons.
“Cal Poly” has its name because it competes in Division I sports and school names sound better when you don’t put a city name in it. Sounds less hokey.
Cal Poly Pomona is a Division II school where names like that are far more common.
San Luis Obispo did not change the style of its name until it upgraded its athletic program.
Clearly an exception must be recognized for UCLA in this regard.
Yes, but UCLA pretty much only uses initials. It’s never called “UC Los Angeles”. It’s been UCLA for almost all of its time. UCLA doesn’t even like periods between the letters. However, the NY Times insists on spelling it “U.C.L.A.”
Most students of UC Berkeley would say they go to “Berkeley” or “UC Berekely”, but the athletic teams are “Cal” or “California”. The other UC schools all use their city name at all times. UC Davis, UC Santa Barbara, etc.
I’m afraid I don’t understand. It seems to me the two schools have similarly styled names, with only the placement of the word “Polytechnic” being different.
And what did San Luis Obispo change the style of its name from?
Probably more than half the time we use just the initials when mentioning Los Angeles in any context.
UCB really ought to use the city, or at least the initial, to recognize the fact that it isn’t the the entire University of California. Holding degrees from UCSD and UCLA, I do find it a bit irksome when Berkeley is called ‘Cal’ or ‘California’, but it’s been done so long it’s not something you can constructively object to.
Wrt the foregoing I should point out that the UC system does take pains to present itself more as one univeristy with 10 heads, rather than 10 completely separate entities, rather than as 10 completely independent state-support universities. I suppose the truth is somewhere in between.
The California Education Code Section 90400 reads
Section 89001
The San Luis Obispo got its full name in 1971 when the State legislature opted for the name with University in it.
The Pomona campus was part of the San Luis Obispo campus, until 1966 when it became California State Polytechnic College, Kellogg-Voorhis (the name of the farm it was on). Then in 1972, the state legislature changed the status to that of a university, California State Polytechnic University, Pomona.
So while the school are part of the same university system, the California State University system, they wanted different names to show their independence. However, both schools work together on many things and they have a joint float in the Rose Parade.
I originally read the OP wondering why one had “Pomona” attached to the name and the other didn’t. I had the answer to that.
I don’t have a good answer as to why the order of the words as being different, other than that is just the way the names were approved by the Legislature.
For a while all the UC campuses were University of California, (City Name) EXCEPT Berkeley which insisted on being University of California AT Berkeley. They’ve since gone back to the style of the other 9 campuses.
Cow-Poly people, Cow-Poly.
It’s the ag school of the Cal state system.
Rick
Whose daughter, and whose money go there. Good school
Insert college pot smoking joke here.
I thought UC Berkeley was simply called “Cal” because it was the first UC in the state and originally didn’t need a city designation. I made that up. Is there any truth to it perhaps?
I always thought that, too. I don’t know for sure, either. Originally the University of California was formed out of the College of California (in Oakland & Berkeley). See here for a timeline.
I do know that the term ‘Cal Aggie’ used at UC Davis (e.g. Cal Aggie Alumni Association) comes from its origins as the University Farm. On occasion (like a few weeks ago when college sports writers were struggling to figure out how Stanford lost to a team not yet even Div. I-AA) it gets referred to as Cal-Davis, an abominable term that sounds more like a car dealer than a school.