For the past six months I have been attending West Virginia University for graduate school. Located along the banks of the Monongahela River, the city of Morgantown has been home to WVU since 1868. West Virginia was a land grant university, and during its early years played an important role in providing a secondary education for students. Also, during its early years, some will argue that the University was a “bully” because school officials wanted to do away with smaller colleges. For example, I earned my undergraduate degree at West Liberty State College, which at one time was called the West Liberty Normal School. A normal school provided students with a secondary education, and was also meant to teach teachers. Most normal schools were located in rural areas; therefore community members saw the importance of such educational institutions and fought to keep many of them open. West Liberty State College, originally founded as an academy in 1837 survived the turbulent years of inadequate funding while WVU grew and prospered. I think this is interesting because most people do not understand what normal schools were, and how important there were to teacher training. The conflict that occurred between smaller schools and WVU is also interesting, what would have happened if WVU had succeeded in the abolishment of smaller colleges? While this is something for historians to examine (I wrote 25 pages on it if you’re interested), it is not entirely the goal of this writing assignment (or blog).
I’ve never visited another large university campus, so I’m not sure how everyone else gets around, but here at WVU we use the Personal Rapid Transportation system (PRT). 
It’s basically like a subway, except it’s above ground.
There are 5 stations located in Morgantown. You simply go to one of stations, swipe your mountaineer card (it’s “free” for students and faculty), wait for a PRT to pull up that’s going to your stop, hop on, hold on, do not make eye contact with anyone (it’s like a unwritten rule, that I hate), and ta da! … you’ve ridden the PRT! Each PRT car holds about 15 people, 8 people can sit. For the most part, the campus is divided into two campuses, the downtown campus, and the Evansdale campus. To ride from each campus it takes about 10-15
minutes. The PRT runs on electricity, so there is very little pollution. In my opinion, everything is really spread out, but the PRT makes everything seem a lot closer, and it also makes WVU unique.
Going to a large university has also made one of my dreams come true. I’ve always wanted to go to a school with a library where I could have my own personal lamp, and now I have it! This is a clear example of how easily amused I am. Pictured below is the downtown library and the Appalachia reading room.
Six floors, my own lamp, and a Starbucks. This is basically where I live.
Woodburn Hall is my second favorite building on campus. Why? Well, look below, it’s amazing! It was built in 1876 and is now home to the WVU history department.
Above is a view of University Avenue. It was impossible to get a good shot of this with buildings. To right is “Woodburn Circle.”
Because West Virginia is such a rural state, and many of its inhabitants are isolated from education, I’m glad that smaller schools have been able to remain open, while WVU has also been able to grow into one of the states most prized possessions. With all of this said, I still think that it’s important that the University and other schools do more to promote education throughout the state. When one looks at the culture of poverty, what promotes it? A lack of education. So aside from my constant rambling about history, most of this blog will be dedicated to education, lessons, and poverty. So stay tuned. And sorry, I lack photography skills. Plus people were staring at me.
