Sibling rivalry
In the sibling rivalry between Nevada’s two major universities, the older school is competing with its younger counterpart more and more, university and state officials said.
According to university records, the younger sibling is sometimes out pacing the school that came first: the University of Nevada, Reno.
A lot has changed for the University of Nevada, Las Vegas since the Rebels football team first lost to the Wolf Pack in 1969. Even more has changed since classes started on September 10, 1957 on the campus where UNLV now stands.
UNR established an extension program in Las Vegas in 1951 to accommodate the post-World War II population boom in Clark County.
Twenty-eight students attended class in the dressing rooms of Las Vegas High School’s auditorium, but now, 50 years after it was formally established, UNLV exceeds UNR’s enrollment of about 16,600 by about 11,300 students.
“UNLV has emerged from Tumbleweed Tech,” said Guy Rocha, Nevada’s state archivist. “It’s as good as a school as UNR and some would argue at 50 years, if it hasn’t exceeded UNR, it will.”
It’s a reality the University of Nevada, Reno has had to deal with since the tiny Nevada Southern University rebelled in 1968 to become UNLV.
“If you’re in New York or in Chicago I don’t think UNR captures the imagination,” Rocha said. “When they think of school in Nevada, they think of UNLV.”
But that’s a hard pill to swallow for those who say the northern school – now more than 120 years old – offers a more prestigious education.
Rocha, who grew up in Las Vegas and moved to Reno in 1975 to pursue a doctorate in history at UNR, said he became aware of the fledgling Las Vegas school in the 1960s.
“They were the stepchild to the system,” he said. “It was very clear the big school was Nevada.”
And in UNLV’s early years, a northern bias often kept money from the new southern school, said James W. Hulse, a retired UNR history professor who served as the university’s historian.
“Many of the decisions that were made in Carson City tended to favor the north,” Hulse said.
A shift in power
But in the past 50 years the greater Las Vegas area has grown from 275,000 residents to nearly 2 million and funding for UNLV has grown with it as the state’s power base becomes increasingly southern.
Four out of the five lawmakers in Nevada’s congressional delegation are from Clark County. Moreover, nine of the 13 university regents come from Clark County.
And UNLV has exceeded UNR in certain academic aspects, according to each school’s institutional analysis databases.
- UNLV’s average undergraduate GPA last year was 3.0. UNR’s average undergraduate GPA was 2.94.
- UNLV gave $12.2 million in federal scholarships and grants last year. UNR gave $4.5 million.
- UNLV gave $6.45 million in scholarships to student from its own award programs last year. UNR gave $3.33 million for the 2006-2007 school year.
- UNLV has 950 full-time academic instructors. UNR has 505 full-time instructors.
- UNLV President David Ashley total compensation is $457,533. UNR President Milton Glick’s total compensation is $449,100, according to the most recent data provided by the Chronicle of Higher Education.
But while UNLV may exceed UNR in certain areas, the older sibling still continues to out-pace its younger one – sometimes only slightly, according to each school’s institutional analysis database.
- UNLV’s six-year graduation rate was 39 percent last year, nearly 10 percent lower than UNR’s.
- Average tenured professor salaries was $111,600 at UNR last year. UNLV’s was $109,800.
- UNR’s student to professor ratio is 18-1, whereas UNLV’s is 19.5-1.
- UNR’s total funding is $190,352,000, while UNLV’s is $108,461,369.
- UNR’s sponsored research awards in Fiscal Year 2007 reached $94.6 million. UNLV had $74.8 million in research funding.
Northern ‘snootiness’
Northern opinions of the school down south are relatively similar – Rocha calls it “snootiness.”
“Vegas is kind of the party school,” said Nichole Davis, an 18-year-old English major at UNR. “And this is the more serious one.”
The urban nature of UNLV also played into the UNR perception of the school down south.
“UNLV is real spread out, it’s less personable,” said Justin Doerr, a 25-year-old finance major at UNR. “UNR looks a lot better, it has a nicer campus.”
But there is little difference academically, said Regent Stavros Anthony and UNLV alum. It all comes down to culture.
“UNLV might be more of an urban commuter school where you have older students taking their time going to school,” Anthony said. “Maybe that’s why it’s taking them longer to get their degrees.”
Some say the difference between the two schools are the cultures that surround the campus – the bustling, glitzy strip or the more humble, college town atmosphere in Reno, Rocha said.
“If you want the better part of Nevada, go to UNR,” said Regent Ron Knecht from Carson City. “If you want to go to the place where ‘what happens here stays here’ go to UNLV.”
UNLV’s rise in statute also correlates to the growth of its athletics program, which preceded academic growth, Rocha said.
UNLV’s athletics department’s $25 million outfunds UNR’s $20 million, according to the Nevada System of Higher Education.
The Rebels’ men’s basketball team won an NCAA championship in the early 1990s – the first one for any school in Nevada history.
“That basketball program put that school on the map nationally,” Rocha said. “It took UNLV longer to find parity academically.”
When it comes to comparing the two universities, the differences are between the departments and majors, Joe Crowley, former UNR president, said.
“You can’t characterize an entire institution as superior in any way to another institution,” Crowley said. “We have had time in 120 years to grow a lot more than UNLV in program development, but UNLV has come a long way.”
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September 25th, 2007 at 8:50 am
how many times will it take you clowns, especially on rivalry week to call it NEVADA not UNR.
September 26th, 2007 at 9:27 pm
You are UNR. University of Nevada, Reno. Talk to the board of regents if you don’t like it.
September 27th, 2007 at 9:16 am
athletically we are Nevada buddy, eat shit
September 27th, 2007 at 10:46 am
whatever it may be, reno still sucks dick. You guys are a bunch of sheep raping rednecks.
September 28th, 2007 at 9:55 am
this article is an embarassment to Nevada, where was the toothed edge that the Sagebrush had last year twoard that shit team down south? Instead you guys give enough credence for their paper to go ahead and talk shit after reading this, as well as their cronnies on an internet forum populated by rebel fans. great journalism, way to get the home crowd enthused…
September 28th, 2007 at 10:04 am
Weston, that’s the difference between a journalist and a cheerleader. It stated facts and was a well-written story. Sorry if it gets your homer panties in a bunch.
Incidentally, it is the University of Nevada, Reno. UNR. The athletic department is the UNR Athletic Department. “Nevada” is a feeble attempt to rebrand the University and is no more a correct name for UNR than “The School Up North.”
September 28th, 2007 at 1:01 pm
Actually, the fact of the matter is that our athletic department, alumni association, etc are known as University of Nevada athletics, not UNR. Call it what you want, but that is the official designation. Go back into your hole, NSU troll.
September 28th, 2007 at 4:37 pm
You are neither “Nevada” nor “UNR” to people in Southern Nevada. To us you are “NOC” - Nevada’s Other College.
September 28th, 2007 at 9:33 pm
Like it matters, both universities are embarrassments to the academia as a whole. I kick myself in the ass for ever choosing to go to this university… at least graduation is fast approaching. Then I can run for the damned hills.
September 29th, 2007 at 6:37 pm
Well, the University of Nevada has added to it’s series lead today. Go back to your casino job, tool. Mark, people like you are the reason this university isn’t all that great…apathy, typical of this damned state.
September 29th, 2007 at 9:52 pm
Wow, Nevada Southern must be ashamed to lose, again, to us supposed sheep sodomizers. Take your sorry team, and your pathetic fans back to Las Vegas and lick your wounds. You are the ignorant white trash that you try so desperately to classify us as. I hope your little drive back down to that festering cess-pool known as Las Vegas is filled with memories of your sorry team dragging their sorry butts off of a true NEVADA field. Go home, shut,and get over yourselves.
September 30th, 2007 at 9:04 am
Mark,
You hate it so much you’re going to recieve your degree from Nevada? Sure. Go away Rebel fan and while your at it, never come back to the Silver State. U of N is a fine academic instution that is on par with any state school in California and is well on its way to competing academically with schools in the University system of California. Not bad for a school with only 20,000 living alumni. Seriously Mark, you’re an idiot.
GO NEVADA
GO PACK
NEVADA SOUTHERN IS CANNONLESS AGAIN!
October 8th, 2007 at 5:12 pm
WOLFPACK!!! FUNLV
October 24th, 2007 at 8:27 am
MY REBEL LICENSE PLATE WILL FOREVER READ H8WP. THERE ARE MORE TEETH IN CLARK COUNTY THAN YOU’LL EVER FIND IN WASHOE. THE FACT THAT COMPARISONS ARE EVEN DRAWN BETWEEN VEGAS AND RENO IS COMICAL. FUCK THE TRUCKEE MEADOWS AND KIT CARSON TRAIL. “HOME MEANS NEVADA” TO YOU, BUT WILL ALWAYS MEAN VEGAS TO ME. CLASS OF 02′ AND 06′
October 24th, 2007 at 12:35 pm
A little sibling rivalry between the two schools is healthy. Nevada is a great state period. To suggest Las Vegas and/or UNLV isn’t truly a part of Nevada is ubsurd. Las Vegans have to follow the same state laws Renoites are subject to. When we renew our vehicle registration we all pay outrageous sums, we all learn the same state song (”Home Means Nevada”) in elementary school, and are required to study Nevada law as undergrads. Las Vegas just happens to be the largest city founded in the 20th century (Chicago held the same title with respect to the 19th century) and is more renowned on a global scale (because of its size and unprecedented growth). If Las Vegas were as old a city as Reno, you can bet your ass the capital would be down south. Why Carson City always disburses more funds to the state’s smaller school when the obvious need exists in the south is beyond me, but what’s clear is no matter how much UNR students curse UNLV, they seem to forget that biting the hand from which they’re fed doesn’t require exercising poor sportsmanship and/or slander against the largest part of the STATE OF NEVADA….
January 29th, 2008 at 10:53 am
I grew up in Vegas, and words cannot express how DAMN LUCKY I am to have got out of there when I graduated high school. I look at some of the people I grew up with that decided to get their “education” in Vegas and still live with their parents, and UNR or University of Nevada…what ever you’d like to call it, is one HELL of a lot better than UNLV (the University of Never Leaving Vegas).
January 31st, 2008 at 7:33 pm
Reno is not a good school. I have degrees from both, BS from UNR and MS from UNLV. UNR curves its physics and calculus grades so much anyone can pass, and don’t kid yourselves, UNR is also a commuter school…most students don’t live in the dorms. As for never leaving Vegas… UNLV got me my dream job, and it’s not in Vegas. I root for both the Wolf Pack and the Rebels. The Wolf Pack is better in football (although still terrible) and Rebel basketball is king in Nevada.
I must say the crowds in T@M are far better than in LEC. AND RENO SHOULD HAVE NEVER SCREWED UP THE MACKAY SCHOOL OF MINES!!!!!