It’s been four goddamn years since I left the Chancellorship, which is mindblowing. The year I led this thing was a time: a simple archive turned into a Ministry, then into a sub-community of its own. That began to die out when the UTEP server was merged with the Executive one, a move I sternly fought against, to no avail, so we adapted. That’s what UTEP’s done ever since, under people like y0 or Patch, but mainly under the guidance of my dear apprentice, @Mangegneithe . The sub-community momentum passed away, but during my last term and for the rest of the time Aiv was in charge of it, UTEP flourished with dozens and dozens of articles, sometimes a handful per month. Now this whole thing bears my name, which is certainly quite the honour, but it speaks of a deeper issue this institution endures. Everyone I’ve spoken with about UTEP tells me the same thing again and again: “what is UTEP even supposed to do?” Well, perhaps only I (and Aiv) really know.
UTEP is the heart of the TEP community’s knowledge and knowledge interests. It’s not a RL university, it doesn’t (necessarily) involve courses, it’s just a place to speak in length of whatever you want to speak about. One can do so by writing an article, hosting a regulated debate (we called those “agoras” back in the day) or just by speaking in one of the thematic Discord channels we had back in the day. It’s a place for knowledge, and that’s that. Each Chancellor and ourselves as a community can shape it in any way we consider fit. It has proven to be suitable for that, either by having a Discord server and community of its own, by focusing on articles or by hosting agoras and events. It’s a simple yet dynamic concept, which appeals to the curiosity and desire for knowledge of anyone who happens to be in a country-creation game, attractive even to people from other regions, such as the FNR, which created its own FNR University inspired by UTEP.
This is a place for anyone who desires to talk, and for that we need to have people who desire to talk. I’m certain the recent confusion about UTEP lies on how our numbers are significantly smaller than they were in the post-Drew time I led this place in, but also smaller than during Aiv’s Chancellorship. This might be a symbiotic relationship: UTEP needs recruitment, and UTEP can be interesting enough to boost recruitment. I’ve seen it happen in the past, prominent TEP members first joined or decided to settle here through UTEP or because of UTEP. As AMOM mentioned in his “cabinet reveal”, the lines between UTEP and any other regional affairs are more blurry than they seem, and the success of one will be the success of all.
Who wants to embark with me in this journey of finding out what UTEP is? I don’t have any Deans, and the ~~Supreme~~ Chancellor would love to have some ~~Sith~~ Apprentices. My main target for this tenure is just to find anyone who is passionate about knowledge and isn’t afraid to take UTEP wherever they wish to. I’m deeply honoured to be the namesake of UTEP’s forum branch, but I don’t wanna be UTEP: UTEP is at the very core of why we are in TEP in the first place. So, all of this just leads to me opening applications to the Dean position, effective immediately. WE ARE HIRING.
Welcome to a new era,
Sammy, Chancellor of the University of The East Pacific