He said the question will be phrased on the ballot as a “yes or no” question below the candidates for campus personality elections.
“The primary consequence of including this referendum on the ballot is we’re hopefully going to have the largest student vote of all time, which is really exciting,” Kevin said.
Rumors about a potential mascot change have been a campus constant for four or five years, Kevin said. The university’s official mascot underwent a similar change in 2010, when a student committee decided to adopt the Black Bear as the school’s mascot. A campus vote that year yielded limited student response, and an internet campaign for Star Wars character Admiral Ackbar actually picked up the most support. After polling students, faculty, alumni and season ticket holders, the student committee settled on the Black Bear as the most reasonable mascot choice.
“I certainly didn’t start the conversation,” Kevin said. “The mascot conversation is something that sort of happens every year with ASB presidents and the athletics director.”
The Landshark made its way onto the ballot seven years ago but did not land enough support among the relevant parties polled.
This time around, the vote will only concern the Landshark and the Black Bear. As rumblings of the upcoming mascot vote crept through campus in the opening month of the semester, some students raised questions about which mascot choices would be considered.
Junior international studies major Wess Helton created a petition in early September saying, “We demand … Colonel Reb to be included in the vote alongside the Landshark and Black Bear.”
In the week or so it’s been around, the petition garnered more than 1,000 student signatures before ASB announced the Landshark vote Monday, Helton said.
“Two weeks ago, I got word that Dion Kevin had brought it up. He wanted student vote between the Landshark and Black Bear,” Helton said in a Sept. 10 interview with The Daily Mississippian. “I thought this would be a good opportunity to show the university how much people love Colonel Reb.”
Helton said that after Kevin announced the mascot vote Monday, he’s decided to raise the petition’s goal to collect at least 1,500 more signatures and has been receiving Facebook messages from alumni in support of the petition.
Kevin said he is familiar with the debate about bringing different mascots to the table and the subject has already been approached multiple times.
“I think it’s pretty clear that Ole Miss is not ready to ever bring back Colonel Rebel, which is really out of the student body’s hands,” he said.
Kevin said he and the ASB Senate would consider a petition with a large number of signatures, even though there is no formal policy mandating that ASB acknowledge student petitions prior to ASB Senate action.
As far as outside input goes, Kevin said this phase of the decision-making process is focused on the student body. He said that later on, the alumni association and other relevant shareholders in the university will be able to lend their opinions, but for the time being, ASB is managing a student vote.
“That’s not really my responsibility right now,” Kevin said regarding alumni input. “My responsibility is to speak on behalf of the students.”
Kevin said he thinks Athletics is ready to start making changes, pending a positive student vote.
“They haven’t prepared anything rigidly yet,” he said.
Ole Miss Athletics provided a statement to The Daily Mississippian after ASB announced the upcoming student vote:
“This effort is an ASB-led initiative, and the athletics department will be involved at the appropriate time. The leadership of our two organizations have built a strong relationship, and we will work hand-in-hand through this and any matters that are relevant to our game day experience.
ASB Sen. Hunter Story said he would personally support whatever the outcome of the student election is as long as it allows for students to fully voice their opinions.
“As far as I know, the vote process will happen online the same way elections do, and the choices will be between the Landshark or Black Bear,” Story said. “And there will not be a write-in or ‘neither’ option.”
Story said the driving force for the campus vote came from ASB executives, administration and Athletics.
“The mascot options came from the people involved in creating the vote,” Story said. “ASB senators were not asked for input options, and to my knowledge, neither were students.”
If the student body shows support for the Landshark, either the ASB Senate or ASB executive branch will decide whether to issue a resolution to the university administration in recognition of the student vote. Kevin said timing will decide whether the resolution comes from his office or the ASB Senate.
“If there’s not time, since we want to hopefully make this announcement around the homecoming date, then we would just issue an executive statement saying the ASB supports the decision from the students, for yes or no, and we present it to the university so they would kind of take over from there,” Kevin said.
ASB has already erected a painted sign campaigning for the Landshark alongside the similar signs promoting candidates for the personality elections. Kevin said ASB supports the Landshark because it has been a part of Ole Miss school spirit for nearly a decade now and is something everyone on campus can get behind.
He said both the chancellor and Athletics seem ready to make a change, so it made sense to move forward with a plan this year.
“This year, when it was brought up, I think it was a good time, and we were able to reach some mutual decisions on what could happen with changing the mascot to the Landshark,” Kevin said.
However, if students decide to vote against adopting the Landshark mascot, the administration will respect that decision, Kevin said.
“If it’s a ‘no’ vote, then they’re going to see that the students don’t want the Landshark as the mascot, and so we’ll probably be stuck with the Black Bear,” Kevin said.
