Tartan

Issue date: 10/28/05 Section: News

Media Credit: Courtesy Photo

MCC's president Walt Packard showed his pride for the students at the college by participating on a nationwide "Lessons for Leno" tour. Packard rode his Harley Davidson to the first stop of the tour on September 21st at Joliet Junior College. The tour, which was started in response to comedian Jay Leno and his writers.

For two years Jay Leno, host of "The Tonight Show," assaulted the reputations of community college students in his monologues. An example of this can be found in a March 2004 monologue when Leno stated "You could kind of tell they were community college students," in response to a shot of protesters holding signs reading "Skool is expensive" and "Don't raise tooishun."

Betty Young, president of Northwest State Community College in Archbold, Ohio felt compelled by the comedian's constant bashings of community college students, to respond. She started the "Lessons for Leno" as a moving protest on motorcycles because Leno is an avid motorcycle enthusiast and because the trek across the country is the best way to get attention to more community colleges involved.

Hopefully this tour will do what it intends, to stop the harassment of community college students everywhere on "The Tonight Show," and to better the opinions of the institutions, their staff and students throughout the nation.

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