Originally printed on the front page of the "Careers" section of the Chronicle, their repository for fluff or gloom-n-doom.  I only know Hope College by reputation, so I can't comment on the dress of its faculty or administrators. Still, I think the author exaggerates when he suggests that, by dressing with care, "One might be given inappropriate deference by the unknowing." Isn't another word for this "inappropriate deference" simply "courtesy?"

This is but one of the many problems in American higher education. It's unfortunately symptomatic that a tenured professor writes "I did find more students holding doors for me and calling me "sir" as if I were a person of importance." Who could be more important for students than their professor?