Rutger's University paid Jersey Shore's Snooki $32,000 for a speaking engagement. In contrast, they gave and Nobel Prize-winning author Toni Morrison $30,000.
We're proud of a quality education that you can receive at our fine state colleges.
Not an April Fool’s Joke
Apt. 11d 
I’d want to know who at Rutgers made the offers. Student groups, for example, often have a lot of discretion in who they invite. So, to put this on “Rutgers” is perhaps too quick. Next, how much speakers are paid has nothing to do with what they are “worth”, of course, and it’s not as if the school just sends out an offer. Usually they ask the person, and if the person is famous, they have a set speaking fee for different sorts of events, figured out by their management team. (Morrison surely has an agent who does this sort of stuff.) So, again, I don’t see why the fact that Snooki was paid more than Morrison has any implications at all for the quality of education provided at Rutgers.
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Also, at least judging from Beloved, Toni Morrison isn’t all that as a writer.
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This may not be the best data point for those who argue that budget cuts from Christie, the expiration of the stimulus, etc. will necessarily savage education.
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Speaking of April Fool’s, there’s a fantastic thread at J.D. Roth’s Get Rich Slowly featuring commenters confessing dumb things they’ve done with money.
http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/2011/04/01/ask-the-readers-a-fool-and-his-money/#comments
One of J.D. Roth’s is “How to Turn $500 into $7 the Hard Way — In which I buy a $500 encyclopedia set on credit, only to see encyclopedias become obsolete.”
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“Also, at least judging from Beloved, Toni Morrison isn’t all that as a writer.”
Them’s fighting words. Morrison has a Nobel Prize. And is totally awesome.
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I’m with Dr M. Christie clearly has not cut enough!
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Did he edit Toni Morrison also?
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RUPA (some student programming committee) invited Snooki. Student fees are involved. I guess if the students come, that means it was a good use of their fees. How big is their.venue?
I don’t think graduation speakers should be paid more than an honorarium. I guess Morrison has to make a living, but I wouldn’t pay her or anyone to make a graduation speech.
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I heard that Snooki expected to attract 1,000 people, which is pretty good.
I guess I ended this short post badly. The Snooki v. Morrison issue doesn’t really say anything about the quality of education at Rutgers, though it does say something about the morons on the programming committee who invited her. I know that the money is supposed to used for entertainment for the students, but couldn’t they invite a band or something instead?
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Hey, Snooki didn’t get an honorary degree with it, did she? Morrison is getting 30K *plus* an honorary degree! I don’t begrudge Morrison that kind of money, but I don’t like paying people for honorary degrees!
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