CHANGING CAL STATE’S MOTTO

Upon taking office as the first woman chancellor of the California State University system, W. Ann Reynolds noticed the university’s Latin motto: “Vir, Veritas, Vox.” “It was brought to the attention of the system,” university officials said in a report on Tuesday, “that ‘Vir’ was gender specific. It referred to man, rather than all mankind.”

“After consulting numerous Latin scholars and receiving numerous suggestions on how the motto could be changed to include both men and women,” the report said, the university emerged with a new motto. It is: “Vox, Veritas, Vita.”

The report noted that education begins with vox, the voice, and pursues veritas, the truth. The result is that “through education, the quality of life-- vita-- is enhanced.”

That settled, the men and women of the Committee on Organization and Rules unanimously approved the new motto.