Exciting Announcement From the University of Virginia 

The lady literally clutching her pearls was a nice touch.

Nice to see a sense of humor still exists at UV(A?)!! Great straight presentation without a hint of a smile.

Wow, this is so well done! Jim knocked this out of the park with his delivery, and the marketing / brand exec person and panel shots were super believable. Someone(s) spent a lot of time pulling this together, because the attention to detail is fantastic. Everything in the background is absolutely hilarious: the posters on the wall - "If UVA were a Taylor Swift album;" "If UVA were a Golden Girl," with Sophia winning the vote; all the panelists having names from Clue (Miss Scarlett, Mrs Peacock, Colonel Mustard); the I feel "bellicose" option on the big notepad; the V connotations including 'velociraptor' and 'underpants' for U, then asking people to "solve for A"; the 'cul de sac' note on one of the new brand logo options. Nice work. Go 'Hoos!

My 80-year-old dad just called me totally irate and had already written a sternly worded letter to President Ryan. I had to gently explain to him that it was an April Fool’s joke. 😂😂

omg the tune ends with "for dear old UV" killed me

Thank you for the great laugh! You had me until the "A" literally got crossed out 😂. I sincerely appreciate the effort and time to bring a smile and laugh to our day💙🧡

This is Epic…I appreciate the sense of humor and fun it took to create. Thanks!

I'm a UVA graduate alum, class of 2006. You had me until the very end because of all the (perhaps misguided) effort so many institutions of higher ed and corporations are now putting into their branding image.

This clever and well-executed video has done more to warm my heart towards my alma mater than anything the University has publicly done in years aside from Coach Bennett and the basketball program. Well done! There is perhaps hope for the dear old UV - A after all!

Greatness and excellence in all we do. Even for April Fools' Day. Well done!🤣

I needed that laugh today more than you know!! Thank you UV-A!

I started going through my stages of grief and flew through denial right into anger….. then to appreciation for this brilliantly crafted April Fools joke done in true Wahoo Fashion 🧡💙

WahooW! That was the most well produced and creative Pril Fools prank I’ve experienced. You went all out, and at what expense?? Doesn’t matter, I’m sure the savings from dispensing with “A“ will make up for it. Kudos to all of you who put that together. L.B. Sandy Rock MD &S ‘66 Med 70

The moment the UVA logo became slanted to look more like VT, that’s when I realized what day it was. Happy April Fool’s Day everyone! 🧡💙

I felt for it big time. What irked me most was how cavalier Jim Ryan was talking about a meaningful change. Well done.

That was very well done. Props to the woman clutching her pearls! President Ryan did a great serious face!!

But that meeting room, I've been there, grate when you're like 57 years old and going through your fifth team building exercise complete with butcher paper and being lead by some young creative type and that's when you first start hearing the ticks of your retirement countdown clock. I felt that.

That is SNL-worthy material. Well done!

Good One, President Ryan and all involved.👍

I had slept late this morning, after a rough night of heavy storms here in the Midwest, only to awaken to this . . . this abomination. Seeing the young woman in the video clutching her pearls, I screamed and ran in fevered desperation for mine, tripping over a tree branch that had fallen through the roof into my still storm-darkened bedroom. In a swoon, I had visions that you all had turned the Rotunda into a cafe and pilates center with a new, modern, more efficient, aesthetically crisp pyramidal roof, an homage to . . . other schools in . . . Virgini. A host of every living thing in the Commonwealth rose up in chorus, unanimously declaring: "Virgini by birth, UV by the grce of God!" Just as I was about to die of grief, a little barn owl who had flown into the house through the gaping hole in the roof roused me by rolling a grapefruit sized ball of hail off of the rafters into my ear. "Hoo, hoo, hoo's a foooooolllll" he said, with a raven named Lenore replying, "Yeah, she is," from over my chamber door. It was then that I began to suspect something was not quite right. (Does anyone else out there carefully write "UVa"?) Thanks from a Wahoo from PA who lives in MI, but will always love V. 🧡💙

As a VT grad that hates hearing "Vah Tech", I think the "Oovah" argument has some real merits!

This is brilliant from concept to execution. Congratulations to all! You got us both.

Saw this a day later. Many expletives were shouted at the monitor. Then I figured out it was an April Fools Day joke. That was a pretty good one.

Brilliantly done. Bravo. "It will save spoken time in the day..."

Hilarious! Well done, all involved! ⭐️ Best April Fool’s joke EVER!! 😂

Oh my goodness! My heart was in my throat! You definitely got me! I literally laughed out loud. This was great! Thank you! :)

Lol the woman in the pitch meeting literally clutching her pearls sent me

This was amazingly clever! I completely fell for it and instantly texted my daughter and husband!! Then I looked back to send it to them! And saw the end!! I love this UVA!! Thank you for the laugh and thank you for all the wonderful times and opportunities you are giving my daughter, Loren Black, a third year student, there at UVA!! Go Hoo’s!! WAHOOWA!!💙🧡

This was hilarious and orchestrated pretty well. Thankful this is not happening would have really hated it.

Wow you got me. I was ready to blast a bunch of gripe about brainless projects that serve change for the sake of change. LOL. I was at NBS (National Bureau of Standards) when they changed the name to NIST (National Institue of Standards and Technology). This cost multiple millions of dollars, lined a few publishers' pockets while adding no appreciable value to their mission. Great gag.

I was about to have a heart attack until my husband caught on (early) that this was a joke!! Very funny! Thanks for a great laugh this rainy day! #GoHoos 🧡💙

Oh my gosh. I am watching this on April 4 and was ABSOLUTELY MORTIFIED by this change until I realized this was posted on April 1! 😅 You got me!

Yep had my brow (and other things) contorted for about 30 seconds. Very well done. Thought with the hat and travel glass you were going to add, "and while we were at the discussion table we also updated UV school colors to blue and magenta--no wait-- millennial pink"😂!

I’m impressed they could find actual White-Out in 2023.

You get an A for effort! Fantastic job!

Well done! This got us until about halfway through.

Hilarious & creative... and the Oscar goes to President Ryan for best actor in an academic parody 🤣

HA! I was legit upset for a minute; I said we don’t need to change our name just to conform. Awesome job, Jim!

The song at the end is hilarious 😂

Well done, Jim.

Very well researched and deliberated. Proud to be a UV(A) alum! Go Hoos.

The A is there because Thm Jefferson had plans for a second University. The first UNIVERSITY is UVA as in A being the first letter. the second was to be UVB, accordingly. Jefferson has problems with money, so sadly never was able to realize the UVB vision. This led to the unfortunate creation of the Blacksburg embarrassment.

Man, this is a good one! Didn’t realize until the last second. Well done, UV, well done..

Great idea. Thank you for your visionary leadership, President Ryan!

Love this! Thanks for the laugh at a time when we all could use one. Cav man’s anger was hilarious.

I am officially starting the “Save the A” campaign. In the words of The Dude, “This Will Not Stand”.

The fact that I didn’t realize we were joking until I read the comments… I seriously cried out “what will happen to our song?!” 😂😅

For the first time, thank you for the comments section! I was totally hoodwinked and ready to go ballistic :)

You know that feeling when something doesn't click until well after you're finished thinking about it?

We all needed this. He’s the best.

I love when she knocks over the “A”, lol 😂

Excellent for an announcement on the first day of this month! (However, UVA does distinguish us from UVM, the University of Vermont (Or, in Latin, Unversitas Verdes Mons)

Hilarious! You got me for sure. I was about to order a bunch of current merch until I saw the roll out date. At least I caught on then. BRILLIANT!

First I was like... NOOOO... then I was like...MMM OK let's do this I'm in... then the relief 😂😂😂

I knew this was a joke the moment Jim said that we don't know what the A stands for. 😂 Well done, though! Definitely one of the funniest April Fool's Day pranks I've seen.

The editing is so hilarious. Congrats on the April Fools joke

Well done! Happy April Fools Day! You had me up until the efficiency argument.

Great Initiative! I hope this theme continues in 2024 by removing A's from the grading scale. Would enjoy seeing the reactions.

Forgot it was April Fool’s day… thank goodness I waited until the end.

I was totally convinced and saddened 😢. Duh!good job!

ahhh....you got me. took me about 2 minutes to see that. tbh, some of the "reasoning" wouldn't surprise me today. I almost guarantee someone would agree with the "name change" to cut down on ink cartridge usage lol

I was getting popping mad over the lunacy you were proposing! You got me!

You got me. What a fascinating way to make us all thankful for who we really are.

And here I thought the steering committee was going to debate the relative merits of a capital “A” (UVA) or its lower case sibling “a” (UVa). Well delivered parody, Sir James.

Happy April Fool's Day! Glad that the folks at UV(A) aren't fools trying to change the brand! 🙂

Impressive delivery by Jim Ryan -- home run! I'm in!

And let’s celebrate our beloved UVA’s sense of humor and fun! In a world where have a tendency to take ourselves very seriously, it is good to see some good old fashioned UVAriety on that trend. Go ‘Hoos!

Love Whit Clements cameo…

Bravo! you can add Hilarious to Great & Good. Thanks for the laugh:)

This is classic! Thank you!

OMG! I fell for it. My parents went through the Tuskegee Institute changing to Tuskegee University so I believed it!

My Alma mater - Vanderbilt University - did a similar joke back in 2022 by changing the seal and the logo to something from a Windows clip art. Only it turned out to be for real - not an April Fool's joke. What a disaster! I'm happy that this is just a joke for UVA.

I don’t know how he got through that with a straight face.

It's the pearl clutching for me. Well done!

This is so amazingly clever and funny Thanks for a lot of laughing at my house as we re-watched and read comments👍

🤣🤣🤣🤣 Well done!! For a second or two, you had me...

Great sense of humor, Mr. Ryan!

And delivered with such a straight face! 👏 😂

You almost had me Pres Ryan! 😂 Happy April Fools Day!

Creatively brilliant! Definitely great #HoosHumor that will live thru the ages!

You had me going...I was furious. Then someone explained it's April's fools.

As someone not overly familiar with the institution but very familiar with its call letters, this was momentarily shocking and then extremely funny! Thanks for the laugh 😂

You had us in the first half chief not gonna lie

So much effort went into this... They really full sent and got our necks.

JIm I was irate until I realized it was a joke, but I am still shaking. Good one.

I caught on early, but still loved it and the end made me laugh out loud. Thanks for great start to the day!

I'm glad I checked the date. Haha, good one, President Ryan!

Hooaray hooaray, hey hey UV! Don’t judge my spelling, my BIL was the student. Luckily, he watched to the end.

Surely we've been pranked - released on April Fool's Day !!!

“More importantly, it’s 33% more efficient.”

No idea how in the world this ended up in my feed, but I went right for the bait ... glad I did, well done !

Well done, Pres. True UV humor!

Best April Fool’s joke ever! Perfect in every way!

This would be great, but meaningless to your Canadian students, where it will always be UV eh?

Awesome!!!! UVA !!! Had me going!

Okay, you guys, this is the BEST and FUNNIEST thing I ever saw come from UVA. Can you hear me clapping from out here on the Missouri prairie? Well played and I will reward this creativity with a donation soon. The other side to this is, consultants are going from school to school selling this kind of idea - just appalling national movement to make all university profiles, mascots, slogans, and websites look and feel the same. Absolutely ridiculous! I hope some schools who have recently done things JUST like this will see this spoof and see what dumb choices they have made.

As 51% controlling board member, I appreciate this. Thank you.

The Carolina blue hat was a BIG tip!

You got me there! I was like, whaaat?😂😂😂🤣🤣🤣

Fantastic!!! Thank you for the laugh.