Last Saturday marked the end of an era at the College of Communication. Or more accurately, on top of the College of Communication. The radio tower atop the COM building was removed in one of the first major aesthetic changes made by new Dean Tom Fiedler.

But removal of the ugly, ugly, useless, and did I say ugly? radio tower has not been without controversy, which stems from comments made by none other than Dean Fiedler himself.

“In 2008, radio is old, the technology of our grandfathers,” said the dean in the Nov. 24 edition of The Daily Free Press, just days before the tower was finally removed.

These words seem innocent enough, yet they generated outrage among some in the radio industry. My favorite response came in a letter-to-the-editor from a professional engineer in Salt Lake City, who railed on the dean: “Dean Fielder should climb down from the ivy covered, ivory tower and see what’s going on in the real world.”

The engineer has reason to be upset with the dean’s attitude toward the radio industry. While tower was not used for WTBU or any radio station, to say the radio industry is outdated is not completely accurate. Here in Boston, radio thrives. National Public Radio has a home with WBUR, and in case you couldn’t tell from the call letters, is a BU station. WEEI, the local all-sports station, earns the highest ratings of all sports radio stations in the United States. In addition to talk radio, many music stations are alive-and-running here as well.

Even if radio is old-fashioned, does that mean COM and its dean should abandon the medium altogether? Describing radio the way Dean Fiedler did insinuates that we need to move away from it. This is where many have a bone to pick with him.

Just because a technology is old doesn’t mean we should desert it and forget about it. Even Dean Fiedler hasn’t endorsed this thinking. He is a fan of classical music, and I’d be shocked if he never relaxed with a little Beethoven on the FM dial while driving home. Within the past two years, he has been a guest on NPR. In July 2007, he spoke on the air about a situation that arose while he was a reporter for a newspaper — talk about a technology that’s outdated.

Overall, the new dean has made changes to move COM in the right direction since taking the helm last June. If I were to assign him a grade, he’d get an A-. After BU’s standard grade deflation, that’s about a C+.

While real changes take time and are more difficult to discern at a glance, the aesthetic improvements were necessary. The photographs that line the halls help spruce up the place and demonstrate the talent of COM’s students and graduates. The repaving and landscaping in front of the building widened walkways for pedestrians and brightened the COM lawn. Demolishing part of the wall so that a door directly to Dean Fiedler’s office is visible from the hallway promotes, at least on the surface, transparency. And as I hope I’ve made clear, removing the radio tower was the right decision.

But what message does the dean send to current students who are paying top-dollar to eventually enter an outdated field? He might have some explaining to do with students. A couple of years ago, former Dean John Schulz disparaged the student newspaper, saying, “I’ve never taken the student paper very seriously — these are kids.” These types of comments from the dean undermine the mission of the college. While what Dean Fiedler said doesn’t belittle students, the reaction to his remarks shows that what a dean says matters.

Everything starts at the top of COM. And unlike the radio tower, the dean, despite his recent comment, is signaling a better future for the College. We all hope that signal remains clear.