Trusting Alumni Trustees

By Emily Ghods-Esfahani | Sunday, August 5, 2007

It may fairly be said that 1891 was a year that set Dartmouth apart from many of its peers. In that year, a contract—if not a formal written agreement—was made which resolved a long and contentious struggle over the Board of Trustee’s composition, a struggle which parallels today’s controversies. One hundred and sixteen years later, Dartmouth is still unique among colleges for democratically electing one half of its Board members (not including the two ex officio members: the President of the College and the Governor of New Hampshire). For those of you who have not been tuned in to the machinations of the Olde Guard, the 1891 Agreement—and its 116 year precedent—establishes in perpetuity that one half of Dartmouth’s Board will be democratically elected by alumni.

On June 4, 2007, a memorandum formally released by the Board of Trustee’s Governance Committee threatened to subvert this democratic mechanism. The memo cuts to the heart of the democratic process and then, predictably, threatens to cut out the heart: “The Alumni Trustee nomination process has recently taken on the characteristics of a partisan political campaign, becoming increasingly contentious, divisive and costly for the participants.” In what sense is any election not divisive? Where there is a choice, there is a division of choices, and you only get to choose one; all of the above is not an option in anything other than a rigged election of one. So-called ”divisive” elections are the counterpart to choice, in which such choices in turn stir debate; the opposite is a non-divisive democracy, which is not a democracy at all.

But, the Alumni Council’s Nominating Committee, a group of individuals who hand-pick administration-friendly candidates for trustee elections, tend to think those most qualified to serve Dartmouth, to serve on its Board, contra Groucho Marx’s dictum, should be people who would only belong to a club that would have someone exactly like them as a member. The Board, regrettably, seems to lack Groucho’s subtle comedic touch.

Take for instance, this past trustee election, in which Stephen Smith ’88 won, instead of one of the Nominating Committee’s selected candidates. Like a majority of the alumni, and unlike the Nominating Committee’s candidates, Professor Smith opposed the proposed Alumni Constitution, which was soundly defeated in the fall by the votes of Dartmouth alumni. Regrettably, the plans of Alumni Council leaders are out of touch with the hopes and wishes of the alumni-at-large. Yet, instead of easing this tension, as good leaders do, alumni leaders—and other leaders employed by the College—are magnifying the “divisiveness” by trying to alienate the Dartmouth family of alumni from the governance process in the most egregious and ungraceful way: that is, by seeking to change the parity of the Board.

Even more immediately, the Board’s Governance Committee is sticking it to the full Executive Committee of the Association of Alumni, the only committee of alumni governance fully elected by alumni and therefore fully representative of alumni, from the deliberations over the 1891 Agreement. In a letter formally written to the Board, signed by all but one (guess who, Mr. Spalding?) of the Executive members, the Committee declared, “The agreement for seating alumni-trustees is one between the Trustees and the Association of Alumni. We understand the Association’s previous leadership has not been invited or involved in these considerations over the past months. This is of great concern to us, as participation by alumni-chosen Trustees has been of great value to the College, and through this stewardship, it is a most meaningful way of engaging her sons and daughters.” In response, the Governance Committee suggested that the Executive Committee of the Alumni Association submit their considerations in writing, which is no more than the protocol currently assigned to any one of the College’s 67,000 alumni.

All disrespect aside, how about a little discretion? The timing of the impending change must be a public-relations nightmare for the College’s Alumni Relations office, which is incidentally headed up by our friend David Spalding. Not surprisingly, Spalding is the only member of the Association of Alumni’s Executive Committee who is also employed by the College, the only member of the Executive Committee to not sign the abovementioned letter, and the fellow who deliberately withheld alumni e-mail lists from the rest of the Executive Committee so that the Committee could not communicate about this governance upheaval with alumni-at-large.

Most alumni—having graduated from this esteemed institution—are liable to ask a very obvious, real-politic question: Why does the Board need to be reconstituted now? Why, suddenly, are there system-level problems? Would the Governance Committee have released this study had the well-heeled establishment candidate, Sandy Alderson, won the election? Of course not—and ex-Chairman Neukom obliquely made this point himself with his droll acknowledgement of the very qualified Stephen Smith’s victory to the Board. Displaying a real flair for the obvious, the Chairman opined: “We have a new trustee.” And that was that.

For 116 years, such restructuring of the Board was not even considered. On the contrary, its current structure was solidified: each expansion made to the Board honored the parity of alumni and charter trustees; this includes the most recent 2003 expansion of the Board. Yet, in 2003 then-Chairman Neukom was not claiming that the 1891 accord was “nonsense,” as he did during the Alumni Council’s spring meeting (May 19-20, 2007). Now, only four years later, after the victory of four non-slated petition trustees, does he want to erase what was written into not only the meeting minutes of the 1891 gathering, but the history of Dartmouth College in general. To some, it is all about winning and control, not the betterment of Dartmouth College.

If this parity, this wishy-washy democratic element is all “nonsense,” then perhaps all that is left is to let the money talk. As some readers have already seen, the newly formed “1891 Society” plans to withhold financial contributions from the College should the 1891 accord be violated or altered in any way. Operating under the theme, “No Donation without Representation,” it is clear that a growing group of alumni are fed up with the shenanigans of the majority of Dartmouth’s administrators and trustees. The expanding chasm between alumni and the College—which seems to be ever-widening with the failure of the Alumni Constitution and the accession of four petition trustees to the last four vacant seats on the Board—is exactly the type of problem the 1891 accord hoped to remedy 116 years ago. As the meeting minutes of the 1891 gathering of the Association of Alumni state, parity on the Board will establish “a more sympathetic and close relation between the Corporation [Dartmouth College] and the Alumni.”

In the years leading up to 1891, the College was financially in shambles, which bled into its operational and academic capacity; the instant that alumni became directly involved with the College, with specific responsibilities and duties as Board members on one end, or as voting alumni on the other, Dartmouth was rejuvenated to become the elite and fiscally sound institution that it is today.

To go one step further, it seems to us that the only true way to align the views of the alumni—your views—with the machinations of the College’s administrators and trustees, and ensure a close and sympathetic relation among the two, is to have ALL of the Trustees elected by alumni. The three (now four with the accession of Trustee Stephen Smith) petition trustees have been the highest performing and most responsive trustees on the Board; unlike their confrères on the Board, they have sought out students and professors to determine the true state of affairs at the College. Alumni and students are growingly aware of the good they have done, are doing, and will continue to do, especially in bringing the reassuring voice of the alumni that elected them to the deliberations and governance of the College. The dream and the practice of democracy is alive and—for now—well, here on the Hanover plain.

Here’s to the College remaining that way.

Trusting Alumni Trustees

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