[cross-posted at Dallas Morning Views]
The University of Dallas appears to be moving against its National Alumni Board, which has been, I'm told, a source of irritation and dissent against the administration and the board of trustees. Here's an excerpt from a letter sent yesterday to members of the NAB:
A major area of opportunity is alumni fund raising, which is absolutely essential to the financial well-being of the University and which is viewed as an important indicator of institutional support by our many constituents. In recognition of the key role alumni play in our future, the Advancement Committee of the UD Board of Trustees has recommended that the University staff review the UD Alumni Charter and recommend revisions to clarify the role of the NAB and the Alumni Association at the University of Dallas. The Board of Trustees was informed of this recommendation at its meeting this morning (May 1, 2008). The Advancement Committee will schedule a special meeting in June to consider the recommendations. The goal of this effort is to more fully define and focus the role the NAB plays in supporting the University and the Office of Alumni Relations through its outreach and fund raising efforts.Simultaneous with this governance improvement, we also want to ensure that our NAB reflects the full spectrum of the University, and so we will be reconfiguring the NAB’s membership to include a wider diversity of representation from the various schools, majors, alumni classes and geographic locations of our graduates.
To allow time for this review process, the June NAB meeting has been postponed. In order to ensure that work undertaken by the NAB is not rendered null and void as a result of any future changes in the Charter, current and ongoing projects will await the completion of the Charter review.
If I'm reading this correctly, the NAB's charter will be rewritten by the university, existing members will be "reconfigured" off the board to get a "wider diversity" of members (hmm, I wonder if the new members will be more congenial to the administration's views?), and the June meeting -- where presumably all of this might have been discussed -- has been cancelled.
As one of the sources who forwarded the letter to me put it, it appears that "the Board of Trustees has decided to suppress the National Alumni Board."
I suppose that's one way to make a problem go away. Or appear to.
Add to Del.icio.us
Add to Technorati
Add to Digg
Add to Newsvine
Add to Facebook
Add to StumbleUpon
Subscribe
Good luck to the UD alumni. Kudos to Rod for bringing attention to this story.
Something similar is being attempted at Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire. The alumni there are furious and are organzing at the grassroots level to strike back.
These kind of tactics are unfortunately not unheard of at small private universities with limited endowments - although I have to admit I am a bit shocked to hear the administration at Dartmouth plays the same sort of game, too! You would think particularly at a place which relies almost entirely on tutition for its operating budget (as opposed to a big endowment) that no one would want to alienate alumni and lose badly-needed gifts.
The rivalry between developing professional programs and serving other fields at church-affiliated colleges is also very common, although at most schools it does not appear to be so difficult to find common ground. Aquinas College in Nashville has a nursing program that helps bring in the bucks, but there's no risk of trouble with the Nashville Dominican sisters running the place. Having seen their students running a retreat at my parish and met with some administrators recently, I can safely say that the guiding mission of the college is very much running the show, rather than being run over as apparently is the case at UD.
Yes. Thank you Rod.
Here is a link to a parallel situation at Dartmouth:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121184639298021279.html?mod=todays_columnists
Purchase zithromax look azithromycin Where can I look for azithromycin aquire zithromax online without prescrption?
Post a Comment
By submitting these comments, I agree to the beliefnet.com terms of service, rules of conduct and privacy policy (the "agreements"). I understand and agree that any content I post is licensed to beliefnet.com and may be used by beliefnet.com in accordance with the agreements.