To the Editor:
It is unfortunate that some stubborn alumni on the executive committee cannot foresee the vision of positive change (“Alumni to take legal action against College,” Oct. 3). Remember the brouhaha against coeducation! Dartmouth was going to be ruined should that change happen. A lawsuit pitting the Alumni Association against the College is a waste of time, energy and money. Such focus should be placed on working together to guide Dartmouth in educating people who will make a difference to world peace, and to energy resources, and to environmental conservation. I am not proud.
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To the Editor:
Can we understand the logic of an 11-member committee of the Association of the Alumni which, while claiming to represent all of the alumni, has just voted to sue the College without so much as consulting the alumni (“Alumni to take legal action against College,” Oct. 3)?
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To the Editor:
After spending the better part of the last three years neck-deep in muck of alumni governance and bickering (which I wouldn’t recommend to anybody), I quickly grew to appreciate the fact that a 90-hour-per-week job makes it a lot easier to stick my head in the sand and ignore all of it. I figured that not getting fired in the first three months of my job was worth my efforts more so than writing angry letters which would fall on deaf ears. More importantly, I find the whole ordeal incredibly petty, on both sides.
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To the Editor:
Professor Meir Kohn needs to attend a few classes himself — on non-profit governance (“ExtraCurricular.,” Oct. 3). He’d learn that the Congress and the IRS have long sought to assure that non-profits, including colleges, are subject to careful scrutiny by the Feds and the public. As CEO of a mid-sized conservation organization, my compensation and that of my senior colleagues is reported to the IRS and widely publicized — down to reimbursements for parking and a hundred-dollar annual contribution toward a gym membership. Every other aspect of our financial operations is part of the public record.Not just where our money comes from, but where it goes and whether it serves the tax-exempt purposes for which we’re chartered. And that’s just the beginning. The IRS has just proposed new reporting rules that mirror even more closely those required under Sarbanes-Oxley. We support the goal. But we estimate it will take us twice as long and cost nearly twice as much to complete the form.
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To the Editor:
I happen to agree with the young, stylish woman who told Jacob Baron ‘10’s friend, “He’s right, you know” (“Sociopathic Scripture,” Sept. 26). And I make the same matter-of-fact statement, without getting up and leaving you without debate.
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By conventional wisdom I should have been angry as hell that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was allowed to speak at the United Nations on Sept. 26. As a New York Jew from head to toe, I should be square in the middle of the “protest demographic” that had its blood boiling at 120 degrees over the issue of Ahmadinejad’s speech last week. After all, the Iranian president’s repeated threats to wipe Israel off the map and assertions that the Holocaust never occurred roughly comprise the sort of comments that would normally send me spiraling into a destructive rage. A great deal of my Jewish friends from home seemed distressed about his invitation, and my brothers informed me that the Orthodox Jewish school at which we all received our formal education was to participate in a rally protesting Ahmadinejad’s speech. Clearly, tempers were a’ flarin’.
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