June 19, 2007Statement
The faculty of Antioch College wish to share their perspective on the
closing of the College. I am an Emerita faculty member speaking at
their request because current faculty are in a position of great
vulnerability at this time, no longer protected by tenure. The
narrative supplied by the Board of Trustees contains important
omissions, questionable assumptions and misrepresentations.
We are providing an alternative to that narrative because our dignity
as faculty is at stake as is the preservation of tenure as a principle
and as a promise, and Antioch’s current and historic definition is
hanging in the balance. The College’s considerable assets are at risk
and our sense of justice is offended as decades long practices of
governance and decision making have been ignored.
Antioch College has been in financial crisis since its inception.
Ironically, several years ago the Board imposed a drastic curricular
revision, the Renewal Plan, on the College at a point when the
enrollment had actually been increasing. The College articulated some
of the many challenges it faced in its Strategic Plan of 1997 but the
overall shape of the curriculum was not the central problem, nor was
it perceived as a problem by the NCA in a recent accreditation
review.
The Board’s imposed Renewal Plan was disastrous in terms of admissions
and retention. The student body plunged from 650 to 300 in two years
despite faculty’s considerable efforts to make the Plan work. The
Board mandated the change with great speed scarcely giving time for
the faculty to develop courses and consider the profound implications
of the changes, much less market them. At that time they promised 5
years of financial support to see the College through the Plan’s
implementation.
In brief, the Board risked the College’s well-being with the
imposition of an ill-considered Plan, failed to provide promised
support, and then closed the College. To make matters worse the
Renewal Plan and the College’s deepest financial difficulties
overlapped with the Board’s authorization of a new building for
Antioch McGregor, a branch of Antioch University which had previously
shared a campus with the College in Yellow Springs. At the time of
its greatest need the College’s borrowing capacity was seriously
constrained and it was the College’s assets that provided much of the
collateral for the extensive borrowing necessary to develop the new
McGregor building. How is it that given their role in creating the
College’s grave difficulties the Board did not take responsibility to
raise additional funds, consider the College President’s plan to merge
the College and McGregor, or consider liquidating part of the
College’s endowment?
We must ask who benefits from this? What is Antioch University
without the College? The College is the only one of the University’s
branches with tenured faculty, a unionized staff and self governance.
What of Antioch’s identity do they care about preserving? If they
can’t raise funds now, how can they start from scratch four years from
now with abandoned buildings and an entirely new faculty and student
body to recruit? What will become of the abandoned employers in the
Cooperative Education program, Antioch’s mark of distinction ? How
financially healthy are the other campuses of Antioch University – has
the College become a convenient scapegoat? Again we need to ask who
benefits from this? In fact, the University stands to receive all the
College’s assets – the Glen (a 900 acre nature preserve), the library,
the endowment, the buildings, the land, the legacy of Antioch.
Can the Board and University administration which conducted their
review of the College’s recent situation in secrecy, in violation of
our governance policies, without consulting faculty and staff who
stand to lose their livelihoods and professions, be trusted with the
College’s current assets, its legacy and its future? We might further
ask what is the Board’s responsibility to the town of Yellow Springs?
The loss of income to a small town where Antioch is one of the major
employers, the disappearance of an intellectual and cultural center,
the abandonment of land and buildings are all terrible blows.
The faculty will be exploring legal action to stop the College’s
closing and preserve tenure and the college’s assets. We seek the
support of alumni in this endeavor.
Dimi Reber
