Alumni Council Notes
4/2/2009

Gentlemen of the Class of '60:

Dartmouth Basketball Women Ivy League Champs and in NCAA Tournament

The Dartmouth women's basketball team defeated Harvard 64-51 on March 10, winning the Ivy League title for the fourth time in the last five years (the 17th time overall) and earning a bid to the NCAA tournament. The women lost against perennial national powerhouse, Maryland, in the first round 82-53 Sunday afternoon.

Election of the Executive Committee of the Association of Alumni

All current members of the Association of Alumni executive committee will run unopposed this year for reelection. No petition candidates indicated an intention to run for the executive committee by the official deadline in January. Voting began on March 25th.

The current AofA executives and nominees are John Mathias '69 for president, Veree Hawkins Brown '93 for first vice president, Douglas Keare 56 '57 Th '57 Tu for second vice president and David Spalding '76 for secretary-treasurer. Marian Zischke Baldauf '84, Cheryl Bascomb '82, John Engelman '68, Ronald Harris '71, Kaitlin Jaxheimer '05, Otho Kerr III '79, and Ronald Schram '64 were renominated as executive committee members.

Referendum on the proposed change of the constitution of the Association of Alumni

Even more importantly, the election will also serve as a referendum on an amendment to the alumni constitution that seeks to change the current process for electing alumni-selected members to the Board of Trustees, making it simpler and more transparent and maintaining its fairness to all alumni.

The amendment calls for a one person, one vote system, ending the previous approval voting process. The Council-nominated candidates could theoretically face any number of petition candidates. The amendment requires that candidates receive a majority of the votes to be elected. In races with more than two candidates where no candidate gains a majority of the vote, the top two candidates will participate in a runoff election.

To pass, the amendment must receive two-thirds of the vote of the alumni voting.

I strongly urge you to vote . . . one way or another! We as alumni do want to retain a voice -not necessarily a decisive voice, but simply a voice - in the governance of our alma mater. With that said, let me add a personal comment.

I usually try not take positions in these reports, but will do so in this case. I believe that this is finally a no-nonsense approach to electing the alumni-nominated trustees. What is more straight-forward than a one-person, one-vote system? The Alumni Council will nominate an alumnus or an alumna. If someone doesn't like the recommendation of the Alumni Council, he/she/they can put up a petition candidate. Then we, the alumni, pick one person by popular vote to become trustee. Simple, fair and straight-forward, as I said above. (On this basis we might even talk the trustees into reconsidering parity between Board-of-Trustee-selected and alumni-elected trustees before we show up for our 75th reunion. But don't hold your breath.)

If you want all the nitty-gritty details on this constitutional amendment, click on our class web site, (see below) and read Jim Adler's detailed and objective Qs&As.

The College's Response to the Lawsuit by Several Alumni

You may remember that there is yet another lawsuit hanging out there against the College in connection with the parity issue and the interpretation of the 1891 Board vote that gave alumni the right to nominate alumni trustees. The College filed its official response to it recently, arguing that the legal action is without merit and that the plaintiffs do not have grounds to sue. The College denied the plaintiffs' claim that there is a contract between the College and the Association of Alumni which entitles the alumni to nominate half the Board of Trustees. The College also asserted that last summer's dismissal of an Association lawsuit bars the plaintiffs from bringing another lawsuit making the same claim.

More on President-elect Jim Kim

If you hadn't had the chance yet to see Kim's maiden speech at Dartmouth, see the video at http://alumni.dartmouth.edu/presidentelect. Also, on the home page of www.Dartmouth.edu are several links to additional information about Dr. Kim.

I received a considerable number of comments from you in connection with Jim Kim. Most of you -at least the ones that emailed me- seem to be impressed with Kim's potential. There were only two categories of concern: one, that he is not a Dartmouth alumnus/ae and two, that he does not appear to have a strong administrative background. As one of you said, there are about 60,000 of us; you'd have thought they'd find one guy among us who could run the College. As to Kim's administrative abilities, I take comfort in the comments that I heard at the Brigham and that I reported previously: superb at handling a bureaucracy, a great administrator, he gets things done.

Please start thinking about what you might want me to bring up at the next Alumni Council meeting in May. I'll remind you of that sometime in April.

Axel

[Note: You can also find this email (as well as the previous one re: Dr Kim and football, as well as Jim Adler's Q&A in connection with the AofA constitutional amendment) on our Class Website. To find it, go to www.dartmouth.org/classes/60/alumnicouncil and click 1) Alumni, 2) Classes, and 3) '60