Trustees examine capital campaign, athletics

Excitement about the capital campaign is building.

The Board of Trustees approved the schematic design for the new science center at their meeting last weekend. Although talk of the capital campaign constituted a major part of the meeting, the trustees also turned their attention to athletics, tenure decisions and the preliminary budget.

The trustees discussed athletics in a closed session.

"We had a fairly lengthy discussion of sports at Oberlin," College President Nancy Dye said. "We really do need to beef up the College's efforts in terms of intramural sports and have more robust support for clubs. We'd like to strengthen varsity sports that need strengthening. We have a lot of work to do."

"This is a discussion that's overdue," Dean of the College Clayton Koppes said. Koppes said the trustees' discussion was productive and he expected more in the future.

Eight faculty members were awarded tenure.

"They were strong cases, and received enthusiastic approval," Koppes said of the college's tenure candidates.

The newly tenured college professors are Miles Krassen, Scott McMillin, Oliver Shirokauer and Tim Scholl. The conservatory professors approved for tenure are Timothy Weiss, James Howsmon, Joanne Erwin and Lorraine Manz.

The board voted to create a College Dean's discretionary fund. A similar fund has already been established for the Dean of the Conservatory. More than one million dollars will be transferred from the trustees' discretionary fund to the College Dean's discretionary fund.

"Careful how you spend it!," Chairman of the Board Bill Perlick said.

The board addressed a number of other financial matters.

The trustees approved a 2.7 percent increase in student fees. The increase is the lowest in 30 years.

"We kept the tuition as low as we possibly can," Dye said. "We reduced the cost of board so that offset the tuition increase which is in essence an inflationary increase."

Myron Szold, chair of the investments committee, said Oberlin's international investments were not doing particuarly well.

"After we get done making money instead of losing it, the money invested internationally will be considerably less," Szold said. "There is a general sentiment to replace one of our managers with someone who does the same job better, which will not be a difficult task. Another alternative is to do something different, rather than the same thing better."

Szold acknowledged the presence of a single student in a tree outside Mudd protesting various investments.

"I mentioned to a student with a banner, I'm so pleased you're working on this issue," Szold said. "It's an incredibly complicated and thorny issue. We're delighted the student body is going to be wrestling with it. We hope and pray you come up with ways to do this better."

The meeting ended just four days before Dye's birthday, prompting the board to sing a rousing chorus of Happy Birthday.