Trustees Convene

College finances will dominate the Board of Trustee's meeting this weekend. Headlining the Trustee's agenda will be a proposed $15 million loan for the proposed Science Center. Funding for the $55 million science center has not met expectations, and along with funds from the Capital Campaign the College will need to take out a loan to pay for the science center's construction.

Asides from the loan issue, the Trustees' weekend meetings should shape up to be a routine December meeting, according to Bob Haslun, secretary of the College.

Preliminary meetings were held on Thursday and will continue into today. One special event is the presentation of an honorary degree to William Goldman, OC '52 (see related article page 2).

On Thursday night, an open forum was held for students to talk with Trustees in a casual setting. Unfortunately, poor advertising for the forum led to a poor turn out. The three students that showed up were outnumbered by the five Trustees in attendance.

Regardless of the turn out, the Trustees took advantage of the opportunity to speak openly with students. The Trustees probed the students for information about their experiences with retention, financial aid and the grading system. "We are trying to figure out why people leave Oberlin with a higher frequency than they do at comparable institutions," said Robert Krulwich OC '69.

Krulwich reported that the first meeting on retention showed that students pronounced dissatisfaction with the social life of Oberlin College. More conclusive reports are still to come, however. As Krulwich said, "We don't know anything right now."

Students also used the meeting to announce an upcoming event. College senior Deborah Gardner discussed the Sexual Assault Support Team's planned conference in the Spring. She indicated to the attending trustees her work towards a well-defined sexual offense policy that will deter sexual assault.

The trustees will convene for their executive session bright and early on Saturday morning. After several procedural formalities are taken care of, the board will hear an update from the development committee presented by Judith Plows. Co-chair of the Campaign Steering Committee, William Robinson, will then update the Trustees on the capital campaign.

Although $165 million has been the figure thrown around by the board, no official goal has been agreed upon for the Capital Campaign. It is possible they will vote to maintain that campaign target, but that is still up in the air. The finalization of the campaign goal depends partly upon how much the committee can initially raise. "We are in the nucleus phase of the Capital Campaign; a period of time where you are raising money for campaign goals, but not in a public way," said Dye. At last report $37.4 million had been raised.

After the executive session, the board of trustees will hold its open session which will include reports from the investment committee, buildings and grounds committee, and the budget and finance committee.

The buildings and ground com mittee report, presented by Roberta Maneker, will include some intriguing topics. The maintenance budget will be announced for 1999-2000. The buildings and ground committee draws together their budget a year beforehand, so that any construction or architectural arrangements can be made well in advance. Maneker will also discuss the status of the environmental science building, which has caused some stir recently with the loss of phone service after a worker twice severed phone lines while excavating the site.

The board of trustees will also have the opportunity to vote on the refurbishment plans for the Oberlin Inn. Although managed by a private company, the Oberlin Inn is owned by the College, and must seek approval from the Trustees in order to make any refurbishments.

The final committee report, presented by Karen Florini, will cover the 1997-98 financial report conducted by outside auditors. Florini will also present the bond financing issue for the new science center, which the Trustees will vote on.