Thursday, 4:30 PM
Sides duke it out over Dartmouth
By Marcella Bombardieri, Globe Staff
According to one faction, a shadowy cabal of conservatives is waging a war of misinformation to take over the board of trustees of Dartmouth College.
According to the other, devoted alumni are fighting an administration that has neglected undergraduate education in favor of research, let athletic teams languish, and cracked down unfairly on fraternities.
Voting begins this week for an alumni representative to the board, the latest battle in a fight that may prove influential around the country. Is Dartmouth the first domino in a national war on the allegedly liberal, politically correct Ivory Tower? Or is it an inspiration to alumni not to stay on the sidelines?
At the Hanover, N.H., school, alumni elect half of the trustees, an unusual setup, and the board appoints the rest. For most of Dartmouth’s history, an alumni council nominated all candidates, and they tended to be palatable to the administration. But a clause little used until recent years allows a petition candidate to run if he or she gathers 500 signatures from fellow alumni.
In the last two elections, in 2004 and 2005, petition candidates who criticized Dartmouth’s direction and boasted conservative or libertarian credentials won the three open seats.
"Too often in the past, colleges have said, 'Send us your money, and leave us alone,'" said Anne Neal, president of the American Council of Trustees and Alumni, a group that backs the petition efforts at Dartmouth. "We say, 'Sure, send your money, but also speak up.'"
Neal said Dartmouth is part of a significant trend, along with Colgate University and Hamilton College, where conservative alumni also competed for spots on school boards last year.
At Dartmouth, candidates are spending tens of thousands of dollars campaigning, unheard of in alumni elections at universities, according to Sheldon Steinbach, former general counsel of the American Council on Education.
