The Death of Olin College
Olin College, by consent of the remaining former directors of the Franklin W. Olin Foundation and a majority vote of the College Trustees, has amended the Founding Precepts of Olin College, item six, to reduce the Olin Scholarship by 50% starting for the class of 2014 (entering in Fall 2010).
I would like to say that I totally called the current crisis in my letter to President Miller back in 2004. I wish I had taken a less alarmist tone in that letter, maybe if I had, it wouldn't have been ignored. But let's be honest, it probably would have been ignored anyways.
What really saddens me isn't the abandonment of the founding precepts or the charging of tuition (although that's plenty sad, too). It's the lost opportunity to respond to the crisis with an experimental, innovative, radically creative solution. By responding with a conventional business solution, the administration has dealt a real blow to the Olin ethos, one that will likely remain even if scholarships are eventually restored.
Early Olin was a risk, and the students who signed on reflected that. Now, as the memory of that time begins to fade from the minds of the student body, Olin is in a critical time of transition. But just when leadership was most needed, the administration has wimped out.
I would like to say that I totally called the current crisis in my letter to President Miller back in 2004. I wish I had taken a less alarmist tone in that letter, maybe if I had, it wouldn't have been ignored. But let's be honest, it probably would have been ignored anyways.
What really saddens me isn't the abandonment of the founding precepts or the charging of tuition (although that's plenty sad, too). It's the lost opportunity to respond to the crisis with an experimental, innovative, radically creative solution. By responding with a conventional business solution, the administration has dealt a real blow to the Olin ethos, one that will likely remain even if scholarships are eventually restored.
Early Olin was a risk, and the students who signed on reflected that. Now, as the memory of that time begins to fade from the minds of the student body, Olin is in a critical time of transition. But just when leadership was most needed, the administration has wimped out.