Donald LuzzattoYOU CAN CLAIM victory today all you like. But you are alumni, and though the college appreciates the checks you write, William and Mary doesn’t belong to you.
You don’t own the college like the students who spend every day in the classrooms and on the lawns. Not like the faculty and staff who work there. Not like the parents of kids who attend. You don’t even own it like you did when you were young and watched the alumni during homecoming and thought you would never get that old.
I bring all this up because many of my fellow alumni have been, since the beginning of his tenure, in full green and gold umbrage at the conduct of President Gene Nichol, who quit this week rather than be fired this summer. Wildly over-represented in political circles, alums literally forced Nichol out by the sheer weight of their outrage and offense at his liberal politics.
The president, of course, provided them with ample reason for indignation. He yanked the cross from the Wren Chapel. That was ridiculous. The school lost donations, but no president should run a campus based on what brings in the most dough. Then he permitted sex workers to come and put on a show. Given that students sponsored it, I’m not sure it was his place to say no, even if alums stamped their feet.
Then the General Assembly got in the act. Members of the college’s governing board were frog-marched before a House committee last week, a scene far more insulting to the university than the removal of a cross or the presence of a prostitute on campus.
“If any president of a college has put Virginia in a bad light, it’s Mr. Nichol,” spake Del. Jeffrey Frederick, who — according to his bio — graduated from Emory University in Atlanta. “Perhaps we should reconsider Mr. Nichol’s tenure.”
They no doubt do things differently in Georgia, but here in Virginia the responsibility for firing a college president rests not with a striving delegate, but with the school’s Board of Visitors, which was left with no choice.
Down this path, lit by the flames of Frederick and his friends, is repulsive political correctness of a distinctly cowering kind. It ends at a presidential office that only a politician is fit to fill.
If alums don’t see that, they’re trotting down this path with eyes firmly shut. Worse, they don’t love William and Mary, at least the school they actually attended. Perhaps they love some simulacrum — all perfect sunsets at Crim Dell— but they can’t love the school and its hurly-burly.
The real William and Mary, may I remind my brothers and sisters, allowed the screening of extremely naughty movies to thousands of students as part of a movie series. The real one featured a fraternity of louts so drunken that they lit a float on fire in the middle of the homecoming parade. The real one once allowed a ball so debauched that people traveled from other states to attend.
That’s the kind of stuff that happens on a campus, along with learning and love, and despite a president’s best efforts. It’s part of going to college, and it’s part of growing up.
Several of the people who led the inquisition against Nichol attended those movies and went to that ball, or wish they had. They may have changed plenty in the intervening years and probably disapprove of and regret such behavior. But we carry all that with us, too. It’s part of growing up.
The trick is to get older without getting old, to become an adult without becoming a scold. I’d like to think that my own college behavior (and I have more to regret than many), along with the judicious application of a family I don’t deserve and the passing of plenty of years, molded me into the man I am now, a far better person than the kid I was 24 years ago.
It no doubt has made me a proud and protective alumnus, whose only responsibilities are to be ever-after grateful to the place that birthed me, to write a check when I can and to help lift up the people trying now to survive four years in Williamsburg.
But I no longer own the college. And neither do you.
Donald Luzzatto is an editorial writer for The Virginian-Pilot. E-mail him at donald.luzzatto@pilotonline.com. Find his columns, and comment on them, at donald-luzzatto.blogspot.com.
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William & Mary
Sad that such arrogance and ignorance abounds from the alumni of such a great school as William & Mary. Thomas Jefferson felt strongly that a each generation do it's best and then get out of the way of the next generation doing it's best. Don't hang around and make nuisence of yourself. So grow up and get a life you alumni of the past. It was your school now it's theirs.
Do not belittle the W&M of 2008
I am a member of the William & Mary class of 2009.
Firstly, I thank you tremendously for recognizing the disproportionate weight of the conservative alumni voice in the past months, as well as the under-representation of students, faculty, and staff in all of these proceedings. However, you're argument is not entirely helpful.
The William and Mary you describe is not what it is today. The school has come a long way in the past 24 years, and weekend parties we may have, but the life of the school does not center around such extravagances as you suggest. You belittle our intentions and hinder our demonstrations saying "it's just part of growing up". Striving for diversity and protecting our first Amendment is not "just growing up". This is what becoming an American citizen is about. Let us be progressive. Let us be heard. Help us if you will, but do not belittle the sincerity of the students, faculty and staff who are angered and distressed by the atrocities they have seen wrecked upon their beloved school over the past months and especially these last few weeks. We are outraged at the unjust processes that took place-- namely the pointed interrogation of BOV members
I say good riddance.
What does Luzzatto mean when he says William and Mary alumni are "wildly over-represented in political circles?" As an editorial writer -- not a politician per se, but certainly someone with influence -- does he count himself among that over-represented group?
Luzzatto comes off like an undergraduate, i.e. someone looking for something -- anything -- to protest. The rest of us can clealy see Nichol for what he is: a blow-hard. I say good riddance.
By next semester, all of this will be forgotten.
Agreed
Thank you so much for your support! I agree with much of what this article is saying.
I am an undergraduate member of the class of 2008, and I am thoroughly disappointed with the attitude taken by so many college alumni. Nichol took a course of action CLEARLY in accordance with the separation of church and state. And (most of) you buried him for it, threatening with your checkbooks. As if this weren't enough, the heads of your camp in the BoV attempted to bribe Nichol into characterizing his non-renewal as unassociated with ideological concerns.
The College is a set of interactions between faculty and students to further the pursuit of truth. It is not a place to politically grandstand. It is not a place to be purchased and toyed with. And it is certainly not a not a place to glorify your old ideals.
The Board has claimed the decision was made for more than ideological reasons. If so, what were they? There is absolutely no transparency on this issue. If Nichol faltered because he had poor alumni relations, I see that as a problem with alumni, rather than with upholding the rights of free speech and free religion.
As a current student, I
As a current student, I don't think Nichol has done the job he needs to whilst here. He has divide more than he has united. Whether or not this was intention is irrelevant.
Money is still absolutely vital to the success of this school, considering the state's paltry 20% or so of funding. Not pissing off alumni (whether or not you agree with their reasons for being angered) is a key to improving The College for its *current* students. As donations rise, so do academics, and there will be more money for programs like the Gateway program, but without the side effect of watering down the talent that makes up the relatively small student body by guaranteeing community college transfer admission.
The students you see protesting are mostly sheep who have little substance for their reasons of liking Nichol besides that he is "nice to the students". Many of them have only experienced Nichol (including myself). I agree with them, he is nice, but now he has also left a group of seniors out to dry because there will not be a true President at their graduation ceremonies. Not quite a "Go Tribe" gesture of solidarity.
I'm dissatisfied.
alumni have every right to be involved in William and Mary
I wish I didn't have to be involved, but William and Mary has indeed turned into an asylum run by inmates devoid of all reason. In case you didn't know, alumni built William and Mary into what it is today, not current students, and certainly not self-righteous, misguided editorial writers for the Virginian-Pilot who have lost all sense of reason, history, and morality. I still care about William and Mary. Its billion dollar endowment was raised by alumni, not faculty, and many of us have no desire to see the College which we have worked so hard to build destroyed by lunatics. It is not alumni involvement that you object to, it is that some alumni that are involved are still guided by sanity and reason.
"As a member of the W&M
"As a member of the W&M class of 1994, I have as much of a right to inform you that you are wrong, wrong, wrong, as you do to spew your sanctimonious pabulum in support of the inmates running the asylum. How empowered (read: entitled) and protected you must feel perched high atop Batten Tower, golden pen in hand! Fortunately for the rest of us peons, you, like Mr. Nichol, will just have to get over yourself. "Effective immediately!""
Excuse me, but did you just refer to me and my fellow students as "the inmates running the asylum?" For one thing, I am a student paying my own tuition without aid from my family or the government. As such, I believe I am entitled to have some control over my investment, inmate or no. I do not intend to "get over myself." I will be with my professors and fellow students tomorrow and thursday protesting the BOV decision. This is our school now, not yours. Do your alma mater a favor and recognize that this man matters so much to current W&M students for good reason. If you can't understand that, maybe you should acknowledge your age and "get over yourself."
Donations do matter
"...but no president should run a campus based on what brings in the most dough."
Oh yeah? Donations are preceded by feelings of goodwill. Academic presidential posts are political, juggling the interests of the students, faculty, governing body and alumni. Tell me, which of these groups DONATES money to a school? Which of these groups has added the most to W&M's $600 million endowment?
Nichol, despite doing what he thought was right, squandered his goodwill. Alumni may not "own" the school, but the school could not survive without them. It's a nasty situation and the Board will likely take hits. Nichol was charismatic and well-liked by many. But we now have to move on.
Re: Spare Me the Sanctimony
I am a member of the Law School's class of 2008, although after recent events, and the comments of the College's graduates, I will be ashamed to call myself an alumnus. I had hoped that a public school like W&M would be freer from the threats of its donors than it apparently is, but I should have realized that a bunch of reactionary religious nuts with checkbooks are far more preferable to the ignorant culture police they've elected to the General Assembly. If there is any positive result of President Nichol's resignation, it's that now he will be able to spend his time at the Law School, where we actually care about the First Amendment.
You had your chance.
To the other commenter, no offense, but you started college probably a month after I was born and graduated when I was 4 years old.
Things have changed and you had your chance to be a college student just as now I have my chance and I've been told time in and time out that college is the best four years of your life and you should own it and enjoy it and make mistakes and learn from them, and that's what I whole-heartedly intend to do and President Nichol allowed the students to have their own voice and be able to have a say in what happens in their time at William and Mary, not in the time that YOU spend as an Alum, in the time that WE spend here. While we are grateful to the Alumni that help the campus, you really have no idea what the full story is, you don't live here anymore, I could potentially be living in your old freshman room or the room of something like 150 past students of the College, but its my room now, not yours.
Our campus has been shaken today because he was someone that we as students believed in as the leader of our campus and we've seen the amazing things that he's done, the Gateway program that President Nichol instituted helped my best friend come he
Student's Rights?
As a current student at the College of William and Mary, and a fairly conservative one at that, I must say that I agree with the statements made here. Even though we apreciate the oppinions of those who graduated before us, you no longer have the same stake in this game we're playing. You're watching from afar (or perhaps not so far); we're living it. Most of us are very upset over what has happened. I don't personally know anyone who isn't. Gene Nichol is like a father to us, and like any father, he is human and makes mistakes. I just wish that everyone could see that he's doing what he believes as right. I also wish that people who no longer live or work on campus would stop trying to have the same amount (or more) say as those of us who do. I find it absolutely unforgivable that the wishes of the students have been out right ignored. Trust me, you'll be hearing about this for a while.
Spare me the sanctimony.
As a member of the W&M class of 1994, I have as much of a right to inform you that you are wrong, wrong, wrong, as you do to spew your sanctimonious pabulum in support of the inmates running the asylum. How empowered (read: entitled) and protected you must feel perched high atop Batten Tower, golden pen in hand! Fortunately for the rest of us peons, you, like Mr. Nichol, will just have to get over yourself. "Effective immediately!"
Amen
Enough said.