Monday, March 22, 2004

by Josh Hausman
Gazette Weatherman

Summary: This week will begin cold, but by the end of the week
temperatures should be more spring-like with highs around 60.

by Jonathan Ference
Living and Arts Editor

On Sunday, over a hundred alumni, staff, and current students filled
the Lang Performing Arts Center to take part in the Jonathan R. Lax ’71
Conference on Entrepreneurship, sponsored by the offices of Career
Services and Alumni Relations and the Swarthmore Business Association.
The conference, which started with a light breakfast and an 11:45 a.m.
keynote address, partially aims to erase assumptions that the College’s
education is not especially well suited to future careers in business
for its graduates.

The Conference is funded by an endowment created by bequest of
Jonathan R. Lax, class of 1971, a “consummate activist” who was also a
successful entrepreneur, creating a mutual fund while still living on
campus in Hallowell. This is the fifth annual edition of the
conference, which traditionally features a keynote, round table
discussions, breakout panels, and a final panel.

This year’s keynote address was given by Randall Larrimore, who
graduated from Swarthmore with a B.A. in economics in 1969. Larrimore,
recently retired from his position as president and CEO of the largest
wholesale distributor of office products, United Stationers, Inc., is
currently a member of the board of directors of several corporations,
including Olin Corp, Campbell Soup Cp., Air-Serv Group, and Evanston
Northwestern Healthcare Foundation.

Larrimore’s address, given to a diverse crowd in the LPAC Cinema,
was titled “Taking the Crum to the Boardroom,” and he centered his
speech on how students can extrapolate the values ingrained in him at
Swarthmore to successful business careers. Larrimore, who also has an
MBA from Harvard, stressed how his Swarthmore experience taught him the
valuable skills of thinking independently and valuing people for what
they think, not just for their position in any given hierarchy. He
cited one example of how his computer data processing was completed at
several times the rate of that of other engineers, simply because he
had shown genuine interest in the computer operators. Larrimore, who
spoke in a very accessible yet informative manner, also provided data
showing that the “good guys”—companies with strong corporate culture
and principled leaders—outperformed other companies by 756 times.

After breakout sessions on 11 topics ranging from venture capital to
socially responsible investing, the group split to attend two panels,
called “Internet Prophets Talk Net Profits” and “Working Green:
Business and Environmental Responsibility.” The day ended with a final
panel with the theme of “Business Without Borders”.

The conference was open to a wide range of attendees, and a list of
registered participants distributed at registration includes members
from all four classes, professors, administrators, and alumni from
graduating classes all the way back to 1941. The ultimate attendance
estimate was 150, though conference organizers acknowledged the
difficulty in being accurate due to passersby who simply joined the
panels without stopping at the registration desk. The organizers also
expressed their gratitude to the Swarthmore Business Association for
its assistance in organizing the conference. The SBA is a new student
group that “seeks to expose its members to the exciting, complex, and
multi-faceted elements of the business world,” according to its
pamphlet.

by Greg Leiserson
News Editor

Vice President for Finance and Treasurer Sue Welsh and Vice
President of Alumni, Development, and Public Relations Dan West
provided answers many students had been looking for at the college
collection on the living wage last Friday, when they quantified the
college’s ability to raise revenue from different sources to fund the
implementation of a living wage at Swarthmore. According to West, to
fund a living wage proposal from the endowment that required one
million dollars annually, about $24 million would need to be raised for
the endowment. As stated by Welsh, a 1% increase in tuition would
generate about $270,000 and a 1% decrease in faculty salaries would
generate about $214,000.

As described by Vice President for College and Community Relations
Maurice Eldridge in his announcement of the event, the purpose of the
collection was “to provide an opportunity for the campus to hear about
various aspects of the living wage issue in more depth in order to
bring campus dialogue to a new level.”

Panelists included Professor of Sociology and Anthropology Sarah
Willie, Welsh, West, Professor of Mathematics, Charles Grinstead,
Department of Educational Studies Administrative Assistant Kae Kalwaic,
Student Mariah Montgomery ’04, and Director of Dining Services Linda
McDougal. Maurice Eldridge moderated the panel. Turnout was
significantly above the level of previous conversations about the
living wage, and included a large number of faculty.

Professor Willie opened the panel with a brief statement about her
position supporting the living wage, arguing that “market is not
inherently fair or good” and saying that she believes “we define
ourselves by how we treat the lowest paid employees not the highest.”

“The question,” she concluded, “is not how we can afford to pay [a
living wage] but how we can afford not to.”

Vice President Welsh distributed a summary of the college’s budget
for the 2003-2004 school year and used it to highlight her belief that
“we cannot expect revenue growth to fund new endeavors” and that “the
endowment is not currently in a position to fund new initiatives”
either.

The budget breakdown identified the major sources of revenue,
student revenues at 44% of college income and endowment support at 46%,
as well as the major expenses, faculty compensation at 61%, debt
service at 8% and capital expenditures at 8%. However, many of the
costs cannot be significantly changed, such as debt service, taxes,
insurance, utilities and food. Additionally, as was noted later by
Professor Grinstead, it is unlikely the board would approve a change
redirecting money from the educational program to compensation.

Vice President West began by noting “I do not think there is great
potential for us to raise much money for this purpose” from alumni
giving. In addition to the large amount required to fund annual costs
of the proposal, the college is already in the middle of a long-term
capital accumulation campaign “The Meaning of Swarthmore,” and money
the campaign is expected to bring in has already been spent prior to
the true completion of the campaign. According to West, if we choose to
fund the proposal from the endowment, the campaign to raise the funds
“would have to be done at the end of this campaign” in 2006 and “it
would take about three to five years” to do so.

West also expressed his opinion that the alumni he judges most
likely to give to such a campaign are the roughly 40% of alums working
for non-profits, including schools and colleges, as opposed to the
roughly 41% of alums in business from which the college draws most of
its support now. Additionally, he suspected that these alums would have
less to give because of their chosen career paths. Panelist Mariah
Montgomery ’04 later expressed dismay in her comments that the college
has not more formally investigated these possibilities. Concluded West,
“I don’t think it’s going to happen quickly, and I know it won’t be
easy.”

In his prepared comments, Professor Charles Grinstead outlined a
proposal that he viewed as a feasible alternative to the higher cost
proposal outlined by the report of the ad hoc committee on the living
wage. The plan Grinstead suggested would increase tuition by .5% and
decrease full professor salaries by .5% to raise approximately
$200,000. This would then be used to provide means tested child care
and health care for all Swarthmore employees. By providing means tested
benefits in this fashion, it would free up all staff to take the
benefit bank payout as a pure salary increase. Since the lowest anyone
is currently paid is $9.66, the extra payout from the benefit bank
would bring the wage up to about $10.60, which is almost the level
recommended by the ad hoc committee in its majority proposal. The
college would need to come up with roughly an additional $50,000 to pay
the salary of an administrator for the means testing program.

Panelists Kae Kalwaic and Mariah Montgomery also spoke in favor of
the living wage, while Linda McDougal spoke against it. On the whole,
the panelists and the vocal audience members seemed to be in favor of
the minimum wage, and arguments in favor of it were much more common
than those opposed.

In the question and answer period, conversation focused primarily on
the legitimacy and appropriateness of means testing, and the fact that
the college does not currently means test for some of the benefits
provided for faculty such as subsidized housing and tuition
reimbursement.

At the conclusion of the panel, audience members were invited to
pick up a copy of some alternative perspectives on the living wage
prepared by Professor of Economics Rob Hollister, a member of the ad
hoc committee.

*****

by Victoria Swisher
Gazette Reporter

Before Spring break, Dean Bob Gross and the Dean’s Advisory
Committee organized focus groups comprised of seniors to discuss their
views on their Swarthmore experiences. While many appreciated the
quality of teaching, they also complained about the workload and lack
of social life on campus.

The Dean’s Advisory Committee invited 10 to 15 seniors in each focus
group, while 5 to 11 actually participated, and the sessions were
moderated by an alumnus from Swarthmore. The students were asked to
“reflect on their four years at Swarthmore,” according to Dean Gross.

The focus groups were a follow-up to the bi-annual survey,
administered to seniors and prepared by the Consortium of Financing
Higher Education (COFHE). “We use this survey to compare ourselves to
peer institutions,” Dean Gross explained.

While the results still need to be organized, Dean Gross was willing
to comment on preliminary findings. Dean Gross stated, “It’s not like
the results were a surprise to us—they were pretty much what we
expected.” Most students laud the college in its efforts and successes
in obtaining valuable faculty members, who are seen as a tremendous
asset. Students also appreciate the accessibility of the staff.

However, students find the workload very intense. They also feel
that as they proceed through their years at Swarthmore, social groups
become “more constrained,” and students look for “more variety in
things to do” in their free time, according to Dean Gross.

The Dean’s Advisory Committee plans to meet and discuss what changes
it will advise. While Dean Gross feels that students come to Swarthmore
expecting a heavy workload, he also believes the committee could work
to investigate ways to give students more skills to handle it. He
commented that he would like to find ways to bring the community
together and that he missed some of Swarthmore’s older traditions.
Future actions of the committee could also include forming focus groups
from other classes to see how students’ attitudes evolve as they spend
more time at Swarthmore.

*****

* After five days of fierce fighting and heavy casualties on both
sides, the Pakistani military turned Sunday to tribal elders to try to
persuade hundreds of Qaeda fighters surrounded in the mountainous
border region to surrender. The military called a temporary cease-fire
while it held a jirga, or traditional council, of all regional tribes
in the town of Wana, said Brig. Mehmood Shah, the security chief in
Pakistan’s tribal areas. It was agreed at the meeting, he said, that
elders would try to negotiate a surrender of the armed militants and
the release of some 14 soldiers and government officials they are
holding hostage. The military’s appeal to the elders was prompted by
the rising anger of local people at the military action, which has
killed at least 17 Pakistani soldiers and some 25 militants as well as
several civilians.

* The United Nations’ top two weapons experts said Sunday that the
invasion of Iraq a year ago was not justified by the evidence in hand
at the time. “I think it’s clear that in March, when the invasion took
place, the evidence that had been brought forward was rapidly falling
apart,” Hans Blix, who oversaw the agency’s investigation into whether
Iraq had chemical and biological weapons, said on CNN’s “Late Edition
with Wolf Blitzer.” Blix described the evidence Secretary of State
Colin Powell presented to the U.N. Security Council in February 2003 as
“shaky,” and said that when he related his opinion to U.S. officials,
“…they chose to ignore us.” Mohamed ElBaradei, director general of the
International Atomic Energy Agency, said he had been “pretty convinced”
that Iraq had not resumed its nuclear weapons program, which the IAEA
dismantled in 1997. ElBaradei also authored a report that revealed that
an alleged contract by Iraq with Niger to import uranium oxide was a
forgery, Blix said. “The document had been sitting with the CIA and
their U.K. counterparts for a long while, and they had not discovered
it,” Blix said. “And I think it took the IAEA a day to discover that it
was a forgery.” Blix said he had not been able to say definitively that
Iraq had no such weapons, but added that he felt history has shown he
was not wrong. “At least we didn’t fall into the trap that the U.S. and
the U.K. did in asserting that they existed,” he said.

* Marking the one-year anniversary of the invasion of Iraq, crowds
of demonstrators marched through Midtown Manhattan and several cities
from Alaska to Australia on Saturday, March 20, in a peaceful global
protest to the war. The demonstrations came months after millions took
to the streets in the weeks before the war last year. As reported by
the New York Times, a crowd of more than 100,000 people in New York
City “all came together in what organizers described as a broad-based
protest of the Bush administration’s foreign policy not just in Iraq,
but in Haiti and Israel.” Across the country, there were similar
marches in San Francisco, Fayetteville, N.C., and 250 other cities,
organizers said. Groups also took to the streets in many capitals in
South America and Europe and in places as far-flung as Quetta,
Pakistan, and Dhaka, Bangladesh. In London, two protesters unfurled a
banner reading “Time for Truth,” in a reference to the suspicions some
Europeans have that the United States and Britain exaggerated the
threat posed by Iraq. In Madrid, thousands marched in memory of the 202
killed on March 11 in a series of coordinated bombings along commuter
train lines.

*****

EndNote Citation Software Workshop
McCabe Computer Room, 1:00 p.m.

A Conversation About Diversity: “Unpacking Diversity at Swarthmore”
Scheuer Room, 7 p.m.

Phi Beta Kappa Lecture: Graham Fleming
Science Center 101, 7:30 p.m.

Movie Screening: Fiddler on the Roof
Kohlberg 228, 7:30 p.m.

*****

SPORTS UPDATE

With an amazing 16-2 final score, Swarthmore ended Sunday’s game
against Manhattanville on Clothier field with no mercy.

After the first quarter, Swat led 7-1 and never let up. John Cleaver
’04 and Ryan McKenna ’07 scored three goals each. Other scorers
included Jay Charles ’07, Joe DeSimone ’04, and Tim Chryssikos ’05,
while goalie Steve Ibister ’04 blocked nine shots.

*****

Though Saturday’s game was a loss to Eastern (15-10), Sunday’s game
featured a stunning coming-from-behind victory over Vassar, 9-8.

On Saturday, Lindsay Roth ’07, Ele Forbes ’05, and Jackie Kahn ’04
all scored two goals each, but couldn’t keep up with the Eagles.

The Sunday game was a study in excitement as Vassar jumped to a 3-0
lead, only to be cut back by Swat to 3-2 7:45 into the game. Though
halftime saw the score at 4-2, Swat slammed in 4 goals in quick
succession. Soon the game was tied at six, with more waffling on the
scores until there was only 3:35 left in the game.

Kahn scored a whopping 4 goals, with other scorers Roth, Katie
Crawford ’07, Heidi Fieselmann ’06, Megan Speare, and Niamh Shortt ’06.
Goalie Jenn Hart ’05 recorded 11 saves to help the Garnet to this
stunning victory.

*****

In an unofficial yet exciting match, Swat opened its season with a
9-5 victory over Neumann on Sunday.

Cliff Sosin ’04 knocked out 2 runs, while Jody Fisher ’07 and Sam
Faeder ’07 both drove in more runs.

Pitcher Matt Goldstein ’04 only gave up one run earned and struck
out four Knights. When Jared Leidermann ’05 took the mound, he kept the
lead to allow the Garnet to stay ahead.

*****

Today:
There are no contests scheduled for today.

Tomorrow:
Golf at Dickinson Invitational, 1:00 p.m.
Baseball hosts F&M, 3:00 p.m.
Softball at Alvernia (DH), 3:00 p.m.
Women’s Tennis at Ursinus, 4:00 p.m.

*****

QUOTE OF THE DAY

“To make mistakes is human; to stumble is commonplace; to be able to
laugh at yourself is maturity.”
–William A. Ward

*****

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Just want to tell us what you think?

Contact the staff at daily@swarthmore.edu

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