[Alumni-chat] Re: Alumni-chat Digest, Vol 9, Issue 5

[Pam Olsen]

I'd like to hear from the faculty again.  They've been busy teaching since
school started.  As I recall, they were doing a pretty good job, and the
problems were more with the "renewal" handed down from above, and lack of
spirited fund raising, and lack of good marketing, not with the program. The
program has still been turning out excellence.  I think the watering down of
the co-op program with the "renewal" was a mistake, and of course the drop
in census meant loss of money for programs.

As far as I'm concerned, there will be a need to expand programs when we
recruit more students, but again, how that is done is going to need to
involve faculty more than bringing in "expert alumni."  That can be done,
too, but only in a consultative capacity, I would think.  The people there
are the ones who should have the most input.  They were doing very well
before outsiders came in and started redesigning for them.

Pam ('68)

> From: alumni-chat-request at w3.antioch.edu
> Reply-To: alumni-chat at w3.antioch.edu
> Date: Wed,  7 Nov 2007 14:16:43 -0500 (EST)
> To: alumni-chat at w3.antioch.edu
> Subject: Alumni-chat Digest, Vol 9, Issue 5
> 
> Antioch was most successful when it didn't stand still. Morgan's introduction
> of co-op was a tremendous innovation that defined the distinctive Antioch
> College curriculum for nearly 3/4's of a century. That was vision. Right now,
> however, prospective students are voting with their feet. Without them, there
> will be no Antioch College with or without an alumni rescue effort. I believe
> there is still something unique about the Antioch spirit that links Horace
> Mann to the present: that Antioch prepares a young person to make a difference
> with their life. I believe the 21st century will need this ethos from its
> young people -- exercised in a 21st century way, facing 21st century problems
> and challenges. Today's prospective students are different from those of us
> from the 20th century. How? I say we'd better find out or the enterprise is
> sunk. Rehashing the recriminations of the past will not get us there. Neither
> will secession from the University, whatever the sins of the past may have
> been. Why would we want to turn a blind eye to the current realities and deny
> the need for change? Isn't the Antioch ethos all about being open to change,
> to new perspectives, to facing reality and embracing action? Isn't it about
> learning from experience and shaping one's own destiny? And if it's not, then
> I say Antioch has truly lost its way--and reason for being.