[Alumni-chat] Community Meeting on Thursday afternoon

[Sistersara at aol.com]

In a message dated 10/4/2007 8:58:42 A.M. Central Daylight Time,  
aadole at roadrunner.com writes:

Using  consultants is risky. Consider the plans proposed by  consultants
previously  employed by the BOT (eg. The Renewal Plan).  Both the BOT and the
AB must bear in mind that it is the faculty and  administration (especially
the President whoever she is) plus the students  who have to carry out any
plan. Several specialists in higher education,  sociology, and psychology
have written case studies on the failure of top  down plans. The plans were
subtly sabotaged by those who were charged with  carrying them out but who
were not consulted.

Art Dole '46>  



Art, Consultants can be very valuable if the job they are hired to do is  
well defined.  For instance, one very clear job that needs doing vis a vis  
Antioch is "market research" -- where is the potential market given current  
demographics that might be interested in the kind of Antioch that is  created?  What 
is the likely range in tuition and other costs this segment  of potential 
students will be able to spend on college?  This doesn't mean  starting from 
scratch -- these kinds of projections are possible from widely  available data 
bases, but it looks to me, right now, that this in-house  expertise is not 
necessarily available.  For that kind of information, a  consultant is useful -- it 
can help you determine how to re-organize so as to  potentially be attractive 
to some relatively small segment of the market of the  near future -- say the 
kids and families beginning to think college for their 13  or 14 year old.  
 
Our problem right now, I think, is that no one has focused on "what went  
wrong" over the years, and thus what we actually have to agree to have fixed  
going into the future (should there be one), and in addition, we have not  
examined traditional Antioch Values, and pushed the question of how these would  be 
actualized in the Higher Ed scene of the near future -- meaning the next 25  
years or so.  Those things need to be addressed BEFORE one starts talking  
about recruiting students and all.  Without this, a consultant who can lend  
specialized information to the planning process is probably pretty  useless.  



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