[Alumni-chat] Antioch presidents

[Stephen L. Wasby]

The mention of Henderson - MacGregor - Gould prompts another comment. (Gould 
was president during my five student years at the College.)
    I know less about Henderson than about MacGregor or Gould, but my sense 
here is that something cyclical
was operating -- or at least MacGregor and Gould had
very different styles and strengths (as well as being very different 
personnae).  MacGregor was more the (dare I say "academic"?) visionary, who 
wrote about organizational behavior but was not thought to be good at 
details, or fund-raising, and Gould was the administrator/seeker of funds 
that the College then
needed after MacGregor.
    Although matters were better (relatively) financial then than they were 
later, they were still pretty close to the edge -- the endowment was small, 
and small "perturbations" could make matters dangerous. When Boss Ket gave 
the money for the library, but didn't give money for its maintenance, that 
extra demand on the college's operating budget hit hard.

Steve Wasby '59


----- Original Message ----- 
From: <Sistersara at aol.com>
To: <alumni-chat at w3.antioch.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, February 12, 2008 3:47 PM
Subject: Re: [Alumni-chat] Antioch presidents


>
> In a message dated 2/12/2008 12:03:43 P.M. Central Standard Time,
> aadole at roadrunner.com writes:
>
> The  discussion of Jim Dixon and other Antioch Presidents has not examined
> Algo  Henderson and Doug McGregor. As a student and then an assistant
> instructor.  I observed both these men from afar. When they were in power
> they had to  guide the college through WWII and post war dislocations. The
> faculty  improved in quality. Marvelous students were attracted to the
> college. The  administrators (Dawson, , Pillard, Alexander,etc.) seemed
> resourceful. Many  innovative educational ideas were introduced, including
> the  strengthening  of Community Government, drama and music, and the use 
> of
> achievement tests to recognize student mastery of required  subjects.
>
> Others may wish to add to their accomplishments.
>
> Art  Dole '46
>
>
>
> Art, I would add Sam Gould to your list, and group these three Presidents
> together as the Post-Morgans, who retained Morgan's financial model for 
> the
> college, based on using the physical assets for two divisions of income
> generating students, running the college year round, and thus having about 
> 2/5ths
> more students and income than the number of beds and classroom facilities 
> and
> teaching staff would normally accommodate.  What we have, accordingly,  is 
> an
> economic model for the college that produced sufficient surplus  income, 
> so each
> of these Presidents were able to lead innovations of their  own choosing, 
> but
> at the same time the nearly identical economic structure  served the 
> college
> well in Depression, War, and the post war period of growth  and 
> adjustment.
> Gould's AEA, for instance, beginning in the mid 50's added  another 
> 150-200
> students to the enrolled student body, yet did not need to  provide 
> physical
> facilities for them.  Their needs were met by outsourcing  the teaching 
> and
> serving other needs with a small administrative staff.
>
> I think it important to outline the College History in these sorts  of 
> bare
> economic terms, subtracting from the exposition the values and 
> educational
> ideals for the moment, so as to actually assess Morgan's economic 
> structure
> clearly.  What is important in my mind is that no matter what the 
> economic
> condition of the larger national economy -- Morgan's economic model  both 
> produced a
> constant surplus that could be invested to self-finance  improvements in 
> the
> college -- and it isolated the College from some of the  dislocations of 
> the
> business cycle, war economics, and the like.
>
> Would it be possible to return to something like Morgan's economic model 
> in
> the future?  Don't know, but think it should be discussed in detail.   It 
> may
> well have been the primary reason why all three of these Presidencies 
> were
> fairly successful though with different content.
>
> In looking at Higher Education generally, I suspect we are at the brink of
> some heavy duty major changes -- current economic structure of Higher Ed., 
> has
> just become too expensive for middle income families, and given the 
> anti-Tax
> mood of so much of the Country, I really don't see Government opening  up 
> a
> new river of subsides.  Quite generally, we need a new economic model 
> that
> produces the necessary outcomes, but is simply more efficient.  By the 
> way,
> apparently Ohio ranks 40th in the nation in the percentage of residents 
> who  have
> at least one year of Higher Education.  That surprised me -- I think  back 
> in
> the days I lived in my native Ohio, it was about 10th.  Just an odd
> demographic figure I ran across while thinking about elements of election 
> strategy.
>
>
>
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