About 40 students gathered in the Danforth University Center on Monday evening to celebrate Green Action’s kickoff of Renew WashU, a new initiative to get the University to switch over to renewable energy.

Students attending the event took part in interactive arts activities, and listened to speakers, including one from the Sierra Club.

Green Action co-president Claire Christensen said that the group started the Renew WashU initiative in response to a new University task force aimed at discussing renewable energy.

“We want the campus to use 100 percent renewable energy in the future,” Christensen said.

These energy choices would include wind and solar energy.

Christensen said that although this number might be difficult to reach, the University does have the ability to achieve the goal.

Sustainability Director Phil Valko said that the University taskforce is still in the planning stages, but that it’s main goal will be to create a renewable energy plan for the University.

But, even with the new University task force supported by student involvement, not all students think it is feasible for the University to switch to 100 percent renewable energy.

“I don’t know if it’s possible to have everything be renewable. Not 100 percent, but maybe close to it, like 50 percent,” freshman Mari Price said.

Some students doubt that the group will meet its goal, because sustainability is not a top priority for many students.

“Even though the campus is going green I think there is a lot that can’t be done. People aren’t going to want to pay for a renewable campus when there are other things that are probably more necessary,” junior Alyssa Stein said.

Others said that the cost of making the switch may be prohibitive.

“That would require a lot of infrastructure changes and probably would not be cost effective,” senior Ali Hruschka said.

According to Valko, although the goal may be difficult to reach, it does provide a good incentive.

“I think it’s a big bold goal. It’s going to take an awful lot to achieve a goal like that. I think it’s important for us to be setting big goals but we’re in a short time frame,” Valko said.

Still, Christensen is optimistic about the University’s ability to become more sustainable.

“We want to work with the administration so that it is not just words but actual actions. We know that 100 percent is a lot, but we think Washington University has the capacity and the obligation to do it,” she said.

The survey specifically focused on how university leaders boost their annual income by sitting on corporate boards, for which they receive board earnings.

In addition to the $861,979 in compensation that Chancellor Wrighton received last year from Washington University, he also received $548,734 from sitting on the corporate boards for Corning Incorporated, Brooks Automaton and Cabot Corporation, bringing his total income to $1,410,713.

Other university leaders who made the list include John L. Hennessy of Stanford University—who sits on the boards of Google and Cisco Systems, Ruth J. Simmons from Brown University who sits on the boards of Goldman Sachs and Texas Instruments and Richard C. Levin of Yale University who is on the board of American Express.

In terms of college compensation, Chancellor Wrighton is the sixth highest earner out of the 10 university leaders in the survey. His additional board compensation, though, brought him to fourth, behind Hennessy, Levin, and Shirley M. Tilghman of Princeton University.

Glenn MacDonald, an economics professor at Olin Business School, said it is not unusual for university leaders to sit on corporate boards, as they are usually very intelligent individuals in charge of large organizations.

“Corporations want them because they provide a different perspective coming from an educational background,” MacDonald said. “They frequently have a different way of looking at things that makes them valuable.”

Of the 10 top university leaders on the list, Wrighton is the only one to sit on three different corporate boards; the others sit on either one or two.

MacDonald explained that Wrighton is a desirable candidate for a corporate board position because of how he has proven himself an “academic rock star” who has risen to take charge of an organization with a $5 billion endowment.

“If you’re a washed-up professor, no one’s going to pay you to be on their board” MacDonald said. “But if you’re a really important scientist from a relevant area running a huge organization? Those are the guys people want on their board.”

Wrighton is unique, MacDonald said, in that he has established himself through academia, while most university leaders are administrators who work their way up.

Steven Givens, associate vice chancellor for public affairs, agreed that Wrighton was a top choice for a corporate board member because of his experience both as a scientist and a recognized leader in higher education.

“In his capacity as a member of the board, he is able to offer all these organizations his scientific knowledge and expertise, his management and strategic planning experience and the wisdom he has gained as the leader of one of the world’s great universities,” Givens wrote in an email to Student Life.

Givens explained that the Chancellor Wrighton’s board service is monitored by the University’s strict conflict of interest policies and internal audit procedures.

In addition to the corporate boards listed in the survey, Givens noted that Chancellor Wrighton also volunteers as a board member for a number of nonprofit organizations.

Editor’s note: The original version of this article stated that The Daily performed the study when in fact it is an investigation by the Chronicle of Higher Education. Student Life regrets the error.

This increase, approved at the board’s meeting last week, follows an increase of the same size last year. Chancellor Mark S. Wrighton said he hopes endowment spending will continue to grow in years to come.

The rise in spending comes on the heels of an approximately 21 percent return on the University’s endowment investments this year.

Endowment spending is based on the average value of the University’s endowment over the past five years. Due to negative returns in recent years of economic downturn, this year’s increase in spending is well below this year’s investment returns.

“The aim is to try to increase the spending from the endowment by at least inflation. One percent is lower than inflation. And so that creates a sort of strain for us,” Wrighton said.

The one percent increase accounts for just under $2.5 million in additional endowment spending, and the total endowment spending accounts for 10 percent of the University’s operating budget.

According to Wrighton, most of the increased spending has been predetermined by donors for specific uses, such as endowed professorships, scholarships, research programs and other special projects.

“Where those dollars go is defined by what the endowment has been given to us [for], in terms of purpose, by the donor…There’s no decision. It’s already preordained, if you will,” he said.

The board also began the process of setting next year’s tuition, providing the administration with a range of potential rates. The administration will present a proposal to the executive committee of the board in January, and the committee will decide what tuition will be.

“But because our costs are rising, one percent additional payout is helpful…We’re not keeping pace with inflation in that particular revenue stream. So, we’re hoping that we will have better investment returns in the endowment,” Wrighton said.

Trustees also elected Robert Frick, former vice chairman of the board of Bank of America, to the board of trustees.

The board approved the December graduating class before their Saturday ceremony, as well as new tenure appointments and promotions.

The meeting also addressed innovation and entrepreneurship at the University. Trustees broke into discussion groups that addressed topics such as the economic benefits of research projects and the role of innovation and entrepreneurship in fulfilling what the University refers to as its “educational mission.”

The assistant professor of philosophy addressed the letter to faculty at universities nationwide, encouraging them to approach their schools’ administrations and push for public statements affirming their schools’ dedication to free assembly and speech. It was in response to police actions at the University of California campuses at Davis and Berkeley—where officers attacked nonviolent Occupy protesters with pepper spray and batons.

But in less than two weeks, more than 1600 collegiate faculty have signed Smith’s letter, about a dozen of them from Washington University.

Philosophy Professor John Doris said he signed the letter to encourage the University to use appropriate methods to control the recent surge in activism nationwide.

“[For] the majority of my students’ and my professional life, universities have not been in an activist mode, and…educators have started to ask what are our responsibilities…in this wider social context beyond what we teach in class, and what is our responsibility to our students in terms of having campuses be decent and safe places,” Doris said. “And the worry is that the administrations at Davis and Berkeley in particular seem to fail in that mission in fairly deplorable ways.”

Specifically, the letter notes the importance of protecting universities as centers of national protests.

“For more than three generations, American university and college campuses have been crucial locations in which inspiring and important political activity has occurred…This amazing tradition is being threatened by the use of violence by university officials against their own students and faculty who are acting within this tradition,” Smith wrote.

The letter urges schools to publically announce their dedication to allowing nonviolent protests to occur:

“We therefore call on chancellors and presidents…to declare publicly that their campuses are Safe Protest Zones, where nonviolent, public political dissent and protest will be protected by university police…to commit publicly to making their campuses safe locations for peaceful public assembly…and to instruct their police and security forces that they must abide by these policies.”

Doris is currently deciding whether to gather interested faculty to present the letter to the Washington University administration.

“We would go to [Chancellor Mark] Wrighton with the letter and ask for a statement of support,” Doris said. “There’s not presently a faculty Occupy presence, but there doesn’t have to be for this to happen. It wouldn’t be that hard to put [a delegation] together.”

Although members of the English, philosophy and psychology departments have signed the letter, the University’s administration has not been involved in the discussion.

Assistant Vice Chancellor Rob Wild said that Washington University is unlikely to release an official statement directly in response to the events in California, noting that the school already has a strong tradition of permitting nonviolent protests.

“That’s just something that’s been part of our University for a long time and continues to be part of it today,” he said. “Most people in the University are aware that there’s a level of protest that’s going on…conversations I’ve been involved with the Chancellor on this have reaffirmed that we are a place that supports the rights of members of the University community to engage in free speech [and] assembly—basically to express their viewpoints in public places on campus.”

Chief of Police Don Strom similarly noted that the University is committed to allowing students to voice their opinions in a way that doesn’t detract from the operations of the school.

“We recognize the right of people to exercise their free speech but also to do it in a responsible way…and often that’s not a problem,” he said.

Smith said he plans to publish the letter with signatures sometime next week. The letter has already been published without signatures on numerous academic blogs and the Huffington Post.

Smith said he was taken aback by the attention the letter has received.

“I was blown away, I was overwhelmed by the support and interest in this,” he said. “I did nothing beyond posting this on my Facebook page—really, nothing.”

The effects of the economic recession that first hit the University around two years ago are just starting to diminish, according to Barbara Feiner, chief financial officer for the University.

“Following the decline in our endowment in fiscal year 2009, we did reduce many budgets in fiscal years 2010 and 2011, primarily in central administrative areas,” Feiner said. “During the current year, we are monitoring expenses carefully, but there have not been widespread budget cuts.”

Numerous departments are seeing the effects of the improving endowment.

University Libraries is seeing an increased budget after suffering from cutbacks over the 2010-2011 year.

“We received an increase in our ongoing collections budget and one-time funds for some large purchases,” Shirley K. Baker, vice chancellor for scholarly resources and dean of University Libraries, said. “And, we were funded to add two positions to the staff to deal with changing library needs.”

Baker said the libraries need the funds to afford increasingly expensive collections, especially scientific journals.

The Office of Residential Life is also having fewer financial difficulties this year, Accounting Manager Joyce Markowski said.

In the previous fiscal year, the office lost five percent of its funding, leading it to postpone its plan to demolish Rubelmann House and forcing it to cut several staff positions. Tim Lempfert, associate director of Residential Life, emphasized that the office specifically avoided cutting programming or College Council funding.

“Budgets change every year depending upon income and expenses,” Markowski said. “We have looked for ways to be more efficient, trim our expenses…in some cases, we have not filled [our] open positions.”

Radha Gopalan, assistant professor at the Olin Business School, said the decreasing cutbacks reflect the University’s improving finances.

“The economy influences university spending by affecting the two important revenue sources: the performance of the endowment and fee income. I believe the decreasing cutbacks are a reflection of improvements on both fronts.”

Some students remain surprised that the University’s endowment suffered in the past, and disagree with the school’s allocation choices.

“I’m surprised that endowment has dropped in past years, especially considering the prestige and accomplishments Wash. U. has been obtaining recently,” sophomore Timothy Greer said. “If I had to change one thing in Wash. U.’s budget, I would allocate more money to athletics and less to keeping the grass green. Wash. U. pays so much for fertilizer and landscaping everywhere on campus and I think the money could be used better for other things.”

Another student suggested the University use its increased endowment to provide more services to undergraduates.

“I would kind of guess they’d do some more construction things, but I hope they’d do things that would be more helpful to students,” senior Zach Lou said. “I’m a senior and I’m really interested in post-grad opportunities.”

In response to the upcoming launch of internet “.xxx” domains, the University has preemptively blocked its trademarked names from being scooped up by pornography companies.

According to the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the new .xxx domain is intended only for members of the online, sexually oriented adult entertainment (pornography) community to use.

Washington University, among other institutions, was concerned with protecting its image in the presence of this new domain.

“We want to protect our brand names from being used by others,” said Karen R. Daubert, the Director of Product Licensing at the University.

The .xxx domain was proposed by International Foundation for Online Responsibility (IFFOR). The domain is meant to allow for easier identification of sexually explicit websites for both the people who wish to access it and people who wish to block or avoid the adult content.

“As a part of the process, they offered a period of time, called ‘Sunrise Phase,’ for trademark registrants to block [the trademarks] from being available,” Daubert said.

The Sunrise Period began this year on September 7 and ended on October 28. Colleges and many other organizations all across the nation have been filing applications to block their trademarks from use by third-parties during this time.

Trademarks the University owns include “Wash U,” “WUSTL,” and “Washington University.” The earliest trademark was bought in 2004.

To block the domains, an organization must buy its trademarked names off the .xxx domain at a cost of $200 each.

“I think it’s a smart thing to do,” sophomore Brooke Yarrows said. “In the long run [owning] the .xxx domain names will be preventive.”

While many students agree with the University for taking this measure, some were still astonished by the idea of University buying porn domains.

“When I hear about the University buying porn domains, the first thing that comes to mind is [to prevent] students buying them as jokes,” junior Kristelle Aisaka said. “I guess it shows how much faith they have in us.”

Certain students were not as pleased with the spending.

“I don’t think [buying porn domains] is among our most critical issues,” said sophomore Alaina Smith.

The effectiveness of .xxx domains is still under debate by both pornography providers and people who wish to avoid the content.

Providers argue that the domain will allow the explicit sites to be easily blocked on networks with internet filters, while those opposed to pornography complained of the lack of a mandate requiring all providers to adopt the .xxx domain.

The search for a permanent dean of the College of Arts & Sciences has begun with the appointment of an eight-member search committee and the scheduling of two community forums.

Dean Jim McLeod, who formerly held the position, passed away on Sept. 6 after working for the University for more than 35 years.

Sharon Stahl, dean of the First Year Center, and Wayne Fields, the Lynne Cooper Harvey Distinguished Professor of English, are currently sharing the dean’s duties.

Stahl noted that one key quality the committee is looking for is a strong commitment to excellence.

“[We’re looking for] someone who enjoys both working with students and faculty, someone who appreciates creating opportunities for faculty and students to interact,” she said.

Wolfram Schmidgen, an associate professor of English, is chairing the committee. Other members include Arts & Sciences faculty and administrators and a student representative.

The role of the committee, Schmidgen said, is to identify feasible candidates and recommend one or two to Gary Wihl, dean of the faculty of Arts & Sciences, hopefully in the spring. The committee will begin by looking at people already part of the University community.

“This is a sort of unusual opportunity for us to actually understand more about where we have come from and how we have wound up in this really good place and to really think about what future direction we want to go in,” Schmidgen said. “That’s what makes it an important moment for Arts & Sciences.”

To aid the community and the committee’s understanding of the process, the committee has scheduled two community forums. The discussions, set for Nov. 29 and Dec. 1 from 3-5 p.m., will be held in January Hall, room 110.

The first community forum, “Where have we been?” will focus on McLeod’s accomplishments as dean of Arts & Sciences. His former colleagues will be giving presentations about his accomplishments to help those in attendance gain a better understanding of how McLeod shaped the undergraduate experience during his tenure as dean.

“Because Jim’s work grew up organically over so many years, it’s not necessarily very easy to understand how he was able to do what he did,” Schmidgen said. “[He] was able to do things…that I think are not easy to understand unless you really look more closely, and that’s what we’re trying to do in this first meeting.”

The second discussion, titled “Where are we going?” will focus on the future of the College of Arts & Sciences.

“[We’re] trying to figure out what the future challenges are for us and what kind of leadership we’re actually in need of in this particular juncture,” Schmidgen said. “We’re trying to look back into the past and learn some lessons about Jim’s work and why it was so effective but then use that knowledge and look forward and try to figure out what the future challenges are.”

A third meeting, to be held in January, will showcase two deans from other universities discussing their views on Washington University and the College of Arts & Sciences. That meeting is still in the planning stages.

Schmidgen stressed that the discussions will help the committee define desired characteristics in potential candidates.

“It’s by no means the case that we have a completely clear coherent picture of what Jim has achieved [and] how he has achieved it, and, for that reason also, we don’t have a very clear picture yet—a very defined picture yet—of who the best candidate for this position will be,” he said.

Stahl stressed that despite some difficulties functioning without its top figure, the College of Arts & Sciences is doing well.

“The challenges have been eased greatly by the wonderful colleagues who are the deans in the College of Arts & Sciences,” she said. “It’s because of the wonderful commitment of all the deans in the college that it’s manageable.”

Around 50 students gathered in Tisch Commons Monday night to take part in the University’s annual Tuition Forum, which featured panel presentations and an open forum in which students could ask high-ranking University officials’ questions.

Wrighton took the occasion to stress the importance of continually working toward the betterment of the University.

“We are striving to improve, and we want to do things that respond to student interests and faculty interest,” he said. “We want to have higher impact [and] we want to build the stature of Washington University.”

Academically, Wrighton said that he considers the University comparable to schools such as Northwestern University, Duke University, Emory University and the University of Pennsylvania.

He noted that maintaining and enhancing the University sometimes requires increased costs for students. But he added that the University is working to increase tuition as little as possible by pulling from gifts and endowment funds.

While the rate of tuition increase is higher than the inflation rate, Wrighton said that the rate is actually at its lowest since the 1960s.

Wrighton said that the University was working to keep the cost of tuition manageable by improving scholarships and financial aid. He said that increased financial aid opportunities will help the school achieve greater socio-economic diversity.

“We’ve significantly increased the annual commitment to scholarships,” Wrighton said. “In fact, we’re outpacing our philanthropic success by the commitments that we are making.”

Specifically, Wrighton noted that the University has raised more than $125 million over the past two years, under a public initiative to attract funds for undergraduate and graduate scholarships.

While some students voiced additional concerns about the high price of room and board, Wrighton said that the price was in keeping with quality of the product that students received.

“We receive very positive responses to the quality of our rooms and residential environment and the food service here,” he said. “So yes, we’re expensive on room and board, but we’re not the highest [among peer institutions] there either.”

The position was vacated at the end of September when Fred Volkmann retired after working at the University for 31 years.

Volkmann sent an email to select members of the community on January 10, 2010 announcing his decision to retire on September 30, 2011.

The Vice Chancellor of Public Affairs serves as the chief communication officer for the University, managing the University’s publications, news and central University public relations.

Although the University has not officially announced a replacement, Executive Vice Chancellor for Administration Hank Webber said that the University has identified very strong candidates. The University expects to resolve the job search within the next couple of months.

The Record announced that a 10-member search committee was named on Sept. 2, 2011.

Webber declined to give out any names or details of prospective candidates.

“I think all of us would hope that we are moving toward [a] resolution. It is by no means unusual to have a delay of a few months between a candidate leaving and a new candidate named,” he said. “Vice Chancellor Volkmann performed with great skill for over 30 years. It’s a challenging search.”

A search committee, chaired by the University’s dean of the Law School Kent Syverud, and an outside search consultant has suggested several candidates to the University administration.

“I think that all senior management searches take a certain amount of time to make sure that you’re coming with exactly the right person,” Webber said, “These are very high level searches, and you want to be absolutely sure you have the right person. This [search] is of course being given the prominence of Washington University in St. Louis.”

To find the candidates, the committee looked at a wide variety of candidates across the country. Webber stressed the significance of the job and the importance of finding the right candidate.

“[The Vice Chancellor of Public Affairs] helps tell the story of the many accomplishments of an outstanding university to a wide variety of audiences, be they prospective students, prospective donors, the news media, the St. Louis community, and the global community,” said Webber. “[We want someone to] help tell the story of the many ways that we contribute to the betterment of human life.”

Though the University has been working without a permanent Vice Chancellor of Public Affairs, Webber said that the operations of the public affairs department have not been affected.

“We have very senior leadership within our public affairs operation. Because of that senior leadership, and because its been a relatively short period of time, we’re doing very well,” he said.

The endowment totals $5.35 billion as of June 30, the end of the fiscal year.

Chancellor Mark S. Wrighton said the increase is due to both the return on the University’s investments and donor gifts.

The endowment has swung up and down over the past few years. In 2007, Student Life reported that the endowment had topped $5 billion for the first time ever.

However, the endowment reached a recent low during the 2008-09 academic year. The newspaper reported in June 2009 that the endowment had dropped to $4.2 billion, about a 30 percent decrease from its high two years earlier.

Wrighton recently said the endowment may have lost some value in the current fiscal year because of declines in the value of the stock markets.

“Of course, since July 1 we’ve seen declines in measures of market value,” he said.

Following the endowment’s decrease during the 2008-09 fiscal year, the board of trustees cut spending by four percent.

Last year, University expenditures were about $221 million.

According to Wrighton, because of endowment gains, the University will boost spending by about one percent this year. He said this will be an additional $2.21 million. Additional funds may come from new gifts to the University throughout the year.

“Growth in the value of the endowment from our investments and from new gifts means the prospect of additional spendable income for scholarships [and] professorships…and all the things for which endowments have been provided,” Wrighton said.

When asked Sunday night, students formulated ideas for how they would like to see the extra funds used.

“I feel like a lot of our facilities, definitely the Athletic Complex is something that could use money, but it looks like they’ve been renovating a lot of buildings—they did College Hall, now they’re doing Umrath,” senior Erika Antisdale said.

Some students hope the spending will be funneled directly into supporting more students’ educations financially.

“I think a really good thing we could do is give it back to students in the way of scholarships or financial aid…While our portfolio may have done well, some students’ families may not have done so well,” junior Tarek Elessawi said. “I definitely think that a better investment would be in the actual students themselves.”

With additional reporting by Michael Tabb