Student Life Archives

The Alumni Association responds

Dear Editor:

On Monday, Oct. 24, 2005, Student Life printed a Forum Staff Editorial criticizing the practices of the Washington University Alumni Association.

There were a number of factual errors in the editorial, including: a description of the Washington University Alumni Association as a fundraising organization; details about Alumni Association members soliciting donations from students on behalf of Washington University in front of Olin Library; incorrect information about fundraising practices at Washington University; and an inaccurate description of the University’s Annual Fund and the use of alumni gifts.

In summary, the descriptions of our efforts and practices are wholly incorrect. For the record: the Washington University Alumni Association is not a fundraising organization; neither the Alumni Association nor the Office of Alumni and Development Programs solicited donations from students on behalf of Washington University in front of Olin Library; the fundraising practices described are not part of Washington University’s Office of Alumni and Development Programs; there is no generic Annual Fund at Washington University; and unspecified gifts from alumni are typically designated for use by the appropriate dean, department chair or program director for the greatest need in their respective area.

Here is a brief description of some of the projects the Alumni Association does sponsor (or co-sponsor) for the benefit of students and others: Freshman Welcome programs on the South 40; Founders Day activities for students, including a free program featuring the University’s Founders Day speaker (this year’s speaker, Mayor Rudy Giuliani will be featured on Saturday, Nov. 5); Career Connections, a network of more than 10,000 alumni willing to network with students to assist with internship and job opportunities; a series of e-mail newsletters to keep students aware of the Alumni Association activities and benefits available to them.

Though, again, the Alumni Association is not a fundraising organization, many alumni volunteers join our exceptional Office of Alumni and Development in raising funds to support countless University initiatives. Last year more than 900 annual scholarships were established in all schools by alumni, parents and friends of the University through their Annual Fund gifts. Alumni gifts helped to provide financial assistance to some of the 57 percent of undergraduate students who received financial assistance last year, and Washington University parents provided 12 percent of the total Annual Fund last year, ensuring that all students received the best educational resources available.

I’ve had the great pleasure to meet with a number of students over the past weeks in an effort to learn more about how the Washington University Alumni Association can play a meaningful role in their lives throughout their tenure on campus and beyond. They have been a wonderful source of ideas and energy and I appreciate their time and interest. I welcome your ideas and suggestions as well.

Mel F. Brown, LA57, LW61
Chair, The Alumni Board of Governors

The dead are not sacred. The dead are dead, and they stay dead. No matter how much you think about them, they will still be dead. It doesn’t matter how much you try to remember them, they stay dead. The dead can’t be honored. You give honors to long-serving janitors, cashiers of the month and clever physicists. Dead people don’t see your lit candles, they don’t admire the quality of their gravestones and they cannot mobilize for political demonstrations.

It’s easy to care for a corpse. It’s like a potted plant you don’t have to water. You just need to make sure it doesn’t become dislodged from its plot during a heavy rain.

Then again-especially around this time of year-I start to doubt all of that. I think the dead might walk among us. Some of them seem to have retained memories of what it was like to be alive, and they remain in a sickening behavioral loop.

Don’t be fooled, fellow humans. The undead live-if you could call it that-for one thing only: to consume the warm flesh of the living. They might look like us, but they aren’t us.

Take Todd Schiller, who published an op-ed on Friday that described the poster board placards stuck in the grass of the Hilltop Campus in these terms: “[T]housands of graves, each labeled with the name of a U.S. soldier and an Iraqi civilian killed during America’s ongoing campaign to secure democracy for Iraqi citizens.” There aren’t enough dead names for him there-his first instinct upon seeing the display was to ask the sir if he could please have some more: “I feel it is missing something,” he said, later noting, “There should also be graves included for those Iraqi civilians killed under Saddam Hussein’s regime.”

Young Todd might appear to be a normal, hard-working engineer to his friends and family; but his word choice suggests that you people who must live close to him should be wary that he doesn’t bite you. Be especially vigilant of strange odors or ghastly moaning. Should you believe yourself to be in danger, you should start screaming, begin losing articles of clothing and trip on lots of things as you try to run away from him as the music gets louder.

Such gluttony! I would think that a lone ghoul might content himself with the harvest that we as a nation have provided him-but he wants more! And the fact that the bodies he wants are so overripe makes it even more difficult to decipher. What of the 500,000 Iraqi children who died because of trade sanctions? Todd, will those satisfy you? Those deaders fell in an area of murky responsibility, with the United Nations, Mr. Hussein and America all sharing some of the sin-tender meat to be sure, but you have shown yourself to be a picky eater.

Ah, but this is a mere flight of fancy. The undead possess no capacity for rational thought, or even basic cognitive functioning. That’s why politicians love them. They shamble through their half-lives moaning, “Duhhh-moooohhh-craaaahhh-cyyyy, freeeeeee-doooooom,” looking to bite anything that looks soft and alive.

John is a sophomore in Arts & Sciences.

Last week, Student Life published a staff editorial critiquing the Alumni Association and its particular methods of soliciting students for donations and memberships. In response, we received several letters criticizing us, including one from Mel Brown, the chair of the Board of Governors at the Alumni Association. He argues that we published several factual inaccuracies about the Alumni Association, and attempts to clarify the Association’s name and purpose.

The biggest “fact” Mr. Brown claims that Student Life got incorrect was calling the Alumni Association a “fundraising organization.” He states that “the Washington University Alumni Association is not a fundraising organization.” His own Association’s Web site, however, contradicts his claim. If you go to alumni.wustl.edu (the title of this page is Alumni Association Services), the top link on the right side of the page reads, “Making a Gift.” Below, there are links to ways to contribute money to various University funds and scholarships. Clicking through the links, you can find lots of information regarding gift giving, or as we also call it, fundraising.

A few paragraphs later, Mr. Brown writes, “Though, again, the Alumni Association is not a fundraising organization, many alumni volunteers join our exceptional Office of Alumni and Development in raising funds to support countless University initiatives.”

This statement seems to be a complete paradox. The Alumni Association is not in the business of fundraising, but many volunteers help with raising funds? This is like arguing that the bread in my pantry was not made by a bread-making machine, but rather a volunteer machine that helps with making bread.

Mr. Brown also calls into question our claim that the University has an Annual Fund into which generic donations can go. He says, “there is no generic Annual Fund at Washington University.” Once again, if you visit the above Web site, one link in particular will take you to the Annual Fund gift description page, where you contribute and read all about how the Annual Fund is useful to the University. Mr. Brown also writes that “Washington University parents provided 12 percent of the total Annual Fund last year, ensuring that all students received the best educational resources available.” But remember, there is no Annual Fund.

The e-mail goes on to talk about the countless ways in which alumni gifts and donations enrich our education here at Washington University. And I have no doubt in my mind that those gifts do. What I resent, however, is the masquerade performed, rather poorly, by Mr. Brown and the Alumni Association. When you try so very hard to say that you are not a fundraising organization, you call attention to the fact that that is actually what you are hiding. It’s like the little kid saying, “I’m not scared. I’m not scared! I’M NOT SCARED!” in the face of a big bully pinning him up against a locker. Of course the kid is scared.

The Alumni Association is, as the staff editorial pointed out, a necessary and important part of Washington University. And while the Association does offer many non-fundraising initiatives like the Founders Day activities, Career Connections and the Senior Class Transition Series, the major purpose of the AA is to solicit gifts from alumni. To fundraise, so to speak. The Association flaunts how much money it raises and the good uses to which that money is put; there is no reason to argue that it isn’t a fundraising organization. Perhaps they believe that by patently denying that they’re soliciting us for money (and then doing so anyway), we won’t notice what’s happening. But unfortunately, all those hard-earned donations did give us the university education to figure out what’s actually going on-though I doubt a university education is required to do so.

Perhaps if the Alumni Association quits denying its true nature and removes the wool covers from its eyes, students and alumni alike will quit treating it like the Big Bad Wolf.

Until then, my, what big teeth they have.

Jeff is a senior in Arts & Sciences and a Forum editor.

Soon, a seismic event will forever alter the way Wash. U. students eat lunch. The much-loved Taco Bell will be replaced by an Asian-themed Bon App‚tit area, thus significantly altering the Mallinckrodt lunchscape for all University community members.

The Forum staff has debated this issue and has yet to emerge with a clear favorite, partly due to a lack of clear information that has been made available by Bon App‚tit about the upcoming change.

Many members of the Forum staff, however, have expressed concern about the imminent lack of Cheesy Gordita Crunches that will be available at lunchtime, as well as the future impossibility of “thinking outside the bun” while on campus.

Concerns have also been expressed about the potential line length of the future Asian eatery; Taco Bell often had the shortest line out of any venue in the food court, so much so that some have claimed they would not have even eaten lunch had they not had the option of the Bell. This is a dramatic statement that the school hopefully considered when deciding to make the switch.

Others contend that the stir fry option at the North Side bodes well for the Asian spot, and, from a multicultural perspective, Bon App‚tit is doing well to expose us to a new, ethnically different lunch option that has the potential to be just as delicious.

Perhaps the most important point in this heated debate is the outdated reason for why Taco Bell is being replaced.

Originally, the movement to replace Taco Bell was fueled by concerns for workers in Florida who wanted an additional penny for each pound of tomatoes they picked, some of which were bought by Taco Bell and used in their food. At this point, however, Taco Bell has given in to the workers and agreed to pay the additional penny per pound, thus making the original point moot.

It is clearly too late to keep Taco Bell after all the effort and preparation that have surely already been put towards the changes, but it is interesting that there is now no real reason why Taco Bell should be booted off campus.

For better or for worse, those of us who need our 7 Layer Burrito fix will soon have to look elsewhere, while University students who need to satisfy their egg roll or moo shu fix will soon have a solution to their problems.