The campus witnessed a tumultuous year of change. There was cause for some lament and some celebration as 1992-93 tried to usher the College into a new era. The year began with a daring call by Student Assembly President Andrew Beebe '93 during Convocation for the Class of 1996 to revolutionize the Greek system. Less than a month later the annual building of the Homecoming bonfire was marred by violence. At the start of winter the College paused to mourn the loss of a beloved former College president. Since then there was a scandalous student election, the formal ending of the more than 100-year-old clay pipes tradition and, of course, a little construction here and there to tidy up the campus.
People
In December, the Dartmouth community grieved the loss of former College President John Kemeny, who died of heart failure at the age of 66. Kemeny, President from 1970-81, oversaw the implementation of co-education and the D-plan in 1972. He was best known outside the College for developing the BASIC computer language.
Provost John Strohbehn, a close friend of current President James Freedman, announced he will leave Dartmouth at the end of this month to resume teaching and research. Associate Provost Bruce Pipes will serve as Provost until 1994 when Lee Bollinger, the dean of the University of Michigan Law School will take the job.
The College's fund-raising team took a hard hit this year with Warren "Skip" Hance '55, vice president for development and alumni affairs, and Young Dawkins, director of major gifts, both announcing they would leave the College. Hance was instrumental to the start of the College's $425 million Will to Excel capital campaign. Dawkins helped coordinate the College's more substantial alumni donations.
The Board of Trustees found itself in transition as well. President Bill Clinton selected Trustee Robert Reich '68 to serve as Secretary of Labor.
Lisle Carter Jr. '45, Robert Douglass '53 and Chairman I. Michael Heyman '51 left the board. Susan Dentzer '77, the first woman ever to be elected by alumni to serve on the Board, replaced Heyman's elected Trustee position.
Dick Plummer, head of buildings and grounds, and Jack Skewes, director of business affairs announced they will retire this year. Each has worked at Dartmouth for more than 30 years. Replacing both of them will be Michael Getter, currently the physical plant director at Oberlin College.
Teoby Gomez assumed the position of Assistant Dean of Students and Dean for the Class of 1994. He replaced Susan Wright.
Diana Beaudoin, dean of Freshman, also announced her plans to leave the College after this term.
The World and Dartmouth
The College found itself embroiled in numerous political controversies this year. Fall term started with a group of students protesting the College's investment in Hydro-Quebec, a Canadian hydroelectric project which critics claimed supported the cultural genocide of Native Americans near the project.
In November, the Student Assembly passed a resolution calling for divestment from Hydro-Quebec, and in January the Trustees ordered the College to divest its $6.8 million holdings.
In October, the construction of the traditional Homecoming bonfire was marred by violence. Bags of vomit and feces were hurled back and forth between upperclassmen and the freshmen guarding the site. In an effort to thwart future incidents, the administration decided not to allow the construction to begin until the Thursday before homecoming, an attempt to avoid confrontations that resulted after fraternity meetings on Wednesday nights.
The short construction time will probably end the days of the sky scraping bonfires --this year's bonfire was called the smallest in recent memory.
Encouraged by President Clinton's efforts to lift the ban on homosexuals in the military, the Trustees voted this winter to postpone for one year the planned discontinuation of the College's Army Reserve Officer's Training Corps program.
In September 1991, the Trustees said the College would ban the ROTC program if the military's homosexual ban was not lifted by April 1993.
The Dartmouth Review, an off-campus conservative journal, once again found itself embroiled in campus controversy. Several black students, in protest to what they said was racism in The Review, systematically removed copies of the newspaper from College dormitories.
Although The Review lambasted the students' efforts, equating them to censorship, the students continued collecting the journal and discarding them for several weekends. Dean of Students Lee Pelton responded by asking students not to remove The Reviews but emphasized that students who chose to do so were not violating any College rules. Eventually the collection halted.
The women's softball team filed a discrimination complaint with the Education Department's Office of Civil Rights this spring, claiming the College gives men's athletic teams preferential treatment and greater funding.
The softball team, which has sought varsity status for four years, argues that the College's continual refusal to grant them varsity status violates Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, which prohibits federally-funded academic institutions from discriminating on the basis of sex in any program or activity.
And finally, the year came to a close with a heated discussion on the more than 100-year-old Class Day tradition of smashing clay pipes against the stump of the Lone Pine tree.
Class Day is the day before Commencement when seniors gather for one last time. The clay pipes ceremony was meant to symbolize a clean break between the students and the College.
In April, a committee chaired by Pelton voted unanimously to end all College support of the clay pipes ceremony, which Native American students at the College said was an insult to cultures that consider pipes to be sacred objects.Last month, the Class Day Committee decided to replace the clay pipes with mugs. On June12, seniors will have shared a toast in the mugs, and then have smashed them in a fashion similar to the clay pipes ceremony.
"Animal House" days over?
In his first speech as president of the Student Assembly, Andrew Beebe '93 said the College should investigate making the Greek system co-educational.
Beebe's speech sparked debate across campus over the future of the Greek system, and in the Trustees' spring meeting, Beebe met with the members of the Board to discuss the merits of a fully co-ed system.
With more than 50 percent of upperclassmen in Greek houses, such a change would drastically alter the College's social scene, typified by the movie "Animal House," which was loosely based on one graduate's experience as an Alpha Delta fraternity brother.
But no decision has been made.
Panarchy, a co-ed house, perhaps setting an example for the future of the Greek system, broke away from the Greek system and established itself as an "undergraduate society" under the jurisdiction of the College.
Fraternities also felt the College tighten its grip around them over the course of the year.
Over the summer, Pelton announced that students would no longer be allowed to live in Greek houses independent from the College. The ban caused several fraternities, who had broken ties with the College to protest the strict alcohol policies and delayed rush, to re-affiliate and subjugate themselves to College policy.
Good news came in January. The College issued a new alcohol policy, which terminated the ban on common sources of alcohol, such as kegs, and gave the Greek system the power to enforce the policy.
In 1991, more than 800 students packed Webster Hall and expressed dissatisfaction with the alcohol policy that forbade kegs in fraternities and granted the College the power of enforcement.
In April the Pan Hellenic Council, the governing body of the College's sororities, voted to dissolve Xi Kappa Chi sorority and replace it with a new local sorority tentatively called Kappa Delta Epsilon.
Freshman women quickly filled the 50 available slots in the sorority, indicating to some the need for more than 6 sororities on campus. While nearly equal numbers of females and males are involved in the Greek system, there are currently twice as many fraternities as sororities.
Education
The new curriculum scheduled to be in place for the Class of 1997, has been delayed for a year by Dean of Faculty James Wright because the College does not have enough money to make the changes.
Last April the faculty voted to accept a broad new curriculum which changes the College's distributive requirement, creates a more structured education and requires students to complete a "culminating experience," such as a thesis, in their major.
In February, a faculty committee responsible for approving curriculum changes voted to give students, beginning with the Class of 1994, the option of completing a minor.
In an attempt to promote a "live-and-learn" atmosphere in the residence halls, the Office of Residential Life announced plans to house graduate students in dorms to serve as academic mentors for undergraduates.
A recent internal review committee evaluating the Education Department recommended the department be terminated. The report, which has not yet been released, in part cited internal strife and mismanagement in the department as reasons for closing it.
Students and faculty involved with the popular department sharply criticized the proposal.
The admissions office reported the Class of 1997 is the strongest academic class in Dartmouth history. With 500 more applicants than last year, the Class of 1997 boasts a mean SAT score of 1316.
Males comprise 52.8 percent of the class and females 47.2, the closest Dartmouth has ever come to gender parity.
Finances
Despite a nationwide recession, the College's finances received both healthy contributions and a vote of confidence this year.
The $425 million Will to Excel Capital Campaign, scheduled to be completed in 1996, already raised more than $250 million, which is 60 percent of its goal.
In October, John Berry '44, provided a boost to the campaign, giving the College $25 million to expand Baker Library. His gift is the largest individual donation in College history.
Despite recommendations from the faculty to raise tuition more than in previous years, the Trustees held the annual increase to six percent, the lowest level in 65 years.
An international credit rating service that evaluates the most prestigious colleges and universities named Dartmouth one of the 11 most financially sound institutions in the nation. In May, Moody's Investors Service raised Dartmouth's credit rating to "AAA," a two level increase from their last evaluation in 1987.
Both represent a victory for Dartmouth's financial officers, who have engaged in strict financial planning to keep the College's budget balanced at a time when other schools are amassing multi-million dollar budget deficits.
Changing Face of Dartmouth
Even the granite of New Hampshire changes over time.
Dartmouth continued its campus expansion this year, and worked on construction that could significantly change the face of the College.
Collis Student Center closed in December for renovations that will refurbish Collis and College Hall. The new Collis will increase students' social options by providing a meeting place and late night alternative to fraternity basements. Construction is due to end by March 1993, but might be finished as early as December.
The College's northward expansion into the space between Baker Library and the old Mary Hitchcock Memorial Hospital are underway. College officials and architectural planners will submit their final plans to the Trustees next year. So far, the plans call for a new psychology building, the construction of Berry Library and the new Sudikoff Computer Lab.
Student Assembly
The Assembly was led this year by Beebe and vice president Andrew Smith '94.
After Stewart Shirasu '94 won the April elections with 32 percent of the vote in a seven person presidential race, allegations that he exceeded acampaign spending limit and that he swindled photocopies from a local store forced him to resign.
Nicole Artzer '94, who finished second in the first election, won in a special election to fill the empty presidential spot.
The Assembly's projects committee, which works to improve student services at the College, sought to computerize reserve readings and provide more computers for student use in public locations.
