To the Editor:
It has been nearly a week since the Dartmouth Student Assembly completed their Will to Be Well campaign. This campaign's origins and aim lay in the recognized need for an expanded and improved weight room; however, as the resolution was developed, the prescribed mechanism of focus underwent a metamorphosis -- the "weight room" issue soon became a "student life" issue. With this change came the presented format of the Will to Be Well campaign: "That we, the Dartmouth College Student Assembly, the official representative body for Dartmouth undergraduates, will launch a campaign titled The Will To Be Well to focus attention upon the need to include Student Life in the budgeting priorities."
While student life is a priority that should not be ignored by the Assembly (nor the should the weight room situation which is in dire need of improvement), the measures that the Assembly is advocated in their Will to Be Well maneuver were short-sighted and in fact detrimental to the very students it attempted to serve and the College in general. The reason why is that the trustees, whom the campaign was/is being waged against, are limited to prioritizing only five issues. As of now these five priorities are: Maintaining need-blind admissions, offering competitive faculty salaries, providing academic support, maintaining facilities, and offering endowed professorships. If the Assembly's proposed "student life" priority were placed in the budget paradigm one of the current priorities would have to be sacrificed. No matter how important student life is, can it rationally be more significant to the student body and the well-being of the college in the long run than the existing priorities? Personally, I cannot justify why it should be given priority over something as important as the current five (such as providing academic support or maintain need-blind admissions).
Rather than proceed with their current course, it would be more prudent for the Assembly to look for other means to accomplish its desired goals in improving the weight room. Due to the favorable reception the Will to Be Well campaign received, it should not be difficult, if the Assembly commits itself, to find an acceptable and feasible solution to the current problem. The Assembly will not lose face by reorganizing and regrouping its efforts to reach their desired objectives; however, if it rushes headlong into the currently ill-prepared campaign and is met with impending resistance and thus inevitable failure, the Assembly will most severely embarrass themselves and in the process jeopardize its voice and in doing so the voice of the students it represents, which would be the ultimate folly.
