College President Jim Yong Kim addressed Dartmouth's impending budget cuts before a meeting of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences on Monday in Alumni Hall. Although originally slated to be public, Kim's presentation on the budget, which comprised the majority of the meeting, was restricted to faculty after Dean of Faculty Carol Folt moved to enter an executive session.
All non-faculty attendees including the media were asked to leave, with the exception of senior vice president and strategic adviser Steven Kadish, who is playing a significant role in budget discussions. Folt asked the faculty if Kadish could stay in the room.
The motion for executive session was approved by general consent, with no faculty objections.
Folt, in making the motion, said several faculty members approached her before the meeting to request that the proceedings be closed.
The closed session was necessary to facilitate faculty-to-faculty discussion and allowed faculty members to openly express their concerns about Kim's budget presentation, Folt said in an interview after the meeting had ended.
"This was the only opportunity for faculty to have a private conversation about this new information," Folt said, adding that "there will be many public conversations in the future."
Folt said that any faculty meeting can be called into executive session and that such motions are fairly common. She could not, however, recall the last time a general faculty meeting was closed to the public.
Sociology professor John Campbell also said that the procedure was "not unusual" and that the executive session was helpful in this case.
"A lot of numbers were presented," Campbell said. "[The executive session] allowed for a more open and candid discussion about the issues coming down the pike."
Campbell also said he appreciated that budgetary data was presented.
"[Kim] was really forthcoming with the information, and it was very helpful," he said. "He was pretty frank."
Biology professor Roger Sloboda also praised Kim's presentation, saying that he was "quite open" about the budgetary issues at hand.
"There were many, many questions, and much data, and this was a very open give-and-take," Sloboda said.
Sloboda agreed that the executive session allowed for a more effective budget discussion, but also said that he had never before attended a faculty meeting where an executive session was called.
The procedures governing executive sessions forbid attendees from giving The Dartmouth specific data from Kim's presentation, which focused primarily on identifying "flexible" areas in the current budget, Campbell said, adding that Kim said few budget elements can be easily altered.
"There aren't any proposals on the table yet," Campbell said.
