Abandoning the Sense of Community

Excellent Op-ed in today’s paper by Jacob Baron ’10.

Among Dartmouth’s many special elements — breathtaking physical beauty, green shutters on the dormitories, fraternity pledge rituals that would violate the Geneva Conventions if performed by a government on foreign combatants — its “sense of community” is consistently touted as one of its highest virtues. It is the strongest glue keeping alumni together and connected to the College. This community is what many alumni feel has been violated in the recent governance controversy. The board killed a 116-year-old communitarian tradition for a selfish reason (its favored candidates were losing), with a transparently disingenuous justification (to “increase alumni involvement” on the board), and in a nasty way (by fiat).