Dartmouth's board of trustees came under fire a few months (maybe years) ago, and the board's handpicked candidates were rejected in favor of outsiders after a major campaign.
Always one to side with the outsiders, I didn't take much convincing when the same board tried to rewrite the alumni constitution in its entireity last month. While I'm sure a lot of good, hardworking people saw the new constitution as the right thing, their big-brother style approach which consisted of, basically, "trust us on this one", deserved to fail.
The whole affair begged the question, why? And the powers that be didn't have a good answer for it, so the rest of us assumed it was a power grab and rejected it.
Go the rest of us! The consititution does need to be updated, but let's do it right this time.
Here's the email from the alumni office:
Fellow Alumni,
The proposed new constitution for the Association of Alumni of Dartmouth College failed to achieve the level of support necessary for passage in all-media voting that ended October 31.
A total of 12,729 alumni (51 percent) rejected the proposal, while
12,041 alumni (49 percent) voted for it. None of the proposed petition amendments to the current Association constitution received more than 53 percent approval. Approval by two-thirds of alumni voting was required to pass any constitutional amendments. Accordingly, Dartmouth's current system of alumni governance remains unchanged.
Thirty-eight percent of eligible alumni (24,834) participated in the vote, a record turnout of which we can all be proud.
Voting results for the additional four petition amendments to the current constitution are:
Amendment #2: Article VI (Order of Business)
12,074 voted to accept (51%), 11,587 voted to reject (49%)
Amendment #3: Article III (Meetings)
12,338 voted to accept (52%), 11,273 voted to reject (48%)
Amendment #4: Article VII (Amendments)
11,572 voted to accept (50%), 11,719 voted to reject (50%)
Amendment #5: Article IV (Officers)
12,533 voted to accept (53%), 10,931 voted to reject (47%)
For a complete description of each amendment, please visit http://www.voxthevote.org.
The Association would like to thank the members of the Alumni Governance Task Force who worked to create this proposal and bring it forward for your consideration.
Sincerely,
Stanley A. Colla Jr. '66 Tu'86
Secretary-Treasurer
Association of Alumni of Dartmouth College
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