W&M: Finding a foothold for the future
The good news is that the William and Mary Board of Visitors is making progress in its leadership role as stewards of the College.
I about fell off my chair last Friday at the quarterly meeting when Rector Michael Powell suggested that a brochure or webpage be created that spells out in basic terms how the College manages all its finances—where the money comes from and how it’s spent. Of course he did not specify who would create this marvel or when or how. I suggest Sam Brown, Vice President for Finance, and his minions put this on the top of their To-Do List for 2009.
It was an off-the-cuff comment, but it deserves to be followed up. Immediately. The resulting good graces alone will more than amply justify any time and trouble to make it happen.
We call this “transparency,” and it is a sign of true leadership.
For the first time in eons the BOV is creating a five-year Strategic Plan. Not just a capital campaign to bring in money but a comprehensive road map of where we want to be in five years as an institution, as a national treasure, in writing, for the world to see. This, too, is transparency and a sign of health.
Transparency will go a long way to infusing alumni and the surrounding community with confidence in the College’s leadership. Hiding things, either intentionally or through incompetence, is a tactic born of fear and weakness. Transparency guarantees accountability. Accountability breeds honesty and integrity. Honesty and integrity win admiration, loyalty and ultimately the Big Bucks. This is true in any age, in any economy, in any culture.
As part of the Strategic Plan drafting procedure, the BOV came up with a list of 14 initiatives, printed in Saturday’s Gazette. At the end of Friday’s session, these fourteen were unofficially distilled into six initiatives that will eventually be part of the final Plan. I was delighted to see that the initiative on “Diversity” did not make the top seven when the vote was taken, although I suspect it will make its way into the Core Values list that will come under the Vision Statement, a deliberately broad rendition of the main focus of the College.
Since “diversity” can mean whatever you want it to mean depending on the context, I challenge the BOV to drop that term completely.
If the BOV insists on including the concept of “diversity” as a core value, then they need to include the concepts of Life, Liberty and Happiness as well. To promote diversity over these fundamental American values negates the most fundamental of all American ideals – E pluribus unum-- we are one people, united by core concepts of a pluralistic society, including “all men are created equal.”
If the BOV continues to insist that Diversity gets center stage at the expense of greater, more relevant values, I will insist that they define the term as they intend to use it.
I know it is not popular to speak out against diversity, but it is a divisive idea, a focus on labels, on individual traits that separate, not unite, us. Drop the diversity talk and let the College lead, as it has for 300 years, as a beacon of the true American values that pull us together rather than push us apart.
It is a glorious thing to be the Alma Mater of a Nation; it is the College’s historical legacy. Transparency, accountability and the courage to think through and deconstruct debilitating ideas like Diversity will only make the College stronger, more glorious, and will render a future worthy of our past.
Karla Kraynak Bruno
Author of Mischiefs and Miseries: a novel of
Published as "Drop Diversity from Goals", Nov 26,, 2008, The Virginia Gazette, Williamsburg, Virginia