The faculty and the Goddard community recently had a near-unanimous vote calling for the immediate resignation of President Richard E. Greene. In response, the Board of Trustees and President Greene proclaimed that this, along with any discussion of reorganizing the administration of Goddard, is non-negotiable. As reported in Seven Days, The Burlington Free Press, The Times Argus and The Rutland Herald, demonstrations and protests have taken place, including a Goddard rally for democracy and workers' rights that was attended by such prominent members of the state as Dave Dellinger, Mary Belenky, Chris Wood and Ed Stanick. In addition, a hunger fast was initiated by the college's director of financial aid, Manuel O'Neill, to protest the mistreatment of workers by the current administration. Approximately 20 students and one faculty member joined the fast, which lasted nearly a week.

There have been a series of resignations by staff, faculty and board in protest of the direction that the president and the majority of the board are taking the college. The list, which date back a year, includes Larry Kressley (board member who resigned immediately after the October board meeting), Steven Shapiro (Dean of Students), Peter Burns (Director of Admissions), Sherri Molleur (Director of Business), and Jamie Klein (Admissions Recruiter and Counselor). However, we must not lose sight of the fact that a core issue underlies the events and disputes taking place between, on the one hand, the college president, board president and some board members and, on the other hand, most of the faculty, staff and students at Goddard. What is this issue?

It is whether the college will operate according to democratic principles. Goddard College was originally established as a model of educational democracy. As stated in the "Governance at Goddard College" document, "the founders of Goddard College intentionally placed significant emphasis on the practice and theory of democracy in both academic and operational affairs." In addition, the by-laws of the school mandate that the powers and duties of a trustee are to set forth "the establishment and oversight of polity for the democratic management of the College."

The stated mission of Goddard is "to advance the theory and practice of learning by undertaking new experiments based upon the ideals of democracy, and the principles of progressive education first asserted by John Dewey." The emphasis in the design of Goddard as an institution is not only on democracy but on participatory democracy. In this way, Goddard is quite unique among colleges and universities in the United States, and accordingly should be treated as a national treasure.

The college president, board president and members of the board are... pushing the college toward a corporate ethos and autocratic governance structure.

The Goddard community strives to actualize and practice the ideals of participatory democracy and progressive education on a daily basis. Students and faculty collaboratively design the curriculum and courses through continual dialogue and discussion. Goddard's governance meetings and community-student meetings are modeled on the Vermont Town Meeting. The work program at Goddard is designed with the intention of integrating theory with practice through work experience, so that students and workers have the opportunity to better understand each other and to learn what it means to work collectively. The members of the Goddard community are in near-unanimous agreement about pursuing this experiment in democracy into the future.

All of the conflicts and disputes can be seen in terms of differences regarding the role that participatory democracy should play on campus. The college president, board president and members of the board are not honoring the principles of democracy and are instead acting autocratically pushing the college toward a corporate ethos and autocratic governance structure.

The suggestion has been made that a democratically elected committee replace the college president and that all board members be elected, thus increasing their accountability to the Goddard community. These and other suggestions, if implemented, would bring Goddard's governance process back in line with the core principles upon which the college was founded.

I beseech all board member to reconsider their positions in light of the fundamental issue of self-determination, and to move forward in support of participatory democracy and its application at Goddard. If they continue to stonewall the community efforts to restore democracy, they very well may be throwing the baby out with the bath water.

Andrew Dinkelaker is the Off-Campus Student Representative to the Goddard Board of Trustees.