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The only bad press is no press?
Hamilton College has not had a good year, publicity-wise. First, there was the job offer to Susan Rosenberg, the ex-Weather Underground activist who spent sixteen years in jail for weapons possession and was indicted for her role in a bank robbery in which three people were killed (Rosenberg, who was scheduled to teach a month-long writing course entitled "Resistance Memoirs: Writing, Identity, and Change," did not accept the post). Then, there was the invitation to Ward Churchill to speak (he was disinvited for security reasons). Then there was the college's decision to restrict and defund the Kirkland Project, which had issued the invitations to both Churchill and Ward, thereby potentially compromising the chances of bringing in controversial speakers of any political stripe. Then there is the college's current alumni election, whose restrictive campaign rules are effectively quashing open debate among candidates.
But it would seem that the only really bad press is no press at all. Though Hamilton has not acquitted itself particularly well over the course of the past year, the College has just announced that its incoming class has the highest SAT scores and highest overall class standing of any freshman class in the history of the school; the average SAT score for this year's freshmen is 1346, and 69% of them ranked in the top 10% of their high school classes. The College also had a record fundraising year, raising $5.44 million for its annual fund and $18 million overall, despite a drop in the overall number of alumni who contributed.
Posted by acta online at July 28, 2005 04:35 AM