Twin Cities alumni weighed in on the need-blind debate Monday night, with several alumni expressing concern that Macalester has not made a more extensive fundraising effort specifically for financial aid.

Around 30 alumni gathered in Weyerhauser Chapel for a presentation from Provost Dan Hornbach, Vice President of Administration and Treasurer David Wheaton and Resources and Planning Committee (RPC) member Danny Kaplan. Their presentation was a condensed version of the presentation that they gave to the Board of Trustees on need-blind last January.

In a question and answer session following the presentation, alumni raised concerns about social justice and several said that they were previously unaware of the critical nature of Macalester’s current financial situation.

“If I had received in the literature from [Macalester] something saying ‘We’re going to drastically change our admissions policy unless you give,’ … I definitely would have given,” Marissa Brandt ’98 said to the presenters.

“There’s not a sense of crisis in the communications we get. I feel like there is a sense of urgency here [at the forum],” Paul Cantrell ’98 said. “I think that the low giving rate is partly due to alumni thinking the school is very rich.”

Reid McLean ’72 said that although he does support the recommendation to move to need-aware admissions out of practical necessity, he hopes the administration will take care to uphold Macalester’s mission and tradition. “I think its important for those of us who believe in economic diversity to continue to support the school and to let the people who make these decisions know that that’s why we do it,” McLean said.

In the initial presentation, Hornbach said that Macalester is currently financially unable to fund its programs at a rate comparable to other liberal arts colleges, and that this manifests itself in things like fewer library acquisitions and low faculty salaries.

Hornbach said that since Dewitt Wallace’s donation of Reader’s Digest stock in 1991, Macalester’s reputation has risen to the point that Macalester now competes for new faculty with elite colleges and universities around the nation. He said that in order to attract and retain high-quality faculty, it is important that the college offer competitive salaries.

Wheaton spoke specifically about Macalester’s financial resources. He explained that in 1992, Macalester had the largest endowment of any liberal arts college, but by 2002 Macalester had retreated to the middle of the pack. This stagnation in the endowment was accompanied by a growth in the percentage of the annual budget devoted to financial aid, leaving fewer resources to spend on the actual operation of the college.

“This discussion is not about next year’s budget,” Wheaton said. “It’s about where Macalester will be in 10 years.”

Kaplan addressed the issue of why the college is building a new athletic center and fine arts building while at the same time considering ending need-blind admissions. He said that the cost of the new buildings was “a drop in the bucket” compared to the cost of maintaining the current admissions policy.

“I don’t know that a new gym is a drop in the bucket,” Paul Cantrell ’98 said in response to Kaplan. “Any number that has ‘illion’ in it sounds like a lot of money to me.”

Philosophy Professor and RPC member Martin Gunderson said that, contrary to what opponents of the change suggest, moving to a need-aware policy would actually aid low-income students’ access to higher education. He argued that it would be unfair to those students for Macalester to allow its academic standards to decline in order to maintain need-blind admissions. “We’re providing access to an extremely high-quality education,” he said.

William Sentell ’02, who is leading a group of alumni in support of need-blind admissions, addressed the audience during the question and answer session. He criticized the administration’s approach to the discussion. “The presentation that I see tonight looks like a presentation I would see at the place I work—a corporation,” he said. “It doesn’t look like a presentation I would see at an institution of higher learning.”

Kaplan responded to Sentell’s criticisms, saying that Macalester could not tackle the broader issues of social justice alone. “The way to deal with [low-income students’ access to higher education] is not to be an elite liberal arts college. It’s to be a really good high school,” he said.

At the Alumni Board meeting last Saturday, board members heard arguments against need-aware admissions by Natalia Espejo ’07, and arguments in favor of need-aware from Hornbach, Alumni Board member Martins Blums ’05 and Board of Trustees member Carol Schwarting Hayden ’56. After their discussion, the board unanimously approved a resolution in support of the RPC’s recommendation of need-aware admissions.