Reports from the Task Force on Divestment
February 13, 2015
To the Skidmore Community,
I am pleased to share with you the Phase 1 Report of the Task Force on Divestment. This report addresses a variety of questions, including: our understanding of the meaning and intent of fossil fuel divestment, a review of the ways in which other institutions (particularly our comparison group) have handled this issue, and an analysis of the potential effect of divestment upon Skidmore’s endowment and operating budget.
In order to further our community conversation, we have scheduled two (2) open forums on divestment for Wednesday, February 25th, at 1:00 and at 5:30 in Gannett Auditorium. We hope that you will attend and share your views on this important issue.
Also, we have created a Skidmore Divestment website which contains the Task Force’s reports and updates, as well as links to a variety of content relevant to the divestment discussion. You can find it at: www.skidmore.edu/divestment
Finally, as you may recall, our ultimate responsibility is to develop a recommendation on divestment; we expect to provide this to the President and Board of Trustees by May 2015.
Please feel free to contact me or any member of the Task Force with your questions and comments. The members of the Task Force are noted below.
All the best,
Jim Kennelly
Chair, Task Force on Divestment