3-29-2017
Memo from Faculty Member Pat Oles to Faculty
Dear Colleagues,
I write as a member of the now defunct Divestment Task Force (DTF), but I cannot claim to speak for the committee.
At my request FEC has scheduled a COW to discuss the Board of Trustees response to the DTF recommendations at the 4/1/2016 faculty meeting. The DTF report and the trustee response is linked below. I hope you can review the reports prior to the meeting.
https://www.skidmore.edu/divestment/reports/
The Board “accepted” three recommendations from the DTF while rejecting any link between institutional values and investment philosophy. I think rejecting this linkage is mistaken and that the faculty should voice its dissent, withhold any appearance of consent, and request that the trustees develop an investment philosophy that considers social responsibility.
Skidmore’s Mission Statement, recent Middle States Report and its new strategic plan all claim a Skidmore education prepares “our graduates to live as informed, responsible, and globally and interculturally aware citizens who are not only capable of bringing their personal plans to fruition but who also strive to make the world a better place for all.” I think these values should also inform the college’s business practices.
The DTF and the Board found considerable agreement on “the unique scale and profound global consequences of climate change,” the uncertain impact of divestment, and that the comingling of the college’s funds in various investment vehicles precluded direct control over the vast majority of investment decisions. The DTF appreciated the investment committee’s concern about risk and the threat a lower rate of return on endowment investments poses to the distinctive quality of Skidmore’s program.
For these reasons, the DTF did not recommend divestment. However, the complete rejection of any future direct ownership of bonds or equities issued by firms in the Carbon Underground 200 and the trustees’ refusal to consider any linkage among institutional values and educational mission and the college’s investment policy (recommendation #5) and an annual dialog about values and investment philosophy (recommendation #6) exposes a deep and serious disagreement about the relationship among institutional values, educational mission, and investment principles.
The Board “does not believe it can accept the general principle that there is or should be a fundamental linkage between Skidmore's investment portfolio and its institutional values.” This stance undermines the connection between mind and hand found in the college mission statement as well as the creativity and ambition guiding Skidmore’s strategic plan. We should imagine a role for values in investment decisions. If not Skidmore, who?
The trustees argue that linking values and investment practices would mean the college would have to refuse “any relationship” with carbon producing firms and require the Board “to investigate and adjudicate an infinitely large range of such claims in the future.” It does not. This is simply wrong. The slippery slope and argumentum ad absurdum are unacceptable approaches to the complicated intersection of ecology, economy, politics, and identity. Skidmore cannot claim it is preparing students to confront wicked problems if it refuses to do likewise.
Developing an investment philosophy that links institutional values and investment decisions may—should--lead to future debates. We should welcome and facilitate rather than foreclose such discussions. Investment decisions should involve a critical consideration of profit from prison, child and slave labor, product safety, and consumer health as well as climate change. Skidmore faculty cannot ask students to consider complicated moral, ecological, economic, and racial problems and refuse to consider its own actions relevant.
The trustees argue there is “a troubling inconsistency in the notion that, in managing our endowment, we should boycott a whole class of equities at the same time that, as individuals and as a community, we rely extensively on those companies' products and services for so much of what we do every day.” This is not what the DTF recommended. The DTF appreciated the dilemma our reliance on carbon presents. However, our reliance on carbon now is not an excuse for denial, apathy, or inaction.
The trustees also assert, “these same corporations are currently responsible for the largest non-governmental investment in clean energy research and development.” This is one reason the DTF recommended the college “reallocate approximately 4% of the endowment to fossil-free or sustainable and clean tech investment funds on a test basis, increasing this allocation over time if performance merits.” It is unfortunate that the Board was not “prepared to mandate the diversion of a fixed amount of the endowment to such a fund” given the Board’s appreciation corporate investment in clean energy.
The Strategic Plan argues for incorporating creativity deeply and pervasively into the many functions that support the college’s educational mission. Developing an investment philosophy and process that promotes the citizenship the college seeks to foster, a philosophy that welcomes and supports a sustained discussion of the values, tradeoffs, opportunity costs, and risks of socially responsible investment is consistent with the college’s sense of itself and its mission.
Creative thought does matter; informed, responsible citizenship is a serious commitment, and integrative learning and civic engagement are real pedagogies, not hollow exhortations that apply only to the classroom. Skidmore does not make small plans; linking values and praxis, the mind and the hand, is a substantial, difficult challenge central to the college’s identity, mission, and future. Surely, the college can apply these commitments to its behavior as an investor.
A creative, inclusive community of trustees, faculty, students and staff can and should struggle together with the problems climate change presents. Responding to climate change requires transformation not a reification of the status quo. I ask that the faculty urge the trustees to reconsider its position; together I am confident that we can imagine Skidmore College as a creative leader, part of a broader effort to develop an ethos of socially responsible investing.
So I offer the following resolution:
Resolved: the faculty of Skidmore College takes seriously the need to link institutional values and investment philosophy. We urge the Board of Trustees to 1) reconsider recommendations 1, 5 and 6 from the DTF report and 2) to work diligently with the faculty, students, and administration to develop a meaningful process for aligning investment philosophy with institutional mission and values. In the tradition of shared governance at Skidmore, the faculty stands ready to work with the trustees to engage the moral, fiscal, and political complexity of informed, responsible institutional citizenship.