Dartblog

We can rely on the College’s stats — either from the Dartmouth Fact Book or via the Department of Education — in knowing that the College added 1,009 people to its headcount (going from 2,408 to 3,417 employees) between 1999 and 2008. But what we don’t know is exactly where these people are working.

Sponsored research does occupy some of them: it rose by about $90M during this period; but a huge portion of any grant goes to overheads, equipment and existing faculty. And we have seen that there was a large increase in deans and miscellaneous administrators. However we don’t have any better detail than this.

If the Kim administration is truly going to be transparent, and if it is going to be fair in its cost-cutting, we need to know exactly where the growth in staff took place over the past decade. There are well run sections of the College that did not grow much over the past ten years, and there are sections that have swollen beyond all measure. I would humbly submit that the latter should be the primary object of layoffs.

President Kim is right that the College should not do “across the Board cuts,” as he wrote on November 18. Rigor should be exercised where rigor has been lacking. But to do so entails making judgements.

If the Administration were to supply the needed statistical information to Dartblog, I promise to keep it confidential — sharing it only with our readers.