The Story
Exclusive: DSJ Sits Down with President Reveley (Part 1)
President Reveley, in his office in the Brafferton Building, answered questions from the DSJ about sustainability, finances, and town-gown relations. David Stingle/DoG Street Journal
On September 2, the DoG Street Journal sat down with President of the College W. Taylor Reveley, III, to talk about some of the biggest issues that are on students' minds. In the first half of the interview, President Reveley discussed efforts to green the campus, how to deal with the current financial situation, and his optimistic outlook on the College's relationship with the City of Williamsburg.
DSJ: There’s a lot of talk among students about sustainability and efforts to green the campus. And recently, one of the big movements has been focusing on individuals’ efforts to do that. There are posters up in the bathroom about limiting showers and things like that.
TR: And not plugging in your appliances, and turning off the lights, and doing your recycling…
DSJ: So we were wondering what you specifically are doing with sustainability in mind as goal for the campus as a larger community.
TR: Well I think the first thing on my mind is being sure that the Sustainability Committee continues to be as robust and effective as it has been, because it’s just been dynamite. When we first created it, I didn't know how that was going to work out, because to get anything accomplished was going to take a great deal of work from people drawn from across the campus.
But it all came together extremely well in the first year. Then in the second year, we had the assistance of a graduate fellow who was wonderful, and now we’ve got another one. So I just want to be sure that the committee continues to be as well led as it’s been, as hardworking and effective, and that it’s got the kind of full-time help it needs, which is basically a money problem. That’s number one, because that committee is really key to driving things.
Second, it’s always important, and I think it’s important to all of us, that the green fee be well spent. I am confident that it has been so far, and, as long as we keep the sustainability committee going, I’m confident it will be in the future. I think the so-called DOT Campaign has been remarkably effective in trying to lean on us individually to do something that collectively will amount to some real good. It’s also attracted the attention of other schools, who are coming asking, “How do you do it?” Which is precisely what we want.
What we want around here is to prove [that] even if you haven’t got much money, and even if you haven’t got many full-time people working on it, you can make a lot of progress if you do have something like the green fee plus a really effective sustainability committee and a fellow helping it, though most of the progress will be in relatively small steps. The DOT Campaign is a great example.
Final thing, really, on my mind in the near future is being sure the so-called “eco-village” project actually comes off, having shown up on Earth Day and blown the trumpet about it, said we’re going to do it and how great it’s going to be. Now we’ve got to put some meat in the sandwich.
DSJ: So is there any sort of timeline for that project?
TR: Well, it’s supposed to start soon. As I understand it, we’ll find one of the seven houses that’s most amenable to the drill and get on with it, so long as we have the money. But the beauty of these projects is each house isn’t going to cost but so much.
I guess the other thing that ought to be mentioned is that we really are trying on the recycling front to get our act together and get it all done. I got persuaded last year that the time had come to stop talking about it and simply say, “All right. Let’s do it.” Which involves, for example, buying an absolute thundering herd of recycling cans, small ones, and figuring out how they’re going to get emptied. But I think we’re going to get there. So I expect in this year that recycling will be a done deal.
DSJ: That’s good to hear. So, this definitely came up in the last question, but, from a student’s point of view, the biggest problems on campus arise from the College’s financial situation.
TR: Yes? If you want to know what I think about day and night, yes.
DSJ: It’s definitely on students’ minds too, with everything going on from tuition being raised to construction, all these things affect students’ everyday lives. But, with the Strategic Planning mission, I was wondering, what are some of the goals to overcome or to make a little bit better or to get around the current situation?
TR: We’re doing all we can to get around it, in the sense that we continue, in my view, to do very well despite the Great Recession, despite the state cutbacks. And we’ve got to keep trying to be sure that that which really matters to us, starting with the academic program, does continue to be done really well even as we work on getting our finances into shape. The reality is that we’re moving from being a publicly supported school to being a privately supported school. We’re going through something akin to a birth process. And birth can be sometimes perilous -- it’s always exciting -- and out of it you hope will come renewal and opportunity.
But right now, we’re in the process. And tuition is a piece of it. Philanthropy is a piece of it. We hope there will always be an element that comes from the state, though we’re not counting on it as we used to. Grants, contracts. Plus figuring out is there are any things, frankly, we can sell that we’re not now selling that could make a buck. I mean a lot of schools are looking at their comparative advantages, their great strengths, and figuring out how to sell them to people beyond the campus, people who aren’t their full-time students, and doing it fairly successfully.
DSJ: So how could the College do that? What are some things that we have that we could sell?
TR: Well, the Business School is probably ahead of everybody else, in delivering either actual MBAs over the line or discrete courses and programs.
I have thought for a long time that the combination of William & Mary and Colonial Williamsburg is made in heaven. To put together some, say, one or two-week courses for fat-cats who come and stay at the Inn and enjoy the beauties of Colonial Williamsburg -- and if they like to play golf, play golf; and if they like to go to spas, go to the spa -- but also get a really intense, extremely interesting bit of academic content delivered by some of our professors. I think that would work. Now, the Great Recession has taken some of the edge off that, but the recessionary bear will go back in its cage sooner or later.
We just need to think on what those might be, and even though we do an enormous amount with very little, we need to think about ways to become more productive, to deliver the same caliber of whatever it is in a less expensive fashion. Because, of course, tuition, whether you’re talking about here or any other elite US school, can’t keep rising at the rate it’s been rising for the next generation or college will cost three, four, five hundred thousand dollars a year, which is obviously not going to happen.
It’s a long, shaggy answer, but we’ve got to work on it from all fronts. We’ve got to find more revenue. We’ve got to be more productive. Some of that revenue will come from tuition, some of it will come from philanthropy, some of it will come from being more entrepreneurial, some of it will come from getting more productive.
Now, every time I walk across the yard, whichever way I’m going, I look for someone who might be there, knowing nothing about William & Mary, having no meaning in their life really, but ten billion dollars -- also no children, no spouse, no domestic animals -- and I think, I’d really like to meet that person. So I smile at everybody. I speak to everybody, because you just never know. It could happen, but this is our 318th year, and that sort of thing has never happened to us yet, which may mean the odds are getting better.
But the bottom line is, the current financial foundation will not sustain us going forward. We have to build a new one, and there are a lot of elements that go into building it, of which only one is tuition.
DSJ: It seems to me like the relationship between the College and the Williamsburg community is in an interesting place right now, with [alumnus] Scott Foster on the City Council and Professor [Clyde] Haulman as mayor. It seems like that overlap is sort of intrinsic now.
TR: It’s a very interesting situation and, I think, a very promising one. The basic reality about town-gown relations here is that, on the whole, they’re excellent. The mayor and city manager and I and [Secretary to the Board of Visitors] Michael Fox meet once a month religiously to talk about common issues and to work on things together. And, since I’ve been president, I’ve found this city to be remarkably helpful and interested in us. And vice versa: we’re very interested in the city.
The one area where we’ve had trouble, of course, are in the nearby neighborhoods, the residential blocks around the campus that have a lot of rental property in them, some of which is rented by students. And that’s an area now in which we plan to work really hard this year. I’m trying to see if we can be sure going forward that there are harmonious relations between the students who live on those blocks and the people who live there permanently.
But that’s the only real area that needs a lot of progress, and we put a lot of effort into it last year that has laid the framework, laid the foundation for real steps forward on it this year. But you’re right: we couldn’t have found anybody more closely interested in William & Mary than [former mayor] Jeanne Zeidler, whose husband has been in the History Department for years. But Clyde [Haulman] has actually been on the faculty, is still on the faculty, still teaching. And having Scott Foster is absolutely unprecedented. I think Scott will be a very effective member of the council, and that’ll be good for Williamsburg, good for William & Mary and good for Scott.
DSJ: So what are some specific goals as far as the housing and neighborhood situation? What are some ways to alleviate the problems there?
TR: Now let me give you my theological answer. Five groups have got to pull their oars together. There’s got to be a cooperative undertaking by five groups: first, the city; second, the university; third, the permanent residents, the people who own property and live there all the time; fourth, the students; and fifth, the landlords.
Of those five groups, four are easy to reach. The fifth, the landlords -- particularly if they’re absentee, if they don’t really care about the property much except as a cash cow -- are hard to reach, but they need to be involved in the solution, too. Have you seen the white paper that the university and the city put together?
DSJ: Yes. I did.
TR: Well, that’s the road map. And the key element on a continuing basis is the so-called NRC, the Neighborhood Relations Committee, which has representatives from the five groups I mentioned and is charged with making things happen and dealing with problems. I think the NRC is going to work, and I’m certainly committed to doing what I can to be sure we make progress. But I believe we’ve now got everybody’s attention, except maybe the absentee landlords. So I’m very hopeful.
But what will not work is somebody assuming that just one of those five groups by itself can solve the problem. Not going to happen.
DSJ: Yes, and I feel like there is negligence on behalf of some students to become aware that there is a responsibility on our behalf, too.
TR: The nearby neighborhoods are too important to the university to let them go down the drain. And I think what we have to get across to the students who want to live there is that it can be a great place to live, but it’s not a great place to do things that you would never do at home at your parents’ houses. And if you want to do that, you’re not going to be able to do it in nearby neighborhoods because it drives the permanent people nuts. And I don’t think it’s that hard a message to get across. Because if that’s what you really want, if that’s the reason you’re living off campus, it’s not going to work in the nearby neighborhoods.
The flip side for the neighbors is when students move in, go meet them, tell them who you are, say, “Welcome to the neighborhood. We’re glad to have you. Let’s live together in delightful harmony.” And don’t, as I said earlier in a meeting, treat them like a visitation of the Goths or the arrival of Attila the Hun and his minions. Just don’t do that. But it’s got to be a two-way street.
DSJ: Or a five-way street.
TR: Yes.
Check back on Friday for the second half of the interview, where President Reveley is asked about student rights, the honor council, the College's reputation for suicide and, of course, his love for the griffin.