MIDDBRIEFS

Author: CAROLINE S. STAUFFER

SGA bill expresses concern over College's MIIS consideration



At last Sunday night's meeting, the Student Government Association (SGA) passed a bill expressing concern about Middlebury College's possible acquisition of the Monterey Institute of International Studies (MIIS).

The bill, authored by SGA President Andrew Jacobi '05 and presented on April 16, centered on financial concerns surrounding the institute.

"I'm not sure if students have really paid much attention to the potential acquisition of MIIS, and it isn't really the programs of MIIS that the SGA took issue with," Jacobi said. "It was the concern that acquiring MIIS would take funding away from initiatives that directly pertain to the undergraduate College."

The bill notes that President Ronald D. Liebowitz "has laid out very lofty and worthwhile goals of improving faculty compensation and benefits, hiring new faculty and increasing financial aid packages," but proposes the idea that "acquiring a graduate program that is burdened with heavy debts seems counter to President Liebowitz's goals."

While the bill recognizes that the College would not be required to purchase the institute, it considers the possibility that the College "would need to spend a significant amount of money improving the technology, management and language programs of MIIS."

The SGA worries that improving and maintaining the institute would require funds that could be spent on completing the commons system, hiring new faculty and making financial aid offerings more competitive.

The bill concludes, "The SGA recommends to President Liebowitz and the Trustees that they reject any proposal that requires Middlebury to spend money that otherwise would be spent on college resources."

The final vote was 12-3-1.





Students awarded summer internships in poverty studies



S. Welcker Taylor '06 and Chui Ying 'Rachel' Fong '07 will spend eight weeks this summer working with impoverished people and communities in the eastern and southeastern United States. They are two of 50 interns selected by Washington and Lee University to receive a Shepherd Poverty Alliance internship.

Taylor will intern for the department of public advocacy in London, Ky., and Fong is scheduled for placement with Cabin Creek Health Center in Dawes, W.Va.

While still in high school, Fong joined several organized service trips to remote areas of Guangdong, China, and war-torn Sri Lanka. During two vacation breaks while at Middlebury, she traveled to Juarez, Mexico on missionary trips organized by the Intervarsity Christian Fellowship.

Taylor, a history major who chose law as the focus for his internship, also has a long-standing record of public service. In the summer of 2003, he helped create the Blueprint to End Chronic Homelessness Program while interning for the city in his hometown of Chattanooga, Tenn., and in the fall of 2004, he co-founded the Middlebury College Civil Liberties Union, which, according to Taylor, is the first campus chapter of the ACLU to be started in the state.