AMHERST — An organization led by a Maryland-based philosopher and former presidential candidate is unveiling a five-point plan to reimagine Hampshire College, with a portion of the campus to become the country’s first student-faculty cooperative college.
“Hampshire College may be saved by becoming Hampshire University,” said Jerome Segal, the author of “Graceful Simplicity: The Foundations of Bread and Roses Socialism.”
Segal recently incorporated the Peace and Plain Living Institute, with a board of trustees, in hopes of acquiring the college’s nearly 900 acres in Amherst and Hadley. Should this be successful, the college would become part of the Advanced Hampshire Institute for Peace, Plain Living and Conflict Resolution Training, or AHIP.
Segal, who formed the “Bread and Roses” political party and platform, sent a letter to the college trustees and its chairman, Jose Fuentes, explaining the concept of the merger, and how he wants them to immediately halt efforts to sell the land and lay off faculty, and to encourage students to remain enrolled. This will buy time for his organization to secure the money to retire the $21 million in debt.
“We’re going to go to the bank and get a loan for the future Hampshire University, asking them to lend to us, and then to Hampshire,” Segal said in a phone interview with the Gazette. “We will refinance the loan immediately. We’re going to demand they stop any firings; we want to be open for business in the fall.”
The letter, sent early Thursday morning, provides a synopsis of the plans.
“Our proposal is for a strategic merger between Hampshire College and the Peace Institute,” Segal wrote. Attached to the letter is a memo of understanding detailing the terms of the merger.
“The trigger event for implementing the merger is that the Peace Institute will lend Hampshire College, on favorable terms to be negotiated, $21 million, thus enabling Hampshire to survive and making it unnecessary to sell off its land and close its doors,” Segal wrote.
It outlines who makes up part of the board that was incorporated in late April in Massachusetts. The board includes Robert Malley, former CEO of the International Crisis Group and former senior White House assistant to Presidents Clinton, Obama and Biden; Marwan Muasher, vice president for Studies at the Carnegie Endowment for Peace and former deputy prime minister of Jordan and former Jordanian ambassador to Israel; Vicki Robin, author of the international best seller “Your Money or Your Life; and John de Graaf, a filmmaker and author.
Segal said the letter explains that another month is needed to nail down the financing, but otherwise “it’s falling into place bit-by-bit.”
“All we have to be is credible,” Segal said.
The plan is based on getting the college to a stable place.
“What good does it do to raise $10 million if you cannot close an annual shortfall of $3.7 million?” Segal said. “You end up spending that $10 million on salaries, and in three years, you are back where you started, except that alumni pockets are now empty. And how can you refinance your debt if you regularly return to the road to bankruptcy? Righting Hampshire will require changes that put income at or above expenses.”
The first objective is to get more students, to redesign what is offered so that it has a common core curriculum, grades and senior thesis. He calls this the Hampshire Avocational College of the Arts and Sciences.
“Discover what you have and what you can do for the rest of your life,” Segal said.
Next, the college would abide by a simple living philosophy, with an emphasis put on the writings and life of Quaker abolitionist John Woolman, and an ethos requiring everyone involved with the college to offer five to 10 hours of volunteer labor each week.
Third, Segal will seek Congressional legislation to lower costs of attending college through a $10,000 refundable per year tax credit. This would help many colleges that are on the brink of closure.
Then he will go to foundations, like the Rockefeller Foundation, to explain how without funding this pilot project would be at risk.
Finally, $3 million a year is needed for the “Fund for Saving Hampshire College” and he would ask faculty, students and their parents, and alumni, to move their checking and savings accounts into this fund, where they will be transferred to selected banks, and be protected by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation up to $250,000 per account.
If the plan comes to fruition, Segal sees merging his board, which he contends has “world known leaders” in conflict resolution and plain living, with the existing trustees, and retaining Jennifer Chrisler as president, but eliminating most administrative positions.
“We’re going to be able to reduce the administrative costs of running this school by at least 50%,” he said.
Should such a deal not be accepted by the board, a lawsuit is possible, Segal said:
“Our lawyers tell us that if the board takes irreversible actions, such as selling off the
land of Hampshire or undertaking waves of firings, prior to seeing if the five barrels of (the)
rescue plan, any one of which may be sufficient alone to balance Hampshire’s operating budget, is successful, they would be in violation of their fiduciary responsibilities and be vulnerable to legal action.”
Segal envisions that he would be Hampshire’s provost, overseeing the
work of the vice president for Academic Affairs while also offering small seminars in his areas of expertise: the Middle East, simple living and The Bible as literature.
If successful in Amherst, Hampshire College could also form a satellite location next to the former New College in Sarasota, Florida, which many students left for Hampshire when Gov. Ron DeSantis changed its trustees as a way of shutting down its progressive curriculum.
“Once we get Hampshire College up on its feet in Amherst, Massachusetts, the next step for Hampshire U. should be to open our southern campus, Hampshire South, in beautiful Sarasota, Florida, right next to New College,” Segal said.
“I can’t wait to get on Sarasota TV and say those immortal words, ‘we’re back.'”
