Poly May be Another Marymount in the Making...

  

As some of you have heard Fordham announced on August 31st that it is going to sell the 24-acre Marymount College campus which it acquired in 2002. The Marymount story in many ways mirrors the current situation that Poly finds itself in. Below is a series of articles that we feel brings many important issues to the forefront regarding promises made and promises broken when "trust" is the main element in a college merger transaction. The following article from "The Chronicle of Higher Education", was one of the first stories on the closing of Marymount College.

An article in the "Fordham Observer" contains this particularly powerful paragraph. It brings to light the difference between oral promises and written obligations and guaranties. Promises can sound rosy when first made but reality can intrude very quickly onto the scene when recruitments and retention goals are not met and financial situations do not change:


"I lay all blame on McShane," [Gabriel] Gomes said. Gomes [a philosophy professor at Marymount] said [Fordham President] McShane was never interested in keeping Marymount open because it wasn't up to par with FCLC or FCRH in terms of SAT requirements. "McShane is consumed by ambition to make Fordham the number one Catholic school and Marymount being below Fordham's level is a blot to that ambition."

Cooley said, "This has been really demoralizing because I have a great
love of Fordham, and [I] am disappointed that they're not acting in
accordance with their principals."

Fordham's letter stated, "Although the closing of Marymount College is
painful for all involved, it was done with two years of notice and
extensive negotiations with the Marymount faculty and their
representatives from the AAUP."

In a recent AP newswire story, The Rev. Joseph McShane, Fordham's president, said, "Though it is sad that the Marymount College campus must pass from Fordham's ownership, Marymount alumnae will have a home wherever Fordham exists." and it begs the question will Poly alumni always have a home if NYU sells Poly's campus?

The Marymount faculty homepage shows both the welcome letter to Marymount faculty from Fordham and the subsequent dismissal letter from Fordham. They are very stark in contrast.

 

Last but not least, read the story on Marymount's last commencement, which must have been very bittersweet for many of the graduates.