About a month ago, I set out to find the answers to several questions about what it takes to be a good member of our Board of Trustees so as to be able to cast my vote for Young Trustee intelligently.
Richard Riddell, vice president and University secretary, serves as the liaison between the University and the Board of Trustees. He told me that the Board “works hard at helping the University keep a clear strategic focus so that as events happen, as programs are proposed, there’s a real sense about the impact on the strategic vision of the school.” The Board’s particular strength, relative to other University institutions, is providing “society’s input into ongoing University life.”
One of the most unique things about Duke’s Board is that it incorporates Young Trustees. These members are able to speak to a more recent experience of Duke, a perspective which otherwise might be absent from the Board. Riddell noted that, since the inauguration of the position in 1972, our Young Trustees have “served Duke well” over the years.
Dan Blue, Law ’73, a N.C. state senator and chair of the Board of Trustees, agrees. In a letter published in the Chronicle before the first Young Trustee election last year, Blue wrote that he found the perspectives of the Young Trustees “always valuable and insightful: They are close enough to the experience of being a student while also eager to begin the work of ensuring that Duke continues to be a vital institution for future generations of students.”
Next Tuesday, we have the opportunity to vote for someone to continue that legacy of service.
But how should we evaluate the candidates? To help answer that question, I spoke to several trustees, past and present.
Trustees do not—must not—have constituencies. Nathan Garrett, a Trustee emeritus, noted in an e-mail that, “On occasion, there will be conflicts between the University and one or more constituent groups. When that occurs, the trustee must try to understand the arguments on all sides and work to resolve the issues in a manner that will preserve the University and advance its mission.” Janet Hill, a trustee and the mother of alum Grant Hill, Trinity ’94, told me that trustees must possess a real “commitment to Duke and to making Duke better... [Trustees] must be unselfish in our focus on Duke and must want to help all of Duke, not just the one segment we have been associated with.”
Trustee Ann Pelham, Trinity ’74, wrote in an e-mail that “no one wants any trustee to take a one-dimensional approach. Trustees are expected to consider the university as a whole, to try to understand all the stakeholders, all the issues, all the opportunities. Individuals... don’t represent a constituency or advocate a particular cause.” Trustees are called upon to pursue the greater good of the institution, not a particular agenda cherished by any particular electoral “base.”
A Young Trustee must not enter our boardroom as an advocate for students. We are not electing a representative, responsible to us as his or her constituents. In fact, that type of attitude is completely at odds with the actual responsibilities of the position.
Trustees must ask the right questions and do so collaboratively. Pelham noted that good trustees “come prepared, pay attention, question assumptions, expect the best and keep raising the bar, respect other points of view, and keep learning.” Indeed, valuable Board service, she said, is sometimes “simply about the power of critical thinking.” Trustees, said Riddell, must “think broadly” and “understand the difference between management and governance.” At their best, trustees “critique the questions that the administration is asking.” But the Young Trustee shouldn’t be antagonistic. After all, he or she is only one voice of more than 30. Electing a combative Young Trustee is the quickest way to ensure the marginalization of their perspective.
Service on our Board is no cakewalk. The challenges of service as a trustee range from the mundane—like keeping up with campus news—to the serious. Indeed, we ask our Board, in Pelham’s phrase, to “see into the future—to understand how to take steps today to prepare Duke for that mysterious world, as it will be two or three or even several decades from now.” You and I, if we deserve the vote we cast, need to understand that our trustees are called to find “the balance between prudence and innovation, between the traditional and the revolutionary.” They must manage risk to advance the mission of the University.
Blue told me that a key challenge of trusteeship is to “keep focused on where we want Duke to go, where we want to position it among the great universities of the world.” The broader challenge of Board service is, in Senator Blue’s words, “making sure that [the Board] embodies a big vision, a vision that keeps Duke in the forefront... and [that] develops worthwhile things that serve mankind, that move humankind forward.”
We’ve got to make sure that the Young Trustee we elect is someone who loves Duke, who is committed to the University’s mission, and who can meaningfully contribute to a greater vision of where we need to be in the future. Voters and candidates alike must, as Senator Blue told me, “stay focused on all aspects of Duke.”
Since we’ve got the power to elect a trustee now, let’s be worthy of it.
Banish the parochial and the quotidian. Embrace the strategic and the visionary.
Gregory Morrison is Trinity senior and former DSG executive vice president. His column runs every Tuesday.
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