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Unread 01-13-2018, 01:11 AM
R. S. Gwynn's Avatar
R. S. Gwynn R. S. Gwynn is offline
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Join Date: Feb 2001
Location: Beaumont, TX
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One of the things about West Chester that no one seems to understand is that the program director answers to the dean of the College of Arts & Humanities, but financial support for the conference and other activities of the Poetry Center comes from the University Foundation. Thus, the control of the poetry conference comes from the college, which has no financial stake in the conference and does nothing to support it. The endowment of the Poetry Center, raised over the last 22 years from individual donors and the NEH, amounts to over 2 million dollars, roughly 12% of the university's total endowment. The endowment's interest generates about $80k per year to partially fund the conference; registration fees fund the rest. Last year, the conference was obliged to pay the college in excess of $6000 for classroom/auditorium space and help in putting on the concert, which used unpaid student singers.

How this curious situation came about is a complicated story. Since 2014, the University has refused to fund a full-time director and assistant director. Thus, I feel that any blame for the current or future status of the conference has to be laid at the feet of the university and, specifically, the interim dean of the College of Arts and Humanities. I have wished Jesse Waters well in his unenviable new position. However, I did a lot of unpaid work for West Chester over the past two years and donated my own money to the Poetry Center; I do not plan to lend any further assistance to an institution that clearly does not know where its own best interests lie.
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