Tulane restructures amid protests, lawsuits

Fabian Arzuaga News Editor

With much of New Orleans still in disarray, Tulane University is being shaken to the core by its ambitious and massive post-Katrina reorganization plan. Earlier this month, six alumnae from the University and nine undergraduate students from Tulane’s women’s college filed a lawsuit against the school in an attempt to prevent the redistribution of the endowment of Tulane’s 120-year-old women’s college, Newcomb College, and its consolidation with Tulane’s other undergraduate programs.

Opponents to the consolidation decried the change as detrimental to the character and tradition of each of the undergraduate colleges, while the university administration admits that the changes are vital to the school’s survival.

Those filing suit claim that Tulane does not have the legal power to transfer Newcomb’s $41 million endowment. Federal court Judge J. Carl ordered the administration not to make any changes that could not be easily “undone in short order,” according to Tulane’s Hullabaloo News. The U.S. District Court is scheduled to consider the case on Thursday, March 30.

To date, the school has fired hundreds of employees, including 60 tenured professors. It has also eliminated several engineering programs and more than half of its doctorate programs.

“After the plan was announced and the students and faculty freaked out, the school set up a Task Force,” said Ally Funk ’08 of Newcomb College at Tulane. The Special Task Force was made up of several trustees and held town hall meetings and forums during which students and faculty could air their concerns and thoughts on the direction of Tulane policies after Hurricane Katrina ravaged the Gulf Coast.

The lawsuit comes after the March 16 decision by the Tulane University Board of Administrators to plan to create a single undergraduate college named the "Newcomb-Tulane College,” fusing Newcomb, the male liberal arts Tulane College, and the remnants of Tulane’s engineering programs into one.

Many students argue that while the consolidation will preserve many of the classes and programs of the separate colleges, the small college-like character of each school will begin to fade away. The college-system at Tulane will be eliminated and replaced with schools under one undergraduate college, said Funk.

“Student life will be most affected,” said Funk. “In the end, it will really change the type of student who comes to Tulane.”