Letter to the editor

Re: Hilltop Association

Over the past week or so, the staff of the Spectator (myself included) has been bombarded with emails from Paul Streitz ‘66 of the Hilltop Association.  The Hilltop Association is the group which wants Hamilton to lower its tuition or lose its nonprofit status.  They have made frequent appearances in the Spectator during this academic year, writing letters to bring awareness to their cause.  But I’m tired of getting their emails, I’m sick of their letters, and I want off the Hilltop Association’s email list.  This isn’t just about me, though. I believe a larger point is at issue: the community needs to realize that the Hilltop Association is no longer making a serious effort to debate important issues at Hamilton.

I first was informed of the Hilltop Association through a letter in my college mailbox.  I usually don’t get letters, so I was interested to read it--and more interested still in the mission of the Hilltop Association.  I pay a lot of money to go to Hamilton.  When I say that, I don’t mean “I have wealthy parents that pay lots of money so I can party here.”  I mean that I have an arrangement with my parents in which they pay about half of my tuition (the cost of the premier in-state school where I’m from) and I pay the remainder out-of- pocket. This means I’ve taken a lot of loans and I’ve worked about 50 hours a week during each summer to pay for the privilege to go here.  Hamilton has been generous and given me a significant amount of financial aid during my four years here, which has reduced--but most certainly not eliminated--my debt burden relative to what it would be without aid.

Still, I am acutely aware of the pressures of rising tuition.  More directly aware, I would say, than most other students who go here. So I was interested to see what the Hilltop Association had to say and what meaningful proposals they had to reduce the tuition burden.  But there does not seem to be much of substance on the table.  In real terms, making Hamilton a for-profit institution would dramatically increase tuition (other things equal) because it would drastically increase the tax burden on the College.  Other than that, I haven’t  seen much from the Hilltop Association that strikes me as a serious proposal for either controlling cost growth at Hamilton or reducing tuition below current levels.

What I have seen is an organization that tries to bully and bludgeon its way into the conversation.  Hamilton is supposed to be a school that teaches students to think critically and communicate effectively.  Clearly, both lessons were lost on the Hilltop Association.  Constantly attacking the Board of Trustees and attempting to use the Spectator as an agent in a larger dispute is petty. Frankly, I’m tired of it. I helped craft the editorial where the Spectator called for a conversation between the Hilltop Association, the Board, and the community.  To my knowledge we never received any response from the Hilltop Association on this matter.  It does not seem like the Hamilton graduates who make up the Hilltop Association are interested in having a reasoned discourse on the issue of Hamilton’s cost.  It is all-or-nothing, a scorched earth campaign designed more to draw attention than to initiate communication.

I’m sorry that I have to write a public letter asking to be taken off the Hilltop Associaton’s email list and bring awareness to these issues because I hoped the Hilltop Association would provide a reasonable breath of fresh air into the College discourse.  But that hasn’t happened.  If anything, the Hilltop Association has poisoned the discourse and set back debate on these important issues.  I hope more reasonable people can work together on the issue and attempt to control costs while keeping the quality of the Hamilton experience impeccably high.  The people that will do that, though, are not in the Hilltop Association--so I don’t want to hear from them going forward.

Sincerely,
Evan Klondar ’11