What can I contribute?
- I
am a good listener, so I will be able to hear both constituents and
fellow trustees out on areas of conflict. I have already had
conversations with current trustees about the threats and opportunities
that face the College, and its strengths and weaknesses as an
institution.
- I can use my analytical intelligence to break policy issues down to their elements and study them. I did this with the minor league ballpark issue, where I studied the transportation ramifications of the proposed ballpark for the communities surrounding the college.
- I can articulate complex issues in ways that ensure that we don’t conceive of them too narrowly, or miss subtle implications of what can on the face of it look like good options for the college. This is one of the reasons, I believe, that people, including people whom I didnit previously know, approached me last year and suggested that I run for Trustee.
- I made it through the University of Chicago in one piece, which is quite an achievement, and I’ve been very successful in my career selling books, both in terms of numbers, and in terms of getting the right book used in the right places (and with Norton, always at a reasonable price). I personally need a new challenge, and I see the college’s challenges. I want to help our current generation of McHenry County citizens to leave a legacy for our future, a college that works for all of us to help ensure our community’s future.
- I’ve worked at the college in the past, as a volunteer in the English as a Second Language program, back when the program included classes on Friday nights. I’d like to see the campus open to the program once again on Friday night, as I really enjoyed participating in this program. Generally, I am familiar with the non-credit programs that are available, and how important those are to different groups in our community.
How could I do the job better?
My career marketing books has been entirely devoted to higher
education, and I’ve spent the greatest share of that time selling books
on community college campuses. From my work, I understand
the mission of the community college.
My political
work over the last five years, working as a Democrat, has been devoted
to talking with people across McHenry County, and in three neighboring
states, about how our government is doing. I talked to
thousands of county residents in my campaign for the County Board 2
years ago, and that has grounded me in the community. This
connection would help me both to represent the concerns of individuals
and constituencies in McHenry County to the college, and, conversely,
help me to represent the college and what it needs to accomplish back
to the community. Many people have criticized the college in
recent years for lacking transparency in its process of planning for
the future. Overall, I feel I could better connect the college to
the community than is currently the case.
Why do I want to do this?
McHenry County has grown tremendously over the last twenty years, and it faces many challenges as a result of this growth. Many of these challenges are part of conditions that our larger national community needs to adapt to, cultural, economic, environmental and foreign policy challenges, many of which are related to each other. Both for our local and our national interest, McHenry County College needs to serve as a crossroads for people and ideas.
Part of being such a crossroads is just giving adults (including the young adults, some of whom will end up continuing their education elsewhere) a place where they can learn from and talk to each other. But being a crossroad of ideas also means fostering conditions in which we can innovate, learning about and conceiving of different ways of putting ideas into practice.
We have limited natural resources, and we need to learn how to work in
ways so that we don’t destroy the rich biological substrate on which we
depend here in McHenry County, but within those constraints, there is
in principle no limit to the number of ways in which we combine the
elements of the material world.
Ideas are ultimately the
foundation for the possibility of generating wealth. We need to
open up the circuits of communication in the County, allowing people
from different generations and different walks of life to exchange
ideas and the results of their own attempts to solve problems.
For me, as someone who sells books for a living, the possibilities of wealth are not comprehended solely by material and financial wealth. The overall richness of life comes as much from the bonds we create with each other, and how we work and play together, as it does from how much we consume and invest. The sciences and the arts can serve us practically and spiritually, offering us means of living, but can also offer ways of understanding our place in the world. When people cross the threshold of McHenry County College, they should feel that they are entering a place that offers them access to that richness.
How much time can I give to the job?
My youngest child will be heading off to college in the fall, so I will have much more time on my hands. I would find it very satisfying to sink myself into the problems and opportunities offered by our primary center of adult learning in the county.
What will I get from it?
I
learned an important lesson from the week I worked with a team of
volunteers down in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina: it truly is
better to give than to receive. It is highly fulfilling for human
beings to serve others, and working as a Trustee would present me that
opportunity.
It may be less dramatic to
maintain and improve one’s community than it is to salvage a community
when it has suffered disaster. But there is no question in my
mind that working to build the institutional dikes that collectively
keep us from disaster, and preserve for our own and for future
generations the rich opportunities that life offers here, that kind of
work holds the possibility of great satisfaction.
What will I have to give up?
I’ll
have to give up my book-selling account at MCC, which is too bad,
because it is only a couple miles down the road from where I
live. This may not be required technically, but I think it will
be required ethically, since selling to people whose contracts
one plays even a distant role in negotiating would be a conflict of
interest. I have arranged that, if I win a seat on the
Board of Trustees, I will transfer my account at the college to another
of my colleagues who works in the Chicago area.
But the longstanding conversations I’ve had with faculty over the 18
years I’ve sold books there have contributed to my sense of the mission
of the school, and this grounded understanding will serve me well in my
work as Trustee.
What does my family think?
My family wonders if I can really win a seat on this board (they also hope I don’t spend a lot of money campaigning for a position that pays none). But they know and understand that education, ideas, and conversations about ideas and human development are very important to me, and are part of the legacy I’ve inherited from my family. My children have close friends who are and have been students at the College. I believe they hope that the community will entrust me with the chance to represent both it and the students young and old who attend the College, on its governing board.
What if I don’t win?
Running
a campaign is a challenge, and I am balancing that challenge with my
responsibilities to my children and my friends, to my aging parents, to
the job which enables me to put bread on my table, and to myself, both
in terms of staying healthy, and keeping myself informed about larger
goings on in the world we live in. But I am really enjoying
the process so far, and as with many good challenges, I believe that it
is forcing me to measure up in other areas of my life, so that I can
keep this balance working. I’d only feel bad if I don’t win if I
hadn’t given it the best effort I can with the context of fulfilling
the other responsibilities in my life.
The
election is a social challenge to both myself and the other candidates,
to do our best to make the issues of the larger community part (not the
whole of) our lives, while we take care of ourselves and put bread on
our tables. Win or lose, I hope that the campaign will raise
issues that we need to face, and bring more of the ‘community’ into our
community college’s picture.
.