In response to your editorial “Re-write the donor agreement” (September 6-8, 2012), I would like to correct the record regarding the Riddell agreement:
1. The role of the steering committee is to administer the multimillion-dollar, multi-year gift, and not the academic program. It does not run the program. The committee does provide advice to the university in relation to the terms of the agreement, but it has no authority over the program. There was some confusion created by the original wording of the agreement regarding the role of the steering committee, but that has been fully addressed and clarified in the revisions that have been approved by the donor and the university.
2. The membership of the steering committee comprises two appointees from Carleton University and two representing the donor. The chair of the committee is approved by mutual agreement of the four members. Currently, the chair is Preston Manning, who has been instrumental in wanting to establish a political management program in Canada.
3. The steering committee does not approve the budget for the program or the awarding of scholarships to individual students. It does oversee the annual flow of money from the Riddell Family Charitable Foundation (RFCF) as prescribed in the agreement, but the program budget is developed and managed by the dean of public affairs and is approved by Carleton’s board of governors.
4. The steering committee is not part of the academic governance of Carleton University; therefore, it does not and cannot have any authority over the program. Only the Senate can approve changes in the academic governance of the university. The political management program is housed within Kroeger College in the faculty of public affairs, and it is managed and controlled under the overall authority of the faculty of graduate and postdoctoral affairs and the university Senate in the same way as every other graduate program at Carleton.
5. The steering committee has no authority or control over the curriculum of the program. A program curriculum committee comprised of Carleton faculty from the faculty of public affairs developed the initial program curriculum. The academic program proposal was developed in accordance with Senate procedures in the same manner as all graduate programs at Carleton. The program was approved by the faculty of graduate and postdoctoral Affairs, by the Senate, and then by external review through the Ontario Council of Graduate Studies.
The steering committee constitutes an appropriate mechanism to provide information to the donor to assure him that the gift is being used for the purposes for which it was intended in accordance with the donor agreement, and to ensure the annual flow of money to the program from the RFCF over the 10-year life of the agreement. The role of the steering committee fully respects the academic freedom and the academic integrity of the program, the professors, and the university.
Peter Ricketts
Provost and Vice-President (Academic)
