New College of Weirdness

In a typical case of Founders' Syndrome, the needs of an organization change once rough times are over. Success creates a need for ways to share responsibility and authority. But an old guard might feel nobody else is qualified to carry out the organization's mission. The "founder" makes the important decisions. Boards of directors don't plan or guide, but rather approve ideas coming from the core leader or leaders.

In the case of New College, Henry, Hamilton, and Gabel served as a core leadership group, trading the presidency among themselves whenever crisis hit, taking on fundraising duties themselves, and running the school with a proprietary sensibility. Gabel, who served as president for 20 years, and now leads the Project for Integrating Spirituality, Law, and Politics at New College, helped the school with loans and loan guarantees. Gabel's family foundation, meanwhile, allowed the school to use a building in Santa Rosa as an extension campus.

Gabel did not respond to a phone message requesting an interview. Hamilton did not respond to an interview request made to the school's community relations director.

Hamilton took over as president in 2002, a year WASC scrutinized the school and determined that New College did not have stable revenues or financial controls.

In the intervening years, it seemed the school, with an annual $16 million budget, had become too complex for the freewheeling, leader-centric style of the administration established during the 1970s.

WASC earlier this summer placed New College on probation, a step that precedes yanking accreditation. The U.S. Department of Education, meanwhile, put strict new controls on public aid destined for New College. According to a WASC investigation report, New College faculty and staff blamed Hamilton for alleged conflicts of interest, lax record keeping, and questionable financial practices. Among Hamilton's misdeeds: He allegedly befriended a self-described international student named Kaushal Niroula who promised a $1 million donation to the college in exchange for inappropriate access to academic programs.

Niroula's relationship with the president allegedly came to resemble a Nigerian-style Internet scam. Hamilton may have violated university policies regarding enrollment and appropriate accounting for class credit in exchange for promises of a large gift from Niroula, according to faculty, students, and the WASC report.

Former president and current New College humanities professor Mildred Henry said Hamilton did not alter the transcripts. Rather, she said, a registrar changed the student's credits and grades after Niroula submitted a note with Hamilton's forged signature.

According to a preliminary draft of a letter prepared by New College in response to the WASC report, the school administration said there was nothing improper about Hamilton's relationship with Niroula, and that allegations of impropriety were the result of a campaign by disgruntled faculty to unfairly undermine the college.

Despite his apparent missteps, I have the sense from interviews with teachers and staff, and with Hamilton himself, that the former president did what he thought was best for the school.

"He's an amazing human being. I have learned more from Martin Hamilton than many other people in my life," said Hamilton's longtime assistant Margaret Conway.

Indeed, longtime leaders of charitable organizations who are reluctant to let go of authority are rarely motivated by avarice or ill will. Rather, they've conflated their own personality and the organization's idealistic goals.

"What happens is, you get, in the case of Martin, he doesn't delegate," said Cornford, the poetry professor who helped found the new Faculty Council. "This is classic Founders' Syndrome behavior. They alternate between micromanagement and neglect. Lower down the chain, there's no accountability because no matter what it says on the organizational chart, you actually have to see the president. He's chronically overworked and, in a sense, ineffective. I think that is what happens in nonprofits, and I've seen it in others that were not colleges, such as community organizations in the Mission. What happens is, people who are founders come to identify the organization with themselves. If people are disloyal to them, they think people are disloyal to the organization."

Molina, the interim president, said he and other board members are working day and night to bring the school up to a standard where it can keep its accreditation.

"There are people who have been there a long time, and they are founders, so to speak. There's been this dysfunction at the school that the new board members want to correct. We want to do it in a way that will save the school, stay true to ideals, and move forward, and set up a new model of governance that will be inclusive of the whole community," Molina said.

In order to build a sustainable organization, in other words, it's necessary, ultimately, to reject the founders' Kool-Aid. Otherwise, according to the examples of New College and another famous San Francisco organization, strange stories might start to emerge.

I hope he succeeds.