Letters to the Editor

By Joe Grinstein     10/28/10 7:00pm

When I read Falan Mouton's letter to the editor about the Rice Annual Fund two weeks ago in the Thresher ("Rice just a business; donations are purely optional for graduates," Oct. 8), I had one of those "spit out your coffee" moments that Jon Stewart likes to use for comedic effect. Dr. Mouton seems to be quite upset that the Annual Fund calls her to ask her to support Rice. A large part of her complaint against Rice centers around the fact that she got too many parking tickets when she was on campus. I can't really argue with her there - parking on campus sucks, even when you chair the Annual Fund. Sorry. But I do have to argue with much of the rest of Dr. Mouton's letter. A lot of what Dr. Mouton gets wrong is financial. After noting Rice's $3.6 billion endowment, the market value as of June 30, 2009, Dr. Mouton asserts: "This is not money that goes to education. This is money that sits and hopefully collects interest."

Rice's endowment does not just "sit there." In fact, Rice's current operating budget relies more heavily on its endowment than just about all of its peer institutions. The reason for this is simple - Rice offers a comprehensive university experience that attempts to excel in all areas, and tuition from Rice's very small student body cannot support those efforts by itself. Obviously just spending down the endowment is not a long-term financial solution for Rice. So it is only through the continuing generosity of Rice's alums and friends that Rice can offer an array of programs on par with "big" universities along with the quality experience of a small school.

What galls me even more about Dr. Mouton's letter is her belief that, having "paid" for her Rice education, she owes nothing further to the institution. She writes: "Our contract is satisfied. I will not be donating to Rice because I have already paid for it." Dr. Mouton was on a full athletic scholarship at Rice. Yet even if she had paid for her Rice education, what she would have paid in tuition covers less than half of the total cost of educating her.

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In short, generations of Rice alumni, through their incredible generosity to the university, paid for the rest of Dr. Mouton's education and the education of everyone reading this edition of the Thresher. Now that she is an alumna, Dr. Mouton certainly has every right to decline to participate in the tradition of giving that made her Rice experience possible, parking tickets and all. But every current student at Rice should be grateful to all the alumni who haven't put Rice on their "do not call" list.

Joe Grinstein Baker '94 Chair, Rice Anual Fund

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