This Site Currently Under Deconstruction


Support Progressive Candidates for the Board of Trustees!
Last year's list of nominees for the Board of Trustees was a disappointment, to say the least--nearly all the candidates came from corporate backgrounds or worked in conservative policy think-tanks. This year, WESPAN has nominated its own candidates to challenge the status quo: Cheryl Mejia '95 and David Siegel '69. The catch is that we need another 120 signatures to place them on the ballot! Click here for more information and to help out.


Relief for WTC Janitors
Ilana Sumka '97 works for SEIU in New York, and sent out this letter requesting donations for a relief fund for families of the janitors killed in the attacks of September 11th.

The History
WESPAN started up in 1984 when a group of campus activists decided it was time to connect with alumni support. They sent out mass mailings to the graduating class, held a progressive alumni reception/film screening/organizing meeting during Reunion weekend and, lo and behold, had the beginnings of a sizeable mailing list. WESPAN membership grew to close to 1,600 by the time its campus-based organizing core dissolved in 1992. In that time, WESPAN successfully nominated and elected two people to the Board of Trustees, set up an escrow account to withold donations from Wesleyan until it fully divested from South Africa, and organized a number of regional groups and on-campus events.

ABOUT THIS SITE
This represents the beginnings of the revival of the Wesleyan Progressive Alumni/ae Network. Right now it's just a few campus organizers, the Hermes staff, and the WSA office working on it. If you want to get involved, email wespan@wesleyan.edu. The most important thing we're doing right now is re-establishing connections with old members. Please take the time to sign in and make sure you get on our email list. And tell as many Wesleyan people about this site as you're still in touch with.

We hope to use the network to 1) nominate and elect progressive alumni to the Wesleyan Board of Trustees, 2) create an alumni support network for campus campaigns (anti-aweatshop, socially-responsible investment, labor issues, etc.), 3) create a job information and resouce-sharing network for progressive students and alumni, 4) help alumni find each other and stay in touch.

WESPAN Revival Report: September 2001 After months of research and data-entry, the WSA office has updated the 1600+ person WESPAN database from ten years ago. We'll have it plugged into the email lists shortly. Next on the agenda: organizing WESPAN events for Reunion 2002 and putting together a progressive Trustees slate for future elections (see "Projects" section for more).

New WESPAN CHAT email listserve
We've set up a second list-serve for those who'd like to get more frequent mailings about issues of concern to progressive alumni. Anyone can send out messages on this list--it's intended to be a place to chat, brainstorm, and organize. We'll also be sending out more frequent updates on this one. Sign up Here.

What to do with $2,242.94?
WESPAN has has a chunk of money left in an escrow account from the days of Divestment. At the WESPAN reception during Reunion Weekend 2000 (see the News Section for more) there was a good amount of discussion about what to do with it. The account was created so that alumnae/i could give donations that wouldn't be released to Wesleyan until it had fully divested from South Africa. According to Cari Macdermott, the money never reverted to Wesleyan because the group couldn't reach a consensus as to when Wesleyan was "fully" out of South Africa, nor what do earmark the donation for.
So right now WESPAN has around $2100 sitting in an escrow account earning 1.24% interest. What should we release it as? Financial Aid is one option, but that quantity wouldn't amount to much. It's also too little to endow an honorarium for a lecture series. Danny Rosenblatt '85 suggested endowing a "rabble-rouser" prize for creative student activism, and naming it after one of the three students SJB'd in the fall of '86 for accosting tour groups with information about sexual assault at Wesleyan. Everyone at the reception seemed to like that, and we really should put the money somewhere that gets a better return. Email suggestions, objections, and alternatives to wespan@wesleyan.edu