Archived News

LAA Supported Camden Campus as Integral to Rutgers in 2012

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Rutgers and Rowan universities, along with New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and the State Legislature, in 2012 discussed plans that reportedly would have advanced both Rutgers-Camden and higher education in Southern New Jersey.

The discussions followed a controversial proposal, introduced in January 2012, that would have integrated the Rutgers-Camden campus into Rowan University, as part of a larger restructuring initially focused on medical education. The Rutgers Board of Trustees on May 3, 2012, overwhelmingly approved a resolution reaffirming Rutgers-Camden’s place as a crucial part of the university, and opposing the severance of the campus from Rutgers.

The Rutgers School of Law-Camden Alumni Association and the Rutgers University-Camden Alumni Association have strongly opposed the merger of the Camden campus into Rowan.

The Livingston Alumni Association, and Rutgers Alumni Association (which represents graduates of the former Rutgers College and other colleges on the New Brunswick-Piscataway campus), also opposed the initial Camden-Rowan proposal. LAA’s resolution, modeled on an earlier resolution from RAA, is online. 

Rutgers University Alumni Association Chair Christine Tiritilli wrote an open letter encouraging alumni participation in the conversation and providing links to resources on the issue.

On Jan. 25, 2012, Gov. Christie released and endorsed the final report of the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey (UMDNJ) Advisory Committee, chaired by Dr. Sol Barer. This final report expands upon the committee’s interim report issued Sept. 20, 2011. Taken together, these two documents make three significant recommendations that have the potential to transform Rutgers:

  • Integrate the UMDNJ Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, the Cancer Institute of New Jersey, and the UMDNJ School of Public Health with Rutgers University.
  • Develop a formalized research consortium among Rutgers and the other public research universities in Newark.
  • Create a broader, expanded research university in southern New Jersey that integrates the Rutgers–Camden Campus into Rowan University.

As of 2021 Rutgers continues to maintain a website which explains the eventual 2013  New Jersey Medical and Health Sciences Education Restructuring Act. Ultimately, Rutgers-Camden remained intact.

The following organizations are among those that have issued statements or resolutions opposing the initial Camden proposal:

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From the Dean's Office

Dean’s Letter to the Class of 1985: Change Reflects Progress

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W. Robert Jenkins, dean of Livingston College, wrote the following letter to the Class of 1985, included in the college yearbook, Senior Record.

Dear Graduate:

Congratulations on your degree and best wishes for the future. I hope that Livingston College and Rutgers University have served you well and that your memories will be mostly fond ones. You have been here when major changes have taken place and the gains, perhaps also the losses, which resulted from those changes have had a direct effect on you. However, change is inevitable in a dynamic establishment; we should expect and welcome change, as it reflects progress. Improvements in the future include our new (at last!) student center. I hope that all of you will come back to see and enjoy the completed project. We also look to a continued improvement in the ranking of Rutgers University because, as our reputation improves, so does the value of your degree. Big things are beginning to happen here, and I firmly believe that Rutgers University is to be the premier public institution in the East.

You, as graduates, can continue to be a part of Livingston College, and we need you to continue your association with us. Alumni are the best representatives of a college, and your support of us in conversation with others will boost our visibility and reputation. Encourage students to apply and attend Livingston College; speak up as graduates of Livingston College, not of Rutgers University; give a little time back to us, and when you can, contribute your financial support to our many programs.

As always, I will feel a personal loss when you leave. It is a price one pays in getting to know and like an essentially transient population. Please keep in touch, and let us know what you’re doing, because that is one of the real rewards of having gotten to know you.

So, for one more time — good luck, best wishes, and fond memories.

Affectionately,
W. Robert Jenkins
Dean

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From the Dean's Office

Dean’s Letter to the Class of 1983: ‘Livingston Spirit Has Survived and Thrives’

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W. Robert Jenkins, dean of Livingston College, wrote the following letter to the Class of 1983, included in the college yearbook, Strength Through Diversity.

Dear Graduate:

 

It hardly seems possible that yet another year has passed and I am again writing a letter to the graduating class for publication in the Yearbook. But it is indeed that time for me — and what a year we have had!

 

This year we realized after so many years of trying, the approval by the Board of Governors of a student center for Livingston College. Not just another renovation of a room or two in Tillett, and not an add-on to Tillett, but a separate building designed and planned to be a student center — our own student center. Unfortunately, the class of 1983 will not get to use it but it will be here for you to come home to and to enjoy. I would like to see all of you at a gala to celebrate our opening.

 

Another good happening was Livingston’s “coming of age,” as we were literally swamped with applicants and our dorms were over-crowded. Look out Towers, we’re coming back.

 

A change with mixed blessing has been the accomplishment of physical reorganization. Gone are a Livingston College faculty and Livingston department although old friends remain active in affairs here. As I write this letter, there are many problems to tackle and many traffic jams to delay us while Route 18 is expanded and extended. But the departments and programs based at Livingston College are good ones and all are important to our mission.

 

So, okay, there have been changes. But the Livingston spirit has survived and thrives. As long as we admit to the College only those applicants we wish to enroll, as long as we set graduation requirements, run the commuter and residence life programs, operate the gym and the College Center, we can still be who we wish to be.

 

My message to you then, if I must have one, is goodbye and good luck. I ask that you remember Livingston College and what we stand for. We’re a great place and growing better every year. We care about each other and what happens in society. Our College is unique and it has made each of us who is part of it, whether student, faculty, or staff, a much better person for the experience.

 

Don’t forget your College and do come back to visit. Most of all, keep our spirit alive.

 

Sincerely yours,
W. Robert Jenkins
Dean

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From the Dean's Office

Deans’ Letters to Graduates

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Many of the Livingston College yearbooks include letters to the graduating class from the college’s dean. The pages linked below include the text of each letter, as well as a link to the page(s) where they were printed in each yearbook.

From Ernest A. Lynton:

Classes of 1970, 1971 and 1972: No yearbooks were published; no graduation letters have been located.

Letter to the Class of 1973.

From George W. Carey:

Letter to the Class of 1974.

From Emmanuel George Mesthene:

Class of 1975: No yearbook has been located; most likely it was not published. No graduation letter has been located.

Class of 1976: No separate yearbook was produced (graduates’ photos were included in the 1977 yearbook); no graduation letter has been located.

Letter to the Class of 1977. 

From W. Robert Jenkins:

Letter to the Class of 1978.

Class of 1979: No separate yearbook was produced (graduates’ photos were included in the 1980 yearbook); no graduation letter has been located.

Letters to the Classes of:

Class of 1987: The yearbook does not include a letter from the dean; no separate letter has been located.

Letter to the Class of 1988.

Classes of 1989 and 1990: No yearbooks have been located; most likely they were not published. No separate letters have been located.

From Walton R. Johnson:

Letters to the Classes of:

From Arnold G. Hyndman:

Classes of 1993 through 2001: The yearbooks do not include a letter from the dean; no separate letters have been located.

Letter to the Class of 2002.

Classes of 2003 through 2007: The yearbooks do not include a letter from the dean; no separate letters have been located.

Classes of 2008 through 2010: No yearbooks were published; no graduation letters have been located.

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Arts and Culture History

Livingston Women’s Art Show in 1972 Was ‘Strictly Unpolitical’

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Deborah Stokes, a 1974 graduate of Rutgers University’s Livingston College and a 2015 Livingston College Distinguished Alumna, was one of eight artists exhibiting their works at the “First Livingston Women’s Show” in 1972. She shared the following article documenting the experience (also attached as a PDF file):

Elizabeth FrenchmanLivingston’s first show by women strictly unpolitical

PISCATAWAY — Women artists needn’t be women’s libbers.

That’s proved by the “First Livingston Women’s Show” in the Livingston College Art Gallery, which features the work of eight female art students there.

“There is no overt ‘political’ art in the show, and those expecting to see a few fists and 2-D women breaking their chains will be disappointed,” said Elizabeth Frenchman, a senior majoring in lithography, who is showing two amusing color prints and a yellow vinyl “2-D or 3-D stitched sculpture” (with grommets), which at quick glance might be mistaken for an oversize apron.

“The art is women’s art, painted, woven, glazed by women serious about the creative life,” she declared.

This first show by women art students, which closes Thursday, is small, because the gallery in the new academic building complex is small. Competition was ruled out because of the gallery size. The exhibition consists of the work of eight students chosen by instructors in various art disciplines.

Deborah Stokes, senior exhibiting paintings and a silk screen print, prepared the statement denying feminist intention for the show.

Cognizant of today’s transitory American art scene, she pays lip service to feminism in art but makes no commitment.

She explained: “The politics of the Women’s Movement have brought about a new tolerance of diverse life styles, while the American social structure is experiencing a change in identity as women move out of their traditional roles. Increasingly, women are creating the energy for new discoveries in artistic expression.

“For many years women’s artistic outlets have been controlled by the dominant forces in the art world. The Livingston Women’s Show follows the current trend away from the museum aesthetic and moves towards diversity in artistic acceptance. Although a women’s show helps to strengthen an artistic group seeking recognition, women’s art may suffer as much from new categorical definitions as from the old male dominance.”

The Livingston senior feels, “While some women’s art reveals an inherently feminine consciousness through socially influenced subject matter, stylistic elements are universal and cannot be designated exclusively feminine or masculine.”

“Specific media, however, have been traditionally sex-defined,” she said. “The functional art forms, including weaving and ceramics, are only now gradually acquiring the status of other fine arts.”

She pointed out, “Kim Blackburn (sophomore exhibiting weaving and macrame) and Eleanor Fetteroff (junior showing ceramics) consider their pieces to be more than craft.”

The show’s spokesman said Miss Blackburn believes her weaving is “as much an expression of (her) self” and Miss Fetteroff views her raku ceramics as the means to an aesthetic “sensory stimulation.”

Pedro JuanThe grotesqueries by Inez Andrucyk, another junior studying ceramics, “are derived from human forms.” These whimsical, non-functional pieces beg to be handled.

Bonnie Carlson, a senior showing a big painting with surrealist overtones, so graphic that the stove door handle seems to project from the canvas, makes her eloquent statement as an artist, rather than as a woman.

“I like the paradoxes painting provides, the personal experience turned public. I live working with the two dimensional plane, aiming for the third (perhaps fourth) dimension … my concern is with reality, that level of mystery visible but yet invisible,” she declared.

Puerto Rican-born Pedro Juan, sophomore political science major visiting the gallery, voices a quick, crystal clear interpretation of his own on viewing the kitchen scene that shows a headless man with police cap and full-bodied shadow.

“I like that a lot,” he said of the surrealist painting.

Juan explained, “It symbolized the realities of life. It’s how people see people — the phony person, unreal person. It’s how people really are. They’re phonies.”

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Livingston Legacy Award, Special Awards to Alumni

Leroy Haines Honored at 2012 Rutgers Human Dignity Awards; Residence Life Award Named in His Honor

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Leroy C. Haines, assistant director residence life, Livingston Campus, worked for 43 years at Livingston, dedicating his life to reducing prejudice, promoting respect for diversity, creating inclusive communities and mentoring hundreds of undergraduates. He retired in 2012.

Haines is a member of Livingston College’s first graduating class (1971), and a 2011 recipient of the Livingston Alumni Association’s Livingston Legacy Award.

Haines was one of six members of the university community recognized at the 2012 Rutgers Human Dignity Awards, presented April 26. The awards, presented by the Committee to Advance Our Common Purposes, honored the work of faculty, staff and students who strive to promote social justice and diversity.

Read more about the 2012 Human Dignity Award recipients from Rutgers Focus and The Daily Targum.

The Leroy Haines Award is given each year by Rutgers Residence Life to honor an undergraduate Resident Assistant or Apartment Assistant “who best exemplifies the character and persona of Leroy Haines.”

According to the Residence Life website: “Haines reduced prejudice, promoted respect for diversity, created inclusive communities, and forged intercultural collaboration among groups that had not traditionally worked together … As a student, a student employee, Resident Assistant, an alumnus, Resident Coordinator, Assistant Dean/Director of Residence Life for Livingston College and finally Livingston Campus Director, he has come to embody Livingston’s original motto of ‘Strength through Diversity.’ He always challenged the members of his residential communities to live together in order to learn together.”

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Preserving the History. Advancing the Legacy.

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