Former NJ Governor Joins Opposition To Sale Of Westminster Choir College

PRINCETON, NJ — Former New Jersey Governor Tom Kean will voice his opposition to Rider University’s proposed sale of the Westminster Choir College on Friday. He will make the announcement during an appearance at the school’s Princeton campus, the Coalition to Save Westminster Choir College announced.

He will be joined by members of the Coalition, the Coalition’s recently retained attorney Bruce Afran, the Rider University Chapter of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP), students, alumni, donors, parents and supporters of the college at a press conference, scheduled for noon. It will take place on Hamilton Avenue at Chestnut Street, in the park facing the Westminster Choir College campus at 101 Walnut Lane in Princeton.

Rider University announced its intention to sell the campus in March. The decision came after the university initially said it was looking to close the campus and consolidate it with the campus in Lawrenceville to help with some of the university’s financial problems.

The university has said it will work with an outside entity to sell the college and the campus in a process that may take up to a year. One possibility is to sell the college itself, and then to sell the physical campus as a separate entity.

In February, Kean wrote an editorial saying that closing the college won’t save Rider University. “There are precious few places in the nation and around the world where the music lives. Westminster Choir College is one of them, and it remains one of the central pillars upon which we have built the arts in New Jersey,” he wrote in the editorial, which can be read at nj.com.

Kean was New Jersey’s Governor from 1982-1990.

The Princeton Public School Board of Education has authorized the school district to look into the possibility of buying the campus for continued educational use in the community.

The decision to sell was one of a number of factors that contributed to a vote of no confidence in Rider University President Greg Dell’Omo last month.

Patch file photo of Tom Kean