Rider, WCC Faculty Protest Planned Sale Of Princeton Campus

PRINCETON, NJ — About 80 faculty and students from Rider University the Westminster Choir College turned out for a protest in opposition to the the proposed sale of the campus on Monday, the Princeton Packet reports. Joel Phillips was among those who attended the protest, and recalled the last time the future of the music school was in doubt.

“Some of us were there in those days, they seem ancient and away,” Phillips said, according to the report. “But when you live through something like that, it scars you for life.”

Phillips has been teaching at Wesminster Choir College for 32 years. The current deal between the Rider administration and its faculty union expires in August, according to the report. Professor Dave Dewberry said the faculty wants a fair and honest contract and to keep Rider and Wesminster as one.

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.

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