Inside Iowa State: Iowa State University

INSIDE IOWA STATE
June 29, 2001

Letter

To the editor:
In July, vice president for external affairs Murray Blackwelder is leaving ISU and taking a big position at Purdue University to head up and oversee the fund raising for Purdue President Martin Jischke. Blackwelder also has just been approved as a governor for the ISU Foundation.

The question arises, will Blackwelder simultaneously be able to carry out the overseeing of the ISU Foundation's fund raising and also be the head man for fund raising at Purdue University? Is this a conflict of interest or what?

What is it with the ISU Foundation? On the one hand, they argue that their records must be kept secret to protect the names of their donors and also to keep other institutions from learning the methods that ISU uses to raise funds. Yet, they deliberately make Blackwelder a member of the ISU Foundation while he will be raising funds for Purdue. It certainly appears that the ISU Foundation is inviting the fox into the hen house. Frankly, I don't see how ISU alumni or anyone else can give money to the ISU Foundation when it does things like this, along with dissolving its connection to the university and becoming a private, secret organization.

-- John Robyt, ISU alumnus and professor of biochemistry, biophysics and molecular biology

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