<p>i am not surprised rose has seen a lot of traffic lately – and i’d bet most are people who never set foot in the museum who either 1) want to see it before its gone or 2) want to see it so they know what they are protesting keeping. i am not denying that it has been a wonderful resource – but i do think it has probably been an under utilized resource. </p>
<p>its wonderful that those signing the petition have been willing to put their money where their heart is. i don’t know how that $10,000 stands as an initial influx versus what is available from those sources – but $10,000 is about 1/5 of one student’s overall annual cost of attendance at brandeis. brandeis is faced with a problem in the tens of millions of dollars. my understanding (and i honestly can’t recall where i read this) is that the plan of liqiudating rose was pursued after attempts to seek big money donations didn’t pan out. if donors can in fact make up the difference, that would obviously be wonderful – but i think a big part of why brandeis is where it now stands financially is because the big money donations aren’t flying in.</p>
<p>i am not trying to minimize the importance of smaller donors – every donor is of value – its just a practical issue as to whether donations will be able to alleviate the current situation.</p>