To the editor:
Rider University, having decided to sell Westminster Choir College, is in negotiations with a Chinese company which, until very recently, was called the Jiangsu Zhongtai Bridge Steel Structure Company. These negotiations have not been concluded after many months; meanwhile, Rider is facing two separate lawsuits alleging that it cannot sell the college — and many friends of the college, including townspeople in Princeton, have become increasingly worried that the transaction will fundamentally change the nature of the school.
Perhaps there is a better way to resolve this matter: considering the excellent education that the Choir College has given its students for so many decades, and the prestigious, nationally acclaimed school that it has always been, suppose the town of Princeton were to float a bond issue and buy the Choir College from Rider University, thereby keeping the college alive and functioning.
Obviously the college would have to repay the town for its generosity, perhaps by allowing a portion of its land to be made into housing for the community, but since Rider is only interested in getting its money wherever it comes from, Princeton’s contribution would maintain the College in the form that it is in, while investing in an institution that perfectly fits the residential area it has so long graced.
Westminster is too valuable an asset to the town of Princeton to simply let it disappear or change in deeply fundamental ways. I urge the government and the people of Princeton to appreciate the wonderful school that they have in their midst and raise the money to restore to Westminster the independence that it once enjoyed. That would surely be the greatest gift that Princeton could give to the amazing students and teachers of Westminster Choir College.
Marvin Harold Cheiten
Princeton