This seems like absolutely the wrong call. Beyond the fact that this was one of the most effective and mutually beneficial community engagement programs the University has run in recent years (to my mind), the optics of using it centrally in a capital campaign the year before slashing it are extremely unfortunate. In several cases TAP offered programs that did not exist at all in some of the sending schools — like chorus. And it offered the rare opportunity — for both Princeton volunteers like me and the visiting students from Trenton — of consistent, recurring meetings over the course of years. In the scheme of the University, I do not believe this program can reasonably be described as expensive for what it yielded, particularly given the two seasons of weekly instruction and programming its annual budget was covering. If the University is cutting fat this year, I don’t think this is the right place to look for it.
This seems like absolutely the wrong call. Beyond the fact that this was one of the most effective and mutually beneficial community engagement programs the University has run in recent years (to my mind), the optics of using it centrally in a capital campaign the year before slashing it are extremely unfortunate. In several cases TAP offered programs that did not exist at all in some of the sending schools — like chorus. And it offered the rare opportunity — for both Princeton volunteers like me and the visiting students from Trenton — of consistent, recurring meetings over the course of years. In the scheme of the University, I do not believe this program can reasonably be described as expensive for what it yielded, particularly given the two seasons of weekly instruction and programming its annual budget was covering. If the University is cutting fat this year, I don’t think this is the right place to look for it.