Dickinson College
PAE-16: Committee on Socially Responsible Investment

The Socially Responsible Investing (SRI) Discussion Group provides advice to the Committee on Investments of the Board of Trustees. SRI is composed of students, faculty, alumni and administrators, and is chaired by the Vice President for Finance. The group was convened by President William Durden in August 2007 in response to students’ interest and activism regarding companies operating in Darfur, Sudan. In the years since, the SRI Discussion Group broadened its focus to encompass socially responsible investment policies of the college more generally. The group recommended that the college adopt a Triple Bottom Line strategy to pursue financial, social, and environmental objectives in the management of its endowment and direct investments. This is now the practice of the college (see http://www.dickinson.edu/about/offices/financial-operations/content/investments/Investments/). A substantial portion of Dickinson’s endowment is managed by Investure LLC. At the urging of the SRI Discussion Group, Dickinson College worked with the Rockefeller Brothers Fund and Middlebury College to request that Investure create the Sustainable Investments Initiative, a global equity fund with a focus on investments that generate long-term social, environmental and economic value. In June 2010, Dickinson invested $3 million, approximately 1% of our pooled endowment, in the Sustainable Investments Initiative. See http://www.dickinson.edu/news-and-events/news/2009-10/Dickinson-Joins-Sustainable-Investments-Initiative/. The SRI Discussion Group was very active during the period 2007 through summer 2010 (as described under PAE Credit 17). The group has been inactive since fall 2010, in large part due to retirement of Dickinson’s Vice President for Finance Annette Parker, who had served as chair of SRI and primary mentor of the student members of the group. Thomas Queenan was appointed the new Vice President of Finance and Administration in January 2011 and it is expected that SRI will resume its activities in fall 2011. Further information about SRI and Dickinson’s investment policies can be found at http://www.dickinson.edu/about/offices/financial-operations/content/investments/Note-on-SRI/ and at http://www.dickinson.edu/about/offices/financial-operations/content/investments/SRI-Committee-Background/. Past membership of the SRI Discussion Group is given online at http://www.dickinson.edu/about/offices/financial-operations/content/investments/SRI-Committee-Members/.

Annette Parker, the former Associate Vice President, and David Walker, the Associate Treasurer, facilitated the meetings with four students whom have since graduated.