When I worked for Middlebury’s Office of Advancement, I routinely ended alumni donation calls with: “As a student on financial aid, I thank you for your donation — it really helps to make the Middlebury experience possible for students like me.” But those calls made me think: Who else makes Middlebury possible?
The answer is simple: the staff who clean up the remnants of late-night parties, the public safety officer who once retrieved my forgotten Babar-print tote from the Athletic Center at an ungodly hour, or the line cook who makes the Wednesday morning quiches that motivate me to roll out of bed.
Last Wednesday, Middlebury announced its plan to offer early retirement to Vermont-based employees over the age of 55 with at least 10 years of employment, among other cost-saving measures. While this may appear generous, it raises deeper questions about who we value on this campus and who becomes dispensable when numbers are tight.
First, it encourages the departure of staff with deep institutional knowledge — the dining worker who remembers your allergies, the custodian who helps a student find a lost heirloom, or the landscaper who knows when Battell Beach will flood or when to bring in the Adirondack chairs before the first frost.
Second, those leaving will likely be replaced by lower-paid hires or student workers, who cost less and don’t receive benefits. That’s not just cost-cutting — it’s a quiet restructuring of labor.
Third, the policy excludes younger long-term employees. Someone who’s worked here for 20 years but is only 40 years old won’t qualify yet will still lose access to key benefits they were promised, such as the 15% retirement match.
And perhaps most importantly, there's something less tangible but no less important at stake: care. This isn't just about a few positions. It includes everyone outside of professors, coaches, and senior administrators: Student Activities Organization directors, chefs, Public Safety officers and more. These people being pushed out are often the staff most invested in the well-being of students because they’ve built relationships over years or even decades. If we lose these employees, we don’t just lose labor: we lose an essential part of our community.
That 15% retirement match? It’s being reduced to 11% for employees hired before 2017. The college says this figure remains “among the best of our peers,” but the cut disproportionately impacts lower-paid employees. Meanwhile, in the 2021 fiscal year, then-President Laurie Patton earned over $646,936 in salary and benefits. As cuts are rolled out, we need to be honest about who truly bears the cost.
We’re also in the middle of the largest fundraising campaign in Middlebury history. What if even a fraction of that effort was devoted to the workers who’ve carried this place through every snowstorm, construction project and commencement?
Other cost-saving measures seem simple at first glance. Middlebury plans to reduce external lease costs by relocating the Arabic, Italian, and Portuguese Language Schools from Bennington College to the main campus by summer 2027. The Office of Advancement will also move into college-owned space at Marble Works. On the surface, these are straightforward real estate decisions. But what they save in rent, they may cost in labor strain, particularly for facilities staff who will have to adjust accordingly.
Relocating the Language Schools means a greater number of students and faculty will be on campus during the summer months, increasing demand on dining, custodial and maintenance crews, who already carry a significant load. But here’s the catch: If the college is simultaneously reducing its full-time workforce through retirement incentives and replacing longtime staff with temporary summer hires, two things become likely.
First, there will be an increase in short-term or less experienced workers (like local high schoolers or college students) who do not benefit from the institutional knowledge accumulated over years of working here. Second, the remaining year-round staff will face even greater pressure to keep up, especially during the transition period between summer programs and the start of the academic year.
The plan to raise enrollment projections to between 2,600 and 2,650 students, without a proportionate increase in faculty or staff, raises similar questions — more students, fewer resources — and quietly, more pressure to admit wealthier applicants. Middlebury’s need-blind model only works if enough full-pay students are enrolled to offset those receiving financial aid. But the median family income of a student here is $244,300, and 76% come from the top 20% of earners, according to the New York Times. Just 46% of students are on any financial aid, a decrease from 51% of students in past years. If that trend continues, we risk reinforcing economic exclusivity — not because lower-income students are less qualified, but because they’re more expensive to admit. That’s not access, that’s branding.
Rising healthcare costs don’t affect everyone equally. If Middlebury raises premiums or cuts benefits, lower-wage workers will feel it most. Many earn just enough to be ineligible for Medicaid — eligibility ends at $30,120, while a Grade 1 worker earns $37,835. That’s too much for aid but too little for comfort.
The Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey (MIIS) is often blamed for the institution’s budget issues, but its role in the college’s global network is overlooked. While studying abroad at Sciences Po Bordeaux, I met students who will study at MIIS next year, paying only their French tuition. That same partnership lets undergraduate Middlebury students study in Bordeaux. MIIS hosts international exchanges that the Vermont campus can’t supply, quietly bridging programs and partnerships in ways that most don’t realize.
Not everything I’ve said will lead to immediate administrative change, but it might spark conversation, and that’s a start. What if we launched a fund not just “For Every Future,” but for the people who make the college’s future possible?
Alumni should be more than willing to contribute to a fund that offsets healthcare premiums, supplements retirement contributions, or provides emergency relief for the very workers who supported them as students.
What if we also reimagined how we use our existing spaces? Bread Loaf, for example, sits largely empty outside of the summer months. Rather than scaling back international programs or closing off Monterey, we could relocate select programs there. We could host MIIS fellows, international exchange students or even summer language programs, creating vibrant, year-round opportunities for cross-cultural learning without building new infrastructure. And then there’s compensation. It’s time to take a hard look at how salary cuts and benefit reductions are distributed. During financial crises, some university presidents at other institutions have dramatically reduced their own pay or even foregone salaries altogether. It’s a public gesture, yes — but also a powerful one. It sends a message that leadership is willing to shoulder real responsibility alongside everyone else. Why shouldn’t we expect the same here?
If sacrifice is required, it should be shared. That includes administrators. That includes top earners. Faculty, too, are wondering where they fit into all this; many assume these new policies will affect them as well, and that assumption isn’t unfounded. The saddest part is that faculty have grown used to being underpaid compared to administrative leadership, and they rarely push back successfully. They stay because they care, unlike some administrators who learn to care about students in abstract terms, through data, initiatives or optics. They teach us, mentor us, write our recommendations, challenge us, and cheer for us. That kind of connection is what quietly and consistently holds this place together.
Middlebury has long been proud of its values, community, care, and curiosity. But if we truly want to live up to them, we can’t keep cutting the people who bring those values to life. We have the resources, the space and the alumni base to do better. What we need now is the willpower to do it.
