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With the publication of the College Sustainability Report Card 2010, more than 1,100 school survey responses from over 300 institutions are now available online. In total, these surveys offer more than 10,000 pages of data collected from colleges and universities during the summer of 2009. To access surveys from other schools, go to the surveys section of the website. To see grades, or to access additional surveys submitted by this school, please click the "Back to Report Card" link at the beginning or end of the survey.
Name: Allegra B. Lubrano
Title: Executive Administrator, Dartmouth College Advisory Committee on Investor Responsibility
Date survey submitted: July 21, 2009
1) How does your school handle proxy voting on environmental, social, and governance issues?
(a) We do not have the ability to vote proxies as the entire equity holdings of the endowment are invested in mutual funds (e.g. CommonFund, Fidelity, Vanguard, etc.).
(b) We ask that our investment managers handle the details of proxy voting.
(c) We provide our investment managers with general guidelines that determine our proxy votes.
(d) We provide our investment managers with specific corporate governance guidelines that determine our proxy votes.*
(e) We provide our investment managers with specific environmental and social guidelines that determine our proxy votes.*
(f) A member of our school administration determines our proxy votes.
(g) A committee of administrators and/or trustees deliberates and makes decisions on proxy votes.
(h) A committee that includes student representatives deliberates and makes recommendations or decisions on proxy votes.
(i) School community feedback is incorporated into proxy voting decisions through town hall meetings or a website.
Your answers:
(h) most closely reflects Dartmouth’s practices with respect to the voting of proxy resolutions by virtue of its Advisory Committee on Investor Responsibility (“ACIR”). See below for further explanation.
Proxy voting on corporate governance matters:
ACIR does not generally review or make proxy voting recommendations on resolutions that exclusively address corporate governance issues. If a specific resolution addresses corporate governance as well as environmental or social issues, however, ACIR will review that resolution and issue a voting recommendation on that resolution. An example of a resolution that blends corporate governance issues with environmental or social issues is one that requests an explanation of executive compensation together with either the rationale and criteria for such compensation or a comparison of upper level executive compensation to the compensation of other lower level employees.
Proxy voting on environmental and social resolutions:
ACIR reviews all proxy resolutions that address environmental and social issues when such resolutions are filed at companies in which Dartmouth College directly holds shares. Dartmouth’s Investment Office has always accepted ACIR’s recommendations and voted all proxy resolutions accordingly.
In addition, since 2005 Dartmouth College has conducted a review of the operations of companies conducting business in Sudan due to the concerns of the Dartmouth community about the humanitarian crisis in Sudan’s Darfur region and the Sudan government’s complicity with that crisis. As a result of ACIR’s annual review of these companies’ operations, Dartmouth maintains a list of securities in which it will not hold shares either directly or through outside investment managers. Dartmouth refers to this list as its No Hold List. Outside investment managers are regularly provided with the No Hold List together with instructions to refrain from purchasing shares of the companies on the No Hold List on Dartmouth’s behalf. As of July 21, 2009, there are thirteen companies on Dartmouth’s No Hold List. These companies are:
AREF Investment Group, AviChina Industry and Technology Company, China National Petroleum Company, Kejuruteraan Samudra Timor Berhad, Kencana Petroleum Berhad, Lundin Petroleum AB, Muhibbah Engineering Berhad, Oil & Natural Gas Company Limited, PetroChina, Petronas (Petrolium Nasional Berhad), Ranhill Berhad, and Sinopec Group (China Petrochemical Corporation).
Please see ACIR’s web site at http://www.dartmouth.edu/~finance/committees/acir.html for further information about ACIR’s activities and access to its annual reports from 2004-2008.
2) If you answered "g" or "h" to question 1, please provide the following information about the committee:
Name of committee: Advisory Committee on Investor Responsibility
Number of meetings held since August 2008: ACIR held nine regularly scheduled meetings to prepare for the 2009 proxy season and then to review and issue voting recommendations. In addition, a subcommittee of ACIR met several times during 2009 to review company operations in Sudan. See response to survey question 1) above.
Name of chair(s): Professor John M. Carey, Professor of Government, Chair of Government Department, John Wentworth Professor in the Social Sciences
Position of chair (e.g., administrator, faculty, staff, student): Faculty
To whom does the committee report (e.g., Trustee Committee, President, Vice President): President of Dartmouth College
Number of administrators on committee: Three administrators as well as two representatives from Dartmouth’s Office of Investments
Number of alumni on committee: One Alumni representative
Number of faculty on committee: Four Faculty members
Number of staff on committee: One non-voting executive administrator
Number of students on committee: Three undergraduate students and two graduate students
Number of trustees on committee: None
Total number of committee members: There are fifteen (15) voting members serving on ACIR in 2009 and one non-voting staff member.
3) Please indicate what information about proxy voting records is made available to each of the groups listed under "Your answers" (select all that apply):
(a) No information is made available
(b) Votes cast on proxy resolutions only by category (and not company specific)
(c) Votes cast on proxy resolutions on a company-specific level
(d) Votes cast on proxy resolutions on a company-specific level, including the number of shares
Your answers:
Trustees and senior administrators:
Trustees, senior administrators and other select members of the school community:
All members of the school community including faculty, staff, students and alumni: (b), (c)
The public per open records law:
The public: (b), (c) ACIR’s annual reports are available on the Dartmouth College web site and are, therefore, available to the public. These annual reports contain information about all votes cast by Dartmouth College on proxy resolutions by category and by company.
4) Where is information about proxy voting records made available?
(a) Information is not made available.
(b) Information is available at the investment office or similar office on campus.
(c) Information is sent to individuals upon request.
(d) Information is on the school website with password protection.
(e) Information is on the school website and is accessible to the public.
Your answers:
To the school community. (e)
Proxy voting records on environmental and social resolutions: (e)
Proxy voting records on corporate governance matters: (e), subject to response to survey question 1) above.
To the public.
Proxy voting records on environmental and social resolutions: (e)
Proxy voting records on corporate governance matters: (e), subject to response to survey question 1) above.
5) Please indicate what information about endowment holdings is made available to each of the groups listed under "Your answers" (select all that apply):
(a) No information is made available
(b) Asset allocation
(c) List of external managers
(d) List of mutual funds
(e) Equity holdings
(f) Fixed income holdings
(g) Real estate holdings
(h) Hedge fund holdings
(i) Private equity holdings
(j) Venture capital holdings
(k) Natural resource holdings
(l) Cash
(m) Other holdings (please specify)
(n) All holdings
Your answers:
Available to trustees and senior administrators: (b), (c), (n)
Available to trustees, senior administrators, and other select members of the school community: (e)
Available to all members of the school community, including faculty, staff, students, and alumni: (e)
Available to the public per open records law: (a)
Available to the public: (a)
6) Please indicate where information about endowment holdings is made available to the school community and to the public:
(a) Information is not made available.
(b) Information is available at the investment office or similar office on campus.
(c) Information is sent to individuals upon request.
(d) Information is on the school website with password protection.
(e) Information is on the school website and is accessible to the public.
Your answers:
To the school community: (b) Any member of the Dartmouth community (students, faculty, employees and alumni) may view a complete listing of Dartmouth’s equity holdings by visiting Dartmouth’s Office of Investments during regular business hours.
To the public: (a)
7) Is your school currently invested in any of the following areas? (Please list all that apply.)
(a) Renewable energy funds or similar investment vehicles
(b) Community development financial institutions or community development loan funds
(c) On-campus energy and/or water efficiency projects through the endowment (as an investment and not a payout)
(d) None of the above
Your answer: (d)
8) Is your school currently exploring investment in any of the following areas? (Please list all that apply.)
(a) Renewable energy funds or similar investment vehicles
(b) Community development financial institutions or community development loan funds
(c) On-campus energy and/or water efficiency projects through the endowment (as an investment and not as a payout)
(d) None of the above
Your answer: (a)
9) Does your school have any investment policy provisions, or use any investment managers, that consider environmental/sustainability factors?
(a) No
(b) Yes (please describe)
(c) Currently under consideration (please describe)
Your answer: (b) While Dartmouth College does not have a formal investment policy or guidelines with respect to environmental or sustainability issues, numerous of its outside managers actively consider environmental and sustainability factors when selecting investment opportunities.
10) Does your school offer donors the option of directing gifts to an investment fund that considers environmental/sustainability factors?
(a) No
(b) Yes (please describe)
(c) Currently under consideration (please describe)
Your answer: (a)
Question 11 is for informational purposes only; responses will NOT be included in the Report Card evaluation process.
11) Please provide total endowment value as of the following dates:
6/30/2008: $3.6 billion
9/30/2008:
12/31/2008: $3.0 billion
3/31/2009:
6/30/2009 (may be submitted separately at a later date):
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