This  document  is  intended to give future leaders of WRPI
the benefit of my recently concluded experience as president.	I
do  not  wish  to  make  any  claims concerning the quality of my
administration.  I feel that without judging myself, I can save a
lot of effort for a lot of people yet to come.
      "Leadership  by example" is a phrase of the R.O.T.C.  corps
which is, as I write this, serving  as  a  catch  phrase  of  the
current administration of the station.  It is also a concept that
describes much of the attitude with which, in my time,  I  "lead"
the  station.   It  works.   There is nothing that gets people to
help you out like seeing you do something yourself.  On the other
hand,  setting  a  good  example  can  be  a major liability.  Or
rather, the effort of setting that example can  be  a  liability.
One  must  do  a  fair amount of work to be setting that example.
Quality leadership gets the most done with the  least  amount  of
effort.
      The  other  side	of  the  coin in the matter of setting an
example is the damage done by setting a bad  example.	Executive
committee  members  who  do  not get their jobs done or blatantly
violate station policy are by such action  immeasurably  damaging
the  station.	The  question, of course, is what to do about it.
Although there is provision for impeachment of	officers  in  the
station constitution, that is such a major reaction that short of
gross  illegalities,  it  would  have	to   be   considered   an
over-reaction.	 However,  executive  committee  members  must be
encouraged to do  a  good  job	even  more  strongly  than  other
members.   It  is  very important to make sure that the executive
committee members are doing a good job.  This is  something  that
the   president  should  be  particularly  responsible	for,  but
everyone  else	must  keep  an	eye  out.   The  reason  for  the
president's  special  responsibility  is that he (pardon the male
pronoun) is responsible for keeping some sort of tabs on everyone
else  anyway.	He should insist on regular reports from everyone
with any responsibility (not just the  E-Comm,	here),	and  make
sure that the reports are substantive.
      It is worthy of note that WRPI's difficulties  with  losing
people  due  to  problems  of academic standing are not recent or
temporary.  The earliest records the station  has  indicate  that
Radio  Rensselaer  was  denied  permission for a desired activity
because of what a dean described as "the high  fatality  rate  at
WRPI." Furthermore, there are indications that this situation has
been fairly consistent over the HALF CENTURY since.  Any  problem
that  has  lasted  that  long  is  not  about  to  be  ignorable.
Encouragement of studious endeavors is a good  concept.   Perhaps
inviting the dean of academic advising to a general meeting would
be desirable as well.  On the other hand, nothing you do is going
to  solve  the  problem.   Nevertheless, I've seen a lot of close
friends go, and I would've thought it worth a lot of effort if  I
could've  done  anything  about even one of them.  Even if you're
not into such  sentimentalism,  you  probably  would  admit  that
keeping  people  here  until  graduation is good for the station.
Don't allow people to take on responsibilities  for  the  station
that  you  don't think you can handle -- after all, in many cases
you are worse off if you lose someone from a certain job than you
would've been if no one had been doing it at all.
      Keeping  a set of priorities -- why the station does things
and how important they are -- in mind is advisable.  I  recommend
the following as good concepts:
		   1) hockey (the real reason for our existence)
		   2) educating listeners
		   3) educating ourselves
		   4) having fun
      The order is arguable but the important thing is to keep in
mind  that  there  are  reasons  for  what we do.  Whenever doing
something for the station, think about what the station needs and
what is really to the station's advantage.  Is the station really
better off if you do that  piece  of  production  in  Control-"B"
while  someone  signs  off  the  transmitter?  Everyone, yourself
included, is better off in the long run  if  you  stop  to  think
about the good of the station when making decisions.