Around a dozen Board of Trustees members attended Thursday evening’s Class Trustee Forum to hear student concerns on issues ranging from Lorain County Transit service to building construction to the presidential search process.

The tone of this year’s third forum, which featured presentations from just a few students, was relatively laid-back and conversational. Trustees and students were able to form a circle in the Wilder Hall meeting room, thanks to low student attendance.

First to speak was College junior Ezra Pincus-Roth, who told the trustees about troubles his College Transportation Committee is facing as it tries to find ways to improve transportation off-campus during breaks.

“We have a crisis on our hands,” Pincus-Roth remarked, explaining that the College is spending tens of thousands of dollars subsidizing the LCT, which he called, “the epitome of bureaucratic indifference.” Pincus-Roth encouraged trustees to look at alternative means of transporting students, such as renting school buses from the city of Oberlin or chartering private companies.

Few concrete solutions were offered, but Trustee Philip Hanawalt, OC ’54, assured Pincus-Roth that “this is not a new problem,” and told him about a group of Oberlin students who purchased a bus to transport students between campus and the airport during breaks, only to be shut down after LCT put pressure on College administrators to prevent the students from operating their bus.

Student Senator and College junior Colin Koffel spoke toward the end of the meeting and asked trustees for an update on the College’s new “fearless” marketing campaign and on the presidential search process. Trustees were reluctant to comment on either issue, but when pressed about communication in the presidential search process, they assured Koffel that the Board would find a way to balance the need for student input with the confidentiality required by many candidates.

In addition to Pincus-Roth and Koffel, representatives from the SPACE committee, the Architectural Research Group and the Oberlin Student Cooperative Association addressed the trustees.

As the forum came to a close, the trustees asked students about how to raise attendance at future meetings. After hearing student suggestions, the trustees showed interest in making greater efforts to publicize Class Trustee Forums.

The next forum will be held over summer break.