Executive Committee
Executive Committee
The Executive Committee of the MIT Free Speech Alliance is made up of:
- The President
- The Executive Director
- The volunteer Chairs of MFSA's working committees.
The working committees of the MFSA consist entirely of volunteers from among the membership.
Communications Committee
The Communications Committee is responsible for all MFSA external communications to the public, including press relations and press releases, social media campaigns, and the content and operation of the MFSA website.
Eric Rasmusen Yale B.A., M.A. Economics '80. MIT Ph.D. '84 Economics.
Eric serves as the Chair of the Communications Committee. He recently retired after serving as an economics professor at UCLA and Indiana University and holding visiting positions at Oxford, Harvard, Yale, and Chicago. He teaches 7th grade math and chairs the academic freedom committee of the Indiana AAUP Conference . He wrote Games and Information: An Introduction to Game Theory. Eric lives in Bloomington, Indiana.
External Relations Committee
The External Relations Committee is responsible for liaisoning with the Alumni Free Speech Alliance and its individual members, and with other organizations that advocate for free speech, at universities and in general.
Steven C. Carhart '70, SM '72, CFA.
Steve serves as Chair of the External Relations Committee. He is also a member of the Board of Directors of the Alumni Free Speech Alliance. His professional work has been in energy policy and investment management, including currently managing a mutual fund. At MIT, he served as Editor in Chief at the Tech and President of his class, as well as alumni President of his fraternity and Chair of the alumni association of students of his graduate advisor. Last year he was elected by MIT alumni body to serve on the Alumni Association Selection Committee. He resides in Manchester by the Sea, Massachusetts.
Faculty Liaison Committee
The Faculty Liaison Committee is responsible for communicating and coordinating with the MIT faculty, including faculty organizations (such as the MIT Council on Academic Freedom and the Ad Hoc Committee on Academic Freedom and Campus Expression) as well as individual faculty members.
Ian Hutchinson MIT Professor Emeritus
Ian is the Chair of the Faculty Liaison Committee. He is a plasma physicist and joined the MIT faculty in 1983. He led
Finance Committee
The Finance Committee is responsible for all financial operations of MFSA, including accepting donations and grants, paying expenses, preparing budgets, and preparing financial statements for the organization.
Cesarina Templeton-Wheeler Boston University B.A. (’97), MIT M.S.R.E.D (Course 1) ’02.
Cessy is Chair of the Finance Committee. Her Masters’ thesis, 100 Years of Commercial Real Estate Prices in Manhattan, was published by the Journal of Real Estate Economics. Ms. Templeton enjoyed a long career in commercial real estate before the sale and disposition of Overland Capital Group where she held a variety of positions, including the Managing Director of the asset management group and Senior Vice President in acquisitions and equity placememt. Prior to her tenure at Overland Capital Group, Cessy held positions with Equity Residential Properties, Boston Capital Group and CBRE. Cessy lives in Boston, Massachusetts.
Fundraising Committee
The Fundraising Committee is responsible for raising the funds which support the
programs and initiatives of the MIT Free Speech Alliance. The Fundraising Committee also
takes the lead in raising funds for the Concerned Donors Fund.
Pete Denton BS ’67, Course 6
Pete is Co-Chair of the Fundraising Committee. After subsequently graduating from the Harvard Business School, Pete spent seven years as a management consultant and finance executive. He then joined his family’s technology business, of which he is still non-executive Chairman. Pete later founded an independent technology business which went public in 1997. After that, Pete and his wife founded a public school reform organization focused on New Jersey. It became one of the largest school choice advocacy organizations in the country. Pete is still involved in school reform efforts focused on improving education for disadvantaged and children of color. Pete resides between Newport, Rhode Island, and Palm Beach, Florida.
Neil Webber BS ’86, Course 6-3
Neil is Co-Chair of the Fundraising Committee. He focused his early career on mission-
critical applications, primarily at startup and early-stage companies. His last venture went
public in 1999. After that, Neil formed the Webber Family Foundation which has granted
over $25M for the educational needs of lower-income youth. His foundation also supports
first amendment and viewpoint diversity issues with grants to Heterodox Academy, FIRE,
and many other organizations. Neil lives in Austin, Texas.
Organization Committee
The Organization Committee is responsible for defining MFSA's governance documents, preparing and maintaining its government registrations, and preparing and submitting its reports to comply with government requirements.
Kenneth Kidd S.B. ’78, Course 15, J.D. ’81 University of North Carolina.
Ken is the Chair of the Organization Committee. He practiced law in Miami, Florida and Richmond, Virginia doing corporate, securities, and tax work primarily for tax exempt healthcare organizations. After a radical career change, Ken taught high school math and retired in 2018 to The Villages in Florida.
Strategy Committee
The Strategy Committee is responsible for setting MFSA's strategic objectives and priorities, along with each year's target programs and initiatives.
Bill Frezza BSEE, BS Biology ’76, MSEE ’78.
Bill is Chair of the Strategy Committee. He is a retired engineer, entrepreneur, consultant, columnist, and venture capital investor. He was a fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, where he hosted the RealClear Radio Hour program on Bloomberg Radio, and is the author of New Zealand’s Far-Reaching Reforms : A Case Study on How to Save Democracy From Itself. He is the lead inventor on seven long-expired patents dating back to the dawn of our digital age. Bill lives in Sarasota, Florida.
Student Liaison Committee
The Student Liaison Committee is responsible for communicating and coordinating with MIT students generally, and specifically with free speech student organizations (e.g., MIT Open Discourse Society) and student education initiatives (e.g., Concourse Program).
Allan Tate SMME '86
Allan Tate is the Chair of the Student Liaison Committee for the MIT Free Speech Alliance. He is the Executive Chair of the MIT Sloan CIO Symposium, leading one of the premier gatherings of technology and business leaders. Allan earned his SMME in Mechanical Engineering from MIT, where he conducted robotics research as a Research Fellow at the Charles Stark Draper Laboratory. Following his time at MIT, he built a career in high technology, serving as a software engineer, product manager, and IT architect for companies including Schneider Electric and IBM. Allan lives in the Boston area.
MFSA has additional volunteer committees for which the Chair position is currently open,
- Membership Committee
- Programs Committee