Of Mind & Heart Newsletter: September 2001

An update from Whitworth University President Bill Robinson

FINALLY, classes are in session. Almost three weeks ago, as early arriving student leaders and athletes began to appear on campus, most of us felt our "go" reflexes begin to jerk. Three weeks is a long time to jerk, so we all felt good yesterday when opening convocation brought us together and classes began. Last night I hung out in the HUB during dinner and then drifted through one of the residence halls. Returning students seemed confident and excited about their courses. New students were a little subdued. I think the contrast between the screaming chaos of Mock Rock on Tuesday night and the abrupt regimentation of classes on Wednesday morning must have caught their attention. One returning student told me about a spontaneous gathering after Mock Rock with his friends in which they talked about what they learned over the summer. Another mentioned to me that she'd spent the summer fighting fires and was so glad to be back. A freshman confessed that homesickness was beginning to unravel her. And another reported feeling pretty nervous en route to audition for the choir. When I got home I flopped into my chair and groaned at a pile of work that had sneaked onto my desk while I'd been out all day making speeches. After seriously trash-talking the pile and heading for the refrigerator with a scornful "Who cares?" I laughed at myself. Because I know God cares. I know God cares about homesickness, choir, classes, and even sparrows. And I know God cares about Whitworth, and it is going to be a good year.

Academics

A number of our faculty members spent time this summer helping architects design the new classroom building, Weyerhaeuser Hall, which will occupy the site of the old Leavitt Dining Hall. The building will capture some of the rich, traditional feel of Mac and Ballard, but will also blend in nicely with newer buildings on campus. It will house the School of Global Commerce and Management, the Department of Politics and History and the Sociology Department. We hope to break ground next summer.

Speaking of the School of Global Commerce, we're anticipating this being a great first year of operation. The new dean, Kyle Usrey, brings extensive background, skill and leadership to the program. We're confident that folding all of our business-related curricula into one school characterized by the international engagement that Whitworth has always promoted will add strength to each component.

Through the efforts of Susan Mabry (Math/Computer Science), we will be receiving a $188,000 grant from the National Science Foundation. This "Multi-Agents for Intelligent Monitoring" (a la Maxwell Smart) grant will provide support for faculty/student research and coursework over the next three years. The grant will also provide additional equipment for the computer-research lab and for summer research experiences for our students. Good job, Susan!

This will be an interesting year for Whitworth's involvement in efforts to address regional poverty. A very important grant from the Murdock Charitable Trust, my role as co-chair of the Mayor's Opportunity Council on Poverty, and expanded service learning in student coursework will all deepen our involvement in attacking regional poverty. In the area of service learning, congratulations to Kathy Storm (Student Life) and the Service-Learning Office. They have received a $500 grant from Campus Compact to support a service-learning fair. Special thanks to former service-learning coordinator Karina Boslet, '99, who put the grant together.

This year our freshman seminar, required of all first-year students, has a new look.We're keeping the advising portion unchanged, and we will keep giving these students the careful attention we've offered ever since we started the program in the late 1980s. But this fall we've added a significant content area that poses some thought-provoking questions for our students about their values and commitments. Thanks to the above-mentioned major grant from the Murdock Charitable Trust, we're helping our students think through what it means to live "Lives of Commitment," particularly as they encounter social injustices and spiritual needs that cry out for their response.

Enrollment

In spite of our efforts to control growth, it looks like we broke a few records.According to Registrar Gary Whisenand's preliminary enrollment figures for this fall, it appears that we've enrolled our largest-ever freshman class, 425 students, and that we have a record 1,720 full-time undergraduates enrolled. Our total enrollment stands at 2,040. Another great number, Gary notes, is the 86 percent retention of last year's freshmen, roughly 15 percentage points above the national average. While we won't know the precise numbers for a few more days, we're pleased with the early indications that we're attracting and keeping excellent students.

I love this new freshman class (way more than did the hornets in my backyard who expressed their disapproval at our reception honoring these incoming Whitworthians. My apologies to students and families). I had a chance to meet many students and their parents during Orientation Weekend. We already knew that this is a very bright class, but the students also strike me as warm and eager - and animated when bees zoom up their pantlegs.

Student Life

I just took a break from writing this and went to Chapel, which was great, then grabbed a bite with four freshmen. All four had one thing in common: fatigue. They'll pencil sleep into their schedules soon, but there is a lot going on. The year begins with Faces of America, a Broadway show that features poignant vignettes of the people who make up the multicultural mix of America. Homecoming follows, with the theme Until the Cows Come Home, which will include dorm decorating, square dancing, live bands, the football game, the swim meet, a dance, and no cows. Community Building Day will also be a part of Homecoming Week as approximately 600 faculty, students and staff will assist organizations throughout Spokane in service projects. Finally, the Outdoor Recreation Office will take advantage of September's warm weather with boating trips to Coeur d'Alene, and Intramural Sports will begin the year with ultimate Frisbee and volleyball.

By the way, I shamed myself again this year in the orientation skit. My Saturday Night Fever character was a disgusting cross between John Travolta and Bonzo the chimp. Senior Stephanie Stern, however, performed elegantly and asked me to mention that in this newsletter.

Resources

Boppell Hall is right on schedule for a mid-October opening. It already looks great from the outside. The week after residents move in, the Boppells - Chairman of the Whitworth Board Chuck , '65, and Karlyn, '67 - will be on campus for the fall board meeting. Although they're not even moved in, prospective Boppell Hall residents are already talking about how to express their gratitude to Chuck and Karlyn for making this beautiful building possible.

Many of you who saw Whitworth for the first time while dropping off your students raved about the beauty of this campus. Well, I have bad news and good news. The bad news is that ultimate Frisbee has begun in the Loop, so before long golf-course green will be replaced by horse-stable brown (but there can't be a better sight than ultimate Frisbee in the middle of a college campus on a late afternoon in the fall. Where is Winslow Homer when you need him?). The good news is that we are committed to doing an even better job with our physical plant. Now that our buildings are on a solid maintenance schedule, we're assessing our policies, processes and management practices. Facilities managers from other colleges will be coming in November to do an evaluation.

• News of our capital campaign is encouraging. Here's the latest report from Institutional Advancement on gift activity during our 2000/2001 fiscal year:
• Total giving for the campaign is $49,212,792. We are only $787,208 away from our $50-million campaign goal.
• In FY 2001 we received just over $3.4 million in new pledges. Our total outstanding major pledge balance is $4,475,492.
• The total number of gift transactions this year was up 13 percent from last year and up nine percent from FY 99.
• Additions to The Whitworth Foundation (reported at fair market value) totaled $1,088,105.

That's the good news. But we still need $4,178,065 for Weyerhaeuser Hall. Normally, this is where I would urge you to consider the gift of appreciated equities, but since "appreciated equities" has become an oxymoron for everyone I know, our challenge is huge. We won't proceed with construction on next summer's start date if the funds have not been received or pledged. So please let us know if you can help, or if you know of people who might be in a position to support our mission in this way.

Athletics

In volleyball, the Pirates' commitment, confidence, skill and teamwork helped them finish 3-1 and place second in the 16-team Whitworth Invitational. Beating UPS, last year's conference champs, was a special thrill. Kristen Turner, Julie Weatherred, Lindsay Wagstaff and Nicole Weedman were brilliant. Looks like a great year for our resurgent volleyballers, who head south to take on four schools from Southern California this weekend. I'm preaching at Glendale Presbyterian Church, so I'll get to see the women play Occidental as I head off to an alumni barbecue and our football game against Chapman University. (I'm editing this on the way home from California where the women went 4-0 and the football team won 21-10!)

Women's soccer opened with shutout wins against two bigtime California teams. The Pirates shocked the U.C. Santa Cruz Banana Slugs, an NCAA tournament team last year, with a 1-0 overtime win. The victory came on a corner kick from junior Dalyce Young when the ball bounced off the head of a UCSC defender and into the goal (exactly the way Coach Bushey drew it up). Freshman goalie Sheila Sutherland made eight saves in the shutout. Game two wasn't quite as dramatic, but the Bucs, led by juniors Addi Norman and Annika Ritter, pulled out another 1-0 victory, over Cal State Hayward. This is the best beginning since 1996 for the women, whose home opener is this weekend against Carroll College.

Men's soccer was equally successful on the road, recording a couple shutouts of their own against the same schools the women faced. The U.C. Santa Cruz men's team also qualified for the NCAA tournament last year, but their guys couldn't score a goal against senior Buc goalie Doug Lupton, who successfully shut out the Slugs just after successfully proposing to Kasey Kirk, '02. Senior Matt Stueckle scored the game's only goal off a free kick at 23:55. The next day the men took on Cal State Hayward, and Lupton teamed with freshman goalie Ben Oakley to pick up another shutout. Senior Brian Hein, junior Scott Kerwien, sophomore Kurt Kagawa, and freshmen Bobby LaBelle and Shawn Hanna led the way. After their fast start, the men play a very tough Simon Fraser team this weekend at Whitworth.

The football team, which opens the season this weekend at Chapman University in California, is gearing up for a great year. Northwest Conference coaches picked the Bucs to finish third in the league behind Pacific Lutheran and Linfield, who have traded trips to the national playoffs for the past several thousand years - so that's pretty good. But it's not good enough for our guys, who plan to end their drought against the Big Two and vie for a conference championship this year.

The cross country teams got off to a great start with the women finishing first and the men finishing third in the Harrier Invitational, which we hosted with Gonzaga. Leslie Nelson and Jessica Austin went 1-2 to lead the women to victory, while Ben Robinson and Jesse Stevich finished 6th and 7th in the men's race. Elizabeth Abbey and Elizabeth Bailey for the women and Adam Thornton for the men also had excellent races. Bonnie and I had the privilege of hosting Head Coach Toby Schwarz and 36 runners for an overnight at our getaway place on the Pend Oreille River. What a great group of young people, especially the Robinson kid!

Alumni

Alumni and parents are invited to join Forrest Baird (Philosophy) for an educational trip to China next March 15-24. Details are available on the alumni pages of the college website (www.whitworth.edu/alumni). Space is extremely limited, so you'll want to get your deposit in immediately. I found China to be a magnificent land, and Forrest will do a great tour.

September 28-30 is shaping up to be a wonderful Homecoming Weekend. If you didn't receive a brochure, please contact the Office of Alumni and Parent Relations or visit the Homecoming 2001 website.

Later this month, our students will begin "smiling and dialing" for the annual Whitworth Fund Phonathon. The students are looking forward to connecting with many of you. These students will not try to sell you aluminum siding or a credit card. They just love their school and realize that without your support, they probably wouldn't be here. So thanks for talking to them.

On Friday night, October 19, alumni, parents and friends are invited to join Diana Trotter (Theatre) for dessert and discussion before the fall theatre production, God's Country. For more information about any of these events, please call or e-mail the Office of Alumni and Parent Relations at 509-777-3772, 800-532-4668, or atomson@whitworth.edu.

Closing Thoughts

Yesterday at opening convocation I urged our students to be faithful to their consciences and convictions. (For the full text of the convocation address, click on the "President's Messages" link on my homepage - www.whitworth.edu/president.) So many messages from our culture have a "Delilah" quality to them, seductively trying to shift our focus from things that really matter, to all things popular. This afternoon, U.S. News and World Report released its college rankings. Whitworth moved up from being slotted as the ninth-best master's-degree-level school in the West into a tie for seventh. I'm very grateful for this evidence of the growing awareness of Whitworth's exceptional academic quality. I've been pretty critical of these rankings in the past, because it makes me squirm when I see students and parents placing too much confidence in a list that doesn't begin to capture the best of who we are. I guess I just don't want to let these external measures distract us from the voice within - the voice of our mission. This summer I meditated on a psalm of David in which he mused, "One thing have I desired of the Lord, that will I seek after; that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the Lord, and to inquire in his temple." If Whitworth students learn what it really means "to behold" and "to inquire," we will have achieved more than any ranking can reflect. Thanks to all of you alumni, donors, friends and parents (some of you are all four!) for giving us the kind of support that allows us to be who we are meant to be. You make Whitworth possible.