The State of Whitman College: 2012

Good afternoon and welcome.

Today I am proud to have the opportunity to speak to you about the state of the college. I would like to highlight our successes in recent years, outline our most important goals for the years ahead, and also discuss some of the challenges and opportunities of today.  In other words:  Where are we coming from, where are we going and what does it all mean for this moment in time.

When I joined Whitman College, we committed to accomplishing four goals considered vitally important to the college’s future and to preparing our students for their futures:

• Enrich our already strong academic program,
• Build a more diverse campus community,
• Increase Whitman’s national stature and recognition, and
• Increase the financial strength of the college by leading a comprehensive fundraising campaign.

At the heart of each of these goals is the commitment to continue educating our students in small, challenging classes; the commitment to continue the tradition of enabling students to form close relationships with faculty and other students; and the commitment to enhancing the already welcoming environment – making sure that we support all people regardless of their backgrounds, beliefs, orientations, or status.

I add parenthetically that in addition to these goals were seven major construction projects, three of which – the Fouts Center, the Welty Health Center and the Sherwood Athletic Center – were in the planning stages when I arrived. The buildings and renovations we completed were much needed; they have added functionality and aesthetic beauty to our campus.  I’d also like to mention that all of these projects were completed on time and at – or under – budget.

Four major goals and seven major construction projects: We could not have hoped to make progress on any one of them except in collaboration with one another, with our governing boards, and with our alumni and friends across the nation. But together, the progress we have made on all fronts is nothing short of remarkable.

To achieve many of the goals, a successful fundraising campaign was necessary. I will refer to the campaign and our achievements in fundraising in greater depth in a few moments, but as I review our accomplishments in advancing our academic programs, achieving greater diversity on campus, and enhancing the national stature of Whitman, I wish to acknowledge that the generous gifts received in the campaign have enabled us to realize many of our common goals.

Academic Strength

In addressing our first goal, Whitman faculty, administrators, and governing board members partnered together successfully to increase the depth and breadth of our already strong academic programs. Two documents developed by faculty – Building on Excellence: 2005 and Building on Excellence: 2010 – have played a vital role in guiding many of the critical academic initiatives we have launched in recent years, and we can see their ideals reflected in the current academic culture of the campus.

Over the past few years this partnership has produced results that, frankly, have exceeded all of the expectations we established just a few years ago. Our chair of the faculty, David Schmitz, described some of these at Wednesday’s faculty meeting, but they bear repeating for anyone who wasn’t present.

Since 2006 Whitman has increased the number of tenure track faculty by 25 percent. Of these, 13 are new positions created by the campaign. And as was mentioned on Wednesday, we hope to continue adding tenure track lines in the near future by converting positions that are currently one-year contingent lines to permanent tenure track appointments.

Also in 2006, Whitman awarded a combined total of 29 Perry and Abshire awards, funding our students to participate in faculty members’ scholarly work. Thanks to gifts primarily from parents of current or former students and endowments established for this purpose, last year we awarded a combined total of 46 Perry and Abshire Awards. This represents a 60 percent increase over a four-year period.

With the support of the Andrew Mellon Foundation, our faculty developed and established the Global Studies Initiative in 2007 and inaugurated the Global Studies Symposium in 2009. The initiative is now fully and permanently funded and is an integral part of our academic curriculum, with Whitman and the University of Washington Press jointly publishing anthologies of papers presented each year at the symposium. As a former trustee noted, the Global Studies Initiative “promises to take this college to a new level in international affairs.”

Finally, I want to mention two academic initiatives launched directly from gifts to the college given in the campaign: Whitman’s fund for Innovation in Teaching and Learning and the fund for Advancing Excellence in Teaching. Taken together, these initiatives have supported 30 faculty-led projects and 15 faculty workshops emphasizing cross-disciplinary approaches to teaching. The results have yielded impressive new courses and opportunities for students, including projects for off-campus study led by Whitman faculty to places that range from the Wallowas to Washington, D.C., and from the silk roads of China to the mountains of Ecuador.

Diversity

In pursuing our second goal of advancing diversity, we have sought to recruit and welcome students, faculty, and staff to campus who bring different life experiences, backgrounds, beliefs, and orientations. From these efforts, the percentage of students of color at Whitman has doubled from one in 10 to one in five in the last decade. And now, nearly 15 percent of our students come from families who qualify for Pell grants (families with incomes less than $45,000). One in ten of our students are the first members of their family to attend college. That these students are enrolled here and performing successfully given the obstacles that many overcame just to get to Whitman is inspiring.

The diversity of our faculty and staff have also increased; the demographic shift along gender lines has been particularly striking – women will soon likely constitute a majority of faculty at the college.

An equally important part of sustaining a welcoming environment for students from all backgrounds and traditions is creating a location and space for acknowledging differences and engaging in dialogue. I am particularly proud that Whitman created the Glover Alston Center in 2010 with the generous support of numerous donors, including leadership gifts from multiple trustees. Designed in conjunction with students, the center promotes a culture of inclusion and respect for others through social and cultural events, active dialogue and critically engaged conversations.

Stature and Recognition

Our third goal was increasing the national stature of Whitman. For many years before and after I arrived, the college has sought to expand the college’s reputation from that of a very strong regional liberal arts college to a national college with an exceptional reputation for developing students intellect, analytical skills and personal character in preparation for post-graduate study or moving directly into professions. That we have achieved a national reputation is evident by many metrics, it is perhaps most immediately apparent in the students we enroll – at this moment our students represent 48 states and 30 countries; every region of the U.S. is represented and almost every continent of the globe as well.

Equally important is the recognition that our students and graduates receive in national competitions for prestigious fellowships and scholarships – such as the Watson, Rhodes, Fulbright, and Beineke, among others. At the end of the 2005 academic year, 12 Whitman students had won or received awards from a total of 6 fellowship programs. At the time, we believed that centralizing and investing in dedicated, full time staff for our office of Scholarships and Fellowships would assist faculty in preparing students for these competitions. That belief proved to be right.  Thanks to excellent work by staff and many faculty advisers, this past year 38 Whitman students had won awards from a total of 24 programs; of these, 17 awards came from the most prestigious and competitive fellowship programs in the country.

Fundraising and the “Now Is The Time Campaign”

Pursuing these initiatives necessitated a fourth goal – leading a major fundraising campaign for Whitman. All required significant investments of funds that we did not have seven years ago.

Within the first month of my joining the Whitman campus, the trustees, the president’s council and I began discussing how to raise the needed funds. We conducted countless conversations about the campaign, its points of focus, and the overall fund raising goals on campus and off with governing board members, alumni, faculty staff and friends of the college.

We began the campaign in 2007, quietly contacting our closest friends and supporters for pledges and gifts. And as all of you know, we launched the campaign publicly in Seattle last fall. Our goal is $150 million and as of this date we have raised $113 million with the campaign scheduled to end in June of 2015. Of the $113 million, $72 million has come in the form of cash gifts, $16 million has come in the form of pledges being paid now, and $25 million in bequest commitments that will come to Whitman when the donors’ estates settle.

Thus far, donors have given $51 million to the general area of academic strength, $32 million to endowed scholarships supporting student access to Whitman, and $17 million to current operations and unrestricted endowment. Finally, $12 million has yet to be designated by donors.

These numbers are staggering. Sixty percent of our alumni have made campaign commitments; many of us in this room have also made commitments. Large or small, every one of our gifts and pledges matters. Thanks to those of you who have given; if you haven’t, I hope you will consider giving to a Whitman project or program in which you believe, at a level you can afford – whatever that might be. Ultimately, we want Whitman to be the kind of place where those closest to its core are also those who believe strongly enough in its mission to contribute treasure and talent for our common goals. 

In describing these many impressive accomplishments, we must acknowledge and reflect on the context in which our achievements occurred and the effort we have expended in achieving them.

Since 2008, our country has experienced the worst economy since the Great Depression. Whitman did not escape its hardships. The recession and market losses caused levels of austerity and uncertainty here at Whitman that few of us had ever experienced.

In speaking with many of you individually during this crisis, I heard stories of faculty and staff members moving parents to Walla Walla who had lost pensions. I listened to you talk about your fears of not being able to send your children to college if tuition benefits were substantially altered or revoked. I heard stories of families on the bitter edge of financial collapse, for whom additional monthly medication bills or insurance deductibles would spell financial disaster. I spoke with parents who had lost their jobs and who, without more financial aid from Whitman, could not continue to send their children – our students – to school.

I am grateful for the trust you bestowed in telling me your stories. These were the most profound and memorable moments of the difficult years between 2008-2011 and among the most profound and difficult moments of my career.

I know this was a tremendously painful period for all of us, and I want to express my immense respect for the resilience, persistence, and commitment of all of you. I remain grateful for the confidence that so many of you vested in me, in the leadership team, and in the trustees. In personal conversations and email messages, you held out hope, and sought to forge meaningful personal connections in the process of making difficult changes and transitions.

I am confident that we are now moving out of the recession and because of the budgetary measures we put in place over the past few years as well as the funds we have raised in our campaign, the darker days are behind us.

I am reminded of remarks made by Franklin Delano Roosevelt in the 1936 presidential election as he reflected on the impact of the Great Depression:

“America will not forget these recent years, will not forget that the rescue was not a mere (political) party task. It was the concern of all of us. In our strength we rose together, rallied our energies together, applied the old rules of common sense, and together survived.”

What stands out to me in this quotation is the idea that together we rallied and survived an unprecedented global economic crisis, together we transcended our own difficult period. We reduced spending, reduced our reliance on a much smaller endowment, and managed the college’s limited resources prudently and judiciously. Despite difficult moments, we kept sight of the vision, values, and aspirations that have distinguished Whitman for 130 years. I thank all of you who bore this period bravely, all who dared to smile through the storm.

Today, we are far stronger than we were in 2007. Having restructured our annual budget and achieved unprecedented success in our campaign, we have resources to invest in our highest programmatic priorities and in our people: Whitman faculty, staff and students. Supporting our programs and people—the intellectual and human infrastructure of our College—remain my highest priorities.

I have great optimism about this year and the years ahead. But like other colleges and universities, there are challenges we must face.  At least six of these will be the focus of our work over the next few years.

Second, as a campus that relies on student enrollment and tuition dollars to support our programs and instruction, we require a steady stream of talented students enrolling at Whitman. However, over the last three years we have witnessed a declining trend in applications of roughly 4 percent fewer applications each year. Last year they dropped 8 percent.

Having a growing applicant pool is vital to our institutional health. We must address the recent declines and invest in strategies that reverse the trend. Tony Cabasco and the Office of Admission and Financial Aid will experiment this year and next with new approaches to reach and recruit more talented applicants to Whitman.

A third and related concern is investing adequately and effectively in our communications with prospective students, their parents, our alumni, and the general public; we need to inform them more fully and effectively about the quality of education we provide.

Nearly 30 percent of our applicants learn about Whitman from sources other than members of our admissions team or staff. In response to this information, we have revised our website significantly and have adopted a new content management system developed by a firm founded by a Whitman alumnus. This system will make changing web page content far simpler and easier to manage. Many of us, particularly our staff in the Office of Communications, deserve enormous credit for these accomplishments. Please join me in acknowledging their work with our appreciation and applause.

But even with these significant changes, additional investments in our communications work are necessary. We will build upon the strategic communication efforts initiated two years ago and, unpretentiously of course, increase our reach into many national constituencies through the use of electronic and social media; we will more effectively highlight the excellent work of our faculty, staff and students in the mainstream media. The budget officers and I intend to discuss this strategy with the governing boards this year. I believe the work is imperative to securing and advancing Whitman’s strong position in higher education.

Fourth, as was mentioned at Wednesday’s faculty meeting, our work on diversity at Whitman is far from complete. I am concerned about the retention of women and minority faculty and staff. Some carry burdens of advising and mentoring that demand significant amounts of time and energy, yet their burdens are invisible to others. Their work represents important service to the college that our current performance evaluations and promotion criteria may not adequately recognize. I am pleased, however, that our Provost and Dean of Faculty Tim Kaufman-Osborn, David Schmitz, and the Committee on Division Chairs and our Human Resource Director Dennis Hopwood share this concern, take it quite seriously, and are working together to address it and related issues.

Fifth, in the past year we have witnessed renewed energy and significant accomplishments in the Student Engagement Center. The center has made substantial progress in expanding student access to paid internships. Thanks to campaign and parents fund gifts, in just one year we increased the number of paid summer internships in organizations and businesses across the country for Whitman students nearly four fold, from 28 in 2011 to 100 this past summer. Positions ranged from fact-checking for San Francisco-based publication house McSweeney’s to studying brain chemistry in New York City; from developing new tests for infectious diseases at a biomedical institute in Seattle, to working with Washington Senators Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell in the nation’s capitol.

However, we need to ensure that the center improves how it serves students who want and need help in identifying and understanding opportunities they have after graduating from Whitman. While I acknowledge that not all of us may view these types of services as a critical priority for the college, I believe they are. We will help our students immensely by investing more in how they can connect with people and opportunities in graduate and professional schools, government, non-profits, and businesses with missions that align with our students’ intellectual passions and interests. This year we will advance initiatives that invest in increasing support for students seeking these connections.

Sixth and finally, we must continue to consider and discuss the new roles that technology is playing in higher education. The advent of MOOCs – massive open online courses – represents the latest development in e-learning, and MOOCs are opening important conversations about post-secondary learning. The best of these courses typically entail short videos on subjects of interest led by leading scholars and exceptional teachers. Indeed, our own classicist, Elizabeth Vandiver is nationally recognized for her courses available from The Teaching Company.

Of what value do these developments offer Whitman? I honestly don’t know. I do know that they represent no threat to the type of education we offer. Our entire approach to education is centered on close, personal interaction and lasting relationships between professors and students. Online courses and material may be effective in transmitting knowledge, but they do not inspire the kind of training in critical thinking that we do, or offer the life-changing webs of connection between academic disciplines, the hands-on opportunities for involvement in faculty scholarship and research, or extracurricular experiences that we offer.

If this latest approach to post-secondary e-learning gains solid footing, at some future point undergraduates at most universities and even at liberal arts colleges like ours might utilize material from any of a number of courses taught by leading academics across the country with national or international reputations to enrich our own courses.

But let me be very clear. I am not recommending that we embrace or endorse these ideas and just buy in. Massive open online courses simply provide a new source of material to enrich the work colleges already do. I will add a humorous comment of skepticism about these courses made recently by one college administrator. He stated “massive open opportunities for learning have existed for centuries: they are called libraries.”

And regarding a question raised in Wednesday’s faculty meeting that is related, I cannot imagine a time when reading and studying books and text from original sources would not be integral to a Whitman education.

What will Whitman become in the years ahead? Changes in our society and at Whitman are inevitable but we should always remain focused on educational ideals that give highest priority to our students and the life-changing power of learning in the liberal arts and sciences. Andrew Delbanco, Chair of American Studies and Professor of Humanities at Columbia, recently wrote about the future of colleges and offered a description of what I believe Whitman ought to be and what we must continue to do as its stewards:

“College should not be a haven from worldly contention but a place where young people fight out among and within themselves contending ideas of the meaningful life, and [a place] where they discover that self-interest need not be at odds with concern for one another. We owe it to posterity to preserve and protect this institution.”

To return to my opening remarks today, I think this quote sums up the answer to all three questions: Where are we coming from, where are we going, and what does it all mean at this moment in time.  The liberal arts education Whitman offers has always provided the power to transform individuals and our society.  In this age of limitless access to information, increasingly complex connections between people and rapid technological change, it will become all the more important as our students come here to understand the meaning behind their studies – the larger overarching ideas that shape their lives and the lives of all others.

Let me close with these words. We have weathered the storm, our future is bright, and Whitman College will continue to thrive and advance in guiding and transforming the lives of our students. They are the future leaders of our country.

Thank you. 

Please join me now at the Baker Faculty Center for an informal reception – and have a great weekend.