Of Mind & Heart Newsletter: April 2009
An update from Whitworth University President Bill Robinson
Charles Dickens could have been writing about 2009 when he penned his famous "It was the best of times. It was the worst of times." In fact, he could have been writing about the weather. If meteorologists traced the variance between perfect and wretched, yesterday would have shattered the standard deviation mark. Big, fast swings show up everywhere these days. Conditions change on a dime. But volatility isn't new. Yesterday we observed Palm Sunday -- the "triumphal entry." Sadly, it only took five days for Palm Sunday hosannas to become Good Friday hisses. It only took five days for "Hail him!" to become "Crucify him!" It's interesting to look at what was going on with Jesus during those five days. On a walk from Bethany to Jerusalem, he got hungry. He spotted a fig tree, and that probably made him hungrier. But there was a problem. It wasn't fig season. That shouldn't be a problem for someone who can turn tap water into fine wine. Still, when Jesus found the tree fruitless, he cursed it rather than "fixed"it. The next day the tree was shriveled and dead. We could chalk that up to Jesus being in a bad mood. Who could blame him? He knew what was coming. But maybe he was sending us a message. Maybe he was telling us and his disciples that every season is fruit season. In today's environment, we all have a good excuse not to bear fruit. Sometimes you just want to survive. But Jesus says that bearing fruit is how you survive. It's how you keep from shriveling and dying. Feeding the hungry is not seasonal. Giving more than anyone expects is not seasonal. Waiting around until the season changes doesn't work. We need to bear fruit all the time. For us at Whitworth, bearing fruit means living these days on high alert. It means spotting students in need; it means watching constantly for opportunities to nourish students. It means doing our jobs, in season and out of season. And it means relying on you to fortify our efforts. Thank you for your faithfulness, year 'round. We're not waiting for a new season.
Academics
The seventh annual Spokane Intercollegiate Research Conference will be held on campus April 25, in Weyerhaeuser Hall. Graduate and undergraduate students from Whitworth and Gonzaga will present their academic work to an audience of peers.
Great news from Cincinnati. Our Ethics Bowl team tied for fifth in the nation at the National Intercollegiate Ethics Bowl. The team was undefeated in three preliminary rounds of competition and narrowly lost to defending national champion Clemson University. Members of the Whitworth team include junior Dan Herve and seniors Chris Caldwell, Heather Stevens, Kelly Vincent and Nicole Holland. The team was coached by Mike Ingram (Academic Affairs) and Keith Wyma (Philosophy). This was Whitworth's first trip to the national bowl. Not bad!
Lindy Scott (Spanish) is the co-editor and co-author of Los Evangélicos: Portraits of Latino Protestantism in the United States (Wipf & Stock, 2009). A group of church historians collaborated on this book, which, Lindy says, is "somewhat unique in that it covers the broad spectrum of Latino/Hispanic churches in the United States."He adds, "It is our hope that this project helps to round out the study of Christianity."
Great news from the School of Education: The SOE is now approved to offer the specialty endorsement in gifted education. Kudos to Margo Long, Chris Huss, Roberta Wilburn and the Gifted Advisory Board for making this happen.
We will be hosting three very interesting presentations this month. First, Betty Williams (Education/Lindaman Chair) will deliver the Lindaman Chair Lecture (April 15, 7:30 p.m., Robinson Teaching Theatre). Her topic, which reflects many years of research and practice, is "What Works in Treating Autism: Examining the Evidence." The following evening, the Rev. Peter Storey will speak at 7:30 p.m. in the same location. Storey was chaplain at Robben Island, South Africa, during Nelson Mandela's incarceration there. And at 7 p.m. on April 24 we will celebrate the memory of a dear faculty member at the inaugural Nadine Chapman Endowed Reading. For a complete list of events, see www.whitworth.edu/speakers&artists.
The Junior Art Exhibit will feature the work of 11 members of the Class of '10 in Mélange: Beginnings, April 7-17 in the Bryan Oliver Gallery of the Ernst F. Lied Center for the Visual Arts. This will be the first student art show in the Lied Center, and the majority of the works were created in the new facility.
Art from students at regional colleges and universities will be displayed at Spokane's Chase Gallery through April 24. The Spokane Arts Commission invites you to visit Explorations XI, which will feature works by Whitworth students Anna Collins-Wakeman, Nathan Ellefson and Bryan Putnam, all '09, and Graeme MacPherson, '10.
The Whitworth Wind Symphony will present Postcards on Sunday, May 3, at 3 p.m. in Cowles Auditorium. The program will feature guest soloist Kirk Ferguson, principal trombone in the Spokane Symphony. Also on the program is Karel Husa's landmark Music for Prague 1968, the composer's personal response to oppression and to the 1968 Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia.
It's a good thing Richard Strauch's research turned out the way it did. Rich, a professor in our music department, discovered that a high percentage of incoming Whitworth students who were involved in high school band are academic high achievers as well. The same is true of current students who participate in Whitworth's other music ensembles. His findings were published last fall in the journal of the Washington Music Educators Association; they are also featured in the April 2009 issue of Teaching Music, the national journal of the Music Educators National Conference.
Whitworth will host a civic-engagement colloquium for the Spokane community on April 9. Led by our student Bonner Leaders, the colloquium will present audience members with a set of local and global issues as well as information about ways to become directly involved in solving some of those problems. Our students are not wringing their hands, waiting for the world to improve. They're bearing fruit now.
Each year, Spokane's great GetLit! Festival welcomes important writers to share their work. As part of this year's GetLit!, our English department will host a reading by Phillis Levin, of Hofstra University, whose poetry has been showered with awards and has been published everywhere that matters. Levin will read on April 8 at 7 p.m. in the Music Recital Hall. And Whitworth's own noted poet Laurie Lamon, '79, (English) will participate in an after-hours poetry read-around at Europa Restaurant, downtown, on April 17 at 9 p.m. Finally, Jim McPherson (Communication Studies) will join two other Spokane-area news experts in a panel discussion about recent and future trends in print and digital media. The discussion will take place at Auntie's Bookstore, downtown, on April 11 at 3 p.m.
Enrollment
May 1 is our deposit deadline for incoming fall '09 freshmen. Right now it looks like we won't have any space for admitted students who wish to deposit after that date. This is going to be a great class. We've spoken with so many excellent students who are drawn to Whitworth not only for our strong academics but for the rich sense of community they find here.
In May and June, the financial aid office will e-mail 2009-10 renewal award notifications to current students. The priority deadline to file the FAFSA for need-based financial aid is May 1. Academic scholarships are renewed automatically (if all criteria are met).
Student Life
March was an eventful month in many ways. Intramurals held their first-ever badminton and pickleball tournaments, which were overwhelmingly successful, and the senior class had about 200 students show up for a bowling night. (My first date with Bonnie was bowling. Actually, I wasn't with Bonnie; she was with the other guy on our double date. I had been a college athlete, and her college life was spent practicing piano. She demolished me in bowling. Then she made fun of me for being so bad. Such indignity from someone I had known for only three hours...the first two of which were spent watching Billie Jean King thrash Bobby Riggs in "The Battle of the Sexes."I should have seen something coming. At the time, I didn't realize that I would marry Bonnie, nor could I have known that for the rest of my life I could not say the word "bowling"without her howling about how she destroyed me.) Students are still taking advantage of the snow-covered mountains by hitting local ski and snowboard parks. They also filled a rooter bus to cheer on the men's basketball team at a second-round NCAA playoff game in Tacoma. Student leadership hiring is taking place all over campus for positions for next year, and the ASWU election process begins soon. During Spring Break, SERVE took students to Jamaica to work with children in a VBS, while outdoor rec hosted a trip to Utah, where students were able to kayak, ride mountain bikes, rock-climb and not go bowling.
Resources
Last week I posted a letter online that describes our financial situation. You can read it by checking www.whitworth.edu under Campus News. Yesterday I saw a similar letter from the president of an excellent school in Pennsylvania. The conditions there are virtually identical to what I reported, so we are not alone. And we are also not alone because the One who "never slumbers nor sleeps"watches us with "a steadfast love that endures forever."No portfolio is better than that.
With only a couple more months remaining in the fiscal year, we're counting on the great work of the phonathon's student staff as alumni, parents and friends fulfill the pledges they made over the phone to The Whitworth Fund. To date we have just over $130,000 in pledges, and we're counting on that money to add to the final Whitworth Fund total on the big (end-of-our-fiscal-year) day, June 30. If you have not mailed in your gift, please send it to the annual-giving office or visit the website (www.whitworth.edu/give) to fulfill your pledge.
Athletics
The Whitworth men's track and field team had quite a month in March. The Pirates finished in third place at the NCAA Division III Indoor Track and Field Championships, matching last year's outdoor-meet finish. Cody Stelzer was named the West Region Men's Field Athlete of the Year by the USTFCCCA after he won the indoor national title in the high jump. Emmanuel Bofa is the West Region Men's Track Athlete of the Year after he finished second in the 800 meters at the indoor championships. And Toby Schwarz not only claimed the West Region Men's Coach of the Year award -- he was also selected as the NCAA DIII National Men's Indoor Coach of the Year. Kudos to these guys for hitting the trifecta!
The men's and women's golf teams played in the NWC Spring Classic this week at Chambers Bay GC in University Place, and Whitworth's women surprised the field with a big win. This tournament counts for 25 percent of the final conference standings. The women also won the NWC Fall Classic last October, so they're looking strong. The men are just getting started; they posted a fifth-place finish at the spring classic and are looking forward to the rest of the season.
Women's tennis is ranked No. 30 in the latest ITA Division III poll. The Pirates are 17-3 overall and 14-0 in the NWC. Earlier this season Whitworth ended Linfield's 108-match NWC winning streak that dated back seven seasons. Depth has been the strength of the team as the Bucs are strong throughout the singles ladder. Even more impressive: Whitworth is 40-2 in doubles matches against NWC competition this year, and Katie Staudinger's singles record is 18-0.
Whitworth's men's tennis team is 10-7 heading into the final stages of the season. The Pirates are 9-6 against NWC competition and should be seeded fourth or fifth at the upcoming Northwest Conference tournament (April 17-18) in Yakima.
Our young baseball team has been experiencing some growing pains this season. The Pirates are starting several freshmen throughout the lineup. One of those young guns, Landon Scott, is leading the team with a .404 batting average.
The Pirate softball team is coming off of a trip to the Sun West Tournament in California. Lacey Kerr is among the leaders in the Northwest Conference with a .481 batting average this season. After starting the season 1-8, our team has won seven of its last 11 games.
Natalie Turner had another outstanding year at the NCAA Division III Swimming and Diving Championships. The junior has competed in nine individual events at the NCAA championships and has scored nine times. She broke Whitworth and Northwest Conference records in both the 500-yard and 1,650-yard freestyle events at the meet. Freshman Rory Buck broke the Whitworth and NWC men's record while scoring in the 200-yard breaststroke.
Alumni
Whitworth alumni are invited to join Leonard Oakland in Tacoma on Tuesday, April 21, for a light appetizer reception prior to the City of Destiny Faith and Film Festival at the Grand Cinema. The reception begins at 5:30 p.m. At 6 p.m., Leonard will speak briefly on the topic of faith and film prior to a showing of Crimes and Misdemeanors. The film begins at 6:45 p.m. and tickets will be available at the theater. For more information, contact the alumni office at alumni@whitworth.edu or 800.532.4668.
The classes of 1959 and 1949 will celebrate their 50- and 60-year reunions during Commencement Weekend, May 16-17. All alumni from 1959 and earlier are invited to the festivities. Contact the alumni office for more details.
Closing Thoughts
In the last three weeks I've participated in eight president's receptions in four states. I'm pretty sick of hearing myself speak, but seeing so many Whitworth friends and family provides ample energy. Particularly in Portland and Seattle, I shook many of the same hands that I had the great privilege to shake as they were extended to me on the commencement stage. Our exchanges were filled with great stories and the awakening of dormant (and not so dormant) memories. Special thanks go to the '00 and '97 grads for their uncommon consultation, plus high fives to the Portland afterglowers who asked for an M&H shout-out. Mostly, great thanks go to all of you who made the effort to join us. The final reception is in Spokane on April 23 (call 509.777.3799 or register online at www.whitworth.edu/presidentsreceptions). Seeing alumni, parents and friends living lives that represent the best of Whitworth's mission inspires us all.
