Of Mind & Heart Newsletter: September 2002

An update from Whitworth University President Bill Robinson

Yesterday, 435 freshmen and 100+ transfer students descended upon Whitworth. They seem just great. I sensed in them a certainty that their lives were about to be forever changed and an uncertainty as to just what the change would look like. Personally, I'm fighting a low-grade anxiety as I consider starting the year in a very different world than the one in which we welcomed last year's new students. As I write, I have just come home from a worship service with parents and students in which Dean of the Chapel Terry McGonigal reminded us that God's grace, truth and care hover over our students. I cling to Christ's words, "My peace I give you...let not your heart be troubled." (I must say, the glow of the service was dampened a few minutes ago when, as I rode my bike home, a bird pooped on my bald spot. I always thought the "he" in "His eye is on the sparrow, and I know he watches me" referred to God, not the sparrow. Either way, it's not encouraging.) For those of you alumni and friends who haven't experienced the kind of Whitworth welcome we now provide, it would be worth coming here to witness it. Faculty, staff and student leaders blanket our beautiful campus with the common goal of providing a great start for students and their families. Special thanks go to Assistant Dean of Students Dayna Coleman, conductor of this weekend, for helping us all prepare for another year in which minds and hearts will surely grow at Whitworth College.

Academics

I would usually include enrollment information below, but many academic factors are directly influenced by the number of students enrolled. Once again this year, we have unintentionally broken a few records. Our "perfect" number of freshmen was 420, but a record 431 actually matriculated. Also, we are markedly up in transfer and returning students. We can more easily accommodate non-freshmen because they enroll in the less-populated upper-division classes, and a higher percentage live off campus. Challenges notwithstanding, the sharp rise in applications and our retention progress flat-out thrill us. Registrar Gary Whisenand reports that our total headcount is now approaching 2,200, up from 2,107 last year. So our dedicated faculty is working even harder to make sure that no student is shortchanged because of this situation.

When our enrollment bulges like this, we really stretch our classroom capacity. We feel so acutely the need for our new academic building, Weyerhaeuser Hall. It's frustrating to have 80 percent of the funds given or pledged and then to watch the stock market dive into the dumper. I know that for many of our donors, the spirit is willing but the bank account is weak. Oh, well - we'll get to our number. We just need to keep giving our best to this wonderful mind-and-heart mission.

This year's opening convocation was the setting for the conferral of a presidential commendation upon Holocaust survivor Eva Lassman. Now 83, Ms. Lassman lost most of her family in the Nazi death camps. For decades she has told her story and preached against hatred and bigotry with an authority that can come only from the firsthand, horrifying experience of those who lived through such evil. A full house in Cowles Auditorium gave her a standing ovation to recognize her work in telling thousands of school children and college students of her experiences as a young Jewish woman in Nazi-occupied Poland in World War II. As our students clapped, it struck me that by the time they are my age, there will be no more living voices to bear witness to an event that we must never forget. We thank Jim Waller (Psychology) for bringing Eva into our lives. Two weeks ago, we held another ceremony for the purpose of conferring an honorary doctorate on Franklin Graham in recognition of his tireless humanitarian work as president of Samaritan's Purse and for advancing Christ's gospel as president of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association. Franklin was in Spokane doing an evangelistic festival exactly 20 years after his father had done a crusade here. It is amazing how many lives have been rescued and redeemed through Franklin's ministry.

One of the most celebrated representations of the Nazi's wicked march across Europe will be presented by our theatre and music students in this fall's play, The Sound of Music. For some reason this musical just does me in, and I think its message of freedom will be especially poignant right now.

I'm particularly involved in academic affairs this year, having found my way back to the classroom. I'm teaching a capstone course to 30 seniors. I was rusty in my first class, but I'll rally in the next session. The students are wonderful, and today's academic technology is much more advanced than when I was a full-time professor. Unfortunately, my efforts to use the new technology were spectacularly inept. It's lucky I didn't bring down our whole system.

We received a $137,628 grant from the Herbert Jones Foundation to develop a shadowing/mentoring/internship program for business students that focuses on entrepreneurship. Liz Peterson (Economics and Business) worked hard to bring us these funds that will provide great opportunities for our students to supplement what they're learning in class with hands-on experience in local businesses.

Susan Mabry (Computer Science) attracted a National Science Foundation grant of $18,000 in the area of bioinformatics. This will provide additional funding for her work in helping emergency-room personnel employ software that ranks patients' urgency. Much of this grant will be used to employ students to do research on this project. The chance to conduct research with our faculty attracts many students to Whitworth.

Thanks are again in order to the Fluke Corporation. Karen Stevens (Chemistry) wrote a grant resulting in an in-kind donation from Fluke Corp. of more than $19,000 of equipment for the chemistry and physics departments. Delbert Friesen (Physics) also worked on this grant request shortly before his untimely death this summer.

Enrollment

The first of our two Great Escape campus visit programs for high school seniors will be held Oct. 20-21. Information and registration materials can be found on the Whitworth website in the prospective student section. The second Great Escape date is Nov. 17-18. Please spread the word.

Student Life

Some of you parents mentioned to the freshman advisers that you were worried about the shyness of your children. So you might have been surprised at the annual yell-off, when students' neck and forehead veins bulged as they screamed bloodcurdling affirmations of two-day-old loyalty to their residence halls.

We're housing a record number of students - 1,051 - in college housing. That's up 63 students from last year. And even with the opening of our plush new residence hall, Boppell Hall, we still have a waiting list for students wanting to live on campus.

Parents' Weekend is Oct. 11-13. Parents will hear from faculty, see The Sound of Music, and cheer on the Whitworth football and volleyball teams. I love how much our students love this weekend. They can't wait to see you. I'll be around all weekend and will give a short message at the worship service. The registration form is available online at http://www.whitworth.edu/Parents/ParentsWeekend.htm or you can call (509) 777-3276. Don't wait!

We appreciate our international students so much. Our cultural diversity advocates (members of our student leadership team) have already created a wonderful bond and climate for these new students. We have one student (Duong Ngo) who was in transit for 30 hours starting from Hanoi, Vietnam, and arriving in Spokane at 7:30 a.m. last Tuesday. She's a freshman and hopes to stay here for four years. Many others traveled for hours and hours to get to Whitworth. Incidentally, we have students who speak Afrikaans, American Sign Language, Cantonese, English, French, German, Japanese, Mandarin, Russian, Spanish, Taiwanese, Thai, and Zulu (though not all at the same time).

Resources

In order to be really ready for a miraculous gift, Camco Construction will begin next week to prepare the old Leavitt site for the new Weyerhaeuser Hall. There will be construction fencing, backhoes, trenches and generally torn-up grounds in this zone for the rest of the fall term. In spite of appearances, it is important to note that this is not a formal groundbreaking. Once the site preparation is completed, the lawn will be restored and will remain in place until we have the finances to proceed. I hope the grass doesn't get very long before the miracle hits.

In October, the beautifully restored Davenport Hotel will be the site of our successful Faith in the Future Campaign celebration. This morning, owner Walt Worthy gave me a quick tour of their latest progress. This grand old dame will be one of the finest hotels in the world, and that is not an exaggeration. We'll announce all of our final campaign totals shortly before the celebration.

Our student phonathon kicks off again this month, so if you're an alum you will be getting a call from our smiling, dialing students very soon. Most of the voices you hear will be of students who would not be at Whitworth without the generous gifts you provide, and they are excited about contacting you. Thanks for talking to them.

Athletics

This weekend goes down as one of the all-time greats for athletics at Whitworth College. I saw our men's soccer team dominate and our football team pull off another miraculous come-from-behind victory over one of the top teams in the country. I also witnessed four of the five victories notched by our women's volleyball team in a 12-team, five-match tournament we hosted. Here's the rundown:

The cross-country team is larger than ever, with 48 athletes competing. Led by returners Lindsay Nelson, Beth Abbey and Jessica Austin, the women's team is 27 strong and is aiming at a top finish in the conference and west region. The men's squad has 21 runners and looks capable of breaking into the top three teams in the conference, with Jesse Stevich and Ben Robinson leading the way. Both teams are coming off victories over Gonzaga last Saturday.
The volleyball team, ranked 20th in the nation, began strong in Colorado. The Pirates came back from a two-games-to-none deficit to defeat 10th-ranked Central College (Iowa) in their season opener. The Bucs went 3-1 in the tournament, and seniors Julie Weatherred and Lindsey Wagstaff were named to the all-tournament team. At this weekend's 27th annual Whitworth Invitational, the Bucs won all four of their matches, three of which were important in-region victories over Occidental, Redlands and Cal Lutheran. And Julie was named to her second straight all-tournament team.
Men's soccer is also ranked 20th and also got off to a great start. The Pirates defeated Northwest College 3-2 in overtime after trailing 2-0 with less than 10 minutes remaining in regulation. Freshman Todd Sabrowski scored the winning goal in overtime. The following day, Whitworth rolled over Evergreen State 5-0. The Pirates now stand at 3-0 after a win over Montana State-Billings in their home opener on Saturday. Todd stayed hot with a goal and an assist and Justin Tauscher earned his second shutout in goal.
Women's soccer ran up against a couple of Canadian powerhouses, losing to Trinity Western University 5-0 and to Simon Fraser University 5-1. They resume play next weekend.
The football Bucs, all 100 of them, opened against Bethel College (Minn.) last Saturday with another cardiac victory. Both teams are defending co-champs of their conferences. The Bucs picked up where they left off in 2001, when they earned five of their seven victories by coming from behind. Whitworth trailed Bethel 20-7 in the fourth quarter before rallying to win 27-26 when QB Scott Biglin passed to K.C. Dameron for the winning score with 1:35 to play. Scott has now engineered seven game-winning, last-minute scoring drives in his career as Whitworth's starting QB.

Next weekend is the Whitworth Heritage Gallery Hall of Fame football game against Montana Tech. We'll induct some great Whitworthians into the Hall of Fame: Doug Larson, NAIA decathlon champion in 1981; Mark Linden, all-star baseball and football player from 1988-90; and the 1996 men's basketball team, which finished as NAIA Division II national runners-up.

Alumni

Spokane artist Ken Yuhasz is displaying his neon sculpture in an exhibit, Found: Neon Objects, through Sept. 26 in Koehler Gallery. The exhibit features common objects found in the Inland Northwest's farming communities that Yuhasz has embellished with neon- and argon-filled tubing to create art that represents his perspective of Western icons.

Two summers ago I pretended to be an author. It was great. I like to write. Finally, what I wrote is actually a book, titled Leading People from the Middle: The Universal Mission of Heart and Mind (Executive Excellence Publishing). I have drawn upon my own organizational experiences and my doctoral studies in organizational communication to present what kind of leadership I feel is needed in the 21st century. It won't go down as a classic, but I think it will be very helpful and readable for people interested in leading. You can buy it from major bookstores in Spokane and online for $22.95. However, it's available through the Whitworth bookstore at a discounted rate of $16.75 plus shipping and handling. Contact Bookstore Manager Nancy Loomis at (509) 777-4524 or nloomis@whitworth.edu.

Closing Thoughts

As I mentioned above, it took me a week to write this newsletter. We've all been going at a breakneck pace, but it has been just a great first week of school. Yesterday at the football game an alumnus said to me, "I want you to know how proud I am of what has happened at my school." Following his example, I want you to know how grateful I am for your support. Something exciting is happening at Whitworth. You deserve a ton of credit. Thanks again. Keep us in your prayers.