Stillpoint Summer 2001

SUMMER 2001 THE MAGAZINE OF GORDON COLLEGE

eachable oments LOVING GOD WITH THE MIND AS WELL AS THE HEART, PAGE 10 TEACHABLE MOMENTS, PAGE 14 • CHOOSING THE RIGHT SCORE, PAGE 22

UP FRONT

Blending and

radition INNOVATION

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ollege presidents must always be thinking 10 to 15 years into the future. Where will this college be? Will its mission change? Will its graduates be prepared to enter a world no one can actually define?

Eighteen months ago we reviewed our last strategic plan to determine what had been accomplished. We found our financial base was stronger and the learning experience for students significantly improved. The externals are easy to count—10 building projects, several new undergraduate majors, a graduate program and rapid growth in the student body. But it’s harder to evaluate the human progress.

We regularly ask students to participate in the planning process to ensure that students learn in the best possible environment. As a Christian residential college, we are committed to providing contemporary learning within an eternal framework. One of the ways we measure our success in this enterprise occurs each Commencement Weekend, and this year was no exception. At the senior breakfast, Class President Thomas Routhe said: I have invested a large sum of money, not to mention four years of my life, into developing my mind. Was it worth it? Unequivocally yes. The investment I have made at Gordon College has indeed been a worthwhile one, and it will continue to reap benefits as long as I am a diligent steward of the gifts God has given me. . . .

We of the Class 2001 are prepared to fulfill our calling to be men and women with purpose, to live lives that have consequence and worth, to be seeds in the Kingdom of God, to have souls deep enough to withstand the dry spells and to possess a confident peacefulness that comes from the assurance and hope we have in knowing the certainty of our salvation.

Editor Patricia C. McKay ’65 Director of Communications Sarah Sams Public Relations Specialist Chris Underation Publication Design Lora E. Maggiacomo ’92 Printer Universal Westwood, Massachusetts

The accomplishments achieved by implementing the strategies of our last planning process are indeed measured when we hear the stories of Tom Routhe and hundreds of other Gordon graduates. Only then can we be sure our investment was worthwhile.

But it’s time to start the planning process again. To ensure the future for another generation of Gordon students, we’re launching our next strategic planning initiative: “Planning 2001: Blending Tradition and Innovation.”

A liberal arts education is broad by design, but we must also intensify our assistance to students in focusing on vocational choices and graduate studies.

And we are committing ourselves to recruiting dedicated Christians who more richly represent the mosaic which makes up the Body of Christ. We’ll continue to develop a stronger financial base and improve facilities to undergird the Gordon College of the future.

Blending tradition and innovation is part of our heritage and a key to our future. Our faith requires taking risks and discerning between the dangers and the opportunities always emerging on the educational horizon. With God as our Source of trust, we take risks, knowing that our graduates will be better prepared to face a world of rapid change and ready to fulfill the calling Christ gave us 2,000 years ago: to be salt where there is spoil and light where there is darkness. If our planning in 2001 is done well, graduates in the next decade will still be able to answer the question “Was it worth it?” with a resounding “Yes.” 

COURTER PHOTO GRAFX

President Details on Gordon’s strategic planning initiative, “Planning 2001: Blending Tradition and Innovation,” and the implications on campus development will be summarized in the next issue of Stillpoint after final approval by Gordon’s Board of Trustees.

T.S. Eliot, in his poem Four Quartets, refers to God as the “still point of the turning world.”

Stillpoint, the magazine for alumni and friends of the united college of Gordon and Barrington, is published three times a year and has a circulation of 22,000.

Changes of address should be sent to the Development Office.

Send other correspondence to: Editor, Stillpoint Gordon College 255 Grapevine Road Wenham, Massachusetts 01984 mckay@hope.gordon.edu Visit our website at: www.gordon.edu Reproduction of Stillpoint in whole or in part without written permission is prohibited.

Gordon College is an equal opportunity institution and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, age, sex, or national or ethnic origin.

Volume 16, Number 3 Summer 2001

Teachable

oments

IFC UP FRONT BY PRESIDENT JUD CARLBERG Blending Tradition and Innovation 2

ON & OFF CAMPUS BY CHRIS UNDERATION

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Commencement 2001 BY CHRIS UNDERATION A Snapshot of Memories

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It’s about Original Thought BY PAT MCKAY ’65 Tim Wolfe ’01, encouraged by his professors to be creative and inventive, is taking his original thoughts to the world beyond Gordon.

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Her Story Is in Her Students BY CHRIS UNDERATION Professor Muriel Radtke retires from 34 years of teaching at Barrington and Gordon.

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Classroom Moves to Holland BY STEVE CROWE Professor Steve Crowe reports on students who were scribes at a worldwide children-at-risk conference.

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Loving God with the Mind as well as the Heart

BY JIM WATTERS Wycliffe linguist Jim Watters talks about Dr. Kenneth Pike, for whom Gordon’s Pike Honors Program is named.

i–iv Partners Program 2001

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22 COVER PHOTO BY ROSE-MARIE SLOSEK: EUROPEAN SEMINAR TEAM IN VEZELAY, FRANCE, FAMOUS MONASTIC CENTER OF THE MEDIEVAL WORLD. ON THIS SPOT ST. BERNARD PREACHED THE SECOND CRUSADE TO TWO OF THE GREAT EUROPEAN MONARCHS OF THE 12TH CENTURY, URGING THEM TO TAKE UP THE CROSS AGAINST THE MUSLIM OCCUPATION OF THE HOLY LAND, CIRCA 1146 A.D. MAP: USED BY PERMISSION OF NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC SOCIETY.

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BY ADMISSIONS BY ELIZABETH EAVES ’98 Sweating the College Search?

Recruiter Elizabeth Eaves talks about the college search process.

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Teachable Moments BY DAVID FRANZ ’45B Retired professor David Franz shares a few reminiscences and photos of 43 years of European Seminar, the forerunner of all Gordon’s international programs.

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PROFS & PROGRAMS BY TED HILDEBRANDT Get Lost in Jerusalem Biblical studies professor Ted Hildebrandt takes his students to Jerusalem via virtual reality.

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ALUMS AT LARGE BY LAUREL BRUNVOLL ’89 Taking Ahold of Life Alumna Laurel (Seiler) Brunvoll talks about her family’s struggle with serious illness and the opportunities that have come from the devastating realities of life.

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POINT OF VIEW BY HERMA WILLIAMS Choosing the Right Score Associate Provost Herma Williams recounts her difficult decision to forfeit her career track to save her son.

BC EVENTS CALENDAR College Choir’s European tour

NEW DIRECTOR OF COMMUNICATIONS Sarah E. Sams has joined Gordon College as the director of communications, responsible for strategic communications planning, publications and media relations. Sarah has worked as a project manager and marketing consultant on interactive and multimedia projects the past six years for a host of Fortune 1000 companies. Prior experience in real estate includes marketing a large retail mall for Jones Day LaSalle and strategic planning and operations for a Dallas-based real estate company.

Sarah graduated magna cum laude from the University of North Texas with a Bachelor of Fine Arts and received a Master of Business Administration degree from Southern Methodist University.

Former Director of Communications Rick Sweeney ’85 left Gordon in March to become director of marketing and communications at the Johnson Graduate School of Management, which is part of Cornell University, Ithaca, New York.

Sarah Sams

SENATORIAL PRIVILEGE Alumna Townsend (Lange) NcNitt ’89 has taken a more high profile role in Washington after being appointed by President George W. Bush to become a member of his legislative affairs team. In her new position she will act as one of the president’s representatives to the U.S. Senate. “Townsend is a talented and experienced individual,” Bush said in a press release. “As my eyes and ears in . . . the Senate, she will be an integral part of my plan to reach out to Congress on a bipartisan basis and enact a legislative package that lives up to the visions I laid out during my campaign.”

NcNitt was featured in the Summer 2000 issue of Stillpoint.

Prior to her new appointment she was an assistant and counsel to Senator Judd Gregg of New Hampshire.

NEW RESIDENCE—FULTON HALL

ZACHARY STINE

The new residence hall being built next to Tavilla Hall now has a name. It will be called Fulton Hall in honor of Bob and Lil Fulton, friends of the College who have made a significant investment in the building. To recognize the Fultons, Gordon planned a special ceremony in April during which the Fultons, students, faculty and staff signed some of the beams that will be used in the building. Despite the brutal Lil and Bob Fulton late winter, it appears the residence hall should be largely complete and ready for students this fall.

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Abbie Rabine ’02 nearly collapsed with shock as she was crowned Miss Massachusetts.

COURTESY OF WWW.MISSMASS.ORG

ON & OFF CAMPUS

BY CHRIS UNDERATION

GORDON STUDENT CROWNED MISS MASSACHUSETTS Abbie Rabine, a senior music education major, was selected Miss Massachusetts for 2001 during the Miss Massachusetts Scholarship Pageant held June 9 in the Arts Center of Bristol Community College in Fall River, Massachusetts. “It was unbelievable,” she said.

In the last two years, Abbie has come close to winning the crown. In 1999 she was the first runner-up, and last year she was also among the finalists. As Miss Massachusetts Abbie will receive more than $10,000 in scholarship money and will represent Massachusetts in the Miss America Pageant, to be held September 22 in Atlantic City, New Jersey, and telecasted by ABC at 8 P.M. Her platform, “Making Disabilities Abilities,” grew out of her own struggle with a language-based learning disability (see the story on Abbie in the Spring 2000 Stillpoint). Leading up to the Miss Massachusetts Pageant, Abbie met with most of the state’s congressional delegation to push for full funding of the Americans with Disabilities Act, which is supposed to fund 40 percent of special education funds but presently only funds 13 percent. During the summer she met with President George W. Bush to ask him to support full funding for the ADA.

ATHLETES IN EXCELLENCE One of the high points of each spring is the release of the AllAcademic teams in the Commonwealth Coast Conference.

This year Gordon placed 30 athletes on the list—almost twice as many as any other school in the conference. Though we can’t publish the long list here, suffice it to say the list included students from nearly all the College’s athletic teams. Considering the demands of the classroom and the time investment required to achieve excellence in athletic competition, this is no small feat.

BODY TALK Once again our annual Gordon College Symposium, sponsored by the Center for Christian Studies, proved to be popular with students, faculty and staff. Over 50 sessions, from discussion groups to films to debates, were organized around the theme “Body Talk.” Presentations explored the

BACKGROUND AERIAL PHOTO BY JAMES ABTS, 2000

idea of what it means to be an embodied person and the many different ways we think of the body, from reflecting on the Body of Christ to discussing the body politic.

These symposia are recognized as a unique and valuable educational tool. The Gordon College Symposium was featured during one of the sessions at the recent National Forum on Christian Higher Education.

GRABBING THE GOLDEN GOOSE With all due respect to the recently departed senior class, it appears the sophomores of 2000–2001 have the most class spirit. More than 1,200 students took part in the third annual Golden Goose class competition and cheered on their classes through a variety of stand-up comedies, dancing, skits and lip-sync routines. Each class was given points for each student who showed up in their class color, and at the end of it all the sophomores took home the gold-painted goose, at least for one year.

FROM SOUTH AFRICA TO WENHAM During the spring semester the College welcomed Linda and Peter Biehl to campus to speak about the murder of

eyond the ectern A sampling of faculty accomplishments and activities outside the classroom GRAMMAR GATHERING—Jennifer Beatson, who teaches foreign languages, presented a paper at the North American Foreign Language Association conference at Wheaton, Illinois.

Titled “Lord, Please Help Them with the Subjunctive!”, the paper is a unit meant to help students learn how to pray properly in Spanish.

FROM SUBJUNCTIVE TO SUBJECTIVE —Earlier in the year David Aiken, philosophy, presented a paper on “Subjectivity and Intellectual Eros: A Comparison of Kierkegaard and Lonergan” at the Society of Christian Philosophers meeting at St. John Fisher College in Rochester, New York.

KEYING IN—Music professor Stanley Pelkey presented a paper titled “Approaches to Sonata Procedures in British Keyboard Music from 1760–1820” at the annual meeting of the Southeastern Historical Keyboard Society, held at the University of Virginia. Pelkey has also recently published a paper in the newsletter of the London Handel Institute called “Handel and Samuel Wesley: A Case Study in Handel Reception in the Later Georgian Period.”

HISTORY SPEAKS—In March Richard Pierard, who teaches history, was in Moscow to speak at the Moscow Theological

their daughter in South Africa and the healing work they are doing in that nation in her memory. In 1993 Amy Biehl was stabbed to death by a mob in a suburb of Cape Town while she was working to help bring democratic reforms to the nation. The Amy Biehl Foundation Trust—which has helped some of those responsible for Amy’s death—is designed to provide food, education, job creation projects and after-school care for children in the highly impoverished area where she was killed. “The truest act of benevolence is not charity; it is empowering someone to empower himself,” the Biehls said.

The Biehls were part of the convocation series “Lessons from the United States and South Africa: Case Studies in TransLinda (L) and Peter (R) Biehl with formation.” The Associate Provost Herma Williams. series was initiated

by Associate Provost Herma Williams.

Seminary of the Russian Union of Evangelical ChristiansBaptists. While there he taught the course Church, State and Religious Freedom in Christian History. In April he spoke at the Overseas Ministries Study Center in New Haven, Connecticut, on “Baptists as Missionaries: What, When, Where and How?” TAKING THE C HAIR —Bob Whittet, professor of youth ministries, has been assigned the chairmanship of the Student Ministries Committee of the Board of Directors of Covenant Discipleship. This is the educational ministry of the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Synod. Whittet will be responsible for such things as denomination-wide youth ministry outreach and short-term mission trips.

TANTALIZING TWISTS—The Bulletin for Biblical Research has published an article by Elaine Phillips, professor of biblical and theological studies, titled “Serpent Intertexts: Tantalizing Twists in the Tales.” The essay examines how the Hebrew Scriptures make use of the ideas and interconnections from other textual sources.

EYES ON YOU—Kaye Cook, psychology, has published an article in the Winter 2000 edition of Adolescent titled “You Have to Have Somebody Watching Your Back, and If That’s God, Then That’s Mighty Big.” The article deals with the issue of the role the church plays in the resilience of inner-city youth.

LITERARY PORTRAYAL—Peter Stine, who teaches English, delivered the paper “White Missionaries in African Fiction” at the annual meeting of the African Literature Association in Richmond, VA. SUMMER 2001

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2001

COMMENCEMENT Dr. Marvin Wilson tells 354 graduates to be thoughtful, direct and firm in their faith as they walk off the graduation platform and onto life’s stage.

BY

CHRIS UNDERATION

D

r. Marvin R. Wilson, beloved professor of biblical and theological studies at Gordon, gave the Class of 2001 their final test on May 19 during the 109th Commencement Exercises.

The test: three questions. Due date: at the end of the lives of Gordon’s 354 graduates. The questions: What are your theological nonnegotiables? What is your philosophy of work? What are your dreams, and how do they relate to God’s big dream?

“Convictions do matter,” Wilson said. “Today we are told convictions and opinions are the same thing. But they are not. Opinions are something you hold; convictions are something that hold you.”

Reminding the graduates that at the end of their lives they’ll look back over their work and judge whether they’ve passed or failed, Wilson urged them to regularly reflect on what they believe. They must know, he said, what they cannot compromise in their faith, what their dreams are, and whom they’re serving and why.

“Like Mr. Zimmerman—Bob Dylan—said, ‘We all gotta serve somebody,’” Wilson reminded students. “All professions can be done to the glory of God. If you’re called to be a journalist, be one to the glory of God. If you’re called to be an accountant, do it with God in mind. Have a unified view of life. The Apostle Paul tells us we are to do everything to the glory of God. Your ethics will either be a credit or a discredit to God.”

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Wilson also told the graduates it’s important to have dreams that compel us to move forward in life. “Don’t be afraid to think big,” he said. “And don’t passively sit back waiting for miracles to happen. It is up to us to find some area where there is darkness and take light there. Take good news; take integrity to politics that are too cynical; take healing where there is division; take ethics to business; make optimists out of pessimists.”

But Wilson also cautioned against making dreams the singular goal of life. “It’s possible your dream may never materialize, but don’t get upset about that. We should still be able to see and be thankful that the Head of the universe counts us worthy to be part of His plan. Our question should not be ‘What if my dreams don’t come true?’ Rather, at the end of the day we should ask ourselves if, in pursuing our dreams, we have helped and enhanced God’s creation in any way.”

Wilson said the foundation of our dreams and service to others is found in the realm of conviction in our theological nonnegotiables. “Today we’re led to believe everything is up for grabs and nothing is tied down,” Wilson said. “The best answer some people can give to questions of conviction is ‘Whatever.’ Don’t be afraid to uphold your convictions.”

Wilson told the graduates that today many think religious beliefs are a matter of personal convenience. But they are much more than that,

PHOTOS BY ZACHARY STINE

Dr. Craig Barnes, senior pastor of the National Presbyterian Church in Washington, D.C., delivered the Baccalaureate address to graduates on Friday evening. He said many today believe we must look within ourselves and construct our own identities, and the preoccupation with ourselves has become boring. But all our identity questions will be resolved if we have the right answer to the question “Do you love Jesus?” The mark of maturity in an individual is being bound to and led by Him. The traditional candle lighting by seniors took place at the end of the service.

ZACHARY STINE

he said. “Be wary of people who say tradition is to be distrusted and despised. Tradition is honorable; it’s what has been handed down through the generations as being trustworthy,” Wilson said. “The Bible is a living tradition.

It is not the dead faith of the living; it is the living faith of the dead.”

If students will settle their minds on the nonnegotiables and find a place in which they can serve and build their dreams, the future will be bright, he said. “Over the last four years, a foundation has been laid in you. It is not important that you remember my name in a few years, but it is important that you remember the three questions. If you test well, you’ll be a millionaire in God’s eyes.”  Dr. Wilson taught at Barrington College 1963–1971 and has been at Gordon since 1971. He is Harold John Ockenga Professor of Biblical and Theological Studies and holds a doctorate from Brandeis University. His award-winning documentary film, Jews and Christians: A Journey of Faith, will be aired this fall on public television stations across the United States.

napshots of

emories

COMMENCEMENT PHOTOS BY COURTER PHOTO GRAFX UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED

SUMMER 2001

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COMMENCEMENT

2G 0 0 1

ordon’s graduate program in education presented its fifth graduating class—13 area schoolteachers who received the Master of Education in Curriculum and Instruction.

The winners of the 2001 Distinguished Faculty Awards were Peter W. Iltis and Suzanne M. Phillips, who were honored at Commencement. Their selection was made on the recommendation of faculty associates and members of the senior class.

Iltis, recipient of the Distinguished Senior Faculty Award, is a professor and the chairman of the Movement Science Department and has been at Gordon since 1983. He has published in many academic journals and is a member of the American College of Sports Medicine.

In addition to his scholarly focus, Iltis is also a semiprofessional French hornist who plays with two orchestras and two chamber ensembles.

Iltis holds a Ph.D. from the University of Kansas. He and his wife, Anna, live in Salisbury, Massachusetts, with their two children, John and Kirsten.

Phillips, an associate professor of psychology at Gordon since 1997, received the Distinguished Junior Faculty Award.

She is a 1983 graduate of Gordon and holds a Ph.D. from the State University of New York at Buffalo.

Phillips has written extensively for psychology journals and presented papers at dozens of professional conferences.

She has remained active in research, working on projects for the state university system of New York and several other public and private organizations.

She resides in Ipswich, Massachusetts, with her son, Dexter.

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Dr. Suzanne Phillips above) and Dr. Peter Iltis (right) received Distinguished Faculty Awards from Dr. Mark Sargent, provost.

Distinguished Faculty Awards are based on teaching ability, noteworthy scholarship and the quality of relationships professors have developed with students. Iltis and Phillips will each receive a $1,000 cash award and be honored by the full student body at a convocation to be held in the fall.

Gordon also recognized three retiring professors: Dr. Diane Blake ’58, who served at Gordon for 40 years, both on the faculty and in directing off-campus and international programs; Dr. Muriel Radtke, who served a combined 34 years at Barrington and Gordon and was chairman of the Education Divisions; and Dr. Jane Wells, who served in education for 20 years as the director of teacher certification.

Following Commencement Exercises, guests celebrated the naming of the Margaret Tweten Jensen Studio Theatre in the Barrington Center for the Arts.

A popular author and storyteller, Margaret is a frequent visitor to campus and a loved mentor of students.

She is the mother of Jan Carlberg, wife of President R. Judson Carlberg. Her son Ralph and three of her grandchildren have attended Gordon. Jan and Jud, other family members, and friends have contributed generously in Margaret’s honor. 

BY PAT MCKAY ’65

Recent graduate Tim Wolfe says at Gordon he was freed to do more than imitate; he was encouraged to be creative and inventive —to think original thoughts.

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n May Tim Wolfe walked across the Commencement platform with a lifetime of Gordon connections. “My earliest memories are of driving onto the campus with my father—through the tall stand of pines—when I was 3 or 4 years old. I’ve always been comfortable at Gordon,” Tim says. His father, Dr. David Wolfe, taught philosophy here 1974–1987. Both of his brothers graduated from Gordon, Ben in 1998 and Jon in 1997.

Nevertheless, Tim did a thorough investigation of other small liberal arts colleges before deciding on Gordon. He came for the reputation of the Biology Department’s premed program and its excellent rate of graduate acceptance into medical schools. His scientific bent and interest in helping people led him in that direction.

Over time Tim began to have reservations about his plans to become a doctor, and with the insight of his mentor, biology professor Dr. Dorothy Boorse, Tim realized there were other possibilities to be explored. While taking a course in advanced ecology and doing research with Dr. Boorse, he discovered his passion for the environment and how people understand and relate to it.

“Dr. Boorse helped me free up my thinking in choosing a career path; it’s about original thought. It takes faith, courage, confidence, willpower and tremendous hope to carry through. I had to give up the very safe route of medical school and be willing to graduate from college without necessarily knowing what specific direction was next,” Tim says.

As a result of that broader view, Tim became a Pike Scholar, developing his own academic program in creative writing and the interdisciplinary field of sustainable development, pulling in sociology, economics, energy use and agriculture. Tim says, “The Pike program has been formative in my understanding of the way God is guiding me toward community work in underdeveloped parts of the world. It has allowed me direct experience and preFireflies pared me to be a far more effective servant in God’s The stars are winking kingdom.” giving me that ‘but you and I’ knowSustainable developing look from their sparkling corners, all across this wet black field. ment means determining how to meet So how can I help but pursue, the present needs tracking them with the pause of an area of the (& dash) of the hunter, my paces molding to their flashes? world while also planning to meet Holding one for a moment, it innocently future needs. For lights up my hand, before floating free instance, relief work into the glinting night air, with a wink.

Tim Wolfe (June 2000)

relieves the present need in the face of famine; but sustainable development determines what caused the famine and provides solutions that will prevent future Tim with the friendly beasts in Africa. food shortages. Tim’s objective is to explore several areas of sustainable development before he goes on to graduate studies. He began his quest last summer when he attended AuSable Institute’s environmental study program, focusing on sustainable development at their Kenya site. A professor from Nairobi University offered valuable insights into the relationship of politics and economics to donor agencies and traveled with the students to evaluate businesses, government projects and social institutions, and see how they affect the land and the population.

During the fall of 2000 Tim was an exchange student at Daystar University in Nairobi, Kenya, where he particularly enjoyed a course in African Economic Problems. As students in the Daystar exchange program often do, Tim immersed himself in cultural courses to take the greatest advantage of learning about the country and its people. He recalls meeting a 17-year-old Masai male who was engaged to a 3-year-old child. “Being in Kenya was an awakening to the cultures around me,” Tim says.

With a wide scope of interests, Tim has been described by campus leaders as a renaissance man. Not only was he a 4.0 scholar at Gordon, he also jumped with both feet into College activities. He loves to fence, is an avid ultimate frisbee player and a rock climber. He enjoys writing poetry, was on the Idiom staff (a student literary journal) for three years and was a resident advisor his sophomore and junior years. Tim admits, “It was challenging to learn how to approach 30 guys on 30 very different wavelengths. My goal was to get to know each individual—to be able to discuss classical music with the music major and play computer games with the guys next door. I wanted them to know they could come to me when they had problems.” Tim offered to take Friday night duty both years to ease the demand on his RA staff. “It was a bit of a sacrifice,” he says.

Tim likes to watch how God is connecting the dots in his life. In March he went to a conference in the Netherlands with communications professor Steve Crowe and four other students (see page 9), who did volunteer media work for a large gathering of worldwide children-at-risk agencies. There Tim met a woman who invited him to work at a school for handicapped children in Nigeria this summer.

The legacy of Kenneth Pike at Gordon was to give motivated students the opportunity to put their interests together for specialized study and career direction (see page 10). Tim believes the program served him well.  SUMMER 2001

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Her Story Is in Her Students

BY

CHRIS UNDERATION

Muriel Radtke didn’t set out to be a teacher. But she wouldn’t t may be a bit strong, but not change her long-term detour for anything—not even journalism.

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inaccurate, to call Muriel Radtke an accidental teacher. “Actually I she says. “And I get e-mails and letters from students who want taught elementary school to pay my way through college to stay in touch or let me know how something they learned so I could be a journalist,” Muriel says. But along the in class has come in handy. way, Muriel’s plans were interrupted. The result was a “There’s great virtue in spending your career in one 34-year teaching career at Barrington and Gordon that has place because you can help mold that institution and be nurtured and mentored thousands of classroom teachers molded by it.” who, in turn, mentor their students.

Many changes have taken place in education since Muriel “I have enjoyed teaching from the very first minute,” she entered her first classroom. Although Muriel says she doesn’t says. “The classroom is where I have wanted to be. I really see any reason for the rampant negativity around public can see God’s hand in it all as I look back.” schools today—there are both good and bad schools—teachA native of North Dakota, Muriel found herself teaching ing has changed considerably, she says. “We used to teach in a lab class for 8–11-year-olds at Kean State College in much more content; subjects such as history and geography.

New Jersey in the mid-1960s. She was also involved with Now we are expected to teach InterVarsity, where she became basic social skills, sex education friends with Bill Young, a doctoral and character education, whereas student at Columbia University. it used to be assumed character “After his studies, Bill moved was developed through hard work on to teach at a place called Barand overcoming difficulties, along rington College in Rhode Island,” with good parenting and good she says. “Later I got a call from teaching,” she says.

Barrington wanting to know if Muriel believes education goes I’d be interested in an opening in cycles. Currently many school they had. I figured I’d at least go districts are tightening things for the interview, but I was only up and ending the practice of 29 and had never taught at the social promotion, insisting on a college level.” standard level of academic attainThe weather and the interview Muriel in 1974 at Barrington, and today. ment. left her less than enthusiastic, but At Barrington Dr. Radtke taught education courses, These years of tension have several months later—in April supervised student teachers and also served as chair of interdisciplinary courses in fine arts and film. She been somewhat tied to the breakof 1967—she got a phone call was appointed interim academic dean there for two down of the family, she feels. Over inviting her to teach at Barrington and a half years. She chaired the Education Divisions at the last three decades, teachers in the fall. “I wasn’t too sure about both Barrington and Gordon. Muriel was instrumental have had to deal with disagreeit, but I decided to go,” she says. in establishing the Master of Education program at Gordon and was named chair of the combined underments about their roles. “There “I needed some shaping and graduate and graduate Education Divisions in 1996. used to be clarity and harmony direction, and Bill Young helped She and retiring colleague Jane Wells plan to conbetween home and school expecme with that. And the students tinue their ministry to women in prison—a focus on tations and what each was respongave me good feedback and let me literacy and spiritual development through classes, Bible studies and worship services. sible for. Now many more homes know where I needed to improve. operate with single parents, often Some of the students from that leaving greater expectations for first class are still in touch and what schools need to do. have become great friends.”

“Over the years teacher attitudes have changed in general Because many individuals had taken an interest in too,” Muriel says. “Teachers used to clearly be role models and her progress when she was a beginner, Muriel became a were expected to behave in certain ways. That has changed, champion of more experienced instructors mentoring the and teachers are now more like any other professionals.” Some less experienced. “During my whole career there has always of this comes from teachers’ unions, Muriel says. been someone willing to come alongside and help me,” The National Education Association was primarily a Muriel says. “Drs. Mary Thorpe and Rachel King are two professional organization when it started. “But as it became who really helped me in classroom and administrative more unionized, the association did things that shackled duties at Barrington.” teachers,” she says: requirements to work fewer hours; By the late 1970s Muriel had so mastered her discipline restrictions that make teaching harder than when we were that she was named chairman of the Education Division free to arrive early and stay late. But one positive aspect at Barrington, a position she held until the school merged of unions is improved teacher salaries, and for that we with Gordon in 1985. She served as the chair of Gordon’s are grateful.” education program from 1993 until her retirement this As she retires from her unplanned college teaching career, year. does Muriel feel she missed the road to journalism? “Teaching Along the way she’s had the privilege of watching is what I was meant to do,” she says. “I like organizing a students she helped educate, prayed for and supported, grow classroom and helping to shape teachers; these tasks still into parents and professionals who have moved into many appeal to me. And the great by-product is students who walks of life. “Many have become teachers, but I recently become lifelong friends and encouragers. I didn’t expect that heard from one of my last students at Barrington—Sharon when I started out.”  (Snow) Sirois ’85—who has just published her first book,” 8

Classroom Moves to

Holland

Gordon students tapped into a children-at-risk network when professor of journalism Steve Crowe took them to a worldwide conference to volunteer as scribes.

STEVE CROWE

F

ive Gordon students knew they’d be getting an education when they flew to Holland in March for a weeklong international conference on children at risk. After all, the 300 leaders of Christian child development agencies, ranging from the president of Compassion International to the director of a 40-bed orphanage in the Philippines, would offer a wealth of knowledge and insight into the disturbing worldwide trends in malnutrition, poverty, education and AIDS. Seniors Tim Wolfe, Jane Mellema and Christina Morgner, and juniors Jennie Hutchinson and Susan LeCain attended dozens of lectures and workshops and took volumes of notes. They were volunteer scribes for Cutting Edge conference sponsors, Viva Network, based in Oxford, England.

“People kept asking me if I was getting credit for this,” said Front row, L to R: Jane Mellema ’01; Jennifer Hutchinson ’02; Susan LeCain Christina, a senior biology major. She wasn’t getting credit, though ’02; Christina Morgner ’02. Back row: Peter Coleman; Timothy Wolfe ’01; Wess Stafford, president of Compassion International; Karen Smith ’84, she spent as much time in sessions and conversations as she would with New Life Center in Chiang Mai, Thailand, and sister of Gordon’s in class for a typical, semester-long course. The students weren’t Professor Stephen Smith; Steve Crowe. paid either; they helped raise their own support to cover airfare, room and board.

The invitation for students to attend the conference came through a longtime friend of mine. The conference planning committee was looking to improve communication at its third Cutting Edge conference and to collect information to continue building a network out of the 25,000 projects for children at risk worldwide. Gordon students worked 10- to 12-hour days, taking notes, conducting surveys and typing up hundreds of handwritten comments from delegates for two reports: one on political, economic and other global trends, and one on the biblical basis for child development work.

At the conclusion of the gathering, they helped write a two-page newsletter on conference themes.

“I felt great about what we did,” said Tim. “It really was unlike anything I’d done before. I never felt really out of my depth, and I quickly realized how much I could help people.”

Ken Harder, executive director of the Council of International Children’s Ministries, had high praise for the Gordon students: “Thanks for your servant leadership. Your willingness to do anything we asked of you was such a great example. We hope God rewarded you with an experience which will change your lives.”

During their final seven weeks of college, the three seniors—all biology Ken Harder, conference chairman majors—found their minds drifting back to the conference. “I felt like this was a conference to ‘come away from,’” said Jane. “It was not about what occurred at the conference, but about what will come later.”

For Tim the impact of the conference is more immediate. He’ll head to Nigeria this summer to work on projects ranging from construction to videotaping, thanks to a contact he made at the conference (see page 7).

Two of the keynote speakers took time for private meals with the Gordon contingent. Students were especially impressed with the spiritual depth of Dr. Samuel Kamaleson, a longtime Urbana Missions Conference speaker and World Vision vice president emeritus. But it was a lunch with Wess Stafford, president of Compassion International, that had the most direct impact on Steve Crowe has taught jourstudents. Stafford told how, at the age of 28, he doubted that God had much nalism and writing courses at of a purpose for him.

Gordon since 1997. Prior to that he was an editor at The Jane noted: “I guess it was very encouraging to me to hear that a man Salem Evening News, the largest being used by God in such powerful ways was at one point in his life as Massachusetts daily north of directionless as I am.”

Boston. He has also taught Stafford encouraged students to embrace every conversation, every class, courses at Boston University. every person, Jane said, “because God may use any of these things to guide, Steve holds master’s degrees from Boston University shape and inform us of things we may use later.”  Viva Network is an international family of networks set up to link Christians working with children at risk worldwide. To find out more, go to www.viva.org or write to Viva Network, P.O. Box 633, Oxford OX2 OXZ, UK.

and Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary. He and his wife, Betsy, have two grown sons.

SUMMER 2001

9

PAT MCKAY ’65

BY

MasIND well as the

Loving God with the

Heart

HE MAY NOT BE A HOUSEHOLD NAME, BUT WHEN KENNETH L. PIKE, CLASS OF 1933, PASSED AWAY DECEMBER 31, 2000, THE CHRISTIAN COMMUNITY LOST ONE OF ITS GREATEST SCHOLARS AND ONE OF THE OUTSTANDING LINGUISTS OF THE 20TH CENTURY. SINCE HE WAS A YOUNG BOY, JIM WATTERS HAS KNOWN AND ADMIRED HIM.

S

BY JIM

WATTERS

Scholarship didn’t come easily for Ken Pike as a student at Gordon in the early 1930s. Though he went on to author or coauthor 20 books and 200 articles, the thin, high-strung student often found writing papers especially difficult. He later told how in the cold Boston winters he would sit by an open window, dressed only in his underwear, in deep sweat as he tried to put words on paper.

A native of Connecticut, Ken owed the start of his life of service and scholarship to his parents’ encouragement.

After graduating from high school in 1928, he found a job in a grocery store in Rhode Island. That year he decided to study for the ministry but was too insecure to pursue the application process. His mother took the initiative to get him registered at Gordon. He worked on the kitchen crew for his room and board and studied New Testament Greek with Merrill Tenney.

Ken was convinced by inner feelings that it was God’s will for him to apply to the China Inland Mission, and he did so in December 1933 at the age of 20, fully confident they would accept him. He had spent a few weeks at the mission headquarters in Philadelphia studying Mandarin and learning mission policy. Ken’s struggles with pronunciation and his nervousness were enough to convince the mission he shouldn’t go to China. He was devastated.

Assured by his father that God had a special job in mind for him, he continued at Gordon for a year of postgraduate studies. While there he heard from a fellow student about Camp Wycliffe, a small course in Arkansas designed to train Bible translators to work in previously unwritten languages. With his father’s encouragement he attended and

was especially interested in the phonetics course.

It was Cameron Townsend—founder of the Summer Institute of Linguistics (SIL) and Wycliffe Bible Translators—who invited Ken to join the work in Mexico and begin analysis of a Mixtec language in the state of Oaxaca with the goal of translating Scripture. Early on Townsend took note of Ken’s academic potential and urged him to write a book on language sounds.

Ken put the idea out of his mind, convinced he wasn’t the person for the job. He wanted to focus instead on the Mixtec work. However, on a trip to the area where he was working on Mixtec, he slipped and broke his leg while carrying a hundred-pound sack of corn. Confined to a hospital bed, he decided God had a purpose for him even there. He started writing what eventually became a classic book in the field of linguistics: Phonetics.

Edward Sapir, the most prominent figure in American linguistics at the time, was impressed by Ken’s work and was his instructor at a summer session of the Linguistic Society of America held in 1937 at the University of Michigan. In the following years Ken continued his work on Mixtec in Mexico and studied linguistics at Michigan, earning his doctorate in 1941. During the next decade he wrote many linguistic articles and three more books, all significant works in the field: Phonemics: a technique for reducing languages to writing; Tone Languages; and The Intonation of American English. His productivity continued to be remarkable until late in life.

After those early struggles with term papers at Gordon, Ken had learned to be a prolific writer. He explained it this way:

Dr. Kenneth Pike held appointments as a professor in both anthropology and linguistics at Michigan, served as president of the Linguistic Society of America and the Linguistic Association of Canada and the United States, was elected to the prestigious National Academy of Sciences, and significantly affected the research of modern cultural anthropology. In addition to his doctorate from Michigan, he received honorary doctorates from Georgetown University, the University of Chicago, the Sorbonne in Paris, and Freiberg University in Germany, among others.

Tom Headland, SIL International Anthropology Consultant, tells a story that captures the Ken Pike who was loved and revered by his colleagues, both Christian and secular:

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At the American Anthropological Association’s annual meeting in 1988, Ken and Marvin Harris from the University of Florida participated in a debate. Marvin Harris, a Marxist-oriented anthropologist, was considered the leading theoretician in anthropology in the USA. I was the moderator for the debate, which went on for 4+ hours to an audience of over 600 anthropologists. During the discussion period a man in the audience asked a question.To answer him, Ken was thinking of an incident that happened in Russia, but couldn’t remember a name. He looked out over the audience and suddenly said, “Evie, are you out there? Who was that man we had dinner with in Moscow?” Evie was sitting way in the back. She stood up and said, “Ken, that was Dr. So-and-So.” Ken said, “That’s right.”

And he finished answering the question.

I went to the microphone to call on the next person, but before I did I said, “Let me stop here, colleagues, to tell you who that was in the back of the room.That was Kenneth Pike’s wife, Evelyn Pike, and they are here with us this week celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary.” Everyone started clapping. Even the stuffy, gray-haired anthropologists were cheering.Then, Ken without even a thought, stood up, leaned across the table and blew Evie a kiss.The audience roared with even louder cheering and shrill whistles. I have never seen anthropologists act like that in my whole life.

Jim Watters has been with Wycliffe for 24 years and director of SIL’s work in Mexico since August. He and his wife of over 24 years, Juanita, have four children. Jessica is a senior Pike Scholar at Gordon, with a double major in Asian studies and biology.

Showing some of the same passion Ken Pike had for China, she studied there during the last academic year. Josiah graduated from Gordon in 2000; two other sons are still in high school.

Jim and Juanita have worked on the translation of Scripture into two related Tepehua languages. Jim holds a doctorate from the University of California at Berkeley— largely due to Ken’s encouragement.

Josiah, Jessica and Jim

THE PIKE HONORS PROGRAM AT GORDON

The average student picks his topic for writing from the current state of the art or from materials on the frontier of the discipline. My topics arose from my attempts to help students and colleagues whenever I found them having difficulty studying any language. I would jump down into the ditch with them and try to boost them out. The topics were chosen in relationship to people who were having difficulty analyzing preliterate languages. This led to variety in my interests and in my writings.

Ken was the first linguist to be nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. He was also nominated for the Nobel Prize for Literature and held numerous positions of distinction. Most of all, though, he became a friend to many and encouraged us to serve God with both heart and mind—to combine our commitment to Christ with a life of scholarship.

Ken experienced something even more significant than academic recognition during those early years: he met Evelyn Griset, niece of Cameron Townsend. Evelyn became Ken’s loving wife and a scholar in her own right.

I first came to know the Pikes as a child. After an initial assignment in the Peruvian jungles, my PROBABLY NO parents worked at the home office of Wycliffe Bible Translators in southern California. My father served OTHER EVANGELICAL on the board and as part of the administration of HAS HAD SUCH AN both Wycliffe and SIL for many years, so they became close friends of the Pikes.

IMPACT ON BOTH I remember Ken’s visits to our home. He engaged THE ACADEMIC me in serious conversations, even when I was a teenager.

Sometime after he had spent a year at the Center WORLD OF THE for Advanced Studies in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford, he asked me about my high school math SOCIAL SCIENCES classes and talked about applications of mathematics AND HUMANITIES, to models of language. I was always surprised that an outstanding scholar would take such an interest in what AND THE MODERN I was learning and thinking.

MISSIONARY Ken initiated a new approach to linguistics.

The trend in both the philosophy of language and ENTERPRISE. theoretical linguistics during much of the last half century was to focus on logical issues that arise in the formal structure and semantics of isolated sentences. But Ken’s experience with language analysis and his many consultations with field linguists led him to focus instead on the level of human interaction. This led him to seek parallels between the structure of language and that of other human behaviors.

It also led him to stress the importance of context and observer viewpoint in language and thought. His longest work, Language in Relation to a Unified Theory of the Structure of Human Behavior, had at least as much impact on the work of cultural anthropologists as it did on linguists. Among his statements written over the last 50 years can be found some of the best insights into what we now call postmodernism.

Ken Pike encouraged scores of young men and women to become scholars at a time when many conservative church traditions had retreated from the academic world. Through technical research, articles and books in linguistics, devotional writings and chapel talks, poetry and forays into philosophy, Ken always sought to help others understand—whether it was the intricacies of a particular linguistic construction or issues of truth and the importance of multiple perspectives. His was a life of scholarship in service to the many minority groups around the world, some of whom are still waiting to have God’s Word in their own language. 

T

he purpose of the Kenneth Pike Honors Program is to provide exceptional students an individualized, flexible, academic experience that will challenge them to utilize all of their academic potential.

To enter the program a student must have completed at least one semester at Gordon and have a cumulative grade point average of 3.5. To remain in the program, the scholar must not drop below an average of 3.5 for three semesters.

Under an academic advisor and a Pike Honors Committee member, it is the scholar’s responsibility to design and submit a program consisting of challenging learning experiences. It may include selected regular classes, independent studies, special topics courses, research courses, internships, theses, and travel/study in other cultures.

The emphasis is on individualized learning.

There are 95 Pike alumni and 17 current Pike Scholars.

Dr. Kenneth L. Pike epitomized the melding of academic excellence with the life of faith. Upon instituting the honors program in his name at Commencement in 1982, Gordon College conferred the honorary degree Doctor of Humane Letters on Dr. Pike. On that occasion he made the following statement concerning the importance of faith and learning integration in the life of the Christian scholar.

Life is context. Death is autonomy; and independence is the fatal illusion.The fall of the race followed the intellectual choice of stipulating one’s own moral responsibilities outside of the context of God’s stipulation and God’s personal rule.Yet only in Him can we live and move and have our being—as a Greek poet-philosopher quoted by Paul knew in the past.

Life is person—person above thing, person above proposition, person above academic knowledge. Life in context reaches its integrating wholeness in context of family, context of culture, context of God the Three-in-One. The Trinity could talk, plan and create.

The Trinity made us in that image also to talk, plan and create; talking to create a taxonomy (in naming the animals) before the Fall; planning an ecologically controlled environment (keeping the garden cultivated and trimmed) before the Fall.

And after the Fall? This and more in the Plan: loving the Person of God with commitment which necessarily includes the intellect (mind as well as heart) and society (one’s neighbor).

The college student needs this commanded breadth. He needs psychological insight into community, insight into growing things, physical insight into the created stars and their space-time stuff, and philosophical and spiritual insight into the Plan and Person revealed in words by the Word.

Go to it! It’s fun!

SUMMER 2001

11

PIKE PROGRAM gives perspective Pike Scholars from the ’80s, the ’90s and the 21st century reflect on their experiences in the Pike Program.

BY JESON INGRAHAM

’99

P

erspective has become the mantra of postmodern study. I tried to keep this in mind when crafting a Pike program designed to boil down the historical, political, theological, sociological, economical roots of societal division.

A trip to Northern Ireland to study peace and conflict resolution at Magee College in Derry—Londonderry if you side with Unionists—injected some real life and anecdotal experiences into my academic studies.

I returned to Gordon my senior year with musing on my mind, which I nurtured as a columnist for the school newspaper, The Tartan. And since graduating in 1999, my college degree has taken me further into the field of journalism as I cover two rural communities for The Daily News in Newburyport, Massachusetts.

BY

SAMUEL FOLTA ’87

I

was attracted to Gordon’s high academic and moral quality education, but I had hoped to major in international relations, which Gordon didn’t offer at the time. The Pike Program was the solution to my dilemma. I designed courses similar to those offered at other schools and did some of the work in Korean politics on site in Korea, where I grew up. During my senior year Gordon permitted me the privilege of coordinating a course and arranging for lecturers and activities—Perspectives on the World Christian Movement, which was offered to other students.

I’m still using the training I received at Gordon (as well as that of a seminary degree and a master’s in teaching English) as a tentmaker among the Korean minority people in northeast China—perhaps the most closed nation on earth today. Working BY

from my base as coordinator of the English conversation program at Yanbian University of Science and Technology, where I teach and supervise a staff of 18 English teachers, I’m also able to be involved in leadership training, literature distribution and relief for displaced persons.

My experience in the Pike Program helps me be a better advocate for people trying to accomplish their personal goals which do not fit into prearranged institutional boxes. It prepared me to help young people attempting to get into seminaries—a very difficult endeavor in China. The Pike Program has borne fruit not only in my own life but also in the lives of Charles Kim (Th.M.), Suzie Park (music degree), and Stephen Kim (M.Div.). In my opinion, the Pike Program is one of the best things Gordon has going for it.

CATHERINE MACLEOD ’03

D

uring high school I became interested in linguistics. Because I was homeschooled, I had the flexibility of taking an introductory course in linguistics at a local university during my senior year of high school. That experience cemented my interest in and excitement for linguistics.

As I made my college search that year, it became discouragingly clear that though many have programs in music—another love I didn’t want to give up—few undergraduate institutions offer a program in linguistics. During the application process for Gordon, I learned that one of the benefits of a Gordon education is the Pike Program. This brewed in the back of my mind when I made a decision to come to Gordon as a music major.

During my freshman year I learned of a way music can go hand in hand with linguistics in Bible translation. It’s called 12

This is certainly not the setting I envisioned when coining “Politics in Divided Societies” as the name of my program.

But underneath the sanitation of suburban life there have been plenty of disagreements to report on. You’d be amazed how many lawsuits can be spurred on by plans to extend a sewer line to a beach community on Plum Island, or how much passion is invoked by debate on whether to keep a town landfill open.

Perspective is, perhaps, the single most difficult thing to fit into the who, what, when, where, how and why of the newspaper clipping. While reporting these days has become more concerned with fairness than objectivity, it’s still a tough medium in which to give every viewpoint an equitable hearing.

The sensitivities I gleaned from the Pike Program have helped me take care in understanding how numerous angles add to the fullness of the stories we all tell.

ethnomusicology: the study of musical cultures of a non-Western society. It is an academically challenging field because of the cultural and linguistic barriers involved—the equivalent of musical anthropology.

I was able to make ethnomusicology a part of a modified music major through the Pike Program. In addition to completing a B.A. in music, under the direction of my music advisor, Professor Stanley Pelkey, I’m developing independent studies in ethnomusicology. As part of that, I’m excited to be attending the Wycliffe’s Summer Institute of Linguistics in North Dakota this summer.

I’m grateful God has given me not only the blessing of studying at Gordon but also the privilege of combining these two majors for greater learning opportunities. I look forward to one day using these tools to take the Word of God to unreached language groups.

SUMMER 2001

Par tner s 2001

Happy to be at Gordon College and thankful for the opportunity to follow a rigorous academic program grounded in Christian values

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Par t ners 2 00 1

FROM THE COCHAIRS OF PARTNERS

A

s a member of the Board of Trustees at Gordon College for the past 14 years, I’ve had the privilege of helping make decisions that set and stay the course of the College. There have been decisions to build new buildings, expand academic programs, enable faculty to grow in their fields of expertise and so on. Providing the best possible environment for our students to experience the education they need to serve as Christian leaders worldwide has always been a concern for the trustees. However, for me personally, helping students through the tremendous financial hardships that some face in order to study here at Gordon has been a special area of concern. So in 1989 the Partners Program was launched, and for the past 11 years my wife, Barbara, and I have served as cochairs of the program, providing direction and encouragement.

Don and Barbara Chase

By God’s grace the Partners Program has grown from 40 Partners in 1989 to 350 Partners today, contributing over $1.6 million in scholarship support for a total of 1,500 students. The best explanation for this growth is found in student letters like this one: Thank you so much for supporting my Partners scholarship this year. During the past year my father’s business went bankrupt, my parents separated and are in the process of divorce, and I’ve been stranded in the middle, responsible for paying my way through school. Your support has enabled me to return to Gordon as a junior music education major and get one step closer to being able to teach young people the beauty of music.

Our hope as cochairs of this program is that we are able to get to alums, friends, parents and churches the message that we have a program in place that helps students like this one. But as the students’ needs increase each year, so does our need for additional Partners support.

Students supported by this program are grateful for the opportunity they’re given to experience an education of academic rigor grounded in Christian values and truth. They’re our future local and global leaders, and Barbara and I want to do all we can to help them graduate from Gordon College and face the world with this firm foundation. Will you join us this year?

Barbara S. and Donald P. Chase, Trustee Cochairs, Gordon Partners Program

WHY IS THE PARTNERS PROGRAM SO CRITICAL?

F

inancial aid for deserving students continues to be a challenge for both students and Gordon College. When it comes to meeting the costs of a college education, it must begin with the students and their families. But many families simply can’t afford the full amount. As Partners you help bridge this financial gap by providing support for students through the Partners Scholarship Program.

There are two substantial scholarship sources at Gordon. The first is through the College’s endowment. We’re making good progress in this area but still need to increase the endowment considerably. In the past three and a half years, the endowment has grown from $11 million to just over $24 million.

The second source of scholarship assistance is through current gifts—like Partners. This operates as our current endowment. Gordon continues to work hard to keep cost increases down so your support can have a greater impact.

In the past two years the tuition increase has been held at or below the rate of inflation.

Here are a few points that further illustrate the need for Partners scholarships:

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• •

Eighty-eight percent of all Gordon students are receiving some type of financial assistance.

•

One-third of the students receiving aid have annual family household incomes of $40,000 or less.

For approximately 450 students and their families, the cost of a year at Gordon is more than half of the family’s income after taxes.

The Gordon students who are assisted by Partners scholarships usually receive $6,500 to $11,000 of Gordon’s other scholarship/grant support.

Partners Listing Gary ’74 and Marianne ’75 Gentel Thomas and Jutta Gerendas Paige Gibbs ’69 Dean and Mary Given Michael and Ann Givens Robert and Joan Gordon Robert and Catherine Gough Patricia ’67 and Stephen Graham Gary and Deborah Green Frederick and Juliet Griffin Robert ’81 and Barbara ’81 Grinnell Richard and Jody Gross Susan ’91 and Tyler Gross Thomas ’77 and Carol ’78 Gruen Judson ’69 and Joan ’74 Guest Brian ’87 and Johanna Habib David ’89 and Tera ’89 Hagen Samantha ’95 and Joshua Hager Karl ’96 Hahn David ’89 and Beverly ’77 Hall Craig and Margot ’68 Hammon Steven ’74 and Debra Harding Charles ’86 and Lisa ’89 Harvey David ’84 and Elaine Hayes Robert and Betty Herrmann Peter and Jo Dee Herschend Herbert and Sally Hess Matthew Hillas ’93 Robert ’56 and Frances ’56 Hinckley David and Patricia Hofsass Stanley ’68 and Beryl ’62B Hoglund Roy and Beverly Honeywell David ’65 and Irmgard Howard Donald Howard Robert and Rachel Hsu Gordon and Jane Ann Hugenberger James and Sydney Humphrey Roger ’80 and Barbara Huseland Skip Hussey ’63 Shelly and Mary Ellen Ivey Frederic ’59B and Alma ’75B Ivor-Campbell Raymond Jarvio Margaret Jensen David Jodice ’75 William ’78 and Ann Johnson James and Marilyn Johnston Verna Joithe Ross and Emily Jones Robert and Meredith Joss Deborah Kalafian ’83 John and Jean Kalafian Mamoru ’64 and Noriko Kamada William and Sally Kanaga Howard ’52 and Hazel Keeley William and Jane Keep Kirsten ’90 and Andrew Keith Donna Jean ’69 and Glenn Kendall Glenice Kershaw Daniel ’57 and Ronnie Jean Klim Craig and Deborah Knot Katie ’99 and Matthew Krason Prudence Kuhrt Daniel ’74 and Darlene ’74 Kuzmak Ray and Mildred Lane George ’45 and Ruby Lang David and Sheila Larson William and Carol Ann Laverty Rob and Connie Lawrence Philip ’82 and Flora Lee Jeffrey ’88 and Lorraine Lewin Joseph and Lanayre Liggera Eric ’91 and Catherine ’94 Lindsay David and Suzana Lindsay Martha ’73 and Michael Linehan Richard and Carolyn Lippmann J. Anthony Lloyd Thomas Longhway

Bronwyn ’87 and Caleb Loring Willis and Marjorie Lund Winston ’71B and Margaret ’67B Lyford Edward ’80 and Beryl ’81 Lynch Mark ’84 and Suzanne Lynch Gordon and Gail MacDonald James and Joyce MacDonald Bruce MacKilligan ’58 Stephen and Robin MacLeod Ronald ’81 and Jerilyn ’82 Mahurin Chad and Robin Masland R. Preston ’85 and Pamela Mason James and Virginia Masterson Pat ’75 and Roger McClelland Marjorie McClintock ’90 Norma ’80 and Byron McCluskey Jill ’94 and Patrick McGinn R. Bancroft ’68B and Kathleen McKittrick Catherine McLaughlin Carl ’43 and Alberta ’44 McNally Jerrold and Jolene McNatt George ’85 and Terisa Means John and Jacquelyn Meers David Mering ’71 Eric ’81 and Lois ’80 Meyer Philip ’86 and Cynthia ’78 Michaels Miller Outpost Mail Service Robert and Linda Monroe Margaret Montalvo Howard Moon ’62 Mark and Glad Moore Timothy ’78 and Jane Morgan Taizo Morimoto ’81 Doreen Morris ’74 David ’76 and Debra ’76 Myers Harold and Jeanette Myra Cathy ’80 and F. C. Nackel Jeffrey and Darlene Neil David ’71 and Helgi Nelson Grant and Carol Nelson William and Chelle Nickerson Norman ’75 and Deborah Nielsen Julie Anderson Oldham ’83 Mark ’84 and Alexandra Olson Mark ’95 and Lynn ’95 Overton W. Terry and Janice Overton Richard and Laura Parker Robert and Kathleen Parlee William and Lynne Payne Ellen ’90 and Charles Pepin Leonard and Judy Peterson Virginia ’52 and Meredith Peterson W. Ross ’51 and Lucile Peterson Ned Pethick ’96 Barrett and Susan Petty Pfizer Inc. Eric and Cynthia Phillips Thomas and Gertrude Phillips Carl and Sarah Pickell Gordon Pierce ’60 Jon and Kathy Pitman Shelly Pitman ’95 Judith ’67 and Seppo Rapo Louise Rathfon William and Evie Reed Walter ’50B and Audrey x’50B Rice Douglas Rieck ’75 Colyn ’72 and Janet Roberts James ’66B and Joanne Roberts Jeffrey ’92 and Kari ’90 Rourke Richard ’53 and Dorothy Rung M. Kimberly Rupert David ’74B and Joyce ’75B Ruppell Grosvenor and Marjorie Rust Dante ’80 and Melanie ’82 Rutstrom Bradford ’91 and Sharon ’92 Salmon

Brooks ’65 and Tina x’66 Sanders Mark and Arlyne Sargent Warren ’57 and Joan Sawyer John and Marcia Scheflen Scott ’90 and Karyn Schneider David and Esther Schultz Thomas and Lyn Shields J. Bryan and Kim Simmons Russell and Barbara Skinner Loren and Colleen Sloat Derk ’81 and Amy ’93 Smid David ’79 and Elizabeth Smith Herman ’70 and Denise Smith Durwood and Judith Snead William ’49 and Elizabeth Snow Cheri Lynn Sperr ’86 and Rick Morgan G. Alan and Jane Steuber Michael ’92 and Carolyn ’92 Stevens Peter and Betsy Stine Mark Stockwell Raymond ’81 and Kathleen Stotlemyer Warren and Joan Stratton Bradford ’76 and Marla ’75 Stringer Clement Sutton Jr. David and Marcia Swenson Brock ’84 and Gina Swetland Ann Tappan Stephen and Claire Tavilla Virginia Tavilla x’55 Mark and Carol Taylor Ron and Sue Teiwes Elizabeth Gordon Thompson Gary ’76 and Patricia ’76 Thorburn Harold and Diane Toothman V. Simpson ’45 and Laura Turner Vernon ’33 and Marian ’33 Tuxbury Daniel and Andrea Tymann Jonathan ’83 and Carlene Tymann Nathan ’91 and Linda ’91 Tymann William ’52 and Nancy ’55B Udall William ’52 and Norma Unsworth James and Barbara Vander Mey Silvio ’87 and Theresa Morin ’86 Vazquez Mark ’96 and Joanne ’96 Vermont Andrew Waddell ’98 Richard and Jayne Waddell Edward ’44 and Barbara Walker Meirwyn and Nina Walters James and Elizabeth Warden Robert and Nance Ware Lawrence ’77B and Amy ’78B Warfield Raymond and Mildred Warren Mina ’46 and Robert Watts Jay and Cathie Wegrzyn Thomas Weis Donald x’83 and Shirley Welt Robert Werth ’73 West Congregational Church Doris ’78 and Tom Williams Richard and Gail Wilson Mrs. Robert Wilson Thomas ’80 and Marjorie ’84 Wilcox Helen Wingate George and Penny Wingate Fay Winson Michael Woffenden ’84 Timothy ’73 and Georgette Woodruff David and Suzy Young Thomas ’68 and Linda ’69 Zeiger William ’78 and Laurie ’78 Zimmerman *Deceased

SUMMER 2001

Par tner s 2001

Anonymous Donors A. P. Vending and Amusement Company Starla Ackley ’87 Elmer* Anderson ’24 Joyce ’58 and Harold Anderson Manuel ’47 and Madelyn Avila Jeffrey ’81 and Kathleen ’85 Azadian Jeffrey Baker ’81 Walter and Mary Baker Ronald Barnett ’59 Barrington Alum Andrew ’83 and Sarah (Prescott) ’82 Beauregard John ’53 and Georgia* x’58 Beauregard Peter and Diana Bennett Robert and Genie Bennett Paul and Joan Bergmann Eric ’89 and Andrea ’98 Bergstrom Harry and Gerd Bergstrom Ellen Bishop Peter ’64B and Jan Blackwell Carl and Catherine Blatchley Barbara Boles Philip ’64 and Linda x’66 Bonard Thales and Sally Bowen Robert and Nancy Bradley Robert ’89 and Tatum ’96 Brooks Francis ’85 and Theresa Brown Jan ’78 and Wes Brown Steven ’87 and Laurel ’89 Brunvoll Charles ’61 and Carole Brutto Cedric ’87 and Lisa ’87 Buettner Ronald and Barbara Burwell Frank and Ruth Butler Sandy ’93 and David Butters Nancy ’85 and Gregory Cannon Michael and Patricia Capparelli R. Judson and Jan Carlberg Linda ’70 and David Carlson Paul ’54B and Myrtle Carlson Roy and Barbara Carlson Priscilla ’92 and William Carter Paul and Mary Celuch John ’69 and Jean Chang Donald and Barbara Chase Nancy Cicero Lisa Coderre ’84 Randall ’67 and Patricia ’68 Collins Mary Cowperthwaite ’69 Cheryl Crawford ’77 William and Patricia Crawley Richard Cushing Judith Dean ’78 Thomas and Barbara Denmark Darren ’91 and Deb DeSimone Jeremy DePace ’95 William and Margaret Depew Daniel and Flo Dinzik Alys ’64 and Norman Dorian Deighton ’50B and Alice ’50B Doughlin Jeffrey ’77 and Melanie ’77 Drake Drinkwater Contracting Company Kenneth Durgin Arnold and Mary ’60 Ellsworth Rodney and Barbara Elsenheimer Douglas ’88 and Pamela Elzinga Kenneth and Terry Elzinga Arthur and Karen Emery Thomas and Sue Englund Joanne ’83 and Curtis ’81 Ersing Nola Maddox Falcone Earl ’74 and Linda Farmer Eric ’76 and Robin ’80 Feustel Lynn ’80 and William Fish John ’81 and Andree Fontaine Robert and Lillian Fulton Frederick and Nancy Gale Scott ’81 and Kimberly ’83 Gardiner

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WILL YOU JOIN US THIS YEAR? Joining the Partners Program not only satisfies your desire to help financially deserving students continue their education at Gordon, but it also puts you in touch with other Partners (such as those on the preceding page) who share this desire to support student scholarship.

As Partners we depend on you to: • help us make the best in Christian education financially available to deserving students (see gift levels below)

• •

pray for our students as they seek the Lord’s will in their lives encourage others to support the Partners Scholarship Program so more students can benefit

And, in turn, we . . .

• keep you informed by mailing Partners Reports from President Carlberg to you several times during the year, providing news of student and faculty achievements and other developments at Gordon

•

invite you to special events on campus, where you can fellowship with other Partners and meet students who are the beneficiaries of your support

“We both had tremendously positive experiences at Gordon. We received an excellent education, which prepared us for the business world and matured us in our walk with Christ. Rarely do both of these occur during time spent at college. It happens regularly at Gordon, and we want others to be able to share in that.”

Brad ’91 and Sharon (Harbinson) ’92 Salmon

“The first time we visited the Gordon College campus, our impression was that it was just too good to be true. We couldn’t get over the kindness shown us by the students and administration. But over the years we found this Christlike attitude is indeed a hallmark of Gordon. Not only have our children received a top-notch education, but we’ve all built relationships that will last into eternity.”

Ellen Bishop

Ellen is pictured with her children, Kenneth ’98, Rebecca ’03 and Robert ’98. Ellen and her husband, Larry, formerly served as copresidents of the Gordon College Parents Association. Larry passed away in August 1999.

THREE OPTIONS FOR JOINING THE PARTNERS PROGRAM • •

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Complete the information below and mail it along with your check to: Sandy Butters, Development Office, Gordon College, 255 Grapevine Road, Wenham, Massachusetts 01984.

cut here Yes! I’d like to join the Partners Program for 2001–02. Enclosed is my gift of $________.  Associate Partners Level ($500–$999)

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BY ADMISSIONS

the College Search?

Elizabeth Eaves did seven years ago. Now she herself is shepherding students through the admissions process at Gordon.

BY ELIZABETH EAVES ’98

O

• Start the college

SAT scores and grade point averages are not ctober of 1994 was the first time I flew search early the only considerations when Gordon looks from my home in California to Boston • Visit the campus at an applicant. We look for the student who to visit Gordon College. I was a senior • Beat the deadlines is committed academically but also involved in high school when my mom and I boarded the • Finish high school strong with extracurricular activities and in spiritual plane for an 8 A.M. flight out of San Francisco. areas. We consider the whole person and the That was the first of 27 round trips I’ve made so • Be well-rounded potential contributions he or she may make to far between the coasts—trips taken as a prospec• Determine strengths and present them the campus community. tive student, an enrolled student and now as an well The application essays, references and interadmissions recruiter for Gordon.

• Relax—be yourself view all play important roles. At the same time, On that October morning, the six hours spent the importance of the interview should not in the sky were filled with questions about Gordon be cause for unnecessary anxiety. It’s basically a congenial and the admissions process. Today a plane ride out West takes on conversation that provides helpful information for both the a different meaning. The unknown has been exchanged for underprospective student and the College. Students should prepare standing gained through the experience of not only completing for it by carefully determining their gifts and strengths as well as the application process and attending Gordon, but through workinterests and plans, and then considering how to best articulate ing closely with West Coast students and families who ponder those to another person. This is great practice which will prove some of those helpful in various life opportunities to come, whether they same questions be career or personal. and decisions I faced seven Once prepared, the key is to relax; a student’s demeanor is a years ago. clue to how he or she will deal with college life. And remember, The colall admissions recruiters were themselves at one time prospective lege search and students going through the same process. We’re here to be a application prohelpful resource as students seek to determine whether the cess take hard College matches their needs and desires. work, but a When I left Gordon after my first visit, I felt an excitement student can be and enthusiasm that have since multiplied many times over. rewarded with Gordon is a unique community fueled by dedication to faith and Elizabeth when she was a student at Gordon. L to R: Emily a satisfying learning. Its location in the Boston area reflects the liberal (Holmgren) Amadon ’99, Jennifer (Rolsing) Kennedy ’99, outcome that arts tradition established by the nation’s most prestigious universiElizabeth, Krista Carlson ’00. makes all the ties. Gordon is a place where faith and intellectual development effort more than worthwhile. The process begins with checking are still considered complementary, not contradictory. The out schools that offer desired features. The Internet is a great tool success of its strong spiritual training is evidenced by the for getting an overview of a college. College fairs are an excellent reception of its stusource for information too, and there’s the standard word-ofdent leaders—from mouth endorsements from alumni and their families. the local community to remote parts of All this exploration takes time, and competition for space at the globe through some colleges has become fierce, so many students start making internships, study contacts as early as their sophomore or junior years. The best abroad programs, and way to determine whether or not a college is a good fit is to missions. see and experience the campus. The Admissions Office helps families plan such visits to Gordon.

The college search takes time and intenOnce a decision has been reached, it’s best to beat deadlines, tionality, but it can not just meet them. This goes for admissions, financial aid and should be an and scholarship applications. A worthwhile goal is to mail the enjoyable process. admissions application and essays over Thanksgiving break With hard work and of the senior year. Making wise time management decisions Elizabeth recruited Paige Orton ’02. Here, they patience, a school can is a good exercise, which in itself makes the transition to discuss course listings. be found that will be college smoother. a home away from Another aid in the transition is to take substantive academic home, even if it’s thousands of miles away.  courses right up through the final semester of high school.

Finishing strong contributes not only to a sound application but is For admissions information call 800.343.1379 or e-mail also a solid preparation for the greater work load that lies ahead. admissions@gordon.edu.

SUMMER 2001

13

BY

I

DAVID FRANZ ’45B

n 1954, after completing my general exams at Harvard, I traveled to the Netherlands as a Fulbright Scholar to track down further information for my doctoral thesis.

My family and I lived in a small Amsterdam apartment and traveled around Europe with a used British Ford and a used U.S. Army tent.

I was quite confident I knew almost everything about Europe worth knowing, but shock quickly set in. It became clear I was a stranger in a highly civilized environment and didn’t know what people were saying, doing or thinking. I felt vulnerable, confused, unsure of everything, lost most of the time—but very teachable.

I had been teaching at Gordon on the Fenway since 1951and returned from Europe to the new Wenham campus in 1955 to teach Western Civilization classes. I was a chastened teacher, wearing my tattered learning lightly. Besides humility, I had learned something about the context of history. It was in after-class conversations that some students began to ask, “Why can’t we go to Europe too?” That’s what launched European Seminar in 1958.

For the next 33 years, until I retired from teaching in 1991, some 3,800 students put on their boots and headed for Europe. We chartered our own planes, secured a fleet of vans and for two months Gordon faculty, augmented by teachers from Wheaton, Houghton, Barrington, Yale and others, led a variety of tours through Western Europe, Russia, Greece, Israel and Scandinavia. At first we were a bit uncertain—sometimes baffled—but we were all eager to learn. We were teachable.

The trips were not merely to see the famous and exciting sites on the continent. Travelers were loaded down with assigned readings, preparatory lectures, required daily journals and, of course, the evertalkative team historians. But

14

perhaps it was the unplanned teaching moments that were the most memorable.

No Longer Just Abstractions In 1967 our three vans followed an enormous convoy of Russian tanks and soldiers as they churned up huge clouds of dust enroute to the Czechoslovakia border. We finally passed them, crossed the border and entered Prague. The central square was filled with young people celebrating a successful revolt against the communist government. A few days later, safely outside Czechoslovakia, we watched with horror as Western television chronicled hour after hour the bloody entrance of the Russian Army into Prague. We saw the young people trying to throw flaming bottles of gasoline into the open hatches of the huge tanks. And we asked ourselves, “Was freedom that important, more valuable than one’s life?”

In Moscow a few summers later, a Russian lad in his late teens attached himself to some of the young men on our team. Helpful, joyful and excited, he soon became the team mascot. As we gathered around the

AIRPORT PHOTO SERVICE

Teachable Moments

Gordon’s enviable international study programs made their debut 43 years ago, when such programs were virtually unheard of. A young professor by the name of David Franz led the first group of students to Europe in 1958, and students, alumni and friends have followed him around Europe and Asia ever since. We asked Dr. Franz to reminisce about a handful of teachable moments from his many treks.

Rangers on that terrifying cliff at Pointe Du Hoc. On another occasion a team member left the team to travel by bus to the American military cemetery where his father was buried.

He had been killed in action soon after leaving the States, and this young man had never seen his father. I have never forgiven myself for not leaving the team that day to make the lonely journey with him to his father’s grave.

As the British Colonel John McCrae wrote on the day of his own death on the battlefield, “Tell them this, ‘If ye break faith with us who die, we shall not sleep.’” e Roman

Dr. Fr

res in th anz lectu

Forum in

the 1970s.

vans on departure day, a police van pulled up and several armed police rushed out to grab him. We couldn’t believe what was happening; what crime, what reason, what treason could there be? Just before he was thrown into the van, he lifted his head and shouted, “Don’t worry about me!” The whole scene seemed so bizarre, so frightening, so totalitarian. We replayed it over and over in the vans as we left Russia. The unlimited power of the state had leapt out of the textbook and lodged painfully in our heads, no longer an abstraction.

And who could forget Auschwitz? Huge bins of children’s shoes, tattered suitcases, women’s hair cut from the corpses, furnaces, empty rail cars; by the end of the afternoon we were absolutely stunned. Could it be that Paul’s words in Romans 1 about the fall of man and the depths of our iniquity rang more true than the long hosannas to the progress of man which had been our common gospel in public schools and textbooks?

Were the scholars more accurate to now say the 20th century is the most violent century in written history? We had looked deep into the abyss and were shattered.

Late afternoon above the Roman Forum, we explored the world of the mad Nero, insane Caligula, powerful Augustus.

Then we sat in the shade on the brow of the Palatine, looking down on the Mamartine Prison. Was it the place of Paul’s final imprisonment as many scholars argue? We pulled out copies of Paul’s letters, passed them around the circle and read his sad words to Timothy: “At my first defense, no one came to my support, but everyone deserted me.” And then we read the sequel: “But the Lord stood by my side.”

We continued with another letter from Rome to the Philippians. Was Paul really serious when he urged us from his chains, “Rejoice in the Lord always”? As if he had heard our incredulous response, he repeated this most difficult command: “I will say it again; Rejoice!” Which of us stoics will ever read that letter in some agonizing personal crisis without remembering the man in chains saying to us, “Rejoice in the Lord always.”

The tragic aspects of war settled in our memories as we camped on the cliffs above the Normandy Beaches and traced the landings on June 6, 1944, at Omaha Beach.

More than 2,500 men had died that morning—many of them 19- and 20-year-old American boys fighting their very first and last battle of World War II. On one occasion a team member received a letter from his Dad, detailing a story which he had never been able to tell his family—the story of his attack with the U.S.

Some Lighter Moments Though there was much seriousness on our trips, the history vans traveling down the highway were also filled with endless humor and music. And we learned folk songs from each country as well as hymns that On one occasion Dick were written there.

Gross said the first time In northern Europe we approhe heard of Gordon College priately sang, “In all kinds of weather, what if the rain should was when he became fall, as long as we’re together it acquainted with Gordon’s doesn’t matter at all.” Certain European Seminar. hilarious situations tested our sense of humor, as on one day At Homecoming the in Switzerland. While sauntering favorite refrain of veterans around Interlaken, we saw the of the Seminar is ‘Best heavy, black clouds gathering over the Alps. We jumped in the summer I ever had.’ vans and headed up the valley of Lauterbrunnen to rescue our tents from certain disaster. As we approached the campground we could see the first tent, and inside it one terrified student sitting on a pile of air mattresses with his sleeping bag wrapped around his head. Unfortunately, all the other tents had collapsed on soaked sleeping bags and dripping suitcases.

Facing a long, cold night sitting in the vans, I wandered around the Swiss village looking for some kind of shelter. I came upon a large chalet, and on

Tenting

in Worm

s, Germ

any, cir ca 1980

.

SUMMER 2001

15

ROSE-MARIE SLOSEK

impulse I went inside. Peter and Clare von Allmen welcomed me and hardly blanched when I told them I was the leader of 26 cold, wet and desperate American students down in the campground. For the next 23 years, all of our traveling teams looked forward to spending three days in midsummer at the Chalet Im Rohr, surrounded by the 14,000-foot Alpine peaks.

Amazing Grace Forty-three years later I reflect on the amazing grace of God that we all returned safely from each trip. I think too of the idealism of the leaders who volunteered to lead the teams without summer salaries. They did it simply out of their convictions that all students should have the chance to take the history roads of their own heritage.

The enthusiasm of Diane Blake ’58, Bill ’62 and Lillian ’60 Harper, Russ Bishop, Tom and Jean Askew, Dick and Martha Stout, Ruby Blackhall ’56, Dick Rung ’53, Beth Wilcoxson ’66, Grady Spires, Kaye Cook, Ann Ferguson, John Skillen ’76, John Beauregard ’53, the late Nigel Kerr and many others made it all possible.

Many sacrificed for European Seminar, but no one more than my late wife, Doris (’44B), and my family. Reflecting more fully on the extent of steady support and unending contributions they made to this idealistic venture has been for me yet another teachable moment. 

Since retirement Professors Franz and Bishop have led more than 700 alumni on two-week miniature European Seminars for the Alumni Office.

Dr. Franz has also responded to the request of several local churches to do various journeys on church history in cooperation with the Alumni Office. This year two teams took trips to the British Isles: one to tour England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales; and another to retrace the steps of the Puritan fathers who left Ipswich, England, in 1633. They bought almost the whole of what is now Essex County from Chief Masconomet of the Algonquins for 20 pounds and founded Ipswich, Massachusetts, along with a string of other important Puritan towns in New England.

Dr. Franz is doing a memoir on European Seminar and would like to receive anecdotes, meaningful moments, etc., from seminar veterans. Send memoirs to him c/o the College Communications Office, or by e-mail to dfranz@mediaone.net.

Taken in Brugge, Belgium, on the 1999 alumni trip.

With Dr. Franz are members of the class of 1964: (L to R) Linda (Trask) Siddon; Clara (Niles) Whitney; Mary (Little) Gibbs; Elaine (Townsend) and Calvin Blaser.

The Gordon College Teaching Ship on the Rhine River in the 1960s.

16

International Programs at Gordon Today

needed to pursue her extraordinary gifts in art.

SUMMER 2001

17

DAN LINDSTROM

E

uropean Seminar was the forerunner of the many international programs that students choose from at Gordon today. It shaped the understanding of and goals for cross-cultural studies at the College. In fact, it was their first experience abroad for many faculty and staff, which helped to stimulate cultural awareness and excitement for international programs among the administration and students. If not the first, it was among the very first programs of its type in colleges around the country.

Dr. Franz reminds us of European Seminar’s humble beginnings: “Can it be that in 1958 we took the reconstructed troop ship across the Atlantic, spent two months camping and ate hundreds of peanut butter sandwiches—all for $595?” He also notes that one cannot overestimate the efforts of Diane Blake, who was a student on that first trip, became secretary of European Seminar and then was associate director from 1964 to 1986.”

European Seminar earned academic credits from the start, and at its peak 150 participants—half of which were non-Gordon people—went on five different field trips each summer. The basic program began in Western Europe; in 1964 Eastern Europe was added, and in 1965 the three additional teams went to Greece, Israel and Russia. A fifth team spent one month in England for literary credit and one month Truitt Seitz ’02 sketching on location while studying at on the continent for history credit.

Orvieto Semester in Italy.

Primed for international study by European Seminar, Gordon has participated in the growing list of international programs sponsored by the Council for Christian Colleges & Universities (CCCU) from its inception in 1976 (see Spring 2001 Stillpoint). And in 1987, under then Dean of the Faculty Jud Carlberg, Dr. Diane Blake established Off-Campus Programs at Gordon. She later became assistant dean of external education, retiring this year.

Of the 2001 graduates, 34 percent spent a semester or academic year on an off-campus program. Gordon sends many students to CCCU study programs at home and overseas. Students receive credit in four CCCU programs abroad— China, Latin America, the Middle East and Russia.

Gordon also sponsors four programs of its own: Semester in Orvieto, Italy; Gordon-at-Oxford; Gordon-in-France; and Tropical Biology Semester in Justin Ayer ’00 doing research while on a tropical biology program in Belize. the Philippines. Gordon students can study in a broad variety of other programs including AuSable Institute of Environmental Studies in India and Kenya; Daystar University in Kenya; Jerusalem University College; Nova Scotia Student Exchange Program; and a host of programs in the United States.

International Seminars are intensive summer travel courses from different disciplines taught in the context of a specific culture or region. Gordon offers an international affairs major, hosted by the Political Studies and Economics and Business Departments, as well as a minor in international studies. Their majors study in South Africa, Italy, Australia, Spain, Ireland, to name a few places.

Education students may spend a semester at St. Martin’s College in Lancaster, England, where they are able to do field placements in local schools in addition to Pen and ink drawing, A Celebration of Mother’s Love, course work in education. An increasing number of students from many departments

by Jenny Chang ’01. Jenny spent a semester at the are spending a semester at one of Australia’s fine universities.

China Studies Program and immersed herself in the For information on any of the international studies, contact Lillian Harper culture. It was a time of discovering her roots, growing inwardly and finding her niche. Her experience with in the Off-Campus Programs Office by e-mail at lharper@hope.gordon.edu, or Chinese calligraphy and painting gave her the push she externaled@hope.gordon.edu or call 978.927.2306, extension 4399. 

PROFS & PROGRAMS

Get

Lost

in

Jerusalem

Biblical studies professor Ted Hildebrandt found there’s no substitute for being there when studying the ancient sites of Jerusalem. So now he takes his students there via virtual reality.

BY TED HILDEBRANDT

I

t’s just after lunch and the classroom is warm. The sedentary students settle into their comfortable seats for an afternoon siesta on the history, geography and theological significance of Jerusalem.

Having lived in Jerusalem in the 1970s, attempting to take students there by the retelling of Jerusalem’s story has been one of my passions. The city becomes a part of those who have spent months walking its walls, strolling its streets and crawling into its underground crevices. I want to whet the appetite of my students.

On the blackboard my hand-drawn maps of its valleys and hills fail to stir them from their slumber. Identifying important biblical sites on overheads and transferring the info to xeroxed maps becomes a scribal exercise. Stirred by the awesome significance of Jerusalem as the place of divine encounter, they pose a penetrating question: “Will this be on the test?”

Slide presentations dim the lights into academic exercises fit for memorizing more than for invitations to discover.

Somehow the joy of entering Jerusalem’s gates and circling its walls dissipates into a series of flat, disconnected images.

My desire to collapse the distance between the ‘here’ and the ‘there’ is folded comfortably into their notebooks as they rouse themselves for the next class.

Connecting to a Digital Generation

TED HILDEBRANDT, FROM GET LOST IN JERUSALEM CD-ROM

My burning desire over the years has been to find a way to communicate the biblical significance of a Jerusalem that surfaces throughout the text of the Old Testament: from Abram’s meeting of Melchizedek and the faith-testing sacrifice of Isaac on Mt. Moriah to the city’s capture by David, who filled the Psalms with praises of the divine presence and pilgrim ascents to Jerusalem’s citadels. I wanted to find a way to spark postmodern students with the desperately needed hope heralded by Isaiah in his narration of the restoration of Jerusalem: “The ransomed of the Lord will return. They

18

will enter Zion with singing; everlasting joy will crown their heads. . . . And sorrow and sighing will flee away” (Isaiah 51:11). How could I capture Jesus’ connectedness to Jerusalem as he furiously flipped over the tables because his Father’s house had been violated? How could I recreate the sense of walking down the Via Dolorosa or climbing up the stairway to the top of Golgotha?

Books, Bytes and Being There Today we’re immersed in technology and its diverse forms, but the battle between books and bytes is nothing new.

As early as 1934 Lewis Mumford, patron saint of the NeoLuddite movement, warned that the new media would make us a “society of shut-ins.” Janet Murray, on the other hand, in Hamlet on the Holodek: The Future of Narrative in Cyberspace, expresses the dangers of book-based virtual worlds and losing touch with reality. She quotes from Cervantes’ Don Quixote: “He so buried himself in his books . . . and so deeply did he steep his imagination in the belief that all the fanciful stuff he read was true, that . . . [h]e decided . . . to turn knight errant and travel through the world with horse and armour in search of adventures.” Pierre Levy reminds us in Becoming Virtual that we have always taken virtual trips through our imaginations, memories and religion.

It was the excitement of taking students to a place they’d never been that attracted me to pursue virtual reality as a dynamic way of modeling Jerusalem. If I could just get my students there, the city itself would entice them into wonder and exploration. I wanted to do that without boring them with traditional methods, yet not make them slaves to technology.

The seeds of the idea for a virtual tour actually came while I was teaching some students the inner pathways on-site in Jerusalem. I found that when they followed me through the Old City, they depended on me and didn’t really learn their own way around. So I developed an exercise I called “Get

Lost in Jerusalem.” One morning I took them into the heart of the twisted alleyways of the Old City and announced, “We’re lost. Please lead us back to Jaffa Gate.” With looks of disbelief, they tentatively set out. After wandering for an hour or two, we finally arrived at the desired gate, and they owned a new sense of place and direction. Jerusalem was becoming theirs.

People love to explore. Exploration often includes getting lost and disoriented, being frustrated by wrong turns and dead ends, but it also promises the delight of finally discovering one’s own path less traveled.

A Virtual Jerusalem Becomes Reality I set my sights on capturing the students’ experience in a virtual Jerusalem. After a couple failed attempts, I located new software and read several articles that revealed my errors. On the third attempt, eureka! Innovation often involves vision, risk, failure, experimentation and, especially, committed persistence. There was plenty of each in this project.

My 15-year-old son, Zach, worked with me to construct a virtual JeruIt was the excitement salem from photos I had taken. Links allowed travel naturally from one of taking students to place to the next simply by clicking a place they’d never like one clicks on the link of a Web page. I incorporated two hundred been that attracted pages of text (including audio) with the photos to explain what is being me to pursue virtual seen as well as the history and theolreality as a dynamic ogy of Jerusalem.

Still it lacked the realistic feel of way of modeling moving from place to place. On the Jerusalem. If I could final trip to work out this problem, I had the privilege of taking Zach just get my students to visit the Holy City he had known there, the city itself only through virtualization. When we arrived at Jaffa Gate I paused would entice them and said to him, “You’ve worked into wonder and on the program. I’m lost. Take me to the Gloria Hotel.” He looked at exploration. me as if Father Abraham had just asked something too much of his bewildered son. “I’ve never been here. I have no idea,” he complained. Then, realizing there was no ram in the thicket, he initiated with, “That’s Jaffa Gate, isn’t it?” Within a short walk, his reluctance and hesitance gave way to triumphant joy as he led us right to the doorway of the Gloria Hotel. It worked. He was able to transfer what he had learned from the virtual Jerusalem to the actual Jerusalem.

explore for themselves, engaging with the city. Christie, a student who was planning a semester of study at Jerusalem University College, spent hours learning her way around the maze-like Church of the Holy Sepulchre. Upon arriving in Jerusalem, the knowledge she had gained from the program allowed her to embrace more fully that site which commemorates the place of the death, burial and resurrection of our Lord.

Comments of students both coming from and going to Jerusalem have demonstrated the effectiveness of the program.

A student named Joshua wrote, “Of all the ways I have studied history and geography, be it through textbooks, videos, slides or maps, I would consider this to be my favorite.”

Another student said, “I didn’t know what to expect, and it was amazing. It was so much fun to look around—I got chills thinking this is the very place that Jesus walked. It made me want to go to Israel more than ever.” Trey, who had studied in Jerusalem with Gordon’s Dr. Elaine Phillips before using the program, wrote, “When we were in Israel, we didn’t always have all the time we wanted. With this program, you can take as much time as you want at any site. The program is so realistic. The only big problem I see with the program is this: What about the rest of Israel?”

Technology, innovation, and meaning merge as this generation of digitally active students are presented with new ways of accessing the great redemptive places and history of Scripture. Pioneering efforts at educating with new media are exploding, beckoning us to communicate a solid liberal arts heritage to a generation of wired and wireless students. Get Lost in Jerusalem is just one example of what can be done.  The Windows CD-ROM Get Lost in Jerusalem, published by Zondervan Publishing House, is available at your local bookstore, or contact Ted Hildebrandt at thildebrandt@faith.gordon.edu or by mail: Dr. Ted Hildebrandt, Gordon College, 255 Grapevine Road, Wenham, MA 01984. Cost is $19.95 plus shipping.

Jerusalem Comes to Gordon During summer 2000 we put the finishing touches on the program. Last fall a preproduction version was loaded in the Jenks Resource Center PC lab so students could have easy access to it. To our delight, it passed the test.

In my Old and New Testament classes we had scavenger hunts with students finding their way from Jaffa Gate to Hezekiah’s tunnel to get their thirsty prof a drink. Or they might go to the Wailing Wall and then to the south wall excavations to discover the Herodian stones thrown down when the Second Temple was destroyed in A.D. 70, just as Jesus had predicted in Matthew 24:2.

The result of this interactive learning is that students

Pictured here is Ted Hildebrandt with his son, Zach, who helped him with the project.

Ted has been professor of biblical studies at Gordon since 1999 and previously taught for 19 years at Grace College and Seminary in Winona Lake, Indiana. He and his wife, Annette, lived in Jerusalem 1975–76, sharing an apartment with Drs. Perry and Elaine Phillips (Elaine also teaches biblical studies at Gordon).

In addition to Get Lost in Jerusalem, Ted is the author of Greek Tutor and Hebrew Tutor CD-ROMs (Parsons) and translator for the Book of Proverbs in the New Living Translation of the Bible (Tyndale House). He holds a doctorate in theology from Grace Theological Seminary. See the Gordon website, http://www.gordon.edu/bible/classsites.htm, for other examples of using technology to teach biblical studies.

SUMMER 2001

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LARGE AT

ALUMS

LESS THAN A YEAR AFTER SHE GRADUATED FROM GORDON, LAUREL BRUNVOLL RECEIVED THE DEVASTATING NEWS THAT HER MOTHER HAD OVARIAN CANCER. THAT FOUR-YEAR STRUGGLE LED LAUREL AND HER FATHER TO WRITE A BOOK ABOUT THEIR EXPERIENCES AS A FAMILY FACING SERIOUS ILLNESS—ACCENTUATED BY HIS EVENTUAL DIAGNOSIS OF CANCER AS WELL. THEIR SUBSEQUENT MINISTRY IS ONE OF HELP AND HOPE.

Life

Taking Ahold

and I had worked on Life on Hold: Finding Hope in the Face of Serious IllBY LAUREL SEILER BRUNVOLL ’89 ness for five years. We had rees, still stripped of their foliage, spent time looking back on lined both sides of the rectangular our own experiences, trying to field. The brownish grass showed little decipher what helped us and what sign of its inevitable awakening. I walked with deliberate didn’t. We had talked with other patients and steps around the markers underfoot. My shadow shivered their families; researched academic journals and interviewed when I reached my destination—my mother’s grave. Nancy healthcare professionals, pastors, psychologists, social workers Sara Seiler . . . Born August 8, 1942 . . . Died September and chaplains, gleaning much information from them. We 6, 1994. had asked for God’s guidance as we put it all together.

I breathed heavily until my tears were uncontrollable. They Our goal was to create a practical and spiritual handbook spilled down my face as I remembered for patients and caregivers. Life on Hold those four-and-a-half years she battled tells people what to expect when they face I used to envision the ovarian cancer. Her struggle with the a serious illness as well as how to live with worst that could happen deadly disease shook my world and peace and hope. Even though it’s written changed my family forever. for Christians, we hope nonbelievers so that I would be ready This was my first trip from our home can also benefit from it. Perhaps God for it when it came. in Maryland to her grave near Green Bay, will use it to spark contemplation about This is self-defeating, Wisconsin, since her death. Two years their spiritual destiny in light of illness after she died, my father was diagnosed and death. for rather than prepare with kidney cancer. His remission after Until now, I never completely underyou, such an exercise having the kidney removed is a constant stood God’s words in II Corinthians disturbs the peace of the source of thankfulness.

1:3–4: “Blessed be the God . . . of all present for it anticipates I looked down at the hard ground. comfort; Who comforts us in all our Has it really been almost seven years? afflictions so that we may be able to an evil that is not yet Why, God? Why did she have to go? I still comfort those who are in any affliction a reality and for which yearn for that perfect, fill-in-the-blank with the comfort with which we ourselves God has not provided answer. Instead, God has softened my are comforted by God.” angry heart over the years and comforted God has brought us to a place where strength. my anguished soul. With God’s help, we can use our experiences to help others; — Nancy Seiler sadness and grief have become manageable to point people to God as our Ultimate companions. Worry has been replaced Comforter. We can share our hope in over and over again with His peace and strength, which is Jesus Christ because of what we’ve been through. beyond my comprehension.

Though writing a book has been my dream for years, I Glancing at the words engraved on the stone, I was never anticipated how God might transform an experience reminded that, without a doubt, God loves me. He took so terrible into something hopeful and helpful for others. care of my mom every step of that difficult journey. If He Whenever I reread Romans 8:28—“And we know that God did it for her, He will do it for anyone who asks. He has causes all things to work together for good to those who love promised to never forsake His children. I cling to those God, to those who are called according to His purpose”—I many promises found in the Bible because I know God is trustworthy. I’ve seen Him keep His promises and do His work, both in me and in others.

I rest—though sometimes in turmoil—in His awesome power. He alone is God. He is sovereign over all things, including every event in my life.

As I turned to leave, I realized how long it had taken me to come to this place of acceptance, and once again I relinquished my heartache into God’s loving hands. He alone can take care of that pain, molding it into something for His glory. As I headed toward the car, the March sun warmed my back. I felt a growing excitement about where and how God plans to use my pain.

A few days after my return to our home in Maryland, the first boxes of the newly published books arrived. My dad

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At Laurel’s graduation in May 1989. L to R: Her mother, Nancy; Laurel; sister, Rebecca; and father, David.

am again amazed at how God works. Too often we limit God’s power.

The book seems to be just the beginning of this new twofold ministry of education and encouragement. Talking about serious illness and death is never easy—it’s still not easy for me—but I feel strongly about the value of open communication. Our family talked through all the aspects of struggling with a serious illness and even death all during my mother’s illness. I know it made a difference for both my mom and our family.

And patients and caregivers aren’t the only ones hungry for information. Friends, neighbors and coworkers want to be better support systems for people with serious illnesses. They want questions answered, and ideas and insights for coping with and supporting those they care about.

We provide education by speaking at events, doing radio shows, writing articles, leading seminars, teaching Sunday school classes and just by having conversations with others. We cannot be silent about what God has done in our lives.

I have made a conscious decision to be vulnerable and honest about my experiences with the hope it will encourage others who are walking their own difficult paths. Our ministry of encouragement includes praying, visiting people, and writing letters and cards.

My dad and I do not take this ministry lightly. We pray before every opportunity given to us. We ask God

L

aurel and her dad, David Seiler, are pictured here at a book signing.

David earned his doctorate in physics at Purdue University and is chief of the Semiconductor Electronics and Electrical Engineering Laboratory at the National Institute of Standards and Technology in Gaithersburg, Maryland. He recently received a Purdue School of Science Distinguished Alumni Award.

Life on Hold: Finding Hope in the Face of Serious Illness contains excerpts from Laurel’s mother’s journal, offering scrupulously honest insights into the life of a seriously ill person. The book is a resource for patients, families and friends, medical professionals and pastoral counselors. In late May Laurel was interviewed by the Christian Medical and Dental Association, which is promoting Life on Hold to its physician members. The book offers an extensive list of resources for assistance as well as indexes of the book by person and subject.

Of her writing ventures Laurel says, “I became interested in writing as a second-grader and was continually drawn to writing projects. Thoughts of writing a book first hit me when I

to guide our words and actions, that they will be truthful and encouraging.

We also want to be beacons of light for those who are still searching. Death rips away pretenses and defenses.

There is a window of opportunity that is wide open during times of crisis, and I would not want to miss a single chance to introduce another to the Source of our strength and salvation.

I am humbled—sometimes overwhelmed—at the incredible ministry God has laid at my feet. It’s a huge responsibility, but I am grateful for the part He is allowing us to play in encouraging and comforting others. May we faithfully be visible and audible signs of God’s love and care.  Laurel met her husband, Steven Brunvoll, at Gordon, class of ’87.

They live in Montgomery Village, Maryland, with their two sons, Michael, 6, and Joshua, 8.

Laurel owns Writing Solutions, a writing and public relations firm. She has had 650 articles published in national and local magazines and newspapers. She may be contacted at brunvoll@erols.com or by phone at 301.948.6454.

Visit Laurel’s website at www.lifeonhold.net.

was a senior at Gordon (I had a fantastic opportunity through the Cooperative Education Office to work as an intern at The Salem Evening News that year), but I had no real ideas of what to write about. Years later—in 1996—my dad suggested we write about our experiences with my mom.”

Laurel read dozens of books and magazines on how to write a book and researched the process of selecting a topic, setting goals, outlining the book, targeting a market, finding a publisher and, finally, doing the writing in an organized manner.

She spent more than two years working on her 130-page proposal, enlisting not only two editor friends but also a social worker, a chaplain, a psychologist and a pastor to review for accuracy in those fields. “You only get one chance when making a first impression,” Laurel reminds would-be authors.

It took over a year and several attempts to nail down a publisher. “Be patient and persevere,” Laurel recommends. “It’s worth it to find the right partnership.

“I’ve never worked (and thought) so hard in all my life,” she says. “One lesson I learned: Don’t give up on going to the gym! Taking breaks for physical activity should be built into your writing schedule.”  For information on Life on Hold, go to www.multnomahbooks.com or contact your local Christian bookstore. Book cover used by permission of Multnomah Publishers.

SUMMER 2001

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POINT

OF VIEW

CHOOSING the ight core SHOULD SHE GIVE UP THE OPPORTUNITY TO BE A COLLEGE PRESIDENT TO SAVE A SON WHO HAD WASTED SO MANY ADVANTAGES? GORDON’S ASSOCIATE PROVOST TELLS OF HER AGONIZING DECISION. BY

HERMA B. WILLIAMS



score and never change it.” As she hung up the phone, I eary in mind and body, I boarded the small plane, shouted to her, “Wait, wait.” But suddenly I knew what she happy to finally be heading home from a series of meant: Select the values for the family and never change. rigorous but successful interviews for a presidential Some children need more structure—absolutely clear values post at a midwestern university. and limits. For weeks I thought about her message over and As the little plane dipped and flopped its way to upstate over. Kids get confused, she was saying—especially when New York, where I was assistant provost at a college, an their parents are still trying to figure out the musical score alarming premonition grew within me—not of imminent for their own lives. danger but a warning to prepare for a future event. I uttered My work as assistant provost at the college was exciting a quick prayer and heard my mother’s voice speak to me and challenging, supporting five academic deans, other in her distinct Panamanian accent, quoting Psalm 91:5, administrators and the faculty. I was the only woman and the 14–15: only person of color on the President’s Cabinet. I passionately You will not fear the terror of night nor the arrow that loved working in the academy, and I felt the experience would flies by day. . . . I will protect him, for he acknowledges My prepare me to one day give leadership to a name. He will call upon Me, and I will answer small college. I wanted to work hard and him; I will be with him in trouble, I will I resolved to meet learn how to lead. But something was deliver him and honor him. the challenge head-on. going wrong. I sensed there were I didn’t appreciate it when I was I didn’t realize then how that unknown challenges ahead. a child, but Mother insisted her The known challenge, family memorize passages of strange moment would change our lives of course, was that our Scripture—even entire chapforever. It was easier to say the words than family lived in two difters at times. It seemed to do what needed to be done. During the next ferent places. My huspointless; more along several months—and then years—the sacrifice was immense. band, Eric Sr., a the lines of cruel and professor of instrucunusual punishment. tional media and art at Howard University in Washington, But I thank God my mother never departed from her D.C., had spent a sabbatical year with us. He had returned yearnings for her children to know God’s Word and develop the next year to his teaching position at Howard University, personal relationships with Him. commuting to us when he could. Eric had used his dad’s HOME AT LAST, I thanked my babysitter and dropped the absence as a license to misbehave. A long-distance marriage collected mail on the table. A quick glance revealed a letter is challenging enough, but when a child begins acting out, from the middle school my son, Eric, attended. I picked it it’s serious. I wondered if we’d decided on the best musical up nervously and realized what the Lord had been preparing score for our family. me for. I didn’t open the letter that night, but I knew what it “I’LL DEAL WITH IT TOMORROW,” I thought, as I looked in contained. What had my son done this time? Why couldn’t on my sleeping children—Eric Barclay, 12, and Dana, 9. I he settle down? I stopped right where I was and prayed dropped into bed exhausted, and with an aching heart. aloud, “God help me.”

Hazy dawn awakened me at 5:30 A.M. Dialing Eric Sr.’s I was upset with my son but also angry with myself—angry number, I wondered if he’d be excited about the prospect for not knowing what to do. How does one learn how to of a new job for me. When he asked about the diversity manage difficult people and situations? I was a college of the new community—composed of Anglos and Hmong administrator and dealt with difficulties quite frequently, people—the conversation became uneasy. “What’s the big but I felt almost powerless to handle this one. I wondered deal?” I countered. “We can take diversity with us.” But where I had gone wrong. his reply matched the wisdom of my mother’s: “Our son A few months earlier, in desperation concerning Eric’s must have culturally based experiences, especially in his behavior, I had called my mother for advice. She had early teenage years. successfully raised eight boys—six sons by birth and two “This time you can go alone,” he continued. “The children adopted; surely she could tell me what to do with her first must return to live with me. I will not stand in your way; grandson. “Listen carefully,” she had said to me, “and call me you’re on a dynamic trajectory to give leadership to a college back when you comprehend the message.” or university, but you must go without us this time.”

Her message was metaphoric: “Decide on the musical

22

I felt the fabric of this wonderful marriage of nearly 20 years begin to unravel.

The next 10 hours tested my comprehension and willingness to follow my mother’s advice. Serious questions raced through my mind: Can I accept the position of leading a college and go alone? Do I value the job over the family? Will the marriage disintegrate? Who is ultimately responsible for this soon-to-be teenager?

I began to pray for wisdom, guidance and the ability to administer tough love. I needed desperately to know how to do the latter in just a few minutes when I awakened Eric. I gathered my strength and opened the letter—an immediate summons for me to meet with a team of school personnel concerning Eric’s behavior. This was the fifth summons, and the tone was urgent.

I recalled seeing an article on the front page of The New York Times concerning the larger numbers of incarcerated men of color. Could our child get into serious trouble? Maybe it was not the child; perhaps I was at fault. We already provided a strong Christian family; an excellent school; many cocurricular activities—violin, soccer, swimming, baseball, youth group and other advantages. His dad came often to visit. What more should we do—how should we shelter him?

My friends urged me to relax. But mothers know when something’s wrong. My husband and I needed to face this dilemma together. It was my third year at that college and my husband’s 16th at his university.

Who should take the risk?

IN THE MEETING AT THE MIDDLE SCHOOL, Eric’s teachers indicated he constantly disrupted class with jokes at inappropriate times. They also said, “We love him—we just don’t know how to manage his outbursts in the classroom.” They declared, however, that his comments were unusually interesting, witty and clever. I was truly surprised to learn Eric’s behavior had a positive element.

But I still felt angry and upset with his misbehavior; we had worked so hard to nurture him.

I assured his teachers of our family’s clear set of values for guidance: spiritual development, moral development, respect for and involvement with senior citizens, cultural knowledge, global awareness, a strong dedication and commitment to community service. I shared my deep sadness and apology and told them I intended to resign my job at the college and take my children back to our family home in Silver Spring, Maryland. Eric’s dad and I would save this one with tough love. They urged me to reconsider, but I knew the real solution was for me to sacrifice my dreams for this precious child.

I WAS OVERWHELMED WITH SADNESS. It just didn’t seem fair—I had invested so much in preparing to give leadership in the academic community. Back in my car, I wept long and hard. My tears were for the struggle in these United States, especially for people of color—challenges unknown to the vast majority; for struggling mothers, and for the dads who work two jobs for survival; for families in the suburbs with adequate incomes but no love; tears for the lack of a manual for raising challenging children in this crazy and difficult world; tears for dreams unfulfilled and the hard days to come.

Driving home from the middle school that day, I resolved

to meet the challenge head-on. I didn’t realize then how that strange moment would change our lives forever. It was easier to say the words than to do what needed to be done. During the next several months—and then years—the sacrifices were immense.

WHEN I RESIGNED MY ADMINISTRATIVE POSITION AT THE COLLEGE, I met with jokes suggesting I just couldn’t handle the stress and challenge of five white male deans under me. My supervisor laughed when I spoke of wanting to save my son and not have him end up as a statistic on the front page of The New York Times. He refused to discuss it with me and didn’t even attend my farewell. Neither of us could know then how his

Eric Sr., seated. Standing, L to R: Eric Barclay; Dana, who is a senior English major at Wellesley College in Massachusetts, with plans to go to medical school; and Herma.

response would haunt him in the years to come. I didn’t see or hear from him for the next 10 years.

Leaving was painful. A local women’s support group I belonged to gave me a farewell supper and severely scolded me for not confiding in them over the past three years. I had provided support for many but had never leaned on them for help. It was difficult to share that the role of a senior academician is often different and lonely—that it’s hard for leaders to bare their souls. I remained quiet but very thankful for their presence in my life.

In addition, as a member of a national group of leading professional women of color, I was reprimanded for walking SUMMER 2001

23

As he sat looking at Eric’s graduation photos, he began articles from The New York away from my certain opporto weep. “Your message was for me 10 years Times and tacked them on a tunity to provide important ago, Herma,” he said. “I should have bulletin board in the bathroom. national leadership at prominent listened to you say that children We went to a museum each Sunday Black institutions. It was extremely are more important after church and to a Broadway play or difficult to feel I was letting them down, musical each year. Eric’s talent for playing and to know that an opportunity for that than careers.” level of leadership might never be available to me again. It was frustrating not to have my values and priorities understood by those I admired and sought to emulate.

But it was also a time of discoveries for our family. The week following my agonizing decision, Eric invited me to a musical at his middle school. When I inquired about it, he said, “Mom, just show up.” The play was Mary Poppins, and to my surprise he had a leading role. I was speechless when he appeared on stage speaking and singing with a British accent. I wondered how I could have missed these gifts in my son. During intermission I called his father to share the news, and he drove the seven hours to take in the next performance—equally surprised by Eric’s talents. We had never heard him sing—not even a whistle in the shower.

BACK TOGETHER AGAIN AS A FAMILY IN THE GREATER WASHINGTON, D.C., community, I resolved to find the peace and right attitude to develop a challenging boy into a man, and to find the best school I could for this precious son. After much research, I set my sights on the Sidwell Friends School, whose mission is to develop the character of the young person in an atmosphere void of competition, and to stress values.

I called for an appointment, well aware that registrations had closed seven months earlier. I took the entire family for the interview, carefully choosing each one’s attire and painstakingly preparing every part of our presentation of Eric. The admissions director seemed annoyed with my persistence but impressed with Eric’s essays, unusually high test scores and other admissions materials. God worked His miracle.

With a price tag of $11,500 for Eric’s eighth-grade year (in 1989), my husband declared on the way home that we couldn’t afford to send him to that school. I countered with, “If we needed a new roof or a new car, would we afford it?”

For the down payment, Eric himself loaned us the $500 he had saved to purchase a mountain bike. We stopped at the bank on the way home from the acceptance meeting and transferred the money from Eric’s account to cover the check I’d written on faith that God would provide. God had a bigger plan, and these events were only the beginning.

THE NEXT FEW YEARS REQUIRED SERIOUS, TIRELESS TOUGH LOVE. I became a carpool mom at 6:30 A.M., while I served as both administrator and faculty in the graduate school of education at a local university. My teaching class schedule began at 4:30 P.M., which gave both my husband and me time to be with our children during many daytime activities. Often when I returned home from work exhausted at 11 P.M. or later, I went through Eric’s book bag and found a note from a teacher or a letter from the school. I committed to always awaking him on the spot—whether it was midnight or 3 A.M.—to address the situation.

They were difficult times. I even collected the televisions in the house and stored them in a locked storage room until the reading interest increased in our home. I clipped

24

the violin and learning the music of each Broadway score was enjoyable and exciting.

But we always insisted that spiritual development must be the centerpiece of our lives. Our primary task was to develop our children to be godly leaders for the nation and the world.

The best part was that Eric began to excel. He went on to Sidwell Friends Upper School, performed in nearly every play they did, won many awards in sports and headed Sidwell’s community service student program. He loved and did well in science and math, but he struggled with writing.

When the time came, he chose Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine, and majored in English, to our surprise.

When we suggested he should major in an area of his strengths, he remarked, “Why would I want to do that?

College is about learning to deal with one’s weaknesses.”

He sang with Bowdoin’s 89-year-old group of 12 select young men on national and international tours. He spent much of his senior year at the University of Cape Town in Africa and did community service for eight months with The Amy Biehl Foundation there [see article on page 3]. Eric graduated from Bowdoin in 1999, and today he is the public relations coordinator and writer for The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation in Seattle, Washington. Needless to say, we are very proud of his accomplishments.

YEARS LATER, my supervisor at the college I had resigned from moved to the D.C. area. Though we had not connected in the 10 intervening years, I decided to contact him. I recalled how he had mocked my decision to leave my career track to save my son, and I didn’t know what to expect when I met him.

As he sat looking at Eric’s graduation photos, he began to weep. “Your message was for me 10 years ago, Herma,” he said. “I should have listened to you say that children are more important than careers. It’s ironic that both of our sons are in Seattle now—yours at the Gates Foundation and mine in a maximum-security prison.”

RETURNING TO MY CAR, I remembered the anguish of that day in the middle school parking lot 10 years earlier, when I struggled to step off my career trajectory and do the right thing. Once again—just as I had that day—I sat in my car and cried quietly. This time they were tears of sadness for another’s choices, and thanksgiving for God’s grace in a decision that determined our family’s musical score for a long time to come.  Dr. Herma Williams became associate provost at Gordon in the fall of 2000. She holds a master’s degree from Southern Illinois University and a doctorate from Iowa State University, and has held teaching and administrative positions at a number of colleges and universities.

Her whole family became involved with events in South Africa when she received a Fulbright Scholarship to work at the University of Cape Town in the mid-’90s.

Dear Dr. Carlberg: Since the Commencement Exercises at Gordon, I have been plagued by Dr. Marv Wilson’s speech. . . . I can recite his three points fairly accurately—and have to many audiences. . . . It was . . . a confirmation of the reasons we were delighted when Ian chose Gordon.

From one who believes firmly in Christian education from kindergarten to age 100, I believe Dr. Wilson’s speech should be on the campus and in the guidance office of every Christian school in the country. . . .

I firmly believe it is a must see/hear for Christian educators nationally. Would I dare say internationally?

Therefore, I would ask if I might obtain a copy . . . that I might share Dr. Wilson’s passion with another crop of potential Gordon—and other Christian college—students.

Again, thank you for all of your kindnesses to us through Ian. May God bless you and Gordon as you fulfill His command.

—Ray Doreian, parent of 2001 graduate See a summary of Dr. Wilson’s address on page 4 of this issue. A video tape is available for $7 and an audio tape for $4, including shipping. Make checks payable to Gordon College, and send to the attention of the Media Center at the College.

Homecoming 2001 We’re having A Family Reunion at the place we call home October 5 and 6 Mark your calendars today and watch for more info in ALMAMATTERS

A S

ollege hoirours urope

ugust 28 Art Exhibit—Wlodzimierz Ksiazek: A Decade of Painting (1990–2000); 8/28–9/28, BCA

eptember 7–8 Women’s Volleyball Invitational Tournament 9 Thompson Chamber Music Series; 4 P.M., Phillips Recital Hall 22 Pop Crowell Invitational Tournament

O

ctober

3 Art Exhibit—Duncan Simcoe: Drawings and Paintings from The Golden Book of the Civil War; 10/3–11/8, BCA 5–7 Homecoming and Family Weekend 14 Gordon Symphony Orchestra; 3 P.M., A. J. Gordon Memorial Chapel 26 Symphonic Band and Wind Ensemble; 7 P.M., Gordon Chapel 26–27 New Parents Weekend

N

G. LLOYD CARR ’64

EVENTS CALENDAR

For info, updates and tickets, call ext. 3400 for music events and ext. 3200 for theatre productions.

Phillips Recital Hall is located in Phillips Music Center. Art exhibits and theatre productions are in the Barrington Center for the Arts (BCA).

ovember

9–10, 13–17 9 10 12 18

Theatre—The Visit by F. Durrenmatt; BCA

Choirs! Choirs! Choirs!; 8 P.M., Gordon Chapel Gospel Choir; 8 P.M., Gordon Chapel Jazz Ensemble; 8 P.M., Easton Dining Room, Lane Gordon Symphony Orchestra; 3 P.M., Gordon Chapel 21–25 Thanksgiving Recess 26 Art Exhibit—Senior Thesis Exhibits; BCA

D

ecember

2 Advent Festival; 4 P.M., Gordon Chapel 8 Christmas Gala; 7 P.M., Gordon Chapel 20–1/15 Christmas/Winter Recess

Pilgrim Church of the Black Madonna, Einsiedeln, Switzerland.

F

ollowing Commencement the Gordon College Choir toured Central Europe for two weeks, attracting enthusiastic music lovers from Germany to Slovenia. The choir performed in over a dozen churches and cathedrals. A number of professors and Provost Mark Sargent accompanied the group. Fine Arts Coordinator K. David Goss documented the concerts in a series of digital stereo recordings, which he plans to reproduce in a CD. Throughout the tour choir members were treated to lectures on historic sites by Dr. G. Lloyd Carr ’64 and were provided with spontaneous opportunities to sing in unscheduled venues such as Cologne Cathedral, Limburg Cathedral and Neuschwanstein Castle in Bavaria. Most important of all, through host families and concert audiences the Gordon College Choir made friends and supporters in many towns and cities of Central Europe.

Nonprofit Org. U.S. POSTAGE PAID Gordon College

255 Grapevine Road Wenham, Massachusetts 01984 978.927.2300 www.gordon.edu CHANGE SERVICE REQUESTED