Vol. 141 Issue 16 - February 1, 2018
Michigan’s oldest college newspaper
College waits on accreditation results after recent HLC visit
Architect Duncan Stroik’s rendering of the inside of Christ Chapel. Courtesy
Construction of chapel, new dorm on schedule, Péwé says By | Jordyn Pair News Editor With the construction costs of the $28.6 million Christ Chapel now completely covered, Hillsdale College is one step closer to the building’s completion in May 2019. Construction for both Christ Chapel and the new dorm on Union Street next to Benzing Residence is on schedule, according to Chief Administrative Officer Rich Péwé. The north wall of the chapel is the next area of focus for Weigand Construction in the building’s construction. It is also pouring concrete for the balconies this week. “Pretty soon, they’ll close up the building,” Péwé said. Although its construction costs are covered, the school is still working to raise money for the chapel endowment fund and other features it
hopes to include in the building. The unnamed dormitory finally got walls and a roof over winter break, after construction began on it in August. The crew finished the roof just after Christmas in below freezing temperatures. “It seems like they’re really coming along with it,” said senior Macy Mount, Benzing head resident assistant. “At the beginning of the year, it was just a hole in the ground.” For now, the dorm is still unnamed. “Over-time proposals may be sent to friends who have expressed an interest in supporting student housing or this particular project,” Péwé said. “The college would name it once a significant lead gift was made.” For now, the dorm is being financed with a loan from the college’s endowment. According to Péwé, the college will
By | Jordyn Pair News Editor Students may find their IDs more closely scrutinized in the upcoming months, thanks to a recent increase in the use of fake IDs in and around Hillsdale. “Based on information we have obtained from an ongoing investigation, we have reason to believe it may be widespread in our community,” Chief of Police Scott Hephner said. Hephner said police became aware of the problem when a young person provided a fake license to a police officer. According to public records, an 18-year-old was arrested on Jan. 18 for providing fake ID to police, among other charges. “With new technologies, it’s really hard to tell,” Hephner said. “They’re not as obvious anymore.” Fake identification cards can now have valid magnetic strips and holograms, security measures that were previously difficult to replicate. “We’ve come across some really good ones,” Hephner said, adding the department has confiscated fake identification cards from both college students and area youth. Even students who can legally purchase alcohol have
said their identification is being more heavily scrutinized. Senior Hannah Niemeier was a passenger in a car during a traffic stop in Hillsdale on Saturday night. A law enforcement officer asked for the licenses of everyone in the vehicle. “I’ve never had a cop ask for anybody’s ID who’s not the driver,” Niemeier said. Junior Erin Flaherty, who turned 21 over winter break, also reported having her identification inspected by a cashier. “Something about it looked fishy to her,” Flaherty said. Senior Maria Theisen, who turned 21 in March, said her vertical enhanced license tripped up the cashier at the Hillsdale Brewing Company. “I’ve never been questioned with it before at the bar, but at the brewery, they questioned me about it,” Theisen said. Theisen added she thinks this instance is part of a larger trend. “I’ve definitely noticed that places that sell alcohol are looking a little bit more carefully at IDs,” she said. Local businesses haven’t necessarily noticed this trend, however.
Police crack down on IDs
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pay it back over time with interest. The school still plans to add a café in the dorm. “It’s got to at least break even,” Pewe said. “I’d love for it to happen, but you have to see if students will come.” Péwé added that the dorm, which will house 56 beds, will be ready for student use at the beginning of next school year. Renovations to Galloway Residence are also scheduled to begin at the end of the semester. The school plans to bring the interior up to the same standard as a new dorm. The renovations will cost $4 million, which is coming from the school’s surplus. The school is also planning to expand Phillips Auditorium as a part of its second phase renovation of the Searle Center. The project is estimated to cost $5.6 million.
By | Breana Noble Editor-in-Chief Now the wait begins. Five accreditors from the Higher Learning Commission visited campus Monday through Wednesday, as a part of the college’s comprehensive evaluation for reaccreditation. The college will receive the results in the next few weeks. Accreditation is a certification from a regional group of member colleges, such as the HLC, that says an institution of higher education meets its criteria and federal requirements. Attendance to an accredited institution is often required to attend graduate programs, participate in NCAA athletics, and receive federal financial aid. Fortunately, Hillsdale’s accreditation is pretty safe, said George Allen, director of institutional research. “An institution has to be in dreadful shape to lose accreditation,” Allen said. “Worst case scenario here is they say: ‘You’re not doing XYZ to our satisfaction, so you have to get into gear for these, and here are your extra reporting requirements on those subjects.’” Hillsdale entered its final year of its 10-year Open Pathway accreditation cycle in January. In December, the school submitted its Assurance Argument, an online explanation of how Hillsdale meets its goals and the HLC’s criteria. The accreditors toured campus and met with faculty, staff, and college leadership to discuss the five criteria it needs to meet pertaining to the college’s mission, integrity, academic quality, academic evaluation, and effectiveness. They also held three open forums in which faculty, staff, and students provided feedback on Hillsdale’s ability to meet the requirements. “We’ve enjoyed our time on campus,” Sandy Cassady, the accrediting team leader and the dean of the College of Health and Human Services at St. Ambrose University in Iowa, said at the forum. “We’ve had some good, candid conversations.” Junior Calvin Kinney attended a forum on Monday at the request of Dean of Men
Aaron Petersen because he is a resident assistant. “I thought it was good that they listened to a student’s perspective,” Kinney said, adding, “Accreditation is reassurance to the student body that Hillsdale is living up to what it says it is doing.” It is the first time Hillsdale is completing the Assurance Argument, after the HLC moved Hillsdale to the new Open Pathway about four years ago. The new pathway requires Hillsdale to complete more paperwork required by the U.S. Education Department, despite Hillsdale not taking federal funds. According to Allen, it shows the trend in changes to accreditation. In the 1960s, the function of accrediting institutions changed when the Education Department made them the gatekeepers of federal financial aid. Since then, regulation and scrutiny of the accrediting bodies has increased. From that, the Education Department can influence the direction of higher education, said Mark Maier, assistant to the provost. The increased regulation also means more demands from colleges, even those that do not receive government money such as Hillsdale, Allen said. Also new are requirements in year four and year five to nine of the accreditation cycle. In 2022, Hillsdale will need to update its Assurance Argument. Starting in 2023, Hillsdale will submit a Qualitivity Initiative proposal on which it will provide a report by 2027. Common initiatives focus on student success, the incorporation of technology, and growing campus culture. “Now it’s supposed to be this continuous relationship where there’s always something going on,” Allen said. While this means more paperwork for the college, which resulted in the creation of Allen’s position, the final-year comprehensive review has lessened in extent. Before switching pathways, Hillsdale had to have a whole room of file evidence that visiting accreditors would read to back up its self-study. The self-study was a large book the college had to write
Q&A: CCA speaker Mary By | Stefan Kleinhenz Collegian Reporter Mary Eberstadt spoke at Hillsdale College this week for the Center for Constructive Alternatives lecture series on the 1960s, where she spoke on “Paradoxes of the Sexual Revolution.” A senior research fellow at the Faith and Reason Institute and graduate of Cornell University, Eberstadt is an American essayist and novelist whose pieces have appeared in magazines including TIME, the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, National Review, First Things, and The Weekly Standard. Eberstadt also served as a speech writer to Secretary of State George Shultz during the Reagan administration. She is also the author of a few nonfiction books, including “Adam and Eve After the Pill: Paradoxes of the Sexual Revolution.”
explaining the college’s goals and programs. The Assurance Argument has replaced it on the Open Pathway. Now, all evidence is uploaded online to Dropbox and is less exhaustive, according to Allen. Instead, the materials are supposed to be representative examples of the defense Hillsdale presents in the argument. Additionally, the accreditors’ visit was shorter: they had meetings for a day and a half instead of two and a half days. Accreditation has also moved toward demanding more statistical information. Some of this, however, is good for Hillsdale, Allen said, as it has exposed gaps in transparency and data recording. The HLC requires the college to publish its student outcome rates publicly. Allen worked with the career services office and the college’s website managers to publish that online. “That is great for the institution, because those numbers are great for Hillsdale,” Allen said. “In this case, it’s given us a decent idea that will tie into marketing for the school.” After the accreditors who visited campus this week submit their report and recommendations to the HLC, the commission will review the findings and can edit any of the suggestions. Allen said the accreditors told him that happens about 13 percent of the time. President Larry Arnn will be the first to see the report and then will decide on what happens with the report from the HLC. Last time, the commission provided some recommendations to the college and asked for interim reports on its general education assessment, program assessment, and the Van Andel Graduate School of Statesmanship. The accrediting team may request more documents before submitting its report on Hillsdale to the HLC. Mostly, though, the college just anticipates its results. “We’ll find out if they found what we presented satisfactory,” Allen said. “At this point, we’re really just waiting for the recommendations of the team.”
Eberstadt
and that’s the hardest thing about writing: the other side doesn’t want to talk back. In all of the different types of writing you have done, from speech writing, to essays, to novels, what has been your favorite? Last year my novel “The Loser Letters” was turned into a play, and it ran for two weeks at Catholic University in D.C. That was Mary Eberstadt spoke this week for the Center for very exciting and it makes Constructive Alternaatives. Wikipedia me want to writer in the sense that a lot of do more fiction writing and what I do is against the mainWhat is the significance more stage writing. This year I stream grain, and that’s not of writing in your life? Have have a lot of essay writing and because I want to be contrari- speaking going on, and probyou always loved writing? My main vocation honestly an, it’s just that a lot of what is ably a book that will include happening in the mainstream is being a wife and mother, what I did here today and a is wrong and bad for people. but I have been writing since few other chapters. After that I What I try to do is tell stories, I could hold a pencil. I always want to get back to fiction. whether in fiction or nonhope that somewhere down What do you hope to fiction, that tell truths and there it serves the greater instill in the hearts of your to do so respectfully. I also good and tells truths. I regard audience? myself as a counter-cultural try to engage the other side, One thing is that there are www.hillsdalecollegian.com
truths they may not be aware of, and I’m trying to impart to them. Another thing is to give people morale who feel like they are a minority, they’re not a minority here on this campus, but out in the wider world I’m very aware of how countercultural a traditional Christian message can be. Part of what I try to do, especially with students, is give them ammunition, in a figurative sense, so they feel like somebody’s got their back and somebody understands how hard it is for them to be countercultural too. Part of it is intellectual, but part of the work is of the heart. Is there someone you grew up admiring, maybe an author or another role model you’ve always hoped to follow in their footsteps? Intellectually there are so many, but I draw a lot of inspiration from the Russian novelists. Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Solzhenitsyn,and the reason is that they were crawling out of a serious place and time in their different eras that they put a primacy on the truth. Solzhenitsyn especially writes brilliantly about truth telling and the importance of it.
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