[background music]
[Associate Professor of English Sarah Heidt:] The world that I hoped I would help bring into being
was one where would not just force themselves to take the time to see other people around them
but would be doing that as a reflex, as a habit;
that we would take the time to see each other and make eye contact and have a conversation;
that we would actually feel like there was time we could take.
[background music]
[background conversation]
[President Sean Decatur:] We have a broader crisis in America right now
in that people aren't talking to each other.
The process of building common ground and making individual connections that allows difficult topics
and discussions to be tackled actually begins on topics totally unrelated to
what might be the controversial issues or the controversial subject matter.
[Josh McClain '19:] We take these specific issues,
and then we tie them to a whole network of identity, right, that intersects with all these other issues.
Then we can't have a conversation about one of those things.
It's going to take people who are brave enough to start those conversations.
[background chatting]
[Hope Harrod '98:] It comes out of the believing in the power of discussion,
and discussion comes from many voices. We have to trust each other.
Diversity not only means people of different colors, it also means diversity of thought.
In order to have those conversations in classrooms, in order to
really be able to shape your learning in a way that reflects the world, we need to
have people that reflect the world in that classroom.
[Sean Decatur:] The powers of a residential institution like Kenyon in that people actually have
to live together, they have to eat in the same dining hall, they have to break
bread together, they have to share interest on an athletic team together,
they have a quirky interest outside of the classroom that brings them together
in different combinations — those are the places where people start to get to know
each other and start to realize that, okay, you and I have some things in common:
the engagement of on-campus goods, these points of contact that then gives
a framework or a platform for being able to take on difficult topics.
So it takes time, and it takes work, but I think it's time and work that we can't shy away from.
[background chatting]
[Katie Connell '18:] You're gonna meet people from Zimbabwe but also from Columbus;
from a boarding school in California but also a public school in Milwaukee —
people that have made a choice to come to this tiny place and make it home.
[Professor of Biology Drew Kerkhoff:] You know, we're not here for the nightlife, we're not here for the restaurant scene.
We're here because we want to be doing the things that we're doing. Our students want to
learn; our professors want to teach. That gives a certain tacit commitment to the community.
[Maymuna Abdi '18:] We want people to be able to place themselves in uncomfortable
positions, because I think the only way you can learn is to be uncomfortable.
[Judy Hoff Gilbert '91:] I came into Kenyan wanting there to be right answers to things, and I wanted to
understand history in terms of what was the timeline and who was the king then.
I wanted things to be very clear and black and white. What it took me a while
to get here, but this place absolutely helped me understand it, is even the things that are black and white
aren't really black and white, and that's not where most of the interesting stuff goes on.
[Eric Sutton '18:] We're often, we're told to sort of
read theory or read texts and keep ourselves out of it and keep ourselves distant,
and that's sort of the way that you become a good academic, but you have that one
perspective and you have to have an opinion, and a lot of that comes from your experience.
[Professor of Political Science Fred Baumann:] But that's the point, which is to get people to realize that
there's a whole deep ocean of possibility that they've never thought
of and, wow! Fantastic! Let's explore them.
There's all kinds of just delight, almost childlike delight, that you have in learning as a
student and as a teacher. It's play.
[Sarah Heidt:] What I want from the classroom is for people to learn how to listen to each other. What it should do is teach people how to
ask genuine questions in the face of the world around us. What is a good
life? What is a good death? How do we figure these things out? How do you keep
from getting so wrapped up in the press of your daily life that you stop asking
why the world is the way it is or how it might be better or what your place in it
really should be.
[background music]
[William P. Rice Associate Professor of English & Literature Ivonne M. García:] The blueprint of where we need to go,
it's like a yellow brick road. You can't miss it. I know that under President Decatur and
President Decatur's team, Kenyon is poised to exert leadership.
[Judy Hoff Gilbert '91:] There's something about this place where the essential feel and the smell and the light,
so much of it feels very permanent. We do need to make it more modern; we need to make it
accessible to enable the students in this century to grow and to carry things forward.
[Sean Decatur:] We've come a long way and we know the path forward in order to
continue our commitment to talented students from a range of different
economic backgrounds, to continue to make Kenyon a place that's the model for
rigorous inquiry and discourse, not only in the country but in the world. So we
know the path, what we need is the resources. This is the moment for all of
us to come together and to make those resources possible to drive us forward
to what Kenyon can be and the greatness that lies ahead.
[Judy Hoff Gilbert '91:] It has been gratifying to see the progress that Kenyon has made,
and at the same time, it raises the stakes and raises the urgency to do even more.
[Matt Winkler '77 P'13:] None of us succeed totally on our own.
We succeed because of those who came before us. We succeed because of those around us.
The place is eternal, and may it be so. There's no place actually on the planet that's quite like Kenyon.
[background music]
[Katie Connell '18:] Thinking about that as I leave, like, the scholarship that I have continues, like,
someone else is coming to Kenyon, but they're coming to Kenyon and they're
gonna have this beautiful four years, and they're gonna be hard, they're gonna be great at
the same time, but that's something I couldn't have asked for.
The money I've received and the beautiful academic buildings and the amazing faculty and
professors — they're such a gift that I've been blessed to have in my life, so I
just want to continue that when I leave, and I hope other people will consider
doing that as well because it's been such a gift to be here.
[background music: "Kokosing Farewell"