Being a college president these days
leaves precious little time for reflection—I’m on the road and away from campus
at least a third of each year. But as we look toward the spring term at Bethany,
I’d like to offer a few thoughts on how where we’re going has been positively
influenced by where we’ve been during the past five years, and why your support
has made such an incredible difference in the process.
Let’s start with communication.
Revamping our website and communication strategies has been an enormous
advantage to Bethany’s marketing program. Five years ago, we weren’t very
visible or interactive, electronically that is. Now, using online versions of
this letter and The Old Main Journal, webstreaming of campus events, and social
media like Twitter and Facebook, we’ve expanded our audience to be truly
worldwide. More alumni, friends, families, and prospective students than ever
before can access Bethany College for breaking news, sports statistics, and live
events. Following consumer preferences in other organizations, “our Bethany”
has truly become a more personalized “my Bethany.”
Our challenge is to continue to stay
ahead of the technology “curve” by securing the latest tools to take Bethany to
the world.
A second key area of progress is campus
facilities. With a substantial investment of millions of dollars over the past
five years, the Bethany campus has been enhanced while preserving the
traditional splendor of our historic buildings and natural environment. A few
highlights are the Bethany Beanery, a popular food and coffee shop in the heart
of campus; the reopening of Cochran Hall, offering modern, suite-style housing
to 72 students; the technologically smart Hurl Center for Education; our
24-hour Cummins Community Fitness Center and athletic enhancements including an
all-weather turf and lights at Bison Stadium, expanded weight and workout
rooms, and the Goin Locker Room and Ault Football Suite.
We’ve upgraded learning technology
throughout the campus; one important example is that the T.W. Phillips Memorial
Library, through a Mellon Grant, is now a part of the Bowen Central Virtual
Library of Appalachia with more than two million additional resources available
for research. Last but not least, Christman Manor at Pendleton Heights, the
president’s residence, has hosted more than 2,000 guests per year in that
renovated, historically significant facility.
Predictably, Bethany’s challenge is to
implement the recommendations of its campus master plan to continue to upgrade
classrooms, labs, residence halls, and student- and faculty-support facilities.
It’s vital to our recruitment and retention of students and faculty in the coming
years to foster the best possible teaching and learning environment for
Bethanians.
A third area of innovation is academic
partnerships. During the past five years, Bethany College has significantly
expanded its synergistic partnerships with institutions around the world. They
include dual-degree completion programs in engineering (Columbia University and
Case Western Reserve University), law (Duquesne University), and new
bachelor’s-to-master’s degree programs with Carnegie Mellon University. Our
global initiatives include expanded offerings through the InterAmerican
Consortium and partnerships with Harlaxton College and Arcadia University
abroad.
Along with expanding an already active
internship program with corporate and organizational partners in major U.S.
cities, Bethany must continue to develop such collaborative initiatives—including
increased emphasis on study-abroad opportunities—to give our students the best
possible start on their careers.
Fourth, affirming that the core of our
mission is and will remain the liberal arts, within the past five years we have
focused on making that mission even more meaningful and marketable to a new
generation of Bethanians. Our reputation, as always, precedes us, as confirmed
in our most recent ranking as a First-Tier National Liberal Arts College in U.S.
News & World Report—the only West Virginia higher education institution so
named. Today’s students, however, want specific advantages tied to our good
name—as they should, in order to pursue the latest opportunities available to
them in a hotly competitive career marketplace.
That means that Bethany must redouble
its planning for academic initiatives three, five, seven years out. Progress is
promising thus far. Our new Master of Arts in Teaching program, the
student-managed McCann Family Student Investment Fund, our partnership with the
New York Times Knowledge Network, and cooperation with International Relief and
Development, Arlington, Virginia, on a campus video and online journal, to cite
just a few examples, are ways that our small, liberal arts college is offering
big advantages to career-minded students. Combined with Bethany’s marketing and
communications expertise, academic innovations will offer a highly visible,
attractive, and advantageous package for students who seek an updated
residential campus experience for their 21st-century expectations and
ambitions.
I could cite numerous other areas where
the best of what we have accomplished in recent years foretells continued
progress for Bethany College. My colleagues and I are committed to realizing
the ultimate goals of our strategic-planning process by building on that
success.
And here is where you, our alumni and
friends, come in. Your generous commitment to Bethany through gifts and grants
has made, and will continue to make, possible our plans in the above areas and
more. Our $44 million secured to date through the “Transformation Now!”
campaign for the College is having direct impact on our ability to recruit top
students and faculty, fund academic innovation and collaboration, and tell the
Bethany story with exciting new narratives of scholarship, service, and global
leadership.
We therefore thank you for your direct
support through The Bethany Fund. I invite your continued giving in 2013, and
promise to share exciting updates each month from A Small College of National
Distinction.
