The below remarks were given by Bryn Mawr President Wendy Cadge at the August 26, 2024, Faculty & Staff Town Hall.
Good afternoon. Thanks to all of you for being here. And a special warm welcome to new faculty orienting today.
I’m grateful for the welcome so many of you have extended to me and to my family over the summer, and I’m grateful for all those, present and past, who have made the College what it is today. Faculty and students; plumbers and electricians; coaches and admissions staff; librarians and colleagues in the Dean’s Office, alumni relations, development; Board members, housekeepers, colleagues in campus safety and dining services; generous donors, alumni, and many more. The work of the College is a team effort. Or, if you prefer, the work of an orchestra or a complex organism, in which we each make an important contribution to the whole. I’ll leave it to each of you to imagine which instrument or bodily organ you’d like to be.
My predecessor, Kim Cassidy, and I had a very smooth transition, and I have been working with many of you to learn about our successes, challenges, and opportunities. I think we all share the vision of a robust women’s and gender-expansive residential liberal arts experience for our undergraduates and a top-notch academic experience for our graduate students in which they learn and grow from what is happening in our classrooms, our labs, our community spaces, and the world.
I invited you here today because I think it’s important to spend some time as a community of staff, faculty, and administrators to take stock together and talk about the coming academic year as we prepare to welcome our new and returning students to campus this week.
For the next 15 minutes, I’m going to share a bit of what I’ve learned so far and outline some topics and questions I think we will all benefit from discussing during Q&A and in the hallways and along the pathways in the coming weeks and months.
My overriding insight so far is also the least surprising: Bryn Mawr is a remarkable place – in large part because of all of you.
We have a world-class faculty of scholars who work closely with highly motivated students. A diverse student body that takes their experiences here seriously. A dedicated staff who go above and beyond. A strong and supportive Board. Years of experience with hard discussions and community processes to help us contend with the College’s complicated histories of inclusion and exclusion. A beautiful, intimate campus. Enhanced student services and supports. And a strong financial position that has enabled us to buck prevailing trends in higher-ed, especially those affecting small liberal arts colleges.
It can be easy when you are here day in and day out to forget what a standout Bryn Mawr is in higher education. I want you to acknowledge and own each of your remarkable roles in that.
Bryn Mawr did not become known for rigor and academic excellence by focusing only on what’s going smoothly. We have challenges, and they require us to work together more than ever as a strong team, a harmonious orchestra, a healthy body.
What am I thinking about when I say this?
First, presidential transitions can be disorienting. The new president doesn’t yet know the campus, and the campus doesn’t yet know the president. We are in the early stages of building our relationships, and we are still sniffing each other out. This is normal and appropriate, especially for a place that runs so deeply on relationships. It will take time for us to build those bonds. Everything I am working on – from continuing to reduce the siloing we see across the campus to figuring out the room numbering in Park – will impact what I hope will be relationships of trust and understanding between and among me and all of you. If we begin with the assumption of good intent and the awareness that we must also ask and listen carefully to learn about our effects on each other, this process of trust-building can be one of joy as well as adjustment.
Second, this is a complicated time for higher education. Public opinion of colleges and universities is low. We are pressed to demonstrate the value proposition of the liberal arts. We have seen increases in antisemitism, Islamophobia, and threats and acts of violence directed at students and other members of academic communities around the country, as well as renewed attention and pitched arguments about free expression and hate speech. Acts of protests and their accompanying debates will likely resume on many campuses this fall. The situation in the Middle East combined with the upcoming election is challenging for students, and for many of us and our families. It is also an opportunity to learn from each other and to model meaningful, honest civil engagement.
Third, key laws are in flux and impact how we put our values into practice. Revised Title 9 regulations aim to reduce barriers to seeking redress and filing reports; clarify protections against discrimination based on gender identity, sexual orientation, and sex characteristics; ensure that employees are aware of their reporting responsibilities and are properly trained; and update language on the rights of pregnant and parenting students. Likewise, the US Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights (known as OCR) issued new guidance on protecting students from national origin and ethnic discrimination and intimidation, and on balancing free speech protections with student and campus safety. These changes and interpretations make all of us more responsible for understanding students’ and our own rights and responsibilities and for taking action in many different situations.
I am looking forward to meeting with the faculty’s free speech task force, which I know has already begun to consider these issues. I also ask you all to read the OCR guidance, links to which will be included in Wednesday’s Daily Digest email along with a link to my prepared remarks for today.
It’s been just eight weeks since I began my tenure as president of Bryn Mawr. During that time I have read the College’s charter and governance documents; Board, faculty, student and alumni governance documents and minutes, and the faculty and staff handbooks – yes, all of them. They’ve given me a good sense of how our community sees itself and works to safeguard its values, as well as where some of the fault lines are and how some of us express concerns and displeasure.
We have a robust Mission Statement refreshed in 2019 by our Board of Trustees. If you haven’t read it, or haven’t read it lately, I encourage you to take a look at it on the College website. It makes it clear that we are, above all else, a higher education institution committed to academic excellence and to learning and engaging across difference. And it clearly states that we see the latter as a central element of the former.
These kinds of collective endeavors are often symbolized by linked hands. I’ve been thinking about it more as gently but firmly grasping each other’s forearms, so we can hang on to connection when someone else lets go – because they are tired, overwhelmed, angry, frustrated – or because sometimes it’s just hard to be a human being in a community.
I’m inviting all of us to hold onto each other, to collaborate and nurture individual, institutional, and communal practices of active listening, mutual support and accountability in our communication and interactions.
I find it often helps me to ask, “What is the goal or purpose of my interactions and statements in this situation? What kind of resolution or relationship am I hoping for?” Based on what I have learned about our campus culture so far, my sense is that we often do this – and sometimes we really don’t. Our community can function well and feel better if we all try to commit to this sort of awareness and practice.
So, I invite us to consider how we model for students the kind of community we want to be – and what inspiration we can take from our students as they build and model community through their own creativity and insights.
Last fall, in my undergraduate research methods class, I listened to students talk passionately for several weeks about “the administration.” Eventually, I asked them, “Who is this administration? Who are the people? How do you decide who in these structures to approach with your concerns? " I discovered that students were unaware of the specific avenues through which they could be heard.
Our students are incredibly socially and politically aware – it’s inspiring. Yet I think they can benefit from us helping to inform and teach them about how institutions like Bryn Mawr actually function, and to gently and consistently name the distinction between institutional roles and individual character and morality, which sometimes can get lost.
There are also important questions we need to engage about social change on campus and in the wider world. I’m curious, for example, about when and how on-campus protest relates to students’ engagement, or lack thereof, with elected officials on the issues – and how we at Bryn Mawr can encourage students to have meaningful dialogue with those who can most directly make legislative change.
So, what does all of this mean when we get down to the nitty-gritty? I’ve heard and learned a lot about how our community was impacted by the protest activities on campus last spring. What I heard seemed to exemplify both our strengths and our struggles:
- Many students and some faculty members, across a wide range of backgrounds and perspectives, felt energized and supported by organized protest and solidarity;
- Many students and some faculty members, across a wide range of backgrounds and perspectives, felt uncomfortable, isolated and/ or unsafe on campus;
- There was some exclusivity and some overlap between people with many of these experiences;
- The College received a significant number of campus bias incident reports, more than we’d received before. And many of our off-campus neighbors contacted the College with concerns about on-campus activities;
- Some members of the faculty connected with each other and with students based on shared faith, ethnicity, or lived experiences in deeply meaningful ways and to a degree different from in the past.
- I am hearing more about relationships that were stressed or broken than about those that were strengthened or repaired.
- Faculty members – played key roles in facilitating communication across people in different roles and with different perspectives;
- The year ended with uncertainty and concern about disciplinary procedures and outcomes;
- The College’s staff did so much – so much – in a short time period to organize a joyful and successful commencement in challenging and unprecedented circumstances.
The senior staff and I have been working together to prepare for the academic year and to think about how to build on the best of past occurrences and make progress on those that were difficult, to rebuild trust and strengthen our understanding of one another. Many colleges and universities “policy-ed up” this summer. I do not think that would have been the right approach for Bryn Mawr, given our deep sense of shared governance and the importance of collaboration and dialogue.
So how are we thinking about it?
First, we reviewed existing policies related to the Honor Code, including but not limited to polices that apply to chalking and posters. And with concerns raised in the spring in mind, we examined how behaviors that violate the Honor Code were addressed through the Honor Board and Dean’s Panels.
At the time, discussions were already underway with students about the need to assess and revise the Honor Code. We, especially Karlene Burrell-McRae and Tomiko Jenkins, are continuing that process by inviting groups of students, faculty, and staff leaders to review the Honor Code with a consultant from the Association for Student Conduct Administration. The goal is to ensure that the Honor Code best represents our values and the College’s mission and to ensure a clear, mutual understanding of how it will be implemented in a variety of potential circumstances.
Second, Janet Shapiro, Cheryl Horsey, Millie Bond, and I are drafting for community comment an expanded framework around campus protest, informed in part by a review of polices in place at several of our peer institutions. We will be sharing our draft thoughts with the entire community for feedback, input, and conversation. As with our Honor Code work, the aim here is to come to a shared understanding of how we engage with one another in challenging moments. As a draft intended to generate discussion, it will include our ideas as well as questions for the community to consider and discuss.
Third, in conversation with the senior staff and the leadership of the Board of Trustees, we have decided that the College will not be making public statements this year. We are an educational institution whose mission is to educate and help all of us learn about these and other topics, and that is where we will be focusing our time and attention this year – on the learning.
Finally, we will have a number of opportunities this fall to learn, play, and talk together face to face. The President’s Office will be piloting a monthly lunchtime seminar on “Current Topics in Higher Education.” We will start on September 16th at noon here in the Great Hall by talking about the purpose of higher education. The price of admission is 30 minutes of reading – Drew Faust’s Phi Beta Kappa speech and Boston Globe op-ed on threats to higher education, and a short piece by Brian Rosenberg, author of Whatever It is, I’m Against It: Resistance to Change in Higher Education.
The second gathering in October will focus on higher-education finances and is part of fulfilling a key commitment then-President Kim Cassidy and Provost Tim Harte made to students in the spring. A number of faculty are also planning educational sessions on current events.
We will also continue weekly coffee hours and the first one of each month will include programming, starting on September 5th at 9:30AM with “What Bryn Mawr Did This Summer,” featuring GSSWSR and GSAS Summer Fellowship recipients and undergraduates working on the Who Built Bryn Mawr? project. We will also gather at Convocation, the ribbon-cutting for the new Field Hockey field, the unveiling of the new Art Remediating College Histories, or ARCH, installation in the Cloisters, the Inauguration, and more. Please join us. The Impact Center, Counseling Services, our Interfaith Chaplain, and others are all available to help if/when conversations are difficult. Additionally, resources like the Dialogue Project and opportunities for training in restorative practices will continue to be available. To date, over 50 students, staff and faculty have participated in the Dialogue Project, and this summer, nearly 30 staff and faculty began training in restorative practices, with more training opportunities to come.
As I reflect on my first eight weeks as President, it’s clear that the staff, faculty, and senior staff at Bryn Mawr are incredible. And the graduates this college produces – our alums – are continually giving truth to our mission, illustrating it in distinctive ways every day. Our commitment to excellence is always and forever a team effort, an orchestra, or a complex organism. We do our best work together and I am grateful – in advance – for our collaborations this year. We are joined in the work of preparing our students for lives of purpose. In those lives, they will have to navigate difficult, inspiring, distressing, and meaningful differences of perspective and opinion. It is my passionate hope that we can model for them here on campus how to do that successfully, with open minds and hearts, in community.
Thank you. I welcome your questions.
