A Message from President Harris - Inspiration and Gratitude

Dear faculty, staff, and students, 

Happy New Year! As we embark upon the Spring 2024 semester, it is my pleasure to welcome you back to campus. It may be cold outside, but the warmth of your presence, your intellect, and your ambition is heartening! I write with updates on matters that shape our shared endeavors at the College, with my thanks for your energies to them.

Our strategic plan, Knowledge into Action, is moving into implementation. Seven actions from the strategic plan will be a focus for the upcoming semester.  These are: 

Catalyst for Educational Excellence: 

• Research ways to integrate High-impact Practices with college-wide learning outcomes to assist with student developmental planning, advising, and institutional accountability for equity. 
• Focus on the Higher Learning Commission Quality Initiative for advising as a first step in evaluating our institutional understanding of academic advising. 
• Move forward with the College’s response to the Supreme Court decision on affirmative action with the goal of recruiting and retaining a diverse, well-qualified student body.  

Belonging and Connection

• Reinvent a residential experience and student programming that provide tools and opportunities to build community, develop self-understanding, and establish collaborative relationships across difference. 

Collective Equity

• The Reduce Endowment Dependency (RED) initiative to identify long-term ways to reduce Grinnell’s dependence on the endowment for funding of the operating budget. 
• Build a shared understanding among campus constituents and leadership regarding compatibility of data and cybersecurity and the academic mission of the College. 

Shared Goals and Common Ground 

• Support community building programs and community dialogue, with Renfrow Hall as a focus and inspiration, and the Civic Innovation Pavilion as a place to gather. 

Details regarding the membership of and charge to each working group are forthcoming: with thanks to senior leadership members and their campus partners, I will be excited to share more about how Knowledge into Action is being implemented and about how you can participate in its actions. Strengthening collaboration and discovery for positive change is meaningful work for the college that we can continue to create together.   

Now, to gratitude.  First, I want to thank the group of staff and faculty who have shared their expertise to create diverse opportunities for our community to learn about the histories, conflicts, and identities that are part of the war and crisis in Israel and Gaza.  They are finalizing a set of events that will model ways to be in dialogue even within tense issues, help build trust across different identities and opinions, and facilitate hard conversations. Announcements for these events will come in the Campus Memo and will continue throughout the semester. 

I am also grateful to the College’s outstanding emergency response team as its members kept us informed and prepared to adapt to hourly changes in the weather as we’ve faced Iowa’s winter storms. I speak to our collective thanks for the intrepid and hard-working team from facilities management, campus safety, and dining services.  They came to work in challenging conditions to take care of the students who stayed on campus over winter break and those who returned early. 

As we enter this election year, I invite your engagement with the Rosenfield Program and its many partners at Grinnell who help students differentiate politics from policy, address important issues, and bring the world to Grinnell in the form of distinguished scholars, public servants, and commentators. I hope that you will be able to attend Friday’s event to hear from Alan Page, retired Minnesota State Supreme Court Judge and former professional football player, on the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  

Our community is mourning the death of Professor Emerita Johanna Meehan on Monday, Jan. 8. Professor Meehan, who had been at Grinnell College since 1990, was the McCay-Casady Professor of Humanities and Professor of Philosophy for many years and served on the advisory board for the Center for Humanities. She had transitioned to senior faculty status last year. Professor Meehan was an eminent philosopher and beloved teacher whose loss will be deeply felt. I ask that you keep Johanna and her family and friends in your thoughts. We will share further information about plans for the College and Professor Meehan’s colleagues and students to honor her and commemorate her work as these emerge. 

Now that we are back together as a community, my wish for you is that you may all connect with people and activities that inspire, fortify, and replenish you.  I hope that you both experience and provide empathy as a member of the Grinnell College community.  Take care of yourselves, take care of your friends, and have a great semester. 

Sincerely, 

Anne 

Anne F. Harris 
President