REFLECTIONS ON THE ST. LAWRENCE VISION AND THE RESULTS ACHIEVED
THROUGH CAMPAIGN ST. LAWRENCE
Remarks by E.B. Wilson'53
Chairman Emeritus, St. Lawrence University Board of Trustees
February 21, 2003
We are here to celebrate a magnificent achievement, the
completion of . But in many ways this is and should be a larger celebration,
a celebration that pays tribute not just to but to the campaign as
the catalyst for an inspiring and still evolving vision of St. Lawrence
as a renewed, re-energized and transformed institution of higher education.
HOW THE VISION EVOLVED.
The perception I offer this evening is that our vision,
how we viewed and planned for the future, did indeed evolve through
at least three distinct phases. Let me describe them briefly. I think
you will find interesting and compelling this story of the progression
of our vision as the history of unfolded.
PHASE I: TENTATIVE FIRST STEPS.
First we experienced what I can best label as our "Tentative
First Steps." We had no institutional history of intensive, focused,
comprehensive campaigns. We knew there was much to be accomplished
for St. Lawrence. But since there was no history we had few skills
nor institutional habits of connecting a vision of the future with
the critically important supporting requirements of capital. We were
the clinical example that proved the adage: "when you don't know
where you are going, any road will take you there!" We received
expert advice that campaign expectations that exceeded $50 million
risked putting us on the edge of a campaign failure because the Laurentian
community "just didn't have the capacity for dedicated and inspired
philanthropy."
PHASE II: GATHERING STRENGTH.
We survived those early tentative days and moved on to
the second phase that I now call "Gathering Strength." We
were beginning to see more clearly the vision of the future. To understand
in a systemic way how all of the pieces might fit together: the dramatic
enrichment of student co-curricular life symbolized best by the unfolding
plans for the athletic facilities; the ratcheting up of student intellectual
fulfillment through programs, faculty endowments and new and renovated
academic facilities; and how all of this could be linked to the mission
of St. Lawrence that dedicates us to attracting an ever increasing
population of students with high intellectual promise and purpose.
This was not an easy phase. There were bumps in the road.
There were temporary but very serious doubts whether the business model …the
mundane details of how we pay for things… would work in ways that
supported or even permitted achievement of the rapidly unfolding vision
of the academic model. How well I recall the planning retreat …trustees,
President Sullivan, senior staff, faculty delegates, student delegates…all
gathered together to struggle with these issues. We concluded with
a quiet declaration: we are moving forward, moving forward with the
vision of the future and with … we are "not going to blink." Our
strength was gathering, the vision was becoming clearer but in many
ways our St. Lawrence hearts were running ahead of our fiduciary heads.
PHASE III: RATIONAL EXUBERANCE.
But our confidence was growing and the campaign dollars
were accelerating. We blew through the first "impossible" goal
of $75 million and declared that we were going for the unprecedented "super
impossible" objective of $130 million. We were in phase three
that I now call the phase of "Rational Exuberance." (Note
that I distinguish from that much different national context of "Irrational
Exuberance"). Phase three was rational because in it we could
begin to see in a multitude of tangible and intangible ways the vision
as it started to come together. Of course the buildings were going
up and the campus was being physically transformed, programs were developed
and announced and our enrollment strategies were indeed bringing students
of high purpose and intellectual promise. But there was something else
happening that needs to be recorded here. It is that there was and
is a palpable feeling that a governance team had coalesced. Under presidential
leadership, trustees, faculty, staff and students were linked together,
pulling in the same direction to create the St. Lawrence of the future.
This had not been anticipated as a visionary outcome at the beginning
of . But it might well be one of the most important legacies to celebrate
about . I am reminded of the theme of that wonderful small volume The
Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell that I know has received much attention
on this and other campuses. I think that the governance team that has
emerged from proves the thesis of the "Law of the few." That
a small number of dedicated people, those in this room tonight, had
the will and the capacity to "tip" St. Lawrence into its
magnificent future.
CELEBRATNG AN INSTIUTIONAL TRANSFORMATION.
And so the three visionary phases of …"Tentative
First Steps, Gathering Strength and Rational Exuberance"…bring
us to this celebration this evening. has been a catalyst for visionary
change. It has been a catalyst for institutional transformation. Transformation
that should be celebrated for these reasons:
First, the physical transformation of the campus is visually
dramatic and competitively challenging.
Second, the intellectual transformation is exciting to
witness. The internal debate now is about how to bring even greater
rigor to a student body, to find ways to implement the next cycle up
in the quality of teaching and learning. We have a vision of mentoring
students to responsible adulthood as a critical component of an educational
experience that pursues excellence.
Lastly, we have not talked much about a third accomplishment,
a psychological even a spiritual transformation. We have developed
the self-confidence and the habits of visualizing the possible and
even the impossible…and making them happen!
What a campaign this has been! The evolving vision and the results achieved
are absolutely breathtaking. It is indisputable that has been a catalyst of
historic transformation for this great and venerable academy of learning.
The nineteenth century Irish poet Arthur O'Shaughnessy,
in an ode about the movements of history, wrote: "each age is
both a dream that is dying, /And one that is coming to birth." There
is a sense here tonight not of dying but of leaving things behind…and
there is the glorious feeling that indeed there is a coming to birth
of a new age of St. Lawrence.
has been a great run. Thank you for running with us.
And thank you for listening to my reflections.
