PRESIDENT’S ESSAY

PHOTO CREDITS: INSET TOP LEFT, ALAN STOREY; REMAINING PHOTOS BY PAUL O’MARA

In this regard, Berry is akin to the nation’s another. As they live in close proximity – Berry’s choice to be a residential college top liberal arts institutions. These institutions sharing rooms and bathrooms and meals – has several practical implications. It points in are deliberately residential because they students adapt and bend and understand. part to things we are not likely to pursue understand that the most powerful forms of For a good number of our students, it is the strategically as an institution: extensive part- undergraduate learning occur when students first time they have had to share a bedroom. time undergraduate programs, distance- are immersed in an experience. Such Given a choice, many of them would learning programs or multiple “branch” Dr. Stephen R. Briggs opportunities might involve a research probably prefer not to share, but the life campuses. It points also to the kinds of tutorial with a professor in a laboratory, a lessons learned and friendships that emerge things we are likely to emphasize leadership experience with a campus would not be the same without this close strategically and through resource allocation. organization or a study abroad experience proximity. Living together tests their capacity Thus, in recent years, we have invested in living with a family in an unfamiliar culture. to be civil and courteous, to work through continuing improvements to the residential In-depth learning has little to do with sitting differences and disagreements, and to act on character of the campus: the Cage Athletic in a lecture hall; it has much to do with behalf of someone else’s needs. and Recreation Center; residence hall investing fully in a project and making it Second, students come to lead the renovations and the addition of Morgan and one’s own. community over time, helping shape and Deerfield halls; the expansion of the COLLEGE OR UNIVERSITY Among the nation’s top 50 liberal arts define it. New students benefit from and Krannert dining and event spaces; What’s in a name institutions (including Williams College, enjoy the warmth and generosity of a improvement of campus walkways and Amherst College and Davidson College), community that is created for them. As bikeways; and the creation of gathering spots ? more than 80 percent use the term college to seniors, these same students are responsible such as Kilpatrick Commons and the I AM ASKED QUITE REGULARLY WHETHER Johns Hopkins University was founded in reality is that many institutions combine signify their commitment to excellence in to and for this community – they have the hammock zones. Our goal is to ensure that BERRY IS PLANNING TO BECOME A UNIVERSITY. the model of a Germanic university with a elements of both: There are small research undergraduate education. In the case of privilege and opportunity to create anew a Berry is a wonderful home, a place that is as Sometimes the question is posed in terms of focus on research specializations and the institutions with a strong residential and those using the university label, several have warm and welcoming environment for inspiring today and tomorrow as it was 80 whether Berry is qualified to be a university. scientific discovery of new knowledge. Johns undergraduate focus, and there are professional programs that complement their entering students. Seniors sometimes yearn years ago when the Ford Complex and the These inquiries reflect honest confusion Hopkins became the first university to teach comprehensive teaching institutions that are undergraduate emphasis: for example, to be independent; they appropriately want Normandy barns were constructed. about what it means to be a university or a through seminars rather than lectures and to decentralized and largely non-residential. Washington and Lee University (law) and to take on more of their own affairs. Yet, this In the last four years, Berry has increased college. The simple truth is that institutions offer undergraduate majors rather than a The matter is further complicated by Sewanee – The University of the South desire for increased independence can also its residential capacity from 76 percent to 86 today are more or less free to choose their purely liberal arts curriculum. Many research additional models, including community (theology). Interestingly, several nationally be fundamentally self-centered and percent. We are now in the process of own label. The choice is one that relates to universities now emphasize graduate colleges, technical schools and for-profit ranked doctoral-granting institutions have disengaging. An important lesson of the determining whether to increase this goal to core identity. education more than undergraduate institutions. As a result, college and retained the name college, presumably to heart is to recognize our responsibility to 95 percent, a target that is consistent with Historically, there are two differentiating education. This focus is true even for an university have become interchangeable convey the lasting importance of under - sustain and improve the community in which other top liberal arts colleges. The president’s factors between colleges and universities: the institution such as Harvard; only one-third of terms in many ways. graduate education at these institutions, we live. Engaging in one’s community as a cabinet recently visited three other highly emphasis on undergraduate teaching versus its current students are undergraduates – the Berry could choose to adopt the label of including the College of William and Mary, leader, whether informally or formally, is a regarded colleges to review their residential advanced research and the importance of a other two-thirds are pursuing graduate or university at any time. We have accredited Dartmouth College and Boston College great lesson for life and one that can be master plans. Given continued strong residential learning community. America’s professional degrees. graduate programs and separate schools for (which was chartered as a university). learned practically in the senior year. enrollment patterns, we will need to decide earliest colleges were founded as residential Today, we can point to superb examples business and education, so we could do so Berry chooses to be called a college, Finally, Berry’s residential community in the coming year whether to add additional colleges in the model of England’s Oxford of both types of institutions. U.S. News and quite legitimately. Across the country, other thereby affirming our core identity and provides the context for its extraordinary residential facilities, especially for our senior- and Cambridge universities. Thus, New World Report provides separate categories less established schools use the university committing ourselves to excellence in Work Experience Program. In its early years, year students. We are actively studying College (now Harvard University), the College and rankings for national research label, presumably because they believe it residential undergraduate education. The Berry operated as a self-sustaining options relating to the type and location of of William and Mary, and the Collegiate universities and national liberal arts colleges. positions them beneficially. idea of a learning community is critical to community as much as possible. Although these residential units. School (now Yale University) began as small One model is not superior to the other; these Berry’s identity, however, is defined in Berry in that it provides the context (the the world has changed in the ensuing Residential colleges offer the pinnacle of learning communities in which students were two models of excellence have distinctive large part by its residential nature and living laboratory) for a firsthand education. century, there remains something attractive undergraduate education in the nation. Berry housed and fed and instructed by residential purposes and emphases. The prototypical setting. We date our founding to 1902 when Campus life is integral to, not separate from, and ambitious about this model. Thus, Berry represents this tradition in the state of tutors. Other residential colleges gradually research university focuses on doctoral and Martha Berry deeded over part of her the educa tional experience. The living- once again is highlighting ways in which Georgia and for students in this region of the emerged throughout the colonies. professional programs and is often a large, inheritance to create a residential campus learning community provides lessons not students can contribute directly and country who seek a national-caliber Over time, some of these institutions dispersed, decentralized enterprise, whether that superseded her day schools. She made only for the head, but also equally for the meaningfully to the operations of the college, education. Berry’s residential nature is part added doctoral and professional programs as state-supported or independent. The proto- this high-risk, “all in” decision because she hands and heart. including opportunities to use the college’s of what sets us apart. We expect students to they evolved into more complex institutions. typical liberal arts college emphasizes recognized the power of a residential Consider three ways in which this living- extensive campus assets to generate funds be active participants in the life of the Harvard was officially recognized as a undergraduate education in the context of a learning community. Berry’s exceptional learning community promotes engagement that will support the educational enterprise. college, and we are committed to a university in 1780 at about the time it small, focused, residential learning community. campus with its multiple residential settings and service. First, when students enter the The robustness of the Work Experience residential community that facilitates that opened a medical school. In 1876, however, Although these two models can be reflects the value we have long placed on the college community together, they form class Program is rooted in Berry being a living- expectation. Make no mistake, we are proud a more radical change occurred when The distinguished in their purest forms, the living-learning experience. bonds as they learn from and with one learning community. to be called Berry College. B

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