Dear everyone,

The community of people who make up Hamline University is always changing. Each entrance and exit alters the place as much as it alters the person passing through. With changes in university leadership, staff and faculty, Hamline and its newest graduates are both facing a daunting moment of transition. Through many conversations with stakeholders around campus, The Oracle has set out to share a glimpse of the legacy and identity being built right now, in the last of our editorial contributions.
This issue aims to document the current complexities of Hamline for the living archive in a comprehensive way that causes questions and solutions for how to move forward as an institution, a business and as a community member in this humbling period of transition.
It may only become that to us, of course, because each interpretation of the story we tell will be different. Our goal is not to draw your conclusions but to provide you with some context of this university. On our small campus, the “silos” that divide us and disrupt transparency have led to miscommunications and misunderstandings, opportunities to point fingers and subvert accountability.
In this transitional period in which entire administrative positions are being renegotiated, there are interim administrators at the highest levels of leadership and Hamline students themselves are actively protesting for financial disclosure and transparency from the Board of Trustees, it appears that collaboration could be what is needed most.
Whatever the takeaway of our readership, the takeaway of this editorial team is a humbled and resigned appreciation for this flawed and beautiful community. “Hamline” at face value represents a school; a complete and singular entity. In reality, it is a web that precariously relies on each member of this community to serve a role, and whether that role is carefully designed or carved by routine, this system holds us together. The reliance on set procedures, however, allows for stagnation. No threat of death means no evolution, unless it is demanded. As this is written, some students are demanding one version of evolution from the university, and throughout history, Hamline’s evolution has relied on students to demand change. That is the role of the student in all of higher education, the only member of the community that exists in continuous evolution by definition.
And at the same time, everyone in higher education has returned to the world of learning to never leave; lifelong learners are the faculty in our classrooms, the administrators in Old Main. What a gift the university campus gives everyone, as a place to safely disagree, to be wrong and be offered grace, to learn and lash out and be asked to tend to the wounds you cause. When a community commits itself to care in the way that we have seen Hamline struggle and succeed at in the past two years, that is when our vulnerability becomes a connection. That is when we start to reach each other with our values.
This is not a demand for anything, nor a request, but hopefully a gift. A gift of gratitude and grace for everything this university has provided us. Not all gifts are flattering, but not all criticisms are disparaging. Calling attention to weakness is a crucial part of strengthening. We have strong pillars of foundation within our neighborhood and our campus that emanate joy and beauty. With deliberate intentions to celebrate what we do well, we must also appreciate our failures. Shame for failure destroys the ability to absorb the lesson of the failure. There is no shame or celebration in journalism, there is only what is. It is up to this community to take what is and create what can be.

With love and respect,

The Editorial Board