Bryce Comstock with his new boss, Congresswoman Cathy McMorris Rodgers in Washington, D.C.

By Bryce Comstock (’12)

The year 2011 was special for me. That January I attended the inauguration of a family friend as county auditor, with Secretary of State Sam Reed doing the honors. That spring I also attended an EU studies conference in California, where I presented my first academic paper. Both of these events would become turning points in my young life. These events cemented my dedication to politics, but also posited a unique conflict I still struggle with: Do I want to study political science or take part in the subject matter?

This past June I had the pleasure of going on a study tour to Brussels to examine the institutions of the European Union and NATO. From the initial EU conference in 2011, I met academics and students immersed in various EU subject matters. I also discovered an area of EU studies that that captured my intellectual curiosity. I wondered how diplomats react when they face sometimes conflicting demands – in this case, from their EU peers and their home government. I turned this curiosity into an independent research project my senior year. I started with a broad research question that I chiseled at between essays while studying at Oxford University. I woke up early during winter break to review literature on the subject. Finally, during spring semester, I wrote academics from various universities to get advice on how to approach the subject. Ultimately, I interviewed various EU ambassadors by email to find evidence for my hypothesis. After going to the EU conference earlier, I was determined to go back my senior year and win the top prize, an all-expenses paid study trip. At the 2012 conference, my senior study was determined to be among the best, and in recognition of that I was awarded a seat on the EU trip.

Three months later, I flew from SeaTac to Brussels via New York, and I met up with the three others from the California conference also going on the EU study tour. They have become great friends and professional connections.

I got a chance to explore the European capital with new friends. But the most memorable parts of my journey included talking with officials and ambassadors. While they often faced difficult identity issues of being officials of both the EU and their home countries, they shared an incredible sense of purpose. Whether visiting the new External Action Service (the diplomatic arm of the EU) or the U.S. representative to NATO, I took advantage of an opportunity to see what being an international diplomat is actually like. This led me to lean towards a career in public service, instead of academia.

Last fall, I spent some time working for Thurston County Auditor Kim Wyman, who was then running for election as secretary of state. I had volunteered for her campaign before my June trip and was thrilled to have her offer me a job as her executive assistant at the county. It was the perfect entry into a public service career. Wyman won the election. And yet, changes can come so quickly. In late February I arrived in Washington, D.C., for the chance to work with U.S. Representative Cathy McMorris Rodgers.

None of this would have happened without support from Gonzaga. For two years, Gonzaga paid for me to attend conferences which helped me develop academic contacts and experience necessary for my thesis. Gonzaga also gave me the opportunity to study abroad, which further continued my intellectual progress. Finally, and most importantly, the political science faculty at Gonzaga provided more guidance, support, and challenge than I ever could have hoped for. In particular, Professor Robert Waterman and Associate Professor Laura Brunell always went to bat for me when I needed resources for projects or an intellectual ear to bounce ideas off. Assistant Professor Stacy Taninchev acted as adviser for my independent study, giving me materials to read, blunt critiques, and advice on where to go next with my project.

I have been lucky and blessed to have attended Gonzaga. I received a scholarship from both the school and alumni that made college affordable. I received academic and job search support from my department and the career center. I got funding to study abroad and to attend conferences across the nation. Most importantly, Gonzaga gave me the opportunity to give back through CCASL programs and to engage in reflection to formulate my moral self. I used these experiences to craft who I am and where I want to go, and I know that because of Gonzaga, I am in a unique position to pursue my passion for public service.

Click here to view the embedded video.

(The editor apologizes for misspelling Lauren Joplin’s name in the print version of Gonzaga Magazine’s spring issue.)

Franziska “Sissi” Koehler (’16) and Travis Johnsen (’13)

ACES & EAGLES, INDOOR TENNIS AND GOLF BY 2014

Construction of a $7 million indoor tennis-golf center will transform Gonzaga’s men’s and women’s golf and tennis varsity programs. With six tennis courts and an indoor golf practice facility, the center will undergo construction this spring. Its site, the Legacy Field, is south of Spokane’s Mission Park and west of the Spokane River.

“The entire estimated project cost has been committed by generous donors,” said Chris Standiford, senior associate athletic director. Fundraising continues on an endowment to cover the facility’s operation costs. The center should open in time for the 2014 spring season. All four coaches sound ecstatic at the prospect.

“With this facility, we will be able to apply to host national events,” said men’s tennis Coach Peter MacDonald. “Teams from Stanford and UW will be able to come here to compete. It will be a big selling point for recruits.”

“The new indoor center will allow student athletes to practice 365 days a year.” – Chris Standiford

“It is indescribable how much it will change our program,” said women’s tennis Coach D.J. Gurule. “It will positively affect everything we do.”

“Five years ago,” said Coach Brad Rickel, “women’s golf at Gonzaga ranked about 200th in the country. We are now ranked about 50th. So we’ve built it forward. As you can tell on a day like today” – mid-February snow was bucketing down – “this center will be awfully nice.”

Robert Gray, men’s golf coach, said, “To practice putting and chipping during the winter months and to better simulate outdoor golf will be fantastic. Showing recruits they can work on all facets of their game – and have a place to call home – brings us closer to a level playing field.

With our championship season in the spring, it’s important to be as prepared as possible coming out of the winter.”

“The new indoor center will allow our student athletes to practice 365 days a year,” Standiford said. “And the greatest win for our students? They will be able to practice according to their academic schedules.” Webcams on each tennis court will allow parents to watch their student play live matches. The center also will offer state-of-the-art golf simulators, locker rooms and offices, as well as balcony seating overlooking the tennis courts.

Franziska “Sissi” Koehler (’16), psychology

The story: In Koehler’s native Germany, there are no college sports. So when it comes time for university, serious athletes have to make a decision: Stay close to home and try to find a club team, or travel halfway around the world to pursue their passion while getting an education? Koehler, didn’t think twice. After meeting D.J. Gurule, head coach of the women’s tennis, she enrolled at Gonzaga sight unseen.

In school: In Germany, university students attend lectures and take tests – there is no homework. So, in her first week, Koehler didn’t do any. “It was very diffi cult for me because I was behind.“ She said “Studying and being an athlete is much harder than I thought.” As her English has improved and she’s settled into life at GU, Koehler feels confident in both roles. “Now I know how it works and I know I can handle it better.” Koehler hopes to teach high school English in Germany.

On the court: Even tennis isn’t the same here as the sport Koehler has played most of her life. For one thing, tennis is played on clay in Germany, allowing players to slide. Having never played on a hardcourt before, Koehler had to put in extra practice just to move quickly on the concrete. The other biggest difference, the importance of doubles play, was a huge factor in Koehler’s decision to play in America. “In Germany, it’s all about singles. It’s a very individual sport – all about you, you, you. I love being on a team, you can push each other.”

With the team: Koehler enjoys the strong bond shared by her teammates. “Other teams, they do homework while their teammates are playing or they play on their iPhones. We pay attention to our teammates. That makes me really happy to be on this team.”

Travis Johnsen (’13), business

The story: His grandfather was a successful amateur golfer, and Johnsen remembers chipping golf balls into buckets in the backyard as a little kid. When he hit middle school, he took the sport more seriously and realized he might become good enough to play in college. A few years later, Johnsen met a GU player at a summer tournament. As he learned about the school, the tight-knit community and, yes, the basketball team, he knew this was where he wanted to be. Gonzaga was the only school he applied to.

In the classroom: “You miss five Monday/Tuesdays every semester. That’s a ton of classes, and it’s hard to keep track of what you’re missing. This semester I’m focusing more on school, but I’ve defi nitely had to learn to balance the two.” Johnsen puts in 30-plus hours a week of practice and conditioning.

On the course: Johnsen is captain of the six-man team. “I want to set a good example,” he said. “The freshman thinks I don’t like him. Which isn’t true, he’s a great kid. But I’m not going to beat around the bush when it comes to practice. He’ll learn that I’m only trying to make us better.”

In the community: Johnsen has gotten the most out of college by throwing himself into activities. He has type one diabetes; it has never slowed his ability to compete but inspires him to work towards a cure. Last summer, he volunteered with the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, and he hopes to work for Providence Health Care Systems.

“You’ll recognize me. I’ll be the oldest one there,” Betty Horak reassured me on the phone. We met in the Crosby Student Center, and she was right. In a sea of college students cramming for finals, Betty was easy to spot. She also will stand out when, at age 88, she receives her diploma in May at the Spokane Arena, 70 years after graduating from high school. By all accounts, she is the oldest individual to earn her bachelor’s degree from Gonzaga.

When Horak was young, women didn’t have a lot of options. Most jobs were reserved for men in the Great Depression.

“When I grew up, if you did go to college you became a nurse or a schoolteacher,” she explained. “Otherwise you became a beautician or an office worker. Or if you didn’t get that far you scrubbed somebody else’s floors. That’s no fun. If you were female and you had a job, if you got married you lost your job, so a man could have it to support a family. Now you girls can be doctors, you can be lawyers, you can go into politics, you can do anything you darn well please, and I think that’s wonderful.”

Horak has always lived in Spokane and she did what was expected, marrying a Marine, “Tex,” who came home from World War II. He attended Gonzaga on the G.I. Bill, and they raised two daughters, sending their youngest, Patty, to Gonzaga, too. For 43 years, Horak worked as the office manager for the Long Lake Lumber Company.

Upon retirement, though, Horak decided to do all the things she didn’t have time or resources for when she was young. She took ballet lessons at 70 and voice lessons at 75. She taught herself to swim – she had never learned because her mother had been afraid of water. And in 1998, she enrolled at Gonzaga. Since then, she’s taken time off for illness and to care for dying friends. In recent years, she’s taken just one class a semester, because she wants to enjoy her time at school and focus on each class to allow herself to really and truly learn. Her undergraduate degree has taken 14 years, but she has made it.

“Everyone says that’s perseverance,” she jokes. “I say my husband would have called it bull headedness.” That stubbornness serves her well in the classroom, where Horak, a history major, proved herself a strong student.

“She’s always ready, always on time, always dressed nicely. Life was not given to her on a silver platter,” explained Fr. Michael Maher, S.J., professor of history, who has taught Horak in several courses. She does every bit of the reading for each class, and often provides unusual insight, especially in courses focused on the 20th century.

“Sometimes I read things in our textbooks, and I think, ‘That’s just wrong,’ ” she said. “They talk about Roosevelt’s WPA” – the Works Progress Administration – “and the CCC” – the Civilian Conservation Corps – “and they say that was a giveaway era. Those men worked hard and earned their money and held their heads up high. When I heard that, I had to speak up.”

“It’s good to have a more diverse group of people, especially in a history class,” said senior Stephen Barbarossa, who took Maher’s class with Horak. “She can remember how events were perceived when they occurred, not just what happened. She provides a cultural perspective that we can’t.”

“I’ve lived through a lot,” Horak said. “And I’ve enjoyed every part of my life. I don’t mind being old, it’s really kind of nice. There are so many things I understand better now – and things that were so important when I was young, who cares now? It’s really great. I hate to see anyone scared to get older. Don’t fight it. You can do anything you want, no matter how old you are.”

COURAGE, TODAY: A Global Education for the 21st Century

By Marny Lombard

Today, we live and learn in a radically different landscape. No longer is Gonzaga’s grasp, or even its reach, contained within “the 509,” as the young people say. Our community, the Gonzaga community, has gone global. Digital communication, international politics, economic competition and a rising tide of desire for better lives around the globe make this so. Climate change makes this so. Social justice issues in Africa and many other places on earth make this so.

Gonzaga’s mission and anchoring values remain unchanged. Our Jesuit, Catholic heritage guides us to pursue the service of faith that promotes justice, the creation of women and men for others, and the search for Truth. The liberal arts – ageless, essential and among the formative building blocks that underpin Western civilization – will always uphold Gonzaga’s foundation. Respect for human dignity and the strength of Gonzaga’s community remain central to the University. However, as we begin in this anniversary year to re-imagine
Gonzaga’s future, discussions with President Thayne McCulloh, Academic Vice President Patricia O’Connell Killen and others bring to the fore significant ideas:

• Global engagement, including intercultural fluency matters deeply, because the world is Gonzaga’s community.
• A new level of academic excellence is indispensable, due to the challenges facing our nation and world.
• Interdisciplinary learning will allow Gonzaga graduates to maneuver nimbly among varied modes of thinking and veins of knowledge.
• Learning through internships and other experiences in the real world is called for by Ignatian pedagogy and is keenly desired by today’s employers.
• Digital competence means analyzing and creating with technology, not simply consuming it.
• Sustainability, a priority of faith-filled stewardship, requires our best thinking and most ardent teaching and learning.

Gonzaga’s new Center for Global Engagement animates the University’s development of a deeply thoughtful international and intercultural education. “Within the next five years, a student who matriculates at Gonzaga will have expanded opportunities for global engagement – from the inclusion of texts and examples from other parts of the world in courses, to study abroad and international service learning, to student-faculty research carried out by international teams seeking to understand and often to solve real issues,” Killen said.

“Florence will remain our cultural and spiritual background – that is supremely appropriate for us as a Jesuit university. But the world has changed. If you are a cutting-edge State Department foreign service offi cer today, you’re going to China, to Israel, to Jordan and other places. I think that’s a big ‘tell’ about where else Gonzaga should be going.” Richard Menard, director of Study Abroad

Last spring a faculty task force on campus internationalization developed a cultures-across-the-curriculum initiative. One of the outcomes of this initiative will be a growth in intercultural fluency. “As more students study abroad, as more international students enroll at Gonzaga, and as the student population at Gonzaga’s home campus becomes more diverse, the value of intercultural fluency will no longer be questioned: To be effective in the private, public and nonprofit sectors will require it as a matter of course,” Killen added.

Today’s technology already allows the collapse of geography. GU’s Virtual Campus, which now supports the university’s hybrid graduate programs, will grow into a resource center that will serve all academic programs which desire support for technologically enabled learning.

Some international opportunities will always involve students with boots on the ground. The School of Education, for instance, requires its students in Florence to spend 30-60 hours observing in international schools. Students tell education Dean Jon Sunderland that this is extraordinarily valuable – learning how a different culture influences a teacher’s work in a classroom, and about the International
Baccalaureate teaching program.

Gonzaga expects to see fully half of its students earn academic credit through study abroad programs; and we are very nearly there, with approximately 40 percent of GU students already choosing study abroad experience. Important facets of a stronger GU study abroad program include the need for scholarship funds to ensure that all students can participate. Most importantly, said Richard Menard, director of GU’s Study Abroad Offi ce, programming overseas must lead our students to unplug themselves from their electronic tethers and to engage deeply with the culture and people around them.

Overall, three trends are converging to create excitement and energy around our students’ educational experience, Killen says. “The first is growing attention across all disciplines and professions in universities to how learning actually occurs and to using that knowledge to compose more effective learning contexts for students.”

AUDACITY: Education informed by innovation

The second is the explosion of new technological tools that have the potential to be employed to enrich and improve pedagogy and to relieve faculty of routine work so that they can spend more time with students on those discussions, activities and apprenticeships
for which face-to-face interaction is invaluable. The third is a growing global consciousness – that higher education worth the name has to be infused with global perspectives.”

As well, academic excellence in the 21st century must involve the intelligent cultivation of innovation, creativity and imagination. Sir Ken Robinson, who visited Gonzaga in October, provides definitions of these three terms. He describes imagination as “the ability to bring to mind events and ideas that are not present to our senses.” Creativity is “the process of having original ideas that have value.” And innovation is “the process of putting original ideas into practice.”

“In our time, in our world, and in the face of the rapidly changing economic, social and political contexts in which we live, imagination, creativity and innovation are critical to creating a livable future,” Killen said.

Another catch phrase heard often today is experiential learning. “But all learning is experiential,” Killen said. “The emphasis on the ‘experiential’ in ‘experiential learning’ is a short-hand way of focusing attention on the need to connect what students are thinking, feeling and doing to the disciplinary material they are studying. It is easy to memorize and regurgitate. It is much harder to take the concepts,
theories and procedures of a discipline and know when and how to deploy them to better understand an event or to seek a solution to a problem. The experiential learning movement pushes faculty to reverse their thinking on how to compose the learning environment – starting with students’ experience and building bridges of connection to disciplinary material.”

Investing in faculty development and hiring the best young faculty nationwide will pay dividends. The creation of additional endowed funds make such investments possible. Student research – more experiential learning – is increasingly integrated into Gonzaga’s academic work, and is burgeoning, particularly in the sciences, engineering and computer science, and also in the social sciences and humanities.

“Disciplines aren’t going away. They remain a durable way to organize on-going communities of scholars and teachers who focus on a set of questions or problems. At the same time, interdisciplinary coursework will become more common in the future. Why? Because bringing the methods, concepts, theories and practices of multiple fields to questions of meaning contemplated in the humanities or to real
social problems has the potential to create richer, more complex, more close to real life learning situations,” Killen said.

As we imagine, discuss and plan for an education for Gonzaga’s future, deans and faculty raise intriguing questions: How might we infuse the richness of thinking in the liberal arts into business management classes? How might a course in interdisciplinary performing arts benefit students in engineering? How might teamwork be taught as an identifiable set of skills?

“Engineering and, increasingly, computer science are by their nature interdisciplinary. Few engineering or computer science projects are completed without interaction among the engineering disciplines and, quite often, interaction with the business, legal and social-science professions,” said Dean Steve Silliman of the School of Engineering and Applied Science. In this regard, the school is looking to build on the success of the Center for Engineering Design and Entrepreneurship and projects funded through the KEEN (Kern Entrepreneurship Education Network) initiative. “Over the coming five years, engineering and computer science students will be encouraged as early as their freshman year to participate on team projects involving each of the engineering disciplines, as well as the possibility to work with students from the natural sciences, business, the social sciences, and law. We expect to see other such developments evolve across campus.”

“I would like to find a political science professor to sit in on my business class for a semester. Then, I would ask: You tell me the 10 different ways you could enrich my class. And we will figure out how to do that collaboratively. We, in Jepson, have to find a way to take advantage of the greatness in Gonzaga’s College of Arts and Sciences.” Ken Anderson, associate dean of the School of Business Administration

Ignatius of Loyola used the phrase “living with one foot raised” to describe the readiness of early Jesuits to go where God needed them. We still do this at Gonzaga today, although technology has supplanted foot traffic. “Technologies are tools, not solutions in and of themselves to any problem. Wide experimentation is under way on the use of communication technologies – blogs, electronic portfolios, twitter, and more to construct learning environments. New technologies will provide students tutorials, self-paced learning through problem sets, review and recitation sessions, multiple modes of presenting material and more. Through networks of universities, technology will give students access to faculty from around the world and the opportunity to interact with students from around the world,” Killen said.

Digital media literacy is emerging alongside speech and writing as a basic communications skill, and must be taught as such. In five years, mobile devices such as smart phones and e-readers may become more integrated into academic libraries, replacing laptops/desktops as students’ primary research hardware.

The changes in a Gonzaga education tomorrow will be significant, said President Thayne McCulloh, because our world and our era demand this.

“We live on a planet that only ten years ago had one billion fewer people,” McCulloh said. “The impact of mass scale resource consumption, coupled with growing awareness of its impact on the environment, creates opportunities for solution-building of a kind never before imagined.

“We are a university called to live and learn and teach and explore not comfortably at the center of the culture, but at the frontiers – the cutting edge, the margins, places that require courage. Our world needs educated people who can and will transform the world. By working together, we can meet these challenges.”

PORTAL ON THE WORLD: A new University Center

The University Center, a proposed major new building, will help to propel Gonzaga’s transformation. Academic, student development,
and social and faith components will join together under one roof – in what cannot help but become the new heart of the campus. In addition, the building’s sustainability attributes will create a learning laboratory.

Now under design, the center will replace the COG and its parking lot. Built in 1953, the COG – Circulum Omnium Gonzagorum – has served Gonzaga students well. The new center’s approval and construction depend on successful fundraising efforts.

If fund-raising work is successful and if the Trustees give their approval in April, construction will begin this summer. This spring, the University will complete a new four-story parking garage with a retail center on its ground floor – space that will house an interim dining hall, during the new center’s construction. The city of Spokane required new parking as a condition of pursuing the University Center. The garage itself is funded partly through benefaction.

At this new heart of the campus, students will engage with each another and their professors. Imagine a series of flexible spaces, studios or tinker boxes for research partners, spaces intimate or spacious, for groups large and small, formal and informal, to discuss, perform, reflect, converse and make community. Spaces to enjoy the arts. Places to watch and learn. Conference spaces. University Ministry and a multi-faith reflection space. A window on the world; a global portal on campus. A magnet for students and faculty alike.

Tomorrow’s technology will animate the University Center, streaming life and learning from across the world. Interactive global learning will be an integral part of Gonzaga students’ daily experience. Digital media spaces will connect students to learning in and outside of classrooms, anywhere in the world. The learning and interactive capacities of the University Center will equal or exceed any of Gonzaga’s peer institutions.

“I want people to be surprised and delighted by this new University Center – by what they learn as they work with their peers and professors, as well as what the building itself has to teach them.” Thayne M. McCulloh, D.Phil., president

Those members of the campus community who have helped to research and to dream about the University Center say that it ought to provide space and technology that allow faculty and students to work on research; and to encourage faculty from differing disciplines to leave their silos and come together to spark on and plan the innovative courses of 20 years, 40 years from now.

The University Center, Foley Center and Crosby Center, arrayed on three sides of a quad, will emerge as a triumvirate serving many student needs. Co-curricular programs will locate in the new center. Non-traditional students and graduate students will find a home-away-from home at the center. Conference facilities will draw in the community, as well.

Foley Center will see significant changes. As the mastery of technical tools continues to grow in importance, the main floor and part of the lowest level of Foley will serve technology-enhanced learning. Foley will continue to house the faculty’s Center for Teaching and Advising, and the Writers Center. It also will house the teaching and learning tool of the ages – books. For humanities, said Foley Dean Eileen Bell-Garrison, books remain the gold standard.

MAKING THIS BUILDING HAPPEN

• Construction costs are projected at $51 million.
• Estimated 170,000 square feet spread over four levels.
• Large multi-purpose room or ballroom, with an 800-person capacity.
• A Global Commons with a central hearth will connect many major components of the building.
• Dining opportunities will include a two-level dining hall, a cafe and a pub. President McCulloh has spoken of his interest in a pub that will offer a place where responsible drinking habits can be modeled.
• The Center for Global Engagement and University Ministry will be located in close proximity, helping students to create their own connections among cultures, learning and faith.
• Student services including the Center for Community Action and Service-Learning, Gonzaga Outdoors and GSBA offices will locate in the center.
• New technology will make for rich learning opportunities.
• Advanced heating and cooling equipment will take advantage of the 56 degree aquifer underneath the site.
• The design-build team for the University Center includes Hoffman Construction, Opsis Architecture, both of Portland, Ore., and Bernardo-Wills Architects of Spokane. Spokane firms make up two-thirds of the sub-contractors.

Illustrations by David Clemons

Essential to Gonzaga’s DNA: Jesuit fortitude

We often talk about what Gonzaga University is doing. We speak rather less, however, about the why. Why did the town leaders of “Spokan Falls” write to the Jesuits and ask them to “build up a great university” and why did Father Cataldo agree? Why have we been able to keep this historically small, liberal arts-based institution going, despite facing significant adversity from time to time? And especially in this 125th anniversary year of honoring our tradition – why is this work so important today?

Invited by the Native Americans, the Jesuits arrived in this part of the world in the mid-1800s. Their mission was to bring the gospel to the Native American peoples. By the 1880s, the Jesuits were well known in the many hamlets created by miners, trappers and traders, and by people from the East who came looking for a better life. Looking back over 125 years and more, it is clear that the Jesuits manifested three distinctive characteristics:

First, they were men of deep faith, always attentive to the power of God moving through Creation and guided by their resolute belief in the message of Jesus Christ.

Editor’s note: This is a version of remarks given by President Thayne McCulloh on Sept. 17, 2012, the Historic First Day of classes.

Second, they were intellectuals – well-read, well-schooled and knowledgeable about many things, both beautiful and practical. They carried within themselves an essential thirst for learning, and always engaged in a search for truth. That desire led them to encounter others in an open manner, an experience that Jean-Pierre De Smet described, in his explanation of how the Jesuits entered into their ministry with the Coeur d’Alenes, as a “grafting” rather than an imposing.

And third, these Jesuits were tenacious – tough, courageous, insistent, persistent. They understood that things don’t get done simply because people wish them into existence.

The people of Spokan Falls understood that building up a successful city required an educated populace. In 1881 the town numbered only 350 white settlers. They needed people who could create law and establish order; architects and builders who could lay out subdivisions and design and construct homes and buildings; teachers who could instruct children how to read and write, how to do math and to understand something of their history. The people of Spokane needed doctors, and bankers, and soldiers and, as electricity finally made its way out to the West, the city needed linemen and electricians.

For their part, the Jesuits of the Rocky Mountain Mission understood the vital role that a Jesuit university could play in shaping not only the intellectual capabilities of the community, but its spiritual, moral, physical and psychological capabilities. Indeed, the results of this collaboration among the Jesuits and the people of Spokane is much in evidence today, for Gonzaga’s earliest graduates stepped forward and claimed the responsibility that accompanies the privilege of education.

The people of Spokan Falls were audacious enough to ask the Jesuits to build a university – a great university – and the Jesuits were courageous enough to do it. It is this gift – the gift of the spirit, of the mind, and of the heart – that we honor and celebrate in this 125th year.

President McCulloh continues: Over the past year, I have observed on a number of occasions the belief that we – our society, our nation – have moved through a major shift in how we view higher education. While there are many reasons for this change, it is indisputable that public support for traditional higher education is waning. National and local headlines alike question the value of a college education today.

“We must continue to meld the old and the new. Jesuit education has often been in the lead, even while rooting itself in old wisdom. This is a balancing act we will perform forever.” Blaine Garvin, professor and interim dean of the College of Arts and Sciences

The primary function of the classic, traditional, college experience in our society has been (borrowing the word from Harvard business Professor Clay Christensen) disrupted. No longer is the classic college model the only path to the middle class; no longer is “education” the sole province of a specific type of institution. For-profit, online, and accelerated programs are flourishing, offering access and flexibility for students in ways that would not have been possible even 10 years ago. At Gonzaga, we have been paying attention to this
transformation and developing our own capacities in view of it.

As a Jesuit, Catholic university we have so much to celebrate and so much to be thankful for – and yet we cannot help but wonder what the next 10, 25, or 125 years will hold for us. If we peek into the crystal ball, without question the age of information technology will continue to transform the ways in which so many professions define themselves, from robotic manufacturing to genome-based health interventions. As the human lifespan increases, so too do the complexities of life – new defi nitions of work and retirement, new understandings of the nuclear and extended family, new discoveries in healthcare. As people around the globe move quickly to master the knowledge created in other nations, we can expect dramatic shifts in global power, with new emphases for international relations and the languages required to successfully negotiate with foreign countries.

At the same time, our nation is filled with people whose situations have led them to give up on the idea that one person can make a significant difference – in a life, in an organization, or in the government. I do not believe the problem is apathy. I believe that many people are simply overwhelmed with the enormity of the challenges we face, and while they do not believe that they can make a real
difference, they pray that someone has the answers.

Our nation today – and our rapidly shrinking globe – are desperately in need of bright, creative individuals whose education provides them the capacities to wrestle with complex challenges; to offer leadership when and where it is needed; and to adapt to always changing environments. To effectively prepare our students, we must carefully re-examine the education that we offer, and we must ensure that each educational program at Gonzaga meets the needs and challenges of our time.

Further, I believe in providing our students the opportunity to learn how to create healthy, accountable communities, through the models provided by our campus residential experiences and service learning; by creating an environment in which students grow in appreciation of the significant role that faith can and does play in an individual’s life; and by challenging them with external experiences that mesh with
their studies, so that they more deeply appreciate the practical application of the knowledge they acquire at Gonzaga.

Beyond this, we must remember the words of Pope Paul VI, speaking to the 32nd General Congregation of the Society of Jesus: “Wherever in the Church, even in the most difficult and exposed fields, in the crossroads of ideologies, in the social trenches, there has been or is confrontation between the burning exigencies of humanity and the perennial message of the Gospel, there have been and are the Jesuits.” The 470-year history of the Society is fi lled with the stories of those who reach beyond the needs of the moment, those who go forth and engage the culture with a generous and courageous heart; and those who are resolute in their belief that one person cannot only make
a difference – one person can make all the difference.

What a gift we are given in our 125th anniversary. To us falls the sacred work of preparing our students – regardless of program, major or level – to act as a creative force for the common good in a world so desperately in need of leadership. The three characteristics which made the Jesuits attractive to the Spokan Falls of 1881 – faith, intellect and courage – remain the distinguishing characteristics of Gonzaga today.

Over the next seven years we will chart a course to continue making Gonzaga one of America’s distinguished Jesuit and Catholic universities. This will involve continued and deliberate increases in the rigor and academic excellence of the University. The single most important hallmark in this journey will remain our full-hearted embrace of the fundamental mission of the Society of Jesus – to transform our students into capable, loving individuals with the will and the courage to lead, regardless of their chosen life or profession.

Over Skype, John Horsman is a bit blurry, but this is the closest we can get to a face-to-face conversation.

Horsman lives in Lake Country, British Columbia, just a little north of Kelowna and a five hour drive from Spokane. He’s also a full-time Organizational Leadership professor for Gonzaga.

Most of Horsman’s classes are online, allowing him to teach students from all over the world without being on campus himself. Instead of lecturing in a classroom, he spends most of every day on his computer, preparing lessons, facilitating discussions and communicating with students. Online education is still evolving, but Horsman has complete faith in its potential.

“People can take one course at a time wherever they are,” he explained. “Our courses run for eight weeks, and we encourage students to take one at a time if they’re working. Not many people can stop mid-career, move their family to a university campus, and stay there for two years. I think there’s a tremendous market out there.”

Horsman certainly understands the importance of nontraditional education. He was 32 when he came to Gonzaga for undergraduate studies, after 13 years of farming and selling farm equipment in Saskatchewan.

“I sat in a room with 18-year-olds who were bright and knew the answers and I had to figure out how to read and write again, I hadn’t had to do that for years,” he said. “That’s profoundly influenced how I teach and the way I interact with students and my commitment to teaching them as adults.”

After a year of business school in Ontario, he decided the business world wasn’t where he belonged. Horsman went on to earn a Master’s in Organizational Leadership and a Doctorate in Leadership Studies, both from GU. He taught as an adjunct, and when a full-time professorship became available in the Organizational Leadership program, he knew it was the perfect position. He was able to live where he wanted to retire, and be a part of a program he believed in.

“I’m really sold on the Org-L program,” he said. “It’s a program that fits who I am and what I want to teach. I’m not interested in going to work at any other university. Gonzaga is where I want to finish my career because of the people, but because of the program too. I get to teach the moral, spiritual and business side all together.”

Once or twice a month, Horsman makes the drive to Spokane, sometimes for meetings, sometimes to teach on-campus portions of his regular courses. For the most part, though, his interactions with students are entirely electronic. Student reactions to his courses repudiate any claims that a professor can’t be effective in an online environment:

“I have never before experienced a professor at Gonzaga who was so involved in the discussions,” one student said. “His comments often caused me to pause, reflect and re-think. Many of his posts I copied into a Word document to read them again.”

Online education forces professors to teach in a completely different way, taking away a lot of the spontaneity of a classroom setting. Horsman learned by trial and error, quickly realizing that to successfully offer a class online required a lot more than uploading PDFs of the readings. Because his courses are so discussion-based, he has found it helpful to treat every student as a teacher also, encouraging them to share skills they have learned from their years in the workforce. He has had to find ways to engage electronically, participating in discussions and sending personal emails. The literature is always the primary authority; after all, it is often the only thing all his students have in common.

The challenge is worth it, because of what students can gain from learning online.

“The introverts get just as much time online as the extroverts, and an opportunity to express themselves better than they might in the classroom. Also, a lot of times I can’t tell if a student is male or female, or what race they are. We like to think we’re not biased but we are in a lot of ways. Online, people are judged just for what they write and much less who they are or their accent or other stuff that gets in the way of what they’re saying. It’s a lot more legitimate assessment of the person’s work.”

Unbiased, engaging education that doesn’t disrupt adult learner’s lives and careers? Horsman just might be onto something here.

It wasn’t until fifth grade that senior Molly Roberge finally felt comfortable reading. All through elementary school, she struggled, trying to catch up to her classmates while handling dyslexia, short-term memory and partial hearing loss.

Academically, it was hard. She was taken out of class regularly for individual tutoring. Most of the time, that helped. But sometimes, the tutoring left Roberge less confident that ever.

“During one of our sessions they had taken me out of class and I was sitting in the smallest room. It was like a closet,” she remembered. “It’s me and this teacher. It’s hot, and she’s just drilling me. I finally burst out crying. I was so tired of not getting it. She kept repeating, ‘No, no, no –it’s this.’ And I was thinking, ‘You know what? I’m sure it is this. But I can’t get it. And it’s frustrating because I should be getting this. Other kids are getting this. Once again, what’s wrong with me?’ ”

Other students didn’t help. Roberge became a social outcast, and that only made things more worse. “When kids know that you’re different, they’re not the nicest,” Roberge said. “So having that stigma – all those terrible words that people will call you, it hurt my confidence and my performance in school more than my disability did.”

The University’s DREAM office – Disability Resources, Education, Access & Management – meets a growing caseload. In 2000, just 77 students used its services. Today, Roberge is among nearly 500 students at GU who have learning disabilities requiring accommodation. Gonzaga’s DREAM office provides dyslexic students with options such as textbooks in a read aloud format, dictation software, and extra time and a quiet space to take exams.

“Some students, we wouldn’t have a clear picture of their abilities without DREAM,” said Kathryne Shearer, DREAM coordinator. “We have a message of empowerment, meeting their needs so they can contribute like anyone else.”

Even with DREAM, Roberge had to make tough choices due to her dyslexia. In her freshman year a defining moment came with an important test in biology. She had struggled with the course material; this test would make or break her plans for a major in nursing.

“I’ve always wanted to be a nurse,” Roberge said. “I had studied two weeks in advance every day. I took it up in the DREAM office so I was by myself and I had as much time as I needed. I had studied so hard, but I got my test back and it was not what I needed to get. I cried all the way from Hughes back to Catherine-Monida and I don’t think I got out of my bed for two days. And yet I had a friend in that class who said, ‘I didn’t even study for that test.’ ”

Roberge switched her major to sociology, which she loves and finds easier. Sociology requires less memorization. Now, she’s comfortable talking and even joking about her disability. “I have a shirt that says ‘I put the sexy in dyslexia,’ ” she said.

Last year, Roberge helped to coordinate Eye-to-Eye, along with Austin Carrillo, now a senior. They and 10 fellow students, all with learning disabilities, spend Tuesday afternoons at Garry Middle School. This year Roberge continues as a member of the club. These students serve as mentors to middle school students who, themselves, also struggle with learning disabilities.

“I think the greatest part of this program is that it is not only a huge benefit for the kids but also for the mentors,” Carrillo said. “I have probably have learned more from these kids than I have taught them. The main goal of Project Eye-to-Eye is to empower these young students to not only prove to everyone that their learning disability won’t hold them back, but also to show them that it is something to be proud of. I sincerely believe that without my ADHD I would not be as academically, socially and professionally successful.”

Discussions with the Garry students usually center on an art project developed by the national Eye-to-Eye program.

“One of my favorite projects was the invention,” Roberge said. “You create something that will help you in school. A lot of ADD kids will make a remote because when they zone out they miss what’s said, so when they start zoning out they could press pause. I always thought those ones were the neatest. Or kids would make glasses if they had dyslexia so the words wouldn’t be mixed up on the page, they could just read normally.”

Still, the purpose isn’t art. It is to help learning-disabled kids see a path to success, and to give them the tools to get there.

“We’re there because we don’t want the kids to go through the same things we went through,” Roberge said. “If we can tell them early what works and what doesn’t work and how to get through school to get to college, that can help them.”

When four of middle school students were named Student of the Month, Roberge said, “It shows that Eye-to-Eye was helping them. Or they’re just really great kids.”

By Lauren Campbell ['13]

With 2.3 seconds on the clock, everyone in McCarthey Athletic Center is focused on the basketball. Everyone, that is, except for junior Tucker Keuter, who is watching the coaches. As student director of the Bulldog Band, he is poised to count off the fi ght song as soon as the final buzzer sounds. But if there’s a timeout, or more likely a foul, with just a few tenths of a second left, he had better not cue the band.

“I love the adrenaline rush,” Keuter said. “So many people are watching the game, but in this role, you watch differently. You watch the ebb and flow of benching, you watch the coaches. You watch at a micro level.”

And a band director’s mistakes can impact a game. Previous student director Christopher Andrews (’12) learned that the hard way when he almost earned a foul. It was a media timeout at a women’s game, and after the 15-second warning came over his headset, Andrews was watching the court so he knew when to cut off the band. Usually he waits until the ball is handed to a player, but that wasn’t happening, so
he kept conducting. Then he heard muffled yelling. It was coming from the referee, who dressed him down saying that he was being unprofessional by playing, that she ought to give him a technical. Andrews was fuming — protocol is that an unhappy referee should pull him aside and talk to him discreetly. But he remained silent.

When something – anything – wrong happens with the band, the director is responsible. “You just have to take the blame, roll with the punches, and continue doing your best,” Andrews said.

At any given game, 70 to 100 band members pack their corner of the stands. Some are music majors; some played in their high school bands; some learned their instrument as GU freshmen. Every one of them needs to start on beat, playing the right song, and cut off on time – while much of their focus is on the game in front of them.

“A conductor doesn’t need to be the best musician,” Keuter said. “But he does need to be the best communicator. Hands high, eye contact, asking, ‘Can you in the back see me? Understand me?’ Get a head nod back. I practice in the mirror.”

There’s no set order to the 42 songs in the band’s repertoire, leaving the director responsible for thinking on his feet. Sometimes just a few seconds are left in a time-out after a sponsor’s messages are played: So, you pick the song with an exciting beginning. Maybe the crowd is getting hyped up: You play something they can sing along to. Only play a song with cheerleaders’ choreography if there’s enough time to
get through it. Basic concepts – but not so basic in the middle of a game – when the director considers a dozen factors in a matter of seconds, while listening over his headset to constant updates on media needs, injuries and technical malfunctions.

The job can be stressful. It’s a lot of responsibility, especially in a community that takes its basketball so seriously. But both students have loved every minute of it. “I was a chemistry major,” Andrews said. “I took a ton of classes, I was in wind symphony, but when you say ‘Gonzaga’ the first thing that comes to my mind is the band. I love band.”

And Keuter: “At some point during the season, we have played the songs so many times that we become like a giant record machine made up of 80 people who know these 42 songs, and we are like clockwork.”

Each student researched a topic and shared their expertise with their peers on-site in Turkey. They hiked the valleys of Cappadocia, attended mass in the House of the Virgin Mary, and made life-long friends.

They arrived as Americans and left as young citizens of a complex world.

LAST SUMMER, Gonzaga piloted an unusual study abroad program in Turkey. Seventeen students signed on for an academic adventure that crossed cultures, centuries and empires – drawing together three disciplines, classical civilizations, religious studies and broadcast studies. The program’s official title was “Gonzaga-in-Turkey: Origins and Empires,” but it could also have been called “10,000 Years in 30 Days.”

The month-long program culminated years of dreaming.
Leading the students were Andrew Goldman, archeologist and associate professor of history; Father Steve Kuder, S.J., associate professor of religious studies, who taught a course on St. Paul and the early urban Christians; and Dan Garrity, the irrepressible director of Gonzaga’s broadcast studies program, whose students developed short-form, quick-turn, narrative videos, posted on YouTube. (Just look for “The Turkish Zag Travel Show.”)

Students not only soaked up the political, cultural and artistic accomplishments of ancient peoples such as the Greeks, Romans, early Christians, and Byzantines, but also immersed themselves in modern Turkey, its vibrant culture and charming people. They swam in the Aegean Sea and sweat in the Turkish sun. They traveled together, ate together, studied and had fun together. Their experiences changed them, as people and as young scholars.

The first lesson: Being there makes it real.
Book learning, as we know, offers a challenging way to absorb the complexities of humanity and history. But walking the sun-baked ground where emperors, poets and priestesses lived and died; exploring archeological digs, world-famous sites such as the city of Troy, and the aged yet contemporary streets, markets and museums of Istanbul; losing your way through an overgrown mountaintop ruin – especially when you are the professor? Experience triggers learning.

Gonzaga senior Brian Joyce, a classical civilizations major, reflects on his experiences:
“The greatest change in me occurred in the Grotto of St. Peter in Antioch, at the Patriarchate of the Orthodox Church which holds the bones of John Chrysostom, at Hieropolis where they recently discovered the tomb of St. Philip, at the House of Mary in Ephesus. In other words, the places changed me. We saw sites ranging from Neolithic (as early as 7400 B.C.) to Greco-Roman, to Byzantine, to modern cities. All of humanity’s past and present melted into one stream of activity, culture, religion. You could see the progress, the advances in technology, the changes in human philosophy, in taboos, in the human mindset.”

Joyce’s continues: “When I read first and secondary sources which reference sites like Troy, Ephesus, Tarsus, Constantinople and Nicaea, I see these places in my mind. I remember the heat, the dust, the figs, the smells, the saltwater of the Aegean, the narrowness of the Hellespont.”

Last fall, Joyce encountered a reference to the poet Sappho “and I recalled looking out at the Island of Lesbos – where Sappho lived. For me, these are no longer names in books, dots on maps. Instead, these places occupy actual space and exist in current time just as they did 2,600 years ago.”

The second lesson: St. Paul preached here.
“On our first day in Istanbul” wrote Fr. Kuder in the Gonzaga-in-Turkey blog, “several of us are walking down the broad street from Taksim Square to the Golden Horn. Eyes right, and there in a window, flashing red: Revolution Revelation. Since I’ll be teaching a course on St. Paul and the first urban Christians, I think, ‘Wow! That sums up Paul’s conversion.’ This store-front art gallery has two banners in the window. One proclaims: ‘If we don’t break their rules, there will be no tomorrow!’ That’s Paul all over – as we’re seeing letter by letter and Roman city by Roman city. And the other: ‘Provoke your own illumination: set yourself on fire.’ That’s St. Ignatius of Loyola reminding us what Jesuit education is all about as it returns to Turkey after all these years.”

Fr. Kuder lectures in the outdoor theater of Assos:
“I think about Paul. After his conversion, he has a new insight into things. He never ceases to be a Jew, I’m sure that never occurred to him. But he was going to the Gentiles and saw that Christianity was much more than just a sect of Judaism. The other side of Paul is – he’s born in Tarsus, he’s a city boy, he knows Greek, he knows this world he is moving into. I mean Central Casting couldn’t have come up with a better character.

“He was a hiker, a great walker. In his lifetime, after his conversion,” said Fr. Kuder, “we estimate that he went 10,000 miles. That’s phenomenal. This is the footsteps of Paul, but it’s also the footsteps of Christianity moving from a very rural countryside religion to a religion of the cities, and out into the Roman Empire. It’s amazing – this is that first outward thrust, which in three centuries results in Christianity being not only a legal religion within the Roman empire, but the official religion.”

The third lesson: New experiences and new friends make for personal growth.
“We traveled together with barely any time to ourselves,” said senior Chastonie Chipman, an international studies major. “Even on our day off and in the evenings we hung out together. This trip deepened my love for people in general and for the Gonzaga campus.” Chipman grew up in Germany, with 3 million Turkish immigrants. “I thought I knew the people and culture of Turkey,” she said, “when in reality I had just the fraction of an idea. We never know another culture unless we have walked on their soil and tried to understand the world from their perspective.”

History major and senior Charlie Nichols felt his attitude change this way: “Especially in Istanbul you will find Christians and Muslims, Europeans and Asians, and speakers of all sorts of languages coexisting. This was the stimulus for the greatest change I experienced on this trip, the question of where I fit in this. Turks focus on people as the experience. This absolutely changed the way I go about meeting new people, and how I view myself in new environments.”

“Although I’ve been to Turkey nearly two dozen times,” said Professor Goldman, “this experience was special. I had the tremendous good fortune to work with excellent colleagues, hard-working students and an amazing Turkish support team, led by Aydin Aygun (our Turkish Zag). Our goal was to provide an interdisciplinary field experience for Gonzaga students, and I’m very pleased with what we accomplished. I can’t wait for 2014 and our next trip.”

– Editor

Gonzaga is expanding its summer offerings in Turkey, with a month-long archaeological field school at Sinop, an ancient town on the Black Sea. Professor Andrew Goldman will lead the first small group of students to excavate at Sinop in summer 2014.