Address to University Family
August 22, 2001
Once again, aloha--brothers and sisters. What a stunning sight you are in this magnificent edifice. When our grandson Isaac McKee was three years old he attended sacrament meeting in his ward. The high council speaker, eager to arouse a drowsy congregation, began his talk with a booming shout, “Brothers and sisters, isn’t it wonderful and exciting to belong to the Church of Jesus Christ.” Isaac, absorbed by this exuberance from the pulpit, jumped to his feet on the bench and shouted at the top of his lungs, “YEAH!” It took a few minutes for the congregation to return to normal.
Well, that is kind of the way I feel this morning. It’s wonderful and exciting to be a part of this great enterprise, Brigham Young University - Hawaii Campus. There is no place like it. It is unique in all of the world. There are no other people like you who are here to carry the work forward. My earnest prayer every day is that we all--all of us will have a fullness of the spirit of our calling. You who are new to the campus, again we express our gratitude for your being here.
I trust that we all have been revived and renewed by summer events and activities, family reunions, golf, overdue research projects, publications, home remodeling, fishing. With that renewal, I assume we are wiser as we are older.
As for Carolyn and me, it was a pleasant but sobering summer in many ways. We learned much. We helped bury my dear 91-year-old mother. We witnessed the birth and blessing of our fifteenth grandchild. Aaron Zachary Shumway was born in the same decade in this century that my mother was born in the last century -- Mom in the horse and buggy era and Aaron Zachary in an era of such unrelenting scientific advancements we are either breathless over them or inured to them.
On July 4, after weeks of pain, I admitted myself to the emergency room of the Utah Valley hospital. The agony was due to a large, unpassable kidney stone I had seen before in an x-ray. The size and position of the stone and its potential damage to the kidney made immediate surgery necessary. Such surgery twenty years ago would have been very serious, painful, with a long recovery time. Fifty years ago it would have been life threatening.
As it was, the procedure was accomplished on Thursday July 5, I was out of the hospital on July 6, the tube from my side was removed July 7 and on July 9 I was on my way to Alaska for some king salmon fishing.
I was struck by a number of things in this experience. First, of course, was the surgery’s sophistication and the almost nonchalance of the urologist in performing it. For me it was a big deal. For him it was no sweat, small kine. I was especially sobered by how pain can isolate and focus a person away from all other considerations in this world. The importance of things suddenly become relative only to the intensity of the pain and the fragile nature of our mortality. I have an immense reverence now for people who endure chronic pain but who still function with kindness, cheerfulness, and enthusiasm in their callings and responsibilities.
I was also struck by how willing we are to put our lives trustingly in the hands of complete strangers and the greater trust we have in priesthood blessings. Further, I was most touched by the immediate support and expressions of love from colleagues and friends from Hawaii and elsewhere----cards, flowers, telephone calls, prayers, tears, visits. The speed of my recovery had some people confused in having it on good authority that I was in the hospital and others would say, “No, he’s in Alaska fishing.”
And finally, as an educator, it was not lost on me that the incredibly smooth surgical procedure that rescued me from severe affliction was no doubt the result of careful study, painstaking research, conscientious testing and follow through; indeed the kind of work that required the intellectual commitment and dogged persistence which should be synonymous with the educational enterprise.
Did I mention salmon fishing? I know some of you are expecting my annual fishing story. The Alaska trip was also full of lessons. I will tell you the true story of the big one that got away. On the Talkeetna River I hooked into a monster salmon. When it leapt into the air or rolled over on the surface I felt a shock of panic at its size. I had never experienced such a fish in this kind of stream. “He’s got a hog,” shouted our guide and for many minutes I fought the fish until I drew him close to the bank. Our guide had the net poised saying to me “steady, hold it.” Unfortunately, in the panic of the moment I did the worst thing you can do and that is to grab the reel to get a better grip with both hands. In doing this, I interfered with the drag action of the reel that relieves pressure on the line. So just as the guide was about to net the prize, the fish bolted and the 80 lb. test line snapped with the sound of a rifle shot. For a tiny second the guide looked at me with disgust, as if to say “you stupid idiot.” But then he remembered I was a customer and smiled and said, “Kings are hard to catch, you’ll get the hang of it.” The rest of the day thousands of huge king salmon torpedoed by me on their way up the river, giving me the royal snub. A few acknowledged my presence perhaps with an insolent flap of the tail or a mocking full-bodied leap out of the water.
When I told our group I needed a good fish story for my University Family address today to keep up my tradition they suggested, “Why don’t we think up some appropriate moral lessons to your experience.” So on the way home everybody in the truck teasingly offered little aphorism for me to pass on to you, little pithy sayings. These are my “lost fish” aphorisms. “Just like your fishing line, relationships too may snap when you don’t give a little.” “Panic can overwhelm even habit and common sense.” Another, “We learn wisdom from things we lose.” And finally, “Disappointment now makes later success all the sweeter.” Well, as accurate and attractive as these bits of proverbial wisdom might be, the moral truth I learned was that tidy sayings or clever proverbs will not substitute for the loss of a 40 lb. king salmon.
In retrospect, this past year was historically significant for a number of reasons. I would like to review some of the key events and accomplishments in order to give a prospect for this coming year which I believe will be equally historical. First, I think it is fair to say that never before in the history of BYU-Hawaii has our campus been under the kind of heavy examination and assessment as we underwent this past year—from the careful scrutiny of our own Strategic Planning Committee to the four major audits by auditing teams from the Church Educational System, the Church Auditing Department, BYU-Provo auditors, and an external auditing firm. Also we received enthusiastic responses from our own graduates from exit surveys in which they candidly evaluated their experiences on campus. This was a very revealing exercise which I will comment on later.
In the spring of this year, at my invitation, a management review team from the Provo campus conducted an in-depth evaluation of four of our units, security, the bookstore, university housing, and the library. This review was conducted in the spirit of shared services, shared expertise, and shared resources. The purpose of the review included getting to know our Provo colleagues better, identifying best practices on both campuses, and candidly laying out on the table some of the operational challenges we face here. The recommendations of this review team were valuable and timely.
In April of this year, the Executive Committee of the Board of Trustees visited our campus and expressed great interest in the future of the university with reference to the prophetic visions and utterances of our past, the quality of the present institution, and the immense challenges the Church faces in the developing countries of the Pacific and Asia in terms of education and local church activity and leadership.
As a result of the Executive Committee discussions, President Bateman was directed to bring together a blue chip ad hoc committee to address questions about BYU-Hawaii’s future role in assisting the Church in responding to the growing needs of the saints in these areas. I helped President Bateman in the selection of the committee which was made up of key people from both campuses, including two members of our own Strategic Planning Committee. This special ad hoc group met during the summer laboring diligently to answer five major questions or charges.
1. How do we maximize BYU-Hawaii’s contribution to Asia and the Pacific islands?
2. How do we improve job placement for BYU-Hawaii graduates in their home countries?
3. How can BYU-Provo and BYU-Hawaii work more closely and effectively to accomplish the prophetic missions of both schools?
4. What countries should BYU-Hawaii serve both from a church standpoint (i.e. providing the greatest leverage in building the kingdom) and a “returnability” standpoint (i.e., providing leadership back home to church, community, and professions)?
5. What should be the curriculum/program focus of BYU-Hawaii?
President Bateman counseled the committee to think creatively, even outside the box, but also to propose actions that would start small and grow overtime. We will be sharing with you the insights and recommendations from the report as soon as it is available for discussion here. From initial drafts I’ve seen, much of the report’s content covers familiar round, a validation of the forward thinking we have been doing for several years. But there are also some interesting new ideas and possibilities of exciting to contemplate. The committee has completed the report for discussion this fall at the highest levels of leadership in the Church educational system. I want to thank earnestly Keith Roberts, Bill Neal, Diana Mahoney, and Brent Wilson, our new Dean of the School of Business for their work on this committee.
Thus as this past year has been a period of intense review and assessment, this coming year of 2001-2002, will be a time of wide discussion, recommendations, decision making, and implementation. We expect change which will bring about improvement. That change will include some reorganization of divisions, realignment of stewardship responsibilities, shifts in personnel, reallocation of space.
Other events of significance I want to mention. As you have observed, the new stake center construction is coming along nicely. This building will be an immense blessing to the campus for both religious and academic purposes. Besides the generosity of the Brethren, the gift of this building is due to the attention and persistence of the campus stake presidents who from the very beginning pursued the need for such a building through their ecclesiastical channels. I especially want to express gratitude to President Norman Evans of the BYU second stake, to the former President Garth Allred, and to President James Smith who have been the campus spokesmen for this project. In keeping with the expectation of the Brethren, however, this building will be a shared use facility with the University. It will house the department of religion and provide the daily venues for many academic courses. As such, the building will draw student traffic away from the McKay complex during the week and accommodate eight ward meeting schedules on the weekend and at nights.
As you can see this magnificent auditorium will also have a significant multipurpose function. It too will be a major venue for academic, religious, performance, and recreational activities. The upgrade of the McKay courtyards, the expansion of the swimming pool, the renovation of Hale 5 are all testaments of the support of the Board and the stewardship efforts of our people here. We sincerely beg your patience as so much of the construction comes at some inconvenience to you in terms of the “mess,” the temporary crunch in office space, and so on. We anticipate the completion of these projects will greatly ease the crowded conditions we have experienced over the years.
Another historical event for the campus was the Board approval to formally establish the Jonathan Napela Center for Hawaiian Language and Cultural Studies. With the approval of the name, the Brethren also gave permission to expand the Center’s endowment with philanthropic dollars and to use the earnings from the endowment to fund the entire Hawaiian Studies Program in perpetuity.
On November 1st through the 3rd this fall, the university and the Jonathan Napela Center will celebrate the culmination of a five-year Hawaiian Culture project, funded by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, by dedicating and launching a magnificent double hulled canoe to be named Iosepa. This dedication will be important for the University and for the Hawaiian community and the state of Hawaii. It will be a high profile event to which significant people in Hawaii and elsewhere will be invited, including those who have donated significantly to the Center’s endowment. Elder M. Russell Ballard of the Quorum of the twelve apostles will preside over the celebration and will dedicate the canoe, Iosepa.
The canoe is a 60-foot replica of the ancient Polynesian vessels which traversed the vast distances of the Pacific centuries before the Europeans would navigate the oceans in sailing ships. There is a powerful overflow of joy and gratitude among the people of our community who are drawn to it. For the canoe represents many things to them. First, it is a significant part of the shared cultures of Polynesia. For example this project brings together Tui`one Pulotu, a Tongan canoe builder, Kawika Eskeran, a Hawaiian carver, and Fijian logs shipped from Vitilevu to create a vessel of great beauty and function. It conveys a powerful sense of history. It depicts the Hawaiian love for and sacred stewardship over the sea, just as our lo`i plantation represents the enlightened care of the land. In addition the vessel is more than and emblem of ancient Polynesian technology. It represents the courage, faith, and divine guidance which characterize the migrations of all of the seed of Iosepa, Joseph. The name of the canoe came to brother Bill Wallace the same way the formal name of the Hawaiian Studies program came to the President’s Council, by inspiration. That inspiration was for me a further validation of the Hawaiian Studies program. It was also a clear message that the purposes, projects, and functions of the Jonathan Napela Center of Hawaiian Language and Cultural Studies will be firmly planted in those elements of the great Hawaiian heritage which are totally compatible with the gospel of Jesus Christ and the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
Elder Eyring mentioned to me just after the Executive Committee visited the canoe construction site, “There is a special spirit at this site that I did not sense when you were explaining the program to me before. But I feel it now.” We look forward to this celebration.
I mentioned a moment ago that, thanks to Bill Neal, we are accumulating assessment instruments that will help us in our ongoing commitment to improve as a university. For me one of the most significant of these instruments was the graduate exit survey in which our recent graduates responded candidly to a series of questions about their experiences on campus. This was invited feedback which we promised to take seriously.
Over 300 hundred graduate students responded to questions such as, “If you were in authority and given responsibility, what would you change in order to improve the university.” As was expected, the overwhelming response to the survey was very positive. But this question generated enormous feedback which was not only candid but frequently poignant. Many of the negative comments were predictable relative to administrative processes, bottle necks, student run around, poor communication between administrative offices, high tech breakdown, poor customer services in some administrative units, not fully trained student workers in administrative offices, who interface with other student customers, perceptions of favoritism, racism, and nepotism; long lines, lack of communication and follow up with students, etc.
It was great information, much of which was corroborated by the findings of our own strategic planning committee. But the amazing thing to me was the way our employees responded to this feedback and criticism. There is a natural tendency, in all of us to resist candid feedback and become defensive. But last Thursday the President’s Council invited over 100 of our staff and administrative staff to a special two hour seminar to address ten of the most frequently mentioned issues by our graduates. I think some of the group expected to be given a two hour pep talk by the President’s Council. But instead, we divided them up into ten teams with a team leader. Each team was to address two concerns and recommend realistic and doable ways to resolve them as a university and as individuals. After discussion, each team leader reported the ideas which their group generated.
By the end of the session, several things were absolutely obvious. First, our own people collaboratively have the skill, the experience, and the will to provide excellent solutions to the problems at hand. Second, there was no tendency among them to resist the feedback, make excuses, or fix blame elsewhere. Third, there was a refreshing, almost cleansing aspect to facing the truth directly as it comes from invited feedback. It’s an opportunity to change willingly. As President Orgill at the PCC pointed out to me, “We live and die by the feedback from our customers.” Fourth, when you hear a colleague’s opinion or suggestion, especially one who has long experience, you have the sense of “we are in this together.” Solving problems together is collegiality in the best sense. Finally, in those two hours were generated the ideas which will be the foundation of future training across campus. Our solutions will not be taken only from Franklin Covey or Zenger Miller, but they will be solutions forged from our own context and collective experience.
There was one area of concern many graduates mentioned which I would like to address here because it lies at the heart of everything we do. That is how we mentor, how we teach, and how we model the behavior we want our students to emulate. We are all teachers in this room, we all supervise students, we all provide a powerful example whether good or bad to our students. I personally reviewed the 300 plus comments from our graduates. Consistent throughout their feedback is a collective plea from our students regarding teaching. Clearly, many of them feel we have some of the greatest teachers in the Church Education System on this campus. They are eloquent in their praise and gratitude for them. But about poor teaching they are blunt and sometimes cynical without sugar coating anything. Let me share their major concerns. I do this with no intent to shock or offend, but perhaps to rally to improve as our staff and administrative staff did.
1. They pleaded for more rigor, more hands on opportunities, more interactive teaching and learning. They plead for more follow through from teachers.
2. There is a plea for more well prepared lessons, for teachers to come prepared, organized, brimming with ideas.
3. They express horror that some poor teachers don’t realize that they are poor teachers, but seem oblivious to the fact that they are outdated, boring, and unprepared. Some may realize it but think the students don’t notice, or they realize it but don’t care or rationalize their lack of preparation by reason of overwork, burnout, etc.
4. There is a consistent plea also that we acknowledge and reward good teachers and find ways to retire poor ones. There needs to be an understood standard of what makes a good teacher, a good class presentation, a good syllabus. These things are so uneven across the campus.
5. Some teachers teach one great course, but even though their other courses are differently numbered they seem to blur into that course. There are the same jokes, the same stories and even some of the same general themes from course to course.
6. There’s a plea for teachers to stay on the job. Several complain about teachers who travel extensively during a semester leaving classes unattended.
I hope no one here is offended by my mentioning these things, for I do it in respect of our graduates whose satisfaction should be the best measure of our success. BYU-Hawaii is an institution that must specialize in teaching and learning. That is our central mission. No one knows better than I the challenges that our faculty face in terms of robust teaching loads, culturally and linguistically diverse students in the same class, the widespread expectation for involved university citizenship including tours as bishops and stake presidents, plus the expectation of significant ongoing scholarship. And I want again to salute our faculty and sincerely affirm the amazing success in what you do. However, Keith Roberts assures me that the FAC has a charge to identify and define what the expectations of a BYU-Hawaii faculty member should be, how to evaluate performance and reward that performance appropriately. How to calculate the outcomes of good teaching and student learning. I hope that this gets serious attention this year in all of the divisions of the college and in the two schools. I also recommend highly that we involve student opinions and counsel from the newly organized Student Advisory committee. This will all be part of this year’s theme of Change for Improvement.
Another central issue to be addressed this year is the returnability of our international students. As President Marion G. Romney pointed out years ago, our campus cannot fulfill its mission if it simply becomes a way station for international students on their journey to the United States. The Board’s emphasis on returnability will bring a number of changes in our thinking, our policy, and practice at BYU-Hawaii. These changes will affect recruitment, admissions, our international scholarship program, and placement. They most certainly will affect the way we provide internships and practical training for our students. There will likely be an emphasis on in-country training or internships during the junior and senior year with multi-national companies with offices in the students’ home country or area.
Another scenario suggested already is for international student scholarships to be replaced by international student loans which may be forgiven incrementally when a student returns to his home country. The enormous Church investment in BYU-Hawaii, including the nearly ninety percent subsidy as well as low student tuition is really an investment in the future leadership in Zion across the world. The Church in both developed and undeveloped countries of the South Pacific and Asia desperately needs educated leadership. We will need our best thinking on these issues, guidance from the Board, and from the Holy Spirit.
Above all, I am a witness that the Lord has yet a mighty purpose for BYU-Hawaii in the unfolding of the restoration throughout the nations of this planet. It is still the ideal training site for students who will play a major role in spreading the gospel of peace and the cause of Zion.
Many people ask me, “Is your position a job or a calling?” My brief answer is I hope the same as yours, “It’s a job which is also a calling,” --and the pay is far above salary and benefits. A contract is different from a setting apart. But our stewardship and blessings here reach farther into the spiritual realm of time and eternity than virtually any employment elsewhere.
For example, when David O. McKay dedicated this ground on February 12, 1955 he spoke about the powerful influence this campus would have in the countries of the Pacific and in Asia. He specifically mentioned Japan, India, and the people of China, “a noble race,” he said, “I’ve met them.” At the time he uttered these words, China was becoming steeped in an atheistic communism, oppressive, anti western dictatorship. Now we have wonderful students from those former totalitarian regimes who come to our campus and find what President McKay prophesied would be the “mission factor” in the mission of this campus. Wouldn’t President McKay have been thrilled with the correspondence from one of our Chinese students who came last year on our Asian Executive Management Training program. A poet in her own language, she waxes poetically in English as well. But it’s her depth of gratitude which is so touching for what no other university in China or anywhere else except within the Church could offer her.
Dear President Shumway,
What a privilege I have had to spend eight months in Brigham Young University -- Hawaii Campus. It seems that I just arrived here yesterday, with expecting eyes and an excited heart, to explore this legendary, attractive island. And now it is time to say farewell to all those that I love so much that I can’t help hiding the aching in my heart.
Compared to the endless universe, eight months is as short as a snap [of the fingers]. But to my limited life, this time [at BYU-Hawaii] is the greatest treasure I have ever had. I am just like a naughty girl playing on the beach, but [who just] happened to find gold in the sand. I must confess that if the charming coconut [trees], the alluring climate and roaring ocean are what first beckoned me to come to Hawaii, the aloha spirit which flows genially and naturally out of the warm hearted and talented people here will be the best gift I will bring back to China. All the new concepts of modern management, the way that people here are serving each other and what the possibilities are in academic freedom in the United States [all] have greatly broadened my mind. It is also here during this eight months period that I came to realize how a person can improve himself/ herself and how one can serve others in the best way but still remain humble.
Among all those treasures I got here, the most valuable and matchless one is my acceptance of Jesus Christ which will be passed down to all the following generations in my family without end, and all my people will greatly be blessed in God’s love.
It is really hard to say goodbye to all those I admire and love [whole]heartedly. But in God’s family, there is no time or space or distance and we will have our reunion in serving his people all over the world . . .
China is where my heart belongs and the Chinese people are those whom I love with my whole heart[I intend to be a Public Health worker]. When I read in a recent news [bulletin] “Deadly Shadow of Aids Darken Remote Chinese Village” in the New York Times, my heart bleeds for those poor villagers. They sold four hundred cc of blood for $5 and were infected with AIDS without any knowledge of this disease. What a miserable life they have.”
Fenfang Li’s love for her people, her desire to serve them as a public health officer, her determination to be a Gospel light to her family----all these constitute the nobility President McKay spoke of.
Brothers and sisters every year as I plan this address contemplating the “calling” or “stewardship” part of our employment, I have tried to find some title that would define each and every one of us; some wording from scripture perhaps or some metaphor from our everyday world. I take this seriously because I believe the Lord has already labeled us His.
Last year I used the phrase “The Lord’s Stewards” to define us. In another talk I developed the idea that we were to our students like “angelic ministrants,” referring to that grand account from the Book of Mormon when angels came down out of heaven and surrounded the children and ministered to them. We should be like that with our students.
In another talk I compared us to “The Lord’s shepherds.” In another I encouraged us all to become “assist artists,” trying to develop a comparison between our performance on campus and the most important play in basketball----the assist. The assist on the court is not an assist or is not successful unless someone scores. Our assists count when our students score. We must be “assist artists.”
This year I would like to combine the metaphors of angelic ministrants and the Lord’s stewards. It’s a combination of identity and function, who we are and what the Lord expects us to do and be on this campus.
I recorded in my journal a very personal experience a few years ago that taught me again something of my real identity and therefore stewardship. It occurred during our mission for the Church, not in Tonga where we presided, but in the Sydney, Australia airport while Carolyn and I were waiting for our flight to Brisbane. At the time we were accompanied by President Herschel and Sister Shirley Pedersen of the New Zealand Auckland Mission. We were en route to an area mission presidents’ conference. Suddenly, into the waiting room swarmed a madding crowd of uniformed school children, accompanied by ten or twelve tight-faced chaperons. I guessed the children to be ten or eleven years of age and on a field trip of sorts to the airport. Like invading army ants, they quickly occupied the vast passenger waiting area. Teachers and chaperons kept their distance, forming the largest possible perimeter around the area in which the swarm might be contained. These particular children were totally without awe of adults, friend or stranger. Articulate, wild, cheeky, and intensely curious, they marched like storm troopers through the rows of waiting passengers, pawing at carry-on luggage, interrogating visitors from abroad, climbing up, sliding down, rummaging through. It was impossible for one to escape a feeling of intimidation at the sight and sound of these warriors in navy-blue knee pants.
When they approached us my body stiffened involuntarily with alarm, but suddenly, as if by the sound of an invisible piper, they were off to the other side of the room to maul what looked like some sculpture display.
Relieved that we had been spared a direct encounter with these occupying forces, I made my way to the restroom to freshen up. I had no sooner washed my face when the restroom door burst open and thirty or so of the storm troopers poured in.
“Hello,” I yelled above the din, putting on my friendliest smile.
“Hey, mates, look what we got here, an American!” one of them piped. “Yeah, make him talk. I love the American accent,” shouted another.
I was surrounded and vulnerable. Besides my queer English, my mission president’s badge and my birthmark elicited most of their questions. When I confessed to living in Tonga with my family, they wanted to hear a speech in the Tongan language. By now I was backed against the wall, the towel dispenser pressed tightly between my shoulder blades.
“Now what did you say you did in Tonga?”
“I’m a missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.”
“What’s a missionary?” they demanded in unison.
At this point my chief inquisitor was a dimpled, double-chinned ten-year-old, literally too big for his britches. Half field marshal and half union boss, he gave the impression of an altar boy gone bad. He was especially puzzled by my effort to explain in terms they could understand what a missionary was: One who preaches the gospel? Who baptizes people into the true church? A priest, a minister, etc.? Obviously, neither their experience nor their vocabulary included references that allowed them to label me exactly among the creatures of this world. The press of the throng seemed more intense now as some of the boys were fingering my mission president’s badge.
Suddenly, in a loud voice of authority and with a grand gesture of holding back the throng, my inquisitor cried out: “Hey, wait a minute, mates! I know who this bloke is!”
The announcement produced instant silence among the troops as my mysterious identity was about to be revealed. Who was I, really?
“I know who you are,” he said, totally serious now and without mockery: in fact with a vague sense of reverence. “You’re . . . you’re a God-person.”
This moment of revelation sustained the quiet only a fraction of a second as President Pedersen’s six-foot nine-inch frame loomed in the doorway. (Most will remember “Bones” Pedersen, All-American basketball player at BYU in the mid-fifties.)
“Hello, men!” he sang out.
“Another one!” cried the inquisitor, and the swarm left me for a much more challenging prey.
I left the restroom struck not so much by the excitement of this close encounter of a strange kind, but by the title my inquisitor had used to identify me by. Unlike so many heavily used expressions in the Church, such as “man of God,” “sweet spirit,” “child of God,” “spiritual giant,” “saintly woman,” “Godly individual,” there is something about “God-person” that resonates in the deeper, un-clichéd recesses of my mind. Indeed, there is something stark and wholly unsentimental about this expression. Yet there is an intimacy, even profundity, in its imaginative and doctrinal implications, in its tensions between the human and the divine.
One of the privileges and blessing of having lived in Hawaii and served on this campus so long, is that we know most of you. You have affected our lives profoundly and the lives of our children. I want you to know we see each of you as a God-person. We pray the students will see you as a God-person. In that identity are all elements of grace, faith, charity, mercy, and forgiveness. Within that appellation there are the dimensions of hope, growth, progression, the capacity and the will to love our students, to serve them, lift and inspire them.