Sounding Board: Brighter Days Ahead

In late January in St. Paul, the sun sets just after 5 p.m., and the average high temperature is a chilly twenty-four degrees Fahrenheit. These conditions might not sound ideal for planning a campaign launch event outside. Yet, in true Macalester spirit, we tried something a little different and threw an outdoor party for our campus community to close out our sesquicentennial year and kick off Brighter, a $250 million fundraising campaign that will set Mac up for success for the next 150 years. The evening festivities included ice lanterns, twinkling lights, bonfires, cozy Mac mittens, a DJ, lots of hot chocolate, and even a pop-up ice rink.

In this season of long, dark nights, the lights and lanterns were especially welcome. So, too, was bundling up to gather with students, faculty, and staff just a few days into the new semester, trading stories about winter break and sharing our hopes for the spring. For me, the event was a powerful expression of the joy we experience when we gather in community and the excitement that’s building about the ambitious charge we’re undertaking with our fundraising campaign.

At this time of great pain and difficulty around the world, it may seem surprising to focus on joy. To do so might even be perceived as superficial or frivolous. But, in my view, we can be realistic about the challenges we face and—at the same time—understand that joy is an imperative. Seeking joy (or even inciting it, as recommended by the author Ross Gay) is an important way to promote wellness and self-care, especially when the world feels so hard. In difficult moments, it’s even more important that we make space for joy. Joy is powerful fuel for the cultivation of optimism, and essential for fostering hope in the possibility of a better—brighter—tomorrow.

Joy is embedded in our work at the college because of our strategic plan’s emphasis on amplifying the attributes that make Macalester unique. Accordingly, we’ve designed the Brighter campaign to focus on the student journey. At the heart of it all is the unique spark that every student brings to campus, transforming this community for the better. Every day, I have the immense privilege of walking beside our students as they nurture that spark and develop their own gifts. I see it happening on stage in musical performances, at the library during capstone presentations, and on the field at Ultimate Frisbee games. There’s an incredibly joyful energy on campus when students are testing their limits, experiencing success, and finding out they’re capable of more than they thought they were.

There’s joy, too, in being part of a collective effort to care for a community that matters deeply to you. I experienced this care during my own college years, and I feel so much gratitude for all the ways in which I was nurtured and pushed to grow. Accordingly, once I paid off my student loans, I felt huge pride in being able to express that gratitude by giving back to my alma mater so others could experience the privilege of higher education. In my conversations with many Mac alumni, I hear about the joy they feel in reconnecting with the college—while visiting a classroom as a guest speaker, establishing an endowed scholarship, collaborating with classmates on a Reunion committee, or supporting through the Mac Fund the areas of campus that matter most to them. By the way, to learn more about ways to stay engaged with the college, see the post Alumni Starter Kit.