President’s Report

Dear Goshen College community and friends,

During the past academic year we slowly but steadily returned to a modified normal as we are all learning to live with COVID at less frequent and less severe levels. From travel to performing arts to athletic competitions, we celebrated, discovered and gave voice in many ways to Goshen College’s spirit and values, supported by a generous and committed community of friends and donors.

Here are a few highlights I want to share with you from the 2021-22 academic year on campus: • We appeared in the number eight spot in the nation – the top in Indiana – on Academic Influence‘s ranking of the best colleges and universities in the country by “Academic Stewardship,” a challenge to traditional college rankings that ranks schools based on how effectively they use their financial and human resources toward academic impact. • We announced the new All IN program to increase college access and affordability for Indiana students with the promise to cover 100 percent of tuition for new income-eligible Indiana students. As well, we announced a new offer of 10 percent discount on tuition to all GC alumni who enroll in one of the college’s postbaccalaureate programs. • Our men’s cross country, men’s and women’s indoor track and field, and men’s and women’s outdoor track and field teams, all made it to nationals. Five student-athletes were named NAIA All-Americans: Summer Cooper (women’s indoor track & field), Annika Fisher (women’s indoor track & field), Nelson Kemboi (men’s cross country), Naomi Ross Richer (women’s indoor track & field) and Mia Wellington (women’s indoor track & field). • Our students in the film production program created and released several documentaries about forgotten local history. “Blosser’s Park” told the story of a former youth leisure park in the early 1900s, located on Blosser’s Island in the middle of the Goshen Dam Pond. And “Vital Passage” chronicled the amazing story of David Plaut and his son, Sidney, Jewish merchants in Goshen, who risked their business and livelihood to provide a passage for Jews escaping the Holocaust. • Our student-run radio station, 91.1FM The Globe, WGCS, was named Best Station in the Nation for the fourth time and “Indiana Radio School of the Year” for the fourth consecutive time by the Indiana Association of School Broadcasters, and our student-run newspaper, “The Record,” earned Indiana collegiate “Newspaper of the Year” for the fifth year in a row. As well, the Broadcast Education Association (BEA) ranked Goshen College as the number one Audio Program in the country in their first ever rankings from the BEA Festival of Media Arts. Goshen College was also ranked 14th in Film & Video and 14th overall. • We began to send students abroad again for Study-Service Term (SST) after halting travel for the pandemic, as well as launching the first first domestic SST unit in the American Southwest. As well, we sent our low voice choir, Vox Profundi, on spring break tour to churches and schools in Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia and Ohio. • We celebrated 10 years of our Sustainability Leadership Semester, an immersive, residential semester at Merry Lea Environmental Learning Center. • John D. Roth ’81 was the keynote speaker at our 124th commencement ceremony, where 214 graduates were awarded their degrees. John was a long-time professor of history, director of the Mennonite Historical Library and founding director of our Institute for the Study of Global Anabaptism, and retired at the end of the academic year. • We received a $1 million grant from Lilly Endowment Inc. to develop and implement summer camps for community youth over the 3-year grant period through our Center for Community Engagement. • And last, but not least, we saw increased giving during the 2021-22 fiscal year. We received $12,602,505 — which makes this the largest overall fundraising year since 2007!

On behalf of all of us at Goshen College, I thank each of you for your generous giving and vital contributions. Through you, we continue to nurture life, leadership and service in this deeply rooted community “where everything connects.”

In joyful service,

Dr. Rebecca J. Stoltzfus ’83 President of Goshen College