FROM THE PRESIDENT
healing. It will be wonderful to see our 2020 alums return to campus time and again to celebrate being part of Skidmore.
A
s I reflect at the end of my second year as president of Skidmore, I am in awe of what our community has accomplished over the past two years. Our performance throughout the pandemic has been simply extraordinary. We have prioritized the health and safety of our entire community, while maintaining our educational mission as a great residential liberal arts college. More than that, we have accomplished all of this as a community — we have taken care of each other. As I said to the Class of 2022 at Commencement, when they look back years from now on their pandemic experiences at Skidmore, I think that is what they’ll remember most: how we got through this time together, as a community that cares. It has been a season of gathering and celebration on campus. In early June, we welcomed back to campus the Class of 2020, whose celebrations and culminations were stripped away by the pandemic in the spring of their senior year. Well over half the class returned to campus for a truly glorious celebration. For me, the most memorable moment was having their names called out, as they walked, sashayed, danced, and even rollerskated across the stage in Zankel Music Center, shook my hand, and raised their arms in triumph. To me, 2020 felt like an open wound, one that we are now closing and
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SCOPE SUMMER 2022
Another thousand alums returned over a two-week period for picnics, lectures, meals, dancing, campus tours, and to share the joy of being together on campus. All of this was more than a celebration of Reunion — it was also a celebration of being able to gather in person once again, after the two years of isolation and separation. For me, the whole experience was a veritable history lesson about Skidmore, as I got to spend hours in conversation with our proud and remarkable alums dating all the way back to the Class of 1951! Hearing stories about the Old Campus, about presidents Wilson, Palamountain, and Porter, about the great faculty of generations past who gave so much to our students, and about what I can only call the high-jinks and antics of undergraduates (about which there is surprisingly little variation from the 1950s to the 2020s!), gave me great pleasure and helped me understand in further depth the rich history of our great college. I am especially proud that we have not merely endured and maintained in the face of COVID-19, we have also continued to move Skidmore forward in significant ways. We just completed one of the most successful admissions cycles in the College’s history, and we concluded one of the most successful fundraising years in the College’s history — both enormous accomplishments, especially given the challenges of the times. And over the last year and a half, we collaboratively developed and completed the new Campus Master Plan for Skidmore College. The importance of the Campus Master Plan is hard to overemphasize. We now have a comprehensive overview of the structural needs of the campus to guide us over the next decade and more as we continue to respond to the ever-changing needs of a great undergraduate education. Of particular note in our new Plan is how much it emphasizes the residential student experience. Project after project brings into relief our commitment to our students and what they need to learn and thrive in their
four years at Skidmore. A focus on student health and wellness, on fitness, on athletic facilities, on the residence halls and the living and learning spaces they contain, and on the classrooms and teaching and learning spaces of the campus, defines this Plan and its priorities. Similarly, resolute commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion — along with the natural beauty and the sustainable environments and ecosystems of the Skidmore campus — pervades the Plan. In short, the Plan reflects and articulates the primary values of the College: past, present, and future. I think that historical perspective on Skidmore is what most fills my thoughts now, two years into my time as president. Of necessity, these two years have been highly focused on the present moment. Yet my attention is also always on the future of our College, on the needs and opportunities that await on the near and far horizons as we look to continue Skidmore’s standing as one of the great liberal arts colleges in the world. And increasingly, my understanding of Skidmore’s past, of the great figures and events that have shaped this college in such powerful ways, continues to grow. I believe firmly in the adage that to know where you’re going, you have to know where you’ve been. This year presents a special opportunity to reflect on our history as we mark the centennial of Skidmore’s establishment as a four-year college. From its noble founding by Lucy Skidmore Scribner to the very recent naming event of our Center for Integrated Sciences after one of our defining figures, Billie Tisch ’48, Skidmore’s history is an inspiring story that has even more purchase on the needs of the current moment than it did in Lucy’s day. I am honored to serve that inspiring purpose and look forward to all our achievements to come.
Marc C. Conner President
