Congratulations! The fact that you are reading this means that you are currently enrolled in one of the top liberal arts institutions in the southeast, arguably the nation. You have been chosen specifically by the ad mission staff to be the future leaders in your course of study. This should not be taken lightly! One of the beauties of Wofford is that we have never sacrificed integrity for numbers.Starting my freshmen year, I realized that Wofford wasn’t what I expected. First off, it was much harder then I thought. All of us can agree that the course work at our beloved institution is tough. However, the challenge changed my way of thinking.The point of a liberal arts education is to combine the knowledge learned from a wide variety of courses to form a logical, complete argument. However, from the vocal majority of Wofford students, I have seen the opposite.
When I took a leadership responsibility class on campus, President Samhat challenged me to not seek change for change’s sake, but instead to question the status quo and to make something good into something better. This might seem strange, but to me it makes a lot of sense. Wofford’s motto is “Shining with untarnished honor.”
However, I feel that our honor has been tarnished. Honor is a privilege, not a right, and we have betrayed that privilege. Instead of taking our education to heart, we have resorted to complaints and excuses. Granted, the times have changed; however, I truly believe that the vitality of Wofford’s students has not. Unfortunately, negativity has engulfed Wofford. We have become reactionary, set in complaining instead of changing. We, as a student body, have become convinced that the administration has come to “kill” the Wofford tradition. As far as I’m concerned, that is not the case. As you’re reading this article, I’m sure many specific events have come to mind: Boy’s Bid Day, deferred recruitment… etc. However, I can promise you that the only Wofford initiated “change” since my time here has been looking at the timing of
recruitment, which was covered in the previous issue e of the Old Gold and Black.We were chosen to attend this institution because we were deemed worthy of the standards that Benjamin Wofford founded this college on. However, I have not seen the student body accept this charge. Wofford challenges us to accept the charge, and take it upon ourselves to promote change, not for change’s sake, but for the betterment of this college that we all hold so dear.— Graham Lenes
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