In this post, President Ward shares the biggest challenge and the biggest source of optimism she has as President in this time.

Check out an in-depth interview with President Ward on a podcast called RAISE.

Today on the anniversary of George Floyd’s murder in Minneapolis, I want to acknowledge what a monumental event that was for us here at Luther as well as nationally and even internationally.

Last fall, we shared with you an outline of the ongoing campus-wide effort toward building a more equitable and inclusive Luther College. To that end, we are pleased to provide you a mid-year update that reflects that work.

On this day we celebrate the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., born on January 15, 1929. This year's MLK Day lecture, featuring Dr. Bettina Love, is co-sponsored by Identity Studies, Education, Religion, Paideia, and the Center for Ethics and Public Engagement.

Follow-up to yesterday’s message, which was composed in the early recognition of what was starting to happen in Washington, D.C., on a day that rocked our nation.

This Saturday, November 7, the Center for Ethics and Public Engagement, in collaboration with the Braver Angels organization and the "With Malice Toward None" project, will host a post-election discussion to process the 2020 election.

Today we mourn and despair of the murder of Michael Williams, a Black man and resident of Grinnell, Iowa, whose burned body was found in a ditch in rural Kellogg, Iowa, on Wednesday and identified on Friday.

In support of Luther College’s commitment to educational access, diversity, inclusion, and other dimensions of equity in higher education, I am pleased to announce that Luther College is joining with the other members of the Associated Colleges of the Midwest (ACM) to launch a collaborative anti-racism initiative.

In my message to the greater Luther community on June 4, I stated that the killing of George Floyd and the subsequent global cries of anguish and protest were “not an ‘acute’ event to beaddressed by a quick intervention and subsequent recovery. This is chronic. This requires sustained attention and discipline.”

Today marks the first day of my second year as Luther College’s eleventh president. On this day in 2019, I was getting to know people, learning the names of buildings, discovering restaurants and shops in Decorah, and thinking ahead to the promise of new work together to advance the mission of this institution and to affirm its impact both locally and globally.

In my message on Monday I asked us, even in the midst of grief, anger, exhaustion, and sorrow in the aftermath of George Floyd’s death, the most recent name in a painful history that has radiated across time and space, to begin by listening. I have listened or reached out to student leaders, international students on campus, alumni, and friends of Luther. I have listened to our faculty and staff, standing with them at local protests. I have shared some of my own reading and self-education on social media, and I have been moved by stories of our students and alumni as they speak out against injustice and act as agents of hope and healing in their home communities and places of work.