Dear Antioch Students,
During these last difficult months, we have watched many of you hard-working, intelligent, courageous young people with delight and pride. We want you to know that you are not alone in your struggle. We, members of the Yellow Springs community, are also working in good faith (sometimes to exhaustion) to save our beloved Antioch College. Our commitment is strong, for our lives are deeply intertwined with the College. We, or our family members, have worked at the College; faculty and staff and their families are our friends; we, ourselves, are Antiochians or could have been, as we, like you, have a commitment to the historic vision and values of Antioch College.
We know in these last months you have found valuable friends and found from faculty and staff deep concern and inspiration. Many good and brave things have occurred even during this time of great duress. So we ask you, if you are able, to please hold on.
While it would be prudent to develop a backup plan, we want you to know that this important fight for the College is not yet over and that the struggle for its survival is dependent on many of you choosing to stay. By staying, you will not only learn in your area of study, you will also continue to learn what is possible when people work together towards a good and powerful vision. You must know how very important an Antioch College education is. Author Rita Mae Brown, when she spoke at an Antioch Commencement, called Antioch College the “point of the arrow” among progressive institutions of higher learning. To quote Antioch alumni, Dan Shoemaker, whose recent email is making wide circulation, “Antioch’s traditional educational model (based on the three pillars of community, academics, and co-op) has among the most robust and enviable outcomes of any college in the country.”
Now at Antioch, as you learn about the ugly side of human power—power which is wielded carelessly, the destructive side of faceless, isolated, lonely, ferocious power—you will participate in an Antioch education at its best: that engagement between the academic and real life experience. You have been given this opportunity to shape not only to your own lives, but the life of this extraordinary institution.
Because so much is required of us, it is not the time to lose hope. As Arthur Morgan said, “The chief limitations of humanity are in its vision, not in its powers of achievement.” The struggle is not over until it’s over, and we—all of us working together—are essential for victory!
We, community members of Yellow Springs, pledge to continue our part in this struggle to save Antioch College. We pledge to do all we can to support you, the students, and to support the Antioch College faculty and staff. When you need to focus on academic work, we will protect your back. We need to stick together!
Therefore, we ask again, that you, and all who care about Antioch College, to do as the Civil Rights song entreats us: “Keep your eyes on the prize (and) hold on!”
Sincerely,
Yellow Springs Citizens in Support of Antioch College