Earlham considers split with Indiana Yearly Meeting
By Jonas Shellhammer
The influence and presence of Indiana Yearly Meeting (IYM), one of the largest organizations of Quaker Meetings and founder of Earlham College, may be changing at Earlham in the future.
This coming June, the Earlham Board will be considering the approval of a series of changes in Earlham’s relationship with the Meeting,
One of the proposed changes would be that IYM would no longer appoint six of the 24 members of the Earlham Board, and would instead be entering what is termed a “Covenant relationship” with Earlham. This would entail making several mutual promises, one of which would be that Earlham continues to pledge that the Earlham Board remain half Quaker.
In a March 2008 letter to a task force set up by IYM to analyze the relationship it has with Earlham College, President Doug Bennett clarified some of the reasoning behind the pursuit of change.
“As we gather our students and our faculty from across the U.S. and around the world, why not our Board of Trustees as well? A national and global search for Friends would bring added diversity and richness to our work as trustees,” Bennett said in the letter.
Bennett also emphasized that Earlham is “committed to Earlham’s being, now and in the future, an institution of higher education firmly grounded in the understandings of the Religious Society of Friends.”
In addition, Bennett signaled the need for a broad and globally representative Board of Trustees, commenting that “we have grown beyond being an institution confined to Indiana ‘Quakerdom’ to be something that has global reach.”
However, the process through which these tentative decisions has been arrived at was not started recently, and is described by Bennett as a “complex and historically layered story, and one still very much in play.”
A letter from Bennett to the Earlham Board of Trustees, published in May 2009, outlined the developments of each organization. Bennett stated that these developments led to differences between IYM and Earlham.
Bennett said in the letter, “We need a Board whose organizational arrangements are justified by Earlham’s current needs rather than merely by inheritance from the past.”
A report published by the IYM task force provides insight into the differences between IYM and Earlham. The report lists several realities which it feels IYM must come to grips with, which include “policies, activities/events in the life of the college for which IYM cannot give support; e.g., residence halls that are co-ed; birth control supplies dispensed through the school nurse; Dungeons and Dragons books sold by the college bookstore, pro-homosexuality messages given at graduation; seminars given that seem new age; student groups on campus that promote non-Christian religions, and presentations such as Vagina Monologues.”
Bennett added that these concerns are held by a selection of members of Indiana Yearly Meeting, rather than by the organization as a whole.
Bennett reflected on these differences by saying that “not all colleges see themselves as being in the business of helping students grow to goodness as they become adults” and that Earlham and IYM approach this goal in different ways. According to Bennett, IYM has a tendency to actively tell students how to be good, whereas Earlham seeks to create an atmosphere in which students can independently discover what it means to be good.
A good example of how the new relationship will affect this issue is that IYM, which has given little financial support to Earlham in the past, will now be able to provide funds of its own to certain aspects of campus life. Bennett stated that one area of focus will be a stronger presence of Christian ministry at Earlham.
Practicing Quaker Jay Zevin, senior sociology and anthropology major, hopes that the new system will bring positive change.
“Over my time at and awareness with Earlham, our relationship with Indiana Yearly Meeting hasn’t been overwhelmingly positive,” said Zevin. “I feel that I want our relationship with Indiana Yearly Meeting to be built out of a deep mutual respect, and I hope that this change will provide that deep respect.”
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