Photo Courtesy of Hamilton College
What is going on with the chaplaincy?
With two months of the school year gone and no chaplain in sight, this is the question that lingers in the back of many students’ minds. To address this question, as well as to shed light on the process of hiring a new chaplain, The Monitor spoke with President Tepper on October 25th.
Beginning the Process
Hamilton is working with Isaacson Miller, the executive search firm that recommended that Hamilton hire Tepper, to hire a new chaplain. According to an email from Vice President and Dean of Students Christopher D. Card, the firm is coming to campus on the 11th and 12th of November. Tepper trusts that “they're really good and they can get really good …candidates because they have a strong network.”
During their time on campus, Isaacson Miller will meet with stakeholders and hold input sessions where “the intention is that we get a good cross section of people who care and who have had experience with the chaplaincy to communicate what they think makes a good chaplain,” according to Tepper. With what they learn from these meetings, the firm will create a nationally publicized listing including “a unique set of qualities or tasks that [the] Hamilton community feels are essential” said Tepper.
Card is also currently organizing a search committee of students, faculty and staff that should be announced “in the next few days. There will be a communication to the community that will explain the search process, the timeline, and any other broader visions for religious life on campus,” Tepper explained. This committee has not yet been announced. Two faculty members have already left the search committee, according to an anonymous source.
The Timeline
Isaacson Miller will hold two open forums: one on November 11 from 4-5pm for faculty and staff in the Events Barn and one on November 12 from 3:30 to 5pm in the Chapel. Card’s email asks the Hamilton community, “Do you have any suggestions of individuals we should contact, either for candidate suggestions or as candidates themselves?”
Tepper said that candidates will be reviewed between December and January. Interviews with candidates will likely happen in February, with Tepper hoping that a lot of the campus can participate in them,” Tepper added that, realistically, the school will offer the position to someone at the end of March, with a start time of July 1st.
“We would, if we could, contract them for three or four months before July 1st starts,” said Tepper, “so that they can begin doing the planning work with the community to design what religious life and the chaplaincy will be.”
A goal “in the first six months of that person's assignment [would be] to get the design completed so that we can move forward with hires, [and] with programmatic investments,” Tepper added.
What Does President Tepper Say is Important in Hiring a Chaplain?
Tepper had a few of his own ideas and requirements for a new chaplain, but noted, “If I had a vision that I was just so super confident about, [and that was fully aligned with campus needs], then we would hire a chaplain who could execute that vision, and they would start immediately…I just don't think that's the best way forward for the community.” He sees creating a new model of spiritual life on campus as the role of the new chaplain.
“I don't think there's any past model that we should be committed to. We live in an increasingly pluralistic society,” Tepper said. “Students' religious needs and spiritual needs are changing.”
Tepper wants a chaplain to “understand this place really well,” stating that he desired “a very strong chaplain that can work with a bunch of interim solutions while the larger vision gets designed.”
Tepper offered some clarity into the obscure nature of the search process: “I'm guessing it's going to be open, which means the candidates would come for interviews and anybody could come and get feedback,” Tepper said. “That's the preferred method, but I'm just reserving the possibility that if we think that won't get us the best candidates, that we would be willing to consider a more closed system. But if we do that, then we have to invite lots of people to meet the candidates in a more confidential way.” Tepper added that his “preference is always a more public process.”
Other Chaplains?
There is currently no timeline for hiring new chaplains in other positions, such as a Jewish chaplain or an Imam. “As much as I'd like to go out and hire full-time or part-time faith leaders, it just feels like that then boxes in this next person,” explained Tepper. “We've already made decisions for them. I really want them to build. So I think that means we have to find really good people this year who are willing to serve this community on an interim basis. It doesn't mean we don't do anything. It just means that we make the resources available to make sure that we can bring people in where it fits their life and schedule.”
Card has been in touch with leaders of religious groups on campus to figure out their needs.
“I don't know if there's a formal process, but I guess what I would say is that we're in a moment where if there's a gap or a need, no one should wait for a process,” Tepper said. “They should send an email to me, to Dean Card, and say, ‘can this happen?’”
Students say that this system has not been working, at least from Card’s end of things. Hillel presidents meet with Card and Office Assistant Ariel Jarman once a week to address the group’s needs in the absence of a Jewish chaplain. Co-President of Hillel, Carter Hollins, said, “While my emails to Chris Card have typically been responded to in a very reasonable hour… that is not the same case for other students.” He added that, “even other students’ [emails] on the Spiritual Leadership Council…have gone unresponded for weeks until those students have had to corner him in SLC's monthly meetings to ask their pretty basic questions. So I don't think that that process is working when students are emailing Dean Card. When students email President Tepper, I think that that's been better.”
Kirk Petrie, a co-president of Newman Council, described a similar situation, “I emailed [Card] September 9th to schedule a Newman meeting and we still haven’t met.”
Card did not respond to The Monitor’s request for a comment.