To the Editors:

Winter Term has just ended. Oberlin was quiet, with few students on campus involved in research with faculty, bookmaking, writing, theater work and practicing an instrument. Many of you were engaged throughout the world in diverse projects. Many of you went home to think, reconnect or volunteer.

Winter Term did not exist when I graduated from Oberlin in the ’50s. There were rare semesters abroad and a few academic exchange programs to take a handful of us off campus. We remained college- and curriculum-bound from September to May for four long years.

Nowadays, each student is encouraged to develop a special project for three Januaries — projects which find you close to home or far from it, from Tappan Square to Toronto, San Antonio to Arezzo, Taipei to El Salvador. And if you don’t choose to visit the Caribbean, a dance instructor from the Caribbean comes to Oberlin to share a Winter Term with some avid dancers.

It’s no wonder that when February rolls around, I feel I am reconnecting with students who have undergone change, enriched by your engagement in distant places either inside your head from language immersion on South Professor Street, or outside and inside in a Hanoi hospital. Either way, what happens is good.

We’re glad you embraced this opportunity. We missed you. Welcome back from wherever.

– Thelma Morris
OC ’54