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 Carol
Long does not come from a family of academics. Her scholarship is
unparalleled in her family of bakers and caterers. Her brother completed
several years of college, her mother graduated from high school,
her dad finished eighth grade.
She knew little about the liberal arts in 1962, but a love of
reading and a scholarship to Pomona College began a 42-year journey
that would eventually place her in the dean’s chair in the
College of Liberal Arts at Willamette University.
“I always wanted to teach,” she said. “When
I was in the third grade, I thought I’d become a third-grade
teacher. When I was in the sixth grade, I wanted to be a sixth grade
teacher. But Pomona was a stereo-typical transformative educational
experience. College, which included a semester abroad, changed me
in ways I could not have anticipated.”
The semester of international living in Dublin was eye-popping
even for this Los Angeles native. “You could organize your
school work through your Pomona professors, so essentially we were
there as independent study students. We lived with host families
and spent a lot of time using the libraries at Trinity College and
at University College Dublin as well as the National Library. Basically
we were there without academic supervision which made life very
interesting. I spent part of my semester photo-graphing all of the
locales of James Joyce’s novel Ulysses.”
Her last year of undergraduate school would make the later, more
restricted graduate school years, seem punitive. “Six of my
eight courses were independently organized with a panel of three
professors. I did research on W.B. Yeats and mythology and defended
my thesis at the end of the year. After Pomona, the first year of
graduate school (Northwestern University)was a real come down. I
had to go back to class, take notes, mid-terms and finals. That
was really hideous,” she laughed, “but I survived.”
The shocking difference between her undergraduate and graduate school
experience ended the pattern of wanting to teach at whatever level
she found herself. She discovered she didn’t want to teach
graduate school but wished to return to the liberal arts. She finished
her dissertation in 1970, followed friends to Oregon, worked for
the forest service for a year and for a plant nursery in Beaverton.
“I was tired and I just really did nonacademic things for
a while. In that same period, I was licensed as a river guide. I
spent several summers living out of a waterproof river bag. The
side tour, before I started applying for academic positions, was
a good balance. I was excited about teaching, but I was also interested
in the natural world.” The side tour ended in 1972 when Long
joined the Willamette faculty.
“I was fortunate to come into a very strong and interesting
department. Virginia Bothun, now retired, likes to say that the
English department raised me, which is partly true.”
Required freshman composition courses, class visits and critiques
by department colleagues, and support for course development were
key ingredients for this future dean. The opportunity to teach classes
in Irish literature and to team teach with faculty from other departments
all worked to provide this newest faculty member with fertile soil
for professional growth.
“It was a very supportive, hard working, collegial department
and I think it was certainly part of what bonded me to the institution.
The department has a strong history of University service. Of the
past eight associate deans in the College, four of us, Dick Lord,
Virginia Bothun, Ken Nolley and I have come from the English department.
I know that that kind of modeling, of how one participates in the
institution, helped form who I have become.”
With more than three decades of teaching to her credit, the dean
has noted some subtle shifts in the student population. “When
comparing students from the 1970s to the class of 2004, certainly
there are some changes that are quantifiable. The SAT and grade
point averages are up. We draw a broader range of people from outside
the region, and we have more diversity among students. But we’ve
always had students who went above and beyond and did out-standing
work. I think over the years the average ability has increased,
which allows class discussion to move to a much higher level. But
because Willamette focuses on small classes that encourage individual
instruction, I’ve always had the opportunity to work with
students who were spectacular.”
Willamette freshmen arrive on campus today with 12 to 14 years
of diverse computer experience behind them. It may be their exposure
to technology that most separates them from those who studied here
in the 1970s. “Technology has made a lot of differences just
in the kind of consciousness students arrive with. I believe, for
instance, that today’s students have a lower tolerance for
long, complex prose works. On the other hand, I also see in students
other astonishing things like better visual imagination, better
ability to decode sequences of images.”
If technology is what most separates current students from Willamette
alumni, what remains as com-mon ground is the essence of the Willamette
experience. “What is consistently true of Willamette is that
when a student arrives and he or she has a particular interest,
whether it’s ‘I want to write a novel,’ or ‘I
want to read a bunch of philosophy,’ or ‘I want to organize
a political organization,’ whatever their passion, they are
able to make some progress with that passion. Sometimes it’s
strictly academic or sometimes it’s in extracurricular activities,
but there is always someone on campus who is willing to serve as
a mentor to that student. We are a culture of mentors, mentors who
support and enable the success of others. I have been fortunate
to have excellent mentors in my life, and as dean I hope to be able
to play that role for others.”
Because of her length of service to Willamette University, Long
brings to this new position a distinct perspective on the needs
and challenges of both students and faculty – what some might
call the “long view.”
– Janis J. Nichols
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