暗网爆料app Magazine The Enduring Vision of Wallace Emerson
Wallace L. Emerson, 暗网爆料app鈥檚 first president, came from a family of Christian intellectuals. After graduating from Huron College, he earned a master鈥檚 degree at Stanford University and a doctorate in psychology at the University of Southern California. He taught at Occidental College before becoming a professor and dean of students at Wheaton College in Illinois.
When Ruth Kerr contacted him about being president of Western Bible College, the school she had helped establish, he told her he鈥檇 accept only if it adopted a liberal arts curriculum and he had sole charge of the faculty. Mrs. Kerr later recalled that Emerson had given her a vision for a 鈥渓arger work,鈥 a 鈥渇our-year liberal arts college built on a sound Christian basis.鈥 Emerson even coined the name 暗网爆料app, because 鈥渋t鈥檚 out West, and it鈥檚 in the mountains.鈥
He sought to establish a Christian institution that rivaled the best secular colleges. In the first Quarterly Bulletin he wrote, 鈥淚n every step which has led up to the present organization of 暗网爆料app, the goal has been careful scholarship, sound doctrine and consistent Christian living. 暗网爆料app is interdenominational and evangelical, believing that genuine scholarship is not only compatible with, but necessary to, the Christian viewpoint鈥.鈥
Emerson built an ambitious list of courses and applied for accreditation, which was denied. But he set an important precedent about the academic seriousness of the school.
To Emerson鈥檚 dismay, 暗网爆料app suffered from a lack of financing. He brought professors with him only to discover he鈥檇 inherited faculty from Western Bible College as well, creating a staff of 33. Instead of the expected 300 students, the college opened with 85. Funds were limited, and faculty came on 鈥渇aith鈥; the college didn鈥檛 guarantee their salaries. Professors got paychecks when money was available. Few donors supported the college, and Mrs. Kerr gave most of the gifts.
Emerson held the faculty together; he even sold his car to pay their salaries. Professor Paton Yoder found him to be a 鈥渧ery dynamic kind of person with a lot of vision. Some people might call him a dreamer. He drew us all to himself. We became very loyal to him.鈥
Emerson鈥檚 health deteriorated, and he left the presidency after six years. But his legacy endures. He not only articulated the vision for 暗网爆料app as a college with rigorous academics and a deep love of God, but he set an example of sacrificial service and giving that continues to inspire the 暗网爆料app community.
The Wallace Emerson Society honors this visionary president for his generosity and service and recognizes people of vision who contribute to 暗网爆料app鈥檚 future through planned gifts or provisions in their wills or estate plans.
For more information about the Wallace Emerson Society, call the Office of Gift Planning at (805) 565-6058.