Listen Here
Sarah Fedirka, Ph.D.
Associate Professor and Chair of English, Religious Studies, and Philosophy
Fedirka@Findlay.edu
This column is part of a series published each week in the Pulse for the rest of the semester from the Watterson Institute for Ethical Leadership working group members.
Last week in this space, I invited us to reflect on our roots. I quoted at length from University of Findlay’s first president, Rev. John R. H. Latchaw, to remind us that our roots are deep and deeply inclusive. This week, though evidence of spring surrounds me, feelings of winter overwhelm me. I cannot shake the “imprints of its icy fingers” nor its “chill, and dark, and cold” (Fordham).
Global authoritarianism. Health inequities. Racial inequities. Environmental degradation. Economic disparities. Challenges to due process. Attacks on higher education. Attacks on the First Amendment. The normalizing of inhumanity. These are just some of what fuel this, “the winter of my discontent” (Shakespeare).
In this season, I find myself asking, how is one to live?
In this and every season, the answer is the same. With courage, compassion, integrity, and humility.
This question and its answer drive the urgency of my work with the Watterson Center for Ethical Leadership. In April 2022, Billy J. (‘96) and Brenda Watterson donated $6 million to University of Findlay for the creation of the Watterson Center for Ethical Leadership (WCEL). A year later, the WCEL council was formed. Comprised of employees from the University’s six colleges as well as essential student service areas, the council is responsible for the ongoing, grounds-up development of the WCEL’s programs and pedagogy. Through its mission to inspire ethical leaders who will impact their world, the WCEL promises to make ethical leadership formation the hallmark of a University of Findlay education. It will provide opportunities for students and employees to practice and reflect on courage, compassion, integrity, and humility. These are the Center’s values and the foundational character traits of virtuous leaders capable of meeting the needs of inclusive communities. Such leaders are needed now more than ever. 
In July 2023, only a few months after the WCEL council was formed, Governor DeWine approved the state’s two-year $191 million dollar budget. In doing so, he approved allocation of $24 million for the establishment of “intellectual diversity centers” at five Ohio universities (OSU, Miami, Toledo, Cincinnati, and Cleveland State). The centers were originally proposed in SB 117, which, after passing the House and Senate, was folded into the budget. According to SB 117, all five centers must, among other things, “affirm a commitment to an ethic of civil and free inquiry which respects the intellectual freedom of each member, supports individual capacities for growth, and welcomes the differences of opinion that naturally occur in a public university.”
The Watterson Center for Ethical Leadership should not be confused with one of these state mandated centers. An ethic of civic and free inquiry is not the same as a virtue ethic, grounded in values of courage, compassion, integrity, and humility. A virtue ethic helps us answer the question, “how is one to live?” According to these values, one is to live by taking ethical action even when it’s difficult, unpopular, or undesirable. One is to respond with grace towards oneself and others. One is to request and receive help, love, and forgiveness. If we behave in these ways, respect for intellectual freedom, individual growth, and welcomeness toward differences of opinion are the natural results. To behave in these ways broadens perspective, increases understanding, and normalizes love for humanity. The WCEL was founded not by an act of political fiat but through the generous gift of an Oiler alumnus who believes that University of Findlay graduates can change the world and who likewise believes that through the WCEL, University of Findlay “will become a beacon of light and hope for the world.”
“When despair for the world grows in me” (Berry) and the “wild winds coldly blow” (E. Brontë), this light, this hope remind me that when I stand “on winter’s margin,” even “half-forged memories” of how I am to live return me “to gardens famous for their charity” (Oliver).
