Grove City College ushered in the academic year Tuesday at Opening Convocation, where President Paul J. McNulty ’80 urged the campus community to embrace the College’s values of faithfulness, excellence, community, stewardship and independence.
“Here at Grove City College we truly embrace these values,” McNulty said.
The College’s values are interconnected, McNulty said, and provide a “moral compass that sets the real direction” for the institution, its students, faculty and staff, working together in a Christ-centered learning and living community.
“What we claim to be must match what we really are,” McNulty told the College community gathered in the historic Harbison Chapel. “Only a good tree bears good fruit. These values must be real for us. These values must be true for us.”
He likened the College to a training ground where students learn to put their gifts and abilities to work in service to God and the common good. “If we are all in this together, and faithful to God’s command, devoted to Godly excellence, determined to build a kind and caring community, serve as wise stewards of our resources and vigilant in guarding our independence, then we will be like that ‘house built upon the rock’ with a firm foundation. So that when the rain falls, and the floods come, and winds beat against the house, it will not fall.”
McNulty’s message was delivered to an audience that included 696 new students and nine new faculty members who, along with their peer faculty and administrators, processed in full academic regalia heralded by fanfare from the Wolverine Marching Band’s trumpet section to mark the beginning of the new year. The traditional convocation service opened the College’s 142nd academic year and introduced new students formally to the College community.
Check out our Opening Convocation photo gallery here.
For more about Grove City College and our Vision, Mission and Values, visit www.gcc.edu.