Theresa Hoffmann – attending from Houghton College (OE ’90):
After a semester at the OE, I felt like I had tasted a new paradigm for what learning could be, and I
hungered for more. I did not feel I had to rush-rush-rush to keep up. I had time to think, time for
thoughtful conversation, time to write reflectively, time to walk in nature, to exercise, to ponder who I
was. I felt supported in exploring and growing all of me.
Rob Skidmore – attending from Seattle Pacific University (OE ’86):
Since leaving the OE, I’ve earned an M.Div. at St. Vladimir’s Orthodox Seminary in New York and
have been ordained as an Orthodox priest, in which capacity I’ve served for seven years. I consider
my time at the OE to be amongst the most valuable academic and personal experiences of my life.
My studies fed my mental and spiritual hunger at that time and clarified my direction for the
remainder of my undergraduate studies. In terms of experiences that have taught me how to learn,
how to think, how to revel in the excitement of ideas, nothing competes with my time at the OE.
Anna Cook – attending from Hope College (OE ’01):
Instead of having to spread my attention wide, while also trying to delve deeply into the content of
each course, I was able to give my full attention to each text, each discussion, each assignment
before we moved on to the next. Four years after my term at the OE, I find myself referring to the
authors and ideas I encountered there more often than those I encountered in any other period of
my undergraduate education. It was the OE that helped me lay the groundwork for a deeper
understanding of the philosophical frameworks that shape our intellectual, spiritual and political
endeavors--to understand history, current events, and personal experience in all their irreducible
complexity. It was also important for me that, at the end of each unit of study, the faculty insisted we
take time off. For myself, someone who has never been good at saying "this is good enough," it was
a gift to have a community model serious play--rafting, backpacking, leaf-raking, theater, potlucks--
as well as serious intellectual exertion.
Aaron Fuller – attending from George Fox University (OE ’00):
I arrived at the OE as an enthusiastic, decent student with little direction academically or
vocationally. I left the OE an engaged, confident, and more articulate human being. The academic
rigor that infuses all facets of the OE program was challenging and transformative, enabling me to
perceive myself as a serious student with important work to do. I left the OE burning to discover
answers as well as new questions, and now not a day passes when I don't consider a person or
idea from the OE. My closest and most enduring friends today are people I met at the OE. I also
consider each of the OE professors a friend as well, even though we spent only four months
together; I can make a similar claim about only one other professor from all my other years of
undergraduate and graduate studies.
K. L. Going – attending from Eastern College (OE ‘93):
As an award-winning* author currently working on my seventh book, I
constantly draw from the lessons I learned at the Oregon Extension. I
credit the intensive writing experience and the opportunity for critical
thinking that the OE provided with my success in my chosen field. Now, as
a speaker at conferences, libraries, and schools, I share that knowledge
with aspiring writers across the country. Attending the OE was one of the
best choices I ever made.
*Michael Printz Honor winner
Kent Davis Sensenig – attending from Eastern Mennonite University (OE ’91):
My time at the OE was a significant time of preparation for my later master’s studies at a Mennonite
seminary and my doctoral studies in Christian Ethics at Fuller Theological Seminary. The OE
enhanced my capacity to think theologically, write with greater clarity, articulate ideas in conversation
with fellow believers from diverse Christian traditions, and integrate a range of disciplines. It was
also a wonderful learning community in which serious thinking and daily living flowed together
organically, as their old motto of “read a pile of books and chop a little wood” aptly captured. The rich
diet of reading brought together the enduring themes of classics like The Brothers Karamazov with
the best of contemporary social analysis and cultural observation. And the biblical narrative and
Christian story through the ages were pastorally but unintrusively woven throughout. It was as much
about learning to live rightly and graciously as learning to think cogently and deeply, and all within
the encompassing reality of God’s creative activity in history and nature (which was abundantly
available outside one’s cabin door!). It provided a context for sustained listening—to each other,
Scripture, great books, our own hearts, and living things—free from much of the distracting “white
noise” of our fragmenting, frenetic and consumption-driven postmodern environment. I can safely
say that the OE was the most academically stimulating season of my college years.
Kevin Filocamo – attending from Gordon College (OE ’84):
As a junior in college, I was a person in spiritual crisis, with the foundations of my faith crumbling. I
had the very good fortune to attend the OE during this very critical time in my life. I experienced the
faculty at the OE as a team of very compassionate and dedicated human beings who were
committed to the wholeness and well-being of each student. They helped normalize my experience
of “spiritual breakdown” and offered a structure with which to work through this process. In the
context of this communal spiritual inquiry, in which I was intellectually and personally challenged, I
began to develop tools of engagement and inquiry that have remained with me to this day. At the OE,
I was able to come to a spirituality that is based more deeply in integrity and ongoing inquiry. As a
result, my spiritual life is very much alive.
Rachel Ingraham – attending from Houghton College (OE ’05):
I came to the OE fairly disillusioned about the status of the American church today and the
possibility of my remaining in it. Although I attended a Christian college, I found that most of my
peers seemed to lack curiosity and a sense of urgency in exploring their faith and their world. At the
OE, interactions with books by Simone Weil, Kathleen Norris and James Alison allowed me, my
classmates, and our professors to be in dialogue with a Christianity that was not only content with
the status quo, but also wanted to move out and change the world. Before I attended the OE, I had
almost given up on the world of Christian education. Following my time in Lincoln, however, I was
able to return to my home campus with a renewed sense of how I might more fully integrate my
intellectual, spiritual, and emotional selves. Now that I am in the midst of an MDiv program at
Harvard Divinity School, I realize that it was the particular kind of Christian education encouraged by
the OE that has helped to bring me to where I am today--intellectually, spiritually, and emotionally. I
am still learning to "live the questions" that I began to pursue in Lincoln, and hope that this will be a
journey I can continue for many years to come.
Bonnie J (Geelhood) Davis – attending from Calvin College (OE ’93):
As a science major, and a pre-med student at that, I was not a typical OE student. I was very excited
that I could arrange my schedule so as to get a lot of my liberal arts credits taken care of at the OE. It
was wonderful to come to a place where everyone enjoyed reading and discussing ideas. I was
able to get my first taste of serious philosophy, theology and social thought as well as instruction in
how to read and understand these disciplines critically. As a family practice doctor in a rural
community, I see people in challenging situations every day. It is not just knowing which drug to
prescribe or how to put in sutures. I have found I am a better and more caring doctor when I can
understand a patient’s social situation, family setting, religious background, and what it is about us
humans that makes us really human. Had I just marched straight through college and medical
school without having had my experiences at the Oregon Extension to introduce me in an in-depth
level to the humanities, I would be much less successful as a doctor.
Student Reviews
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