Scholarship Foundation colleagues (left to right) DJ Jackson, Lily De La Garza, and Ricky Hughes helping Executive Director Faith Sandler (in the green “Morning Person” cap) celebrate 65 years on earth.
Yesterday was my 65th birthday. Instead of spending the morning completing Medicare paperwork or checking balances in my retirement funds, I met my colleagues on a hike along a river and up a steep hill, setting the pace so as not to reinforce any stereotype of an “elder”. We sat at the top in the sun, taking in the warmth and the color. We were comfortable enough to be silent together. What a gift.
But as afternoon arrived, I finally decided to break the silence and write from the heart, to give up trying to make a perfect public statement about why I’m still working hard and for what. I’ve ditched many drafts in recent months.
Yesterday morning, two social media posts grabbed my attention: one a birthday wish and the other a now common cry:
- “Happy Birthday my friend! Miss your wisdom” from an east coast colleague
- “Absolutely and utterly defeated” by a St. Louisan who leads the scrappiest volunteer work with people facing the very worst conditions.
These two pair well, silence and defeat. I’ve been working hard and without public proclamation to make certain fear does not immobilize the board, staff, and supporters of The Scholarship Foundation of St. Louis. The climate of rancor and flagrant abuses of power may have some of us feeling unmoored, but our students and the generations before them have long had to navigate systems designed to defeat them. In service to the hope of a true democracy someday, they are our source of wisdom and our north star.
Like many of my counterparts, I’ve been buried in analyses and forecasts, conducting an environmental scan of the most relentless and seismic shifts in social systems we have seen in our lifetimes. At the Foundation, we’ve spent much of my 65th year (our organizational 105th) hunkering down, turning inward, reallocating resources to be sure students are financially and otherwise safe, and taking steps to reduce unnecessary risk in a climate hostile to what we do and with whom we do it. This has become my 2025 project and I’m here to tell you that we aren’t changing course.
So instead of another story of how scary and silencing it all is, I’ll remind you of truths we hold to be self-evident.
Our first and most important priority is direct financial support to students who need it.
(“real dollars to real people”)
Diversity, inclusion, and racial and economic equity are qualities essential to thriving communities.
(not “acronyms to avoid”)
We are committed to outflanking unjust systems by assuring full and last dollar funding,
reducing or eliminating debt along the way.
(“first do no harm”)
Though what we do threatens existing systems that seem hell-bent on disintegration and disenfranchisement (and those in power might prefer we were immobilized or silent) our mission and our 105-year legacy will not allow such laziness. This is hard work resulting in outcomes no U.S. government system or political party can claim having ever achieved.
So no, I can’t announce my retirement just yet. It’s very dark, and the north star we’ve known for more than a century is still shining. I’m working to pack the provisions my successors will need to make it to the top unafraid.
I’m ever grateful you are here too, unretired from the cause, with your sturdy shoes and your determination. Did I mention my birthday cake is vegan banana bread with chocolate chips, pecans, and orange zest and will be served at the summit?
– Faith Sandler
