Cultivating Discovery

Dear Saint Mary’s Friends,

It still feels like the heart of summer, but in just a few weeks, the members of the Class of 2030 (as well as transfers and returning students!) will begin arriving on campus. Like those who came before them, our newest Belles will bring boxes and backpacks, photographs and favorite objects, excitement and uncertainty. 

What strikes me every year is that, despite all their differences, these students have one thing in common: they all expect to find something in college. Some imagine they know exactly what that will be: a sense of independence, a meaningful subject to study, lifelong friends. Others may be less specific in their expectations but carry a quiet hope that something meaningful awaits them, even if they cannot yet name it.

Earlier this summer, I read Kathryn Schulz's beautiful book Lost & Found: Reflections on Grief, Gratitude, and Happiness, an extended meditation on the mysterious ways our lives are shaped by both losses and revelations. In reflecting on what it means to "find," she makes a distinction that has stayed with me. Finding can mean either recovering something we once had but lost or else discovering something we never knew existed. “Recovery,” she writes, “essentially reverses the impact of loss.” Discovery, by contrast, “changes our world” and offers us something new.

I’ve lingered over that observation because it seems to capture something essential about a college education. College can certainly help students recover things: skills, talents, confidence, for example. But those recoveries, important as they are, are not the deepest promise of higher education. The more profound promise is discovery.

College is a place where students discover questions they had never thought to ask. They stumble into disciplines they never imagined loving and uncover gifts they did not yet know they possessed. They find people whose lives are very different from their own and—through them—new ways of seeing the world. Sometimes they even realize that the future they carefully planned is not the future they are ultimately called to embrace.

Schulz also observes that discovery happens in two ways. Sometimes finding starts with looking. We form a hypothesis and then search patiently, think deeply, experiment, revise, and persevere until we have the proof of our idea. But sometimes discovery arrives unexpectedly: a chance conversation, a surprising friendship, a course taken almost by accident, a book in the library next to the one we were looking for. The world suddenly reveals something we did not know we were seeking, and it feels like sheer luck.

The best colleges cultivate both kinds of discovery. We point students in certain directions and invite them to look—to study seriously, to read closely, to ask difficult questions, to test ideas, and to develop habits of careful attention. At the same time, we create a community where unexpected discoveries become possible, where a conversation in a residence hall or a service project or a late-night discussion can change the direction of a life. That kind of discovery requires an open mind and an open heart.

As I reflected on Schulz's insights about losing and finding, I found myself thinking about some important words that have welcomed generations of Saint Mary's students. They are engraved in stone on our campus and are so familiar that many of our alumnae can recite them from memory. Yet after reading Schulz’s book, I heard them differently this summer. In 1939, Sister Madeleva Wolff, the College's third president, offered this promise to incoming students: "We promise you discovery: the discovery of yourselves, the discovery of the universe and your place in it."

What strikes me now is that she did not offer a list but rather a progression. First, the discovery of oneself—not the exact person arriving at Saint Mary's, but one who is still becoming. Then, the discovery of the universe—infinitely larger, richer, more complex, and more beautiful than any one discipline or any one person can fully apprehend or comprehend. And finally, the discovery of one’s place in that universe—not simply a career, but an appreciation of how one’s unique gifts, intellect, values, and heart can become blessings to others in places of work, in communities, and in families. That is a promise worthy of a liberal arts education. It is also a promise that continues to unfold over a lifetime.

As we prepare to welcome the Class of 2030, I hope our newest students arrive eager to learn. But even more, I hope they come ready to discover—to seek with curiosity, to receive surprises with gratitude, and to remain open to possibilities they cannot yet imagine. The most important things they find here may well be the things they never thought to look for.

Warm regards,

Katie Conboy, Ph.D.
President

July 27, 2026