HEALDSBURG COLLEGE DEBT.
By M. E. Cady
Healdsburg College, as most of our other educational institutions, is heavily encumbered with debt. This debt amounts to about forty thousand dollars. During the last year the board of trustees and the faculty have endeavored to do what they could to interest our brethren and sisters in the district in the work of lifting the indebtedness of the college. At the annual camp-meeting a year ago, this matter was taken up in a vigorous way, and about twelve thousand dollars was received in money and pledges. At local camp-meetings held in the State, the amount was increased to nearly twenty-two thousand dollars. This is to be paid in annual payments during the next three years. The board, faculty, ministering brethren, Bible workers, and, in fact, all our laborers, took hold of this work in earnest, and most of them gave a month's wages each year for the next three years. This effort on the part of the brethren and sisters to help liquidate the college debt has also had an influence on public interest in the college work. Without any special effort during vacation, a larger number of students were in school last year than for seven or eight years preceding. The enrollment reached two hundred and fifty. When our people show enough interest in our institutions to help them out of their embarrassing condition, they will certainly have an interest in the work of education. It will be realized that the institution does not belong to the college board and the few teachers who are connected with the school, but it belongs to all who are in the district. The college is the child of the district in which it is situated, and should receive the careful thought and attention that a true parent gives to a child who has made mistakes and blunders. It should not be disowned, but should be admonished, counseled, and encouraged to try to do better in the future. This year at the annual camp-meeting in San Jose, June 5–17, the attention of our people was again called to the college interests. The plan that Sister White has in mind to relieve our educational institutions from indebtedness was presented to our brethren and sisters, and was heartily indorsed. Thirteen hundred copies of “Christ's Object Lessons” were subscribed for, and this number has been increased at one of the local camp-meetings, held since the State meeting. We expect many copies will be subscribed for at the three or four local meetings yet to be held in different parts of the State. It is planned that, as soon as the camp-meetings are over, each church in our district be visited, and our brethren and sisters urged to subscribe for all the copies that they feel able to buy. After this work has been thoroughly done among our people in the different churches, then we shall send out canvassers. During the next school year a canvassers' school will be carried on in connection with the regular college work. The California State agent will have charge of the canvassing department. We shall endeavor to enlist the interest of the students in “Christ's Object Lessons,” and give them a thorough training, so that they can do good work with this book during the summer vacation. We believe that hundreds of books can be disposed of by the students in this way. Not only will the college be blessed financially, but the spirit of canvassing will be revived in the hearts of our students, and the experience gained in this work will better qualify them for whatever work the Lord may call them to do. We thank the Lord for his kind remembrance of the needs of the educational work, and desire to work in harmony with the plan that he has given for relieving our educational institutions. May the Lord bless these plans as they are put into execution, and revive in the hearts of his people a deeper love for the principles of Christian education, and a spirit of greater loyalty to the work of God in all its phases.