Coming up with a word to describe the attitude of Whitworth, both politically and socially, can make for a difficult discussion that soon tends to dissolve into a debate over semantics. However, students and professors debate where Whitworth falls in the conservative spectrum and the negative and positive consequences of Whitworth s image, reputation. A consensus seems to be that Whitworth, as a small, private, Christian institution, is more conservative compared to public, secular schools. Yet compared to other religiously-affiliated colleges, Whitworth is closer to the other end of the spectrum, senior Rachel Hufman said. For a Christian school, I think of Whitworth as liberal, Hufman said.
Some schools don t even bring up that issue.
Sources of conservativism One possible source of this conservative nature, compared to public secular schools, is from Whitworth s religious affiliation. Because of our Christian perspective and our commitment to the Christian community of believers, we re automatically more conservative, Professor of Theatre Rick Hornor said. And, I think it s great. Another explanation is Whitworth s largely homogeneous community. Because the student body is very alike, there s not a lot of different voices.