Compass Center director Daniel Meyers leaves university

Meyers is set to depart at the end of this month. Photo by Elizabeth Stevenson.

AIDAN GREGG | MANAGING EDITOR | agregg1@butler.edu

Khalilah Marbury, vice president for diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) announced on Jan. 13 the departure of Compass Center Director Daniel Meyers. Meyers began his tenure at Butler University in June 2015 and will depart at the end of January. He and his family will move to Ashland, Oregon, where his partner will be a pastor. 

Over nearly 10 years, Meyers has overseen the growth of the Compass Center and deeper integration of the center’s activities throughout campus. He led the rebranding of the Center for Faith and Vocation to the Compass Center, to reflect the center’s emphasis on finding one’s direction in life, not necessarily through faith. The Butler Collegian sat down with Meyers to learn about his next steps and reflect on his time at Butler. 

THE BUTLER COLLEGIAN: What did the process of coming to this decision to leave Butler and move on to your new journey look like?

DANIEL MEYERS: There are multiple things going on. I’m from Portland, Oregon and my parents live there. My wife’s sister lives there with her family and my wife is from Northern California. The town we’ve landed in is two hours north of her parents and four hours south of mine. The logistics of that is a big part of it. 

There’s also a part of me that just belongs and longs for mountains and pine forests and the Pacific Ocean and kind of the growing-up experience of the Pacific Northwest. So there’s definitely a feeling of going home, even though it’s not the town or area of Oregon I grew up in. There’s just an element there that I’m just really excited to be returning and putting some roots into. There are also some stories I’ve built for myself about how I want to be a dad with my young kids, and a lot of that relates to doing the kinds of things you can do out there, like hiking and skiing and backpacking. 

The other big thing is that this is a great move professionally for my wife. She was thinking about how she was ready to move on from the church she’s currently serving. We wanted to get back to the Pacific Northwest. Two positions opened up in our denomination, and there are pretty limited churches in our denomination in that part of the country, so to have two pop up at once is unusual. So she pursued them both, and had lots of interviews and sort of the process went to the one that she got. When we moved to Indiana, we moved here because I got this job at Butler, and it feels really good, I think, as a married couple, for us to move again, prioritizing her career and what’s next for her and for me to navigate that as the trailing spouse this time. So all of that feels really good. 

TBC: So it was both maintaining that balance in the relationship, and also a home going for both of you, and returning to returning to your roots, and then planting some new ones out there?

DM: Yeah, I’ll tell you a quick story. When I flew out to look at a house to buy, I got delayed on my flight to Seattle, so I had to come in the next day. When the Seattle flight picked up over the clouds and was doing a 45-minute flight down to southern Oregon, I could see out my window every single cascade mountain, Mount Rainier, Mount Adams, Mount St. Helens, Mount Hood, Mount Jefferson, the Three Sisters, Mount Bachelor, I know all those places; I grew up hiking in and out of those places. And then there was this mountain that I didn’t know the name of, and that’s pretty much where we landed. And I asked my mother-in-law, “What is that?” And she said, “Oh, that’s Mount McLaughlin.” And so what I like about that is I’m familiar with this place, but there’s this new thing that I actually have never really encountered before. So it is going home, but it’s also going to something new. And I think that’s precisely how I’m framing it, a familiar, but new journey. 

TBC: I want to flash back a little bit. You mentioned that you moved here for this job with your wife. How did you end up at Butler in the first place?

DM: So after undergrad in Oregon, we both moved out to the East Coast and then I went to seminary and graduate school. In that process, I felt I wanted to do hospital chaplaincy, but I got sort of energized and interested in university chaplaincy. I was doing a national search, but Butler was not a place I thought I’d end up. We’re from the West Coast and we’d spend a lot of time on the East Coast. The middle wasn’t a place we’d spent too much time on. But I applied because it was a great position. It was just in a place that we didn’t think we’d end up. But then I came, I interviewed, and the people here were lovely. So the decision to come here was pretty clear. 

TBC: Are there other learning experiences that you think you’ll take with you to what is next?

DM: When I started, the person I reported to was the Associate Provost, whose name was Mary Ramsbottom, and she was amazing. She retired one year after I started, but she gave me a bit of wisdom early on: “Don’t be afraid of incremental requests or incremental success.” So like little bits, little little movements towards the big goal. 

So when I think about one big learning moment for me, it is expanding the center. So in addition to Marguerite and I, who are the two full-time people, we now have two part-time roles focusing on Jewish life and Muslim life. We also have our Compass Center Scholar-in-Residence, Brent Hege. We’ve moved from two people to five, and we’re in the process of trying to explore if we can add an administrative support role. But that is a lot of me learning how to advocate for a space. I don’t think I’ve done all of that perfectly but it has been an ongoing learning experience.

So definitely for me, a big takeaway of my professional development is starting a center here, with basically two of us, and then ending it where we got five people involved, three interns, and how to keep encouraging all that momentum going forward. It’s been fun.

TBC: What would you like to see for The Compass Center after your departure?

DM: I think there’s a really strong foundation right now for the Compass Center. What I hope for is that there can continue to be better integration of all that into new partnerships on campus. I was exploring how to get a course that helps seniors think about their next chapter, particularly as they’re ending their time at Butler. There’s an equally interesting opportunity for athletes who are ending their athletic careers. But then the huge game changer for us too is moving into the DEI division. There’s such energy in student engagement in the DEI division particularly around ideas of dialogue and ideas of working across difference. The next chapter of how to take something like the Interfaith Council and integrate that more fully into campus. It’s this great group, and it produces some really great outcomes, but it’s pretty internal to the Compass Center. My hope is a new director might have some ways to generate some further interconnectedness for some of the best things we’re doing.

TBC: What do you think you will miss the most about Butler? 

DM: Definitely the people. There are really great people here. Whoever the new director is, they’ll experience it this way too. I’ve gotten to know really great collaborators, and the interfaith work is so important right now. Our world is pretty fraught, and pursuing a sense of meaning with an understanding that the way I perceive my life might not be the only way to perceive a life is really important. So I will miss the interactions and the community partners and the students.

TBC: As we wrap up, are there any parting words you would like to offer? 

DM: I have a lot of gratitude for Butler as an institution, but institutions are made of people. 

This interview was edited for clarity and Collegian style guidelines. 

Authors

Related posts

Top