📰The Belltower Times (October 2025)

Furman's new "Dins Digest" is worthy of praise and might reflect a new approach to engaging alumni.

Announcements:

• The Furman Free Speech Alliance will be out in force at Furman’s homecoming celebrations (October 24 - 26). We hope you will join us:

  • Friday, October 24th, at the McAlister Auditorium for an event with the Tocqueville Center on the Crisis in American Higher Education featuring President Elizabeth Davis, Senator Ben Sasse, and Dr. John Tomasi -- the inaugural president of Heterodox Academy.

    • We will be tabling outside the event, telling Furman students, alumni, and community members about out work.

  • Saturday, October 25th, on the Furman Mall for an epic homecoming tailgate featuring plenty of food from Henry’s BBQ.

    • Below, see a photo from our tailgate last year:

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Furman Trivia: Homecoming Edition

How much do you know about Furman? This section will test your knowledge. Our question this month is about Furman’s rivalry with its homecoming opponent, The Citadel.

Question: What year did Furman and the Citadel first play? And what is the all-time record between the two schools?

*Find the answer at the bottom of the newsletter!*

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Campus Dispatch: Dins Digest Deserves Praise

We’ve had our fair share of criticisms for Furman this fall, but this month, I’d like to highlight something the university has done exceptionally well.

Furman’s Office of Alumni Engagement recently launched a new initiative called Dins Digest — a weekly newsletter designed to keep alumni like us connected to life on campus.

If you’re like me, you’re already subscribed and enjoying the updates. But if you haven’t yet checked it out, Dins Digest has featured a range of interesting stories, including:

• Furman retiring U.S. soccer legend Clint Dempsey’s jersey.

• The re-opening of Timmons Arena, Furman’s basketball stadium.

• Two Furman students pursued summer internships in New York.

I’ve also been pleasantly surprised to see that Dins Digest features stories from across the political spectrum and puts a particular emphasis on the importance of political discourse. For example:

• The September 25th newsletter featured this story highlighting how Furman’s “On Discourse” program (which we have covered extensively) is helping students “communicate across differences.”

• The September 18th newsletter featured this photo of members of the Furman Conservative Society placing small American flags around the fountain at the front gate in honor of September 11.

In the past, many alumni — myself included — have felt that Furman only reached out when it was time for a fundraising appeal. Dins Digest represents a real change in approach. It’s an effort to build a genuine relationship with alumni — one based on shared stories, not just solicitations.

I wholeheartedly welcome it. And I can’t help but think that our work at the Furman Free Speech Alliance played some small part in helping make this new spirit of engagement possible.

You can submit story ideas or upcoming events to the Dins Digest team by emailing dins.digest@furman.edu. Events must be received by 4 p.m. on Friday to be considered for inclusion in next week’s Dins Digest.

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CLPs of the Month:

Furman students must attend 32 Cultural Life Programs (CLPs) to graduate. CLPs are university-approved events meant to “enrich” and “build community.”

But what counts as “cultural enrichment” these days?

Here are some examples of CLPs from October:

• October 15th, Furman will host an event on “Christian Non-violence” focused on the “underlying shift in the mindset of American Christians that allows violence in our modern society.”

• October 22nd, there will be an event on “Islamophobia” about how “many contemporary stereotypes about Islam and the ‘Orient’ can be traced back to” how medieval Christians talked about Islam.

• October 28th will feature an event on “Reproductive Justice and Resistance” that will discuss America’s “long history of enacting of reproductive oppression on different communities.”

• October 30th will end the month with an event on “Klandamentalism” that is all about how “the words Bob Jones used in the 1920s to meld fundamentalism with the Klan parallel the white nationalistic rhetoric today.”

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Trivia Answer:

1913; Furman has won 64 times, Citadel has won 37 times,the two schools have tied 3 times