The Observer is Always in the Story
On Memoir, Memory, and the Limits of Objectivity
Not long ago, I reviewed Lauren Kessler’s Everything Changes Everything, her memoir of walking the Camino Francés, the ancient 500-mile pilgrimage that begins in the south of France, crosses northern Spain, and concludes at Santiago de Compostela. Kessler undertook the journey after losing both her husband and her daughter within the span of eight months. My review was later published in the Eugene Weekly (still in existence after 44 years as an actual print newspaper!).
Now, about four months after the book’s publication, Kessler has posted an essay on her Substack titled “The Facts of Memory.” In it, she reflects on the challenges of writing a memoir, a genre that differs from the nonfiction books that established her reputation. As a journalist and nonfiction writer, she has spent her career pursuing facts, verifying accounts, and trying to get the story right. Memoir, however, asks something different of a writer.
The essay explores the uneasy relationship between memory and accuracy. Kessler describes the steps she took to check her recollections against documents, conversations, and other sources, while also acknowledging the unavoidable role of memory in shaping any personal narrative. Reading it, I was struck by her wrestling with questions that have occupied researchers, historians, and writers for a very long time. She invited readers to respond, and I found myself wanting to join the conversation. Here is what I wrote…
Hi Lauren,
This essay resonated with me, though perhaps not in exactly the way you intended.
My academic training was in qualitative and interpretive research. For my doctoral dissertation, I spent several years studying the social world of a college fraternity, conducting interviews, reviewing documents, attending events, and attempting to understand how members made meaning of their experiences. Early in that work, I abandoned the idea that I could somehow stand outside the story as a detached observer. I brought my own history, assumptions, and experiences to the project, and the best I could do was acknowledge them and make them visible to readers.
Because of that background, I really loved reading this discussion of memoir and nonfiction. We both seem to agree that all accounts of human experience are filtered through the observer. Where you see a tension between memoir and nonfiction, though, I tend to see a continuum. Even the most conscientious reporter or researcher makes choices about what to notice, what to include, what to emphasize, and what meaning to draw from the material. Those choices are never entirely objective.
In fact, one of the things I noted in my review of Everything Changes Everything was that I experienced it not only as a memoir but almost as a form of ethnography. You were documenting a journey, certainly, but you were also observing and interpreting a social and emotional world. The subject happened to be grief rather than a culture or community, but the process, and result, felt surprisingly familiar.
Where I think your essay raises an important point is in distinguishing between subjectivity and memory. Subjectivity does not trouble me very much. Memory, well, is an entirely more complicated matter. Human beings reconstruct the past rather than retrieve it intact, and I understand why that creates discomfort for anyone whose professional life has been grounded in nonfiction reporting.
Still, as a reader, what I ultimately trusted in your book was not the impossibility of perfect recall but the honesty and integrity of the effort. Without even much caring, I imagined that you were doing exactly what you describe in your author’s note: consulting documents, checking memories, talking with others, and rendering events as faithfully as possible.
Perhaps that is why I was struck by this essay as sounding almost apologetic. To me, the power of your memoir lies not in overcoming subjectivity but in embracing it. The book succeeds because it offers a deeply observed and thoughtfully interpreted account of lived experience. I don’t see that as a weakness of memoir. I see it as one of its greatest strengths.
Thanks for giving us all something to think about!
LCC Board of Education Testimony — June 3, 2026
Here are my remarks made before the Lane Community College Board of Education on June 3, 2026
Chair Folnagy, members of the Board, President Bulger, President Olson: good evening. My name is Jim Arnold and you now know me as a member of the Budget Committee. Thank you, Trustee Rust, for your nomination and your support.
I sent you all an email about this earlier today, so you may be aware that I published a Guest Column in the Lookout inspired by our recent Budget Committee deliberations. Specifically, the catalyst was last week’s discussion about tuition and whether or not to revisit an earlier Board decision.
I wrote the article for a number of reasons. Partly, I wanted to provide some historical context. Many Oregonians, especially younger ones, have little or no awareness of Measure 5 or the profound effect it has had on the funding of public education. Many of the budget pressures we discuss today did not just suddenly appear. They are connected to decisions that were made decades ago.
And I wanted to step back and look at another large issue, for I believe that discussions about tuition are never really just about percentages. Beneath them is a more fundamental question about who benefits from higher education and who should bear the costs.
But also let me mention something else that stayed with me after last Wednesday’s meeting, which was not so much the outcome as the process.
Students came forward and spoke about the impact tuition has had on their lives. Committee members asked questions. Different viewpoints were expressed. People disagreed. Then the committee voted.
Now, that may not sound all that remarkable, but I think it is worth acknowledging. Public institutions are supposed to create space for such conversations. The process does not guarantee agreement, but it does give us an opportunity to surface often unspoken assumptions.
Having spent much of my life in higher education, I can remember a time when the public discussion was framed somewhat differently than it is today. Back in my early days, students certainly benefited from earning degrees and improving their career opportunities, but there was a widespread understanding that society benefited as well.
Over time, as we all know, more and more of the cost of instruction has shifted to students and their families. That shift did not originate at Lane Community College nor with this Board.
Understanding how we arrived here may not solve our budget challenges, but it can help us have a more informed conversation about them.
Thank you.
Measure 5’s Long Shadow
I was recently appointed to the Lane Community College Budget Committee by the Board of Trustees, though late enough in the year that I only participated in the final three meetings. As far as entries into an established group go, mine was a little clunky. During my first meeting, no one acknowledged the new member in the room and, during the roll call vote, my name was omitted entirely.
Still … three meetings were enough time for me to notice a larger story hiding underneath the spreadsheets.
For those unfamiliar with the process, Oregon community college budget committees are composed of elected Board members plus an equal number of other citizens from the district, appointed by the Board. Their charge is to review the proposed budget, hear public comment, examine the assumptions behind the numbers, and ultimately recommend a budget to the Board for final approval.
This year’s discussions were unusually prolonged and, while mostly civil, occasionally bordered on contentious; there were some close votes. Lane’s proposed FY27 budget comes on the heels of mid-year class cancellations, a mitigation plan involving program closures, and broader concerns about the institution’s long-term financial condition. One recurring issue involved tuition.
Earlier in this academic year, the Board had approved a tuition increase of just 1.2%, considerably below the current rate of inflation. Then, during the final night of deliberations on May 27, Trustee Zach Mulholland proposed revisiting that earlier decision and raising the increase to 2.1% in order to help offset anticipated future shortfalls. I seconded the motion, not because I had fully embraced the proposal, but because I believed the issue deserved public discussion.
The motion failed overwhelmingly, and in the end I voted against it myself.
But what stayed with me afterward was not the outcome of the debate. It was the realization that an important part of the conversation had gone largely unspoken, and that I had failed to voice it myself. We discussed tuition levels, budget pressures, and projected shortfalls, but almost entirely in the language of present-day necessity, with little acknowledgment that Oregon’s higher education funding problems have been shaped by political and economic choices stretching back decades.
To understand why tuition debates at Oregon colleges now carry such weight, we have to go back to Ballot Measure 5.
Passed by voters in 1990, Measure 5 dramatically limited property taxes in Oregon. In many respects it mirrored California’s Proposition 13, reflecting the anti-tax politics that swept through much of the West during the late 1970s and 80s. Supporters argued that homeowners, including retirees on fixed incomes, needed protection from rapidly rising property taxes. That concern was understandable enough, but the long-term consequences for public education proved to be immense.
Before Measure 5, local property taxes played a major role in supporting schools and community colleges. Once those revenues were capped, the state assumed far greater responsibility for financing K-12 education. The difficulty was that state revenues were never really sufficient to fully support both K-12 and higher education at previous levels. Over time, political pressure understandably favored protecting primary and secondary education as much as possible, while colleges and universities were increasingly expected to generate their revenue from other sources. That meant: student tuition hikes.
The shift happened gradually enough that people barely noticed it occurring. One tuition increase did not fundamentally change the system. Neither did the next one. But year after year, decade after decade, the cumulative effect has been truly profound. Public higher education has slowly evolved from something funded primarily by the broader public into something increasingly financed by students themselves.
When I first entered higher education, way too many years ago now, the dominant philosophy was that colleges served a broad public purpose. An educated population strengthened communities, employers, civic institutions, and democracy itself. Students obviously benefited personally from earning degrees and improving their employment opportunities, but society benefited as well. The costs, therefore, were understood as something to be shared collectively.
Over time, however, the dominant cultural and philosophical view of higher education shifted. College increasingly came to be framed less as a public investment and more as a private consumer commodity. If students would eventually earn more money because of their education, then they should bear most of the financial responsibility for obtaining it.
At one level, this argument has a certain logic to it. Students absolutely do reap the benefits from their higher education. But the argument conveniently overlooks the larger public decisions that constrained educational funding in the first place. We, and I mean we taxpayers and voters, collectively shrunk the revenue source that once supported public colleges and universities, then gradually shifted more of the resulting burden onto students and their families.
That reality sat quietly underneath the Budget Committee discussions at Lane, even though no one acknowledged this out loud.
During public comment time, students did argue passionately against tuition increases, and understandably so. Many are already balancing work, rent, food insecurity, housing insecurity, childcare, transportation costs, and/or debt. Even relatively modest tuition increases can feel overwhelming when they are already living close to the financial edge. At the same time, the institution itself faces legitimate fiscal pressures involving bargaining agreements, deferred maintenance, enrollment shifts, program sustainability, and a looming demographic cliff. The math driving these discussions is real.
But arithmetic alone does not explain why Oregon students now shoulder so much of the cost of public higher education. That outcome reflects a more profound, and largely-unspoken decision about who benefits from higher education and who should pay for it.
For decades now, Oregon has largely answered that question by shifting more of the responsibility onto students themselves. The budget-development process and Board decision-making at Lane did not create this reality.
In the end, here’s how I see it: tuition debates are never simply about percentages. They are arguments about public priorities, generational obligations, and the extent to which society still views higher education as a shared public good rather than merely a private economic transaction.
These are larger issues than any single Budget Committee can resolve in any single year. But they are questions worth acknowledging explicitly, especially when the bill increasingly arrives in the hands of students.
Update on June 3, 2026:
This essay, in a slightly-edited form, was published as a Guest Column in the Lookout Eugene-Springfield today.
Recent Column Ignored Deeper College Issues
This is the unabridged version of the Guest Column I published in the Lookout Eugene-Springfield, December 2, 2025
After reading John Anderson’s recent essay in Lookout (November 26), I felt compelled to respond. His column closely resembled an email he circulated to various campus groups in November and, taken together, they present a very narrow picture of conditions at Lane Community College. His focus is almost entirely on the tone of criticism at Board meetings and on the affiliations of certain trustees. These concerns have their place, for sure, but they do not explain the deeper issues the college has been confronting for more than a year. Any serious discussion of what’s happening on campus needs to acknowledge the broader context.
What stands out in Anderson’s commentary is what it leaves unaddressed. Instead of focusing on the content of long-standing concerns, he chooses to discuss how various issues have been voiced. Tone matters, of course, but I’m fairly certain that that’s not the central issue. People speak passionately when they feel their questions are not being taken seriously, when planning is unclear, or when major decisions lack transparency. I attended the November 5 Board meeting he refers to and found the audience demeanor almost entirely civil and restrained. To the extent frustration was visible, I believe it reflected months of extreme stress within a campus environment that many employees now describe as increasingly perilous to navigate.
These issues are not abstract. After my most recent Eugene Weekly essay about LCC, a faculty member wrote me to say that many colleagues avoid speaking at Board meetings or attending union activities because they fear retaliation. They described low morale, the real possibility of a strike, and a sense that a no-confidence vote may be the only meaningful avenue left to express collective concern. For part-time faculty, job insecurity makes this climate even more stressful. This account is not unique. It echoes what many have been saying quietly for months and reflects a pattern that Anderson’s framing does not account for.
It is also inaccurate to suggest, as Anderson does, that criticism of the administration comes from only one constituency. Qualms about college governance, communication, and major decisions have surfaced repeatedly from many corners of the institution, including students. Some of these concerns are public; many are not. Over time, the pattern has become unmistakable. Anderson’s column instead mirrors the position consistently taken by the three-member Board minority who have resisted a fuller examination of administrative choices and their impact on students and staff.
Selective accomplishments, such as enrollment growth, cannot substitute for transparency or sound processes. In three Eugene Weekly columns this year, I have written about broader institutional concerns involving governance and decision-making practices. Program decisions have played a part in that story, especially where course offerings and academic pathways have been affected. During my years as an academic dean, I came to understand how essential predictability and clear communication are when building schedules and supporting programs. When course sections are reduced or altered without strong planning and transparency, the effects ripple quickly into impaired student progress, increased faculty workload, and departmental instability. These are not theoretical issues. They directly affect the community the college is meant to serve.
Anderson also argues that the Board is engaging in micromanagement. That characterization does not match the facts. Boards should not run day-to-day operations, but they are responsible for oversight when policy, academic direction, and institutional mission are involved. Trustees who ask for clarity or request information are not overreaching; they are fulfilling the responsibilities the public entrusted to them. When those requests do not appear on agendas or when major decisions proceed without Board involvement, the issue is not interference. It is a restriction of the Board’s proper role at a time when oversight is especially needed.
His reliance on charges about the faculty union, raised by the NAACP, also requires further context. Those concerns matter and deserve serious attention. But they do not address the substantive questions that faculty, staff, and community members (including myself) have been raising for more than a year. The criticism being voiced is about decisions, communication, planning, campus climate and leadership approach. It is not about the president’s identity. These issues require direct engagement, not dismissal.
Finally, here’s what I believe: Anderson’s focus on tone offers a convenient way to avoid the substantive issues the college must address. What LCC needs now is presidential leadership willing to directly engage the challenges before us, and a Board committed to ensuring that such leadership is fully and responsibly exercised. That combination of leadership and oversight is what will allow the college to move beyond its current difficulties and fulfill its mission to students and the region it serves.
No Confidence
This is the op-ed I published in the Eugene Weekly, November 26, 2025
Last spring (EW, April 16) I wrote that the Lane Community CollegeBoard of Education had become dysfunctional and needed new voices. When I followed up just recently (EW, October 9), I had hoped to report progress. I couldn’t. The same divisiveness remains and the stakes have only grown.
It now seems apparent that LCC’s problems go far beyond a Board unable to find itself. At the November 5 Board meeting, over two hours of public comment revealed deeper layers of concern. Speakers described an administration that, in their view, operates with limited transparency and contributes to a culture in which employees hesitate to speak openly. Several also stated that a divided Board has not provided the oversight the college requires.
President Stephanie Bulger’s leadership has strained relationships with faculty, staff, and some trustees. Rather than collaboration, many describe unilateral decision-making and limited inclusion in governance. One of the president’s stated goals early in her tenure was to improve campus climate. Multiple accounts now indicate that this has not happened. Instead, trust has deteriorated and the fear factor has increased.
Faculty union president Adrienne Mitchell’s open letter to the Board (posted to lccea.org on November 4) courageously documents many of these issues. She reports that employees have been pressured to resign or sign nondisclosure agreements and that faculty and administrators are afraid of retaliation for speaking up. After raising concerns, she was reportedly told by the president, “I don’t know how long you’ll be around here,” before facing a proposed layoff.
Her letter also highlights damaging operational decisions. The suspension of the Licensed Practical Nursing program last spring, enacted without public input or a Board vote, left thirty-seven qualified applicants without a viable local training path. Meanwhile, delays in promoting the new Bachelor of Science in Nursing program resulted in only eleven students enrolling instead of sixty.
