I want to extend an enthusiastic welcome to all of you — students, faculty and staff — as we start a new academic year. What an eventful summer it has been. Our nation came to the edge of financial default and political paralysis. Economic turmoil, social unrest and political strife flared across the globe. And last week, we survived an earthquake and a hurricane. I look forward to the possibilities of a new year.
This fall we welcome almost 4,000 freshmen and 1,400 transfer students. While most of the students are from this state, they also come from 32 different states and 20 countries. I am amazed at their credentials. They comprise one of the most talented entering classes we have ever had. I know their parents are proud of them. And we at the university are proud to embrace them as new members — for life — in our family of Terrapins.
And they are a diverse group. More than 37 percent identify themselves as students of color. This diversity is one of the great strengths of our university. Our academic community is enriched by living, learning and working together with many persons from many different backgrounds, thereby affirming our common humanity.
We welcome some 3,500 outstanding new graduate students who come from scores of different colleges. Nearly 700 of them have come from 80 different countries. As a premier public research university, among the top 20 in the nation, with more than 30 academic programs ranked among the 10 best nationally, we know how important graduate students are to our institutional mission. Great graduate students attract great faculty and vice versa. Graduate students perform an important role in undergraduate education and in working with faculty in research and creative work.
If there is one message I wish to convey to all 37,000 of our students — undergraduate and graduate, new and returning — it is this: The value of a university education is not just in the destination, but in the journey.
You are privileged to be educated in one of the finest universities in the country, rooted in its land-grant tradition of service to the state and the nation. An education here is not only about acquiring the skills that will land you a job upon graduation. It’s about taking responsibility for your own learning. It’s about treating others the way that you want to be treated, with respect and understanding. It’s about serving and giving back to your university, your community and your country.
We also welcome back some 13,000 faculty and staff. Among them are about 100 new faculty members, two-thirds of whom are tenured or tenure-track professors. No university is better than the quality of its faculty, and we are distinguished by outstanding and dedicated teachers and scholars. They are successful because they are supported by exceptionally capable and committed staff.
New senior administrators this fall come from within and outside the university, and they are top flight: We welcome three vice presidents (of research, for administration and finance and of information technology) and two deans (of arts and humanities and of computer, mathematical and natural sciences). The new deans join a corps of seasoned deans who provide the leadership to their respective colleges that propels the university’s upward trajectory in excellence and impact. Finalists for the new position of chief diversity officer will be on-campus to interview this week and next.
Geography professor Eric Kasischke begins his service as University Senate chair, and physics professor Nicholas Hadley begins as the new faculty athletic representative.
We are also pleased to welcome our new coaches in football and men’s basketball. They bring winning records, but more importantly, they — and all of our other coaches — put first the academic and personal welfare of our student-athletes and compete successfully with integrity and by the rules. Terps sports teams are the front porch of our institution, and we are proud of them.
This year we commemorate two decennial events. One is a celebration of 10 years of the Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center’s transformation of lives through engagement with the arts and ideas. The center will present provocative and stirring programs with great artists. The other is the 10th anniversary of that day of infamy we now call, simply, Sept. 11. There will be a memorial service and other remembrance events.
Thus we begin a new academic year with a sense of renewal and opportunities. True, these are unsettled economic times. Millions of our fellow citizens are out of work. Federal and state budgets are likely to be constrained for some time.
Therefore, our work has never been more important than now — educating the next generation of citizens and leaders, expanding knowledge and revitalizing our economy by innovation and entrepreneurship. What all of us do makes a difference in the success of our nation in the 21st century.
We are Terps. We define our own destiny. A turtle, as former university President Dan Mote taught us, only goes forward. I might add that a turtle only advances by sticking its neck out.
So let us continue to advance by dreaming big, working hard, taking risks and supporting each other in the spirit of shared commitment. And someday in the future, people may look back and say the challenges of our era fostered our innovation.
University President Wallace Loh can be reached at president@umd.edu.
