Trustee Chair Buckner, President Whitten, and former Trustee Shoulders. Thank you all most sincerely for your kind comments, which I greatly appreciate, and for making today possible.
Nearly 40 years ago, in 1985, I made my first visit to the United States and paid the first of many visits to the Indiana University Bloomington campus. As I walked the campus with my friend, the late Mike Dunn, I was entranced by its leafy beauty, its bucolic tranquility, the quiet noble splendor of its stately limestone buildings, and the abounding signs everywhere of the dedicated and serious pursuit of the life of the mind, so characteristic of great institutions of learning. I learnt of those who led the university—with vision and genius—for many of its nearly two centuries of existence—of Wylie, Jordan, Bryan, Wells, and its then president, John Ryan. I learnt of its glittering record of creativity and discovery in the arts, humanities, medicine, music, the sciences, and a myriad of other areas—intellectual accomplishments of the highest order recognized in some cases by that greatest of all academic accolade, the Nobel Prize. Some of these accomplishments have literally transformed the world. I learnt more of its storied achievements in athletics, some well-known beyond the shores of this country. And above all I learnt of its ethos—its hallowed traditions and history, its enduring sense of justice and fairness, and its Midwestern culture of civility, decency, and respect for others—what has been called, the Indiana Way. I could only dream of joining such a place.
But not much more than 10 years later, in 1997, I arrived at Indiana University with my late wife, Andrea, and my children Josephine, Lucien, and Arabella, the latter two of whom I am pleased to say are here today with their step-sister Margaret, to take up my position as IU’s first vice president for information technology. I worked for Myles Brand, an outstanding president of rare courage and ability. We became fast friends, and I admired him to the end of his days. I had the unforgettable privilege of meeting with Herman Wells on a number of occasions, then very old but still with the aura of all he achieved and emanating civility and grace. I became friends with the late John Ryan and remain friends with Tom Ehrlich. I learnt much from all of them and would avail myself of their advice and counsel. But never could I have dreamt that, 10 years after arriving here, I would join their company as IU’s 18th president.
It was the greatest honor of my life to have served for 14 years as president of this great university and to have served in senior positions here for 24 years—more than a third of my life. I am immensely proud of all that was accomplished over that period. But none of what was accomplished was due to the efforts of just one person. I want to pay tribute and express my deepest gratitude to the myriad of people who contributed so much over this memorable time—to all the senior leadership of the university over my years in office; to the trustees for whom I worked during that period; to all the faculty, staff, and the over 300,000 students, including 50,000 students of color, who graduated during this time; to all the alumni and extraordinarily generous donors; to my own dedicated personal staff; and to my beloved wife, Laurie, always at my side and with numerous accomplishments and contributions of her own. To all of these I want to give my deepest thanks for all that they did every day during that dynamic and transformative time that was so vital to our university’s continued success, progress, and pursuit of excellence.
In this room 200 years of IU history looks down upon us through the eyes of those who led the university during these centuries. By unveiling my portrait today to join those of my 17 predecessors, the Board of Trustees pays me the greatest honor, and I am deeply grateful. But in so doing the Board also honors all whom I have just mentioned from my years in office; all those whose depth of commitment to the university and love of the university is boundless; all who work in quite anonymity content merely to do their jobs as well as they possibly can; all who no matter what their station in the university strove every day for excellence.
Universities are the most ancient and enduring of all human institutions. Nearly every great civilization of the world, almost without exception, has had institutions whose role is to preserve the knowledge and culture of those civilizations. From the very beginning universities have to a greater or lesser degree, pursued three principal missions—to pursue knowledge, to transmit knowledge, and to preserve knowledge.
And in pursuit of these fundamental missions, universities have been, for over 25 centuries, truly international institutions, open to the world and attracting the very best and most able from every country. For the knowledge of the human race, painstakingly accumulated over millennia, known no bounds of geography and nor do those who seek such knowledge, who wish to add to it, and to convey it to others. The pages of the histories of all great universities of the past back into the dimmest reaches of antiquity are the record of this, with names of students and scholars and great libraries and collections from every part of the world.
Indiana University has had a storied history of international engagement reaching back almost to its founding in 1820. I am proud that we were able to substantially grow and strengthen this in multiple ways. President Whitten has also shown herself to be very supportive of such engagement. And I am particularly proud that we were able to establish the Hamilton Lugar School of Global and International Studies, housed in a magnificent new building that substantially expanded IU’s highly respected programs in languages and international studies.
I am a proud immigrant who became an American citizen over 10 years ago. That I was welcomed to this country and was able to rise to become the president of a great American research university reflects the very best of the United States as a country that embraces immigrants and values them for what they can contribute to strengthening the country in countless ways.
So it is in the context of IU’s long outstanding history of international engagement and as IU’s first immigrant president, that I chose to have my portrait set in the Global and International Studies Building, with the now rich and iconic symbolism of its interior reflected in this portrait. I am immensely grateful to the IU trustees for making it possible to engage one of America’s finest portraitists, Jon Friedman, to paint this portrait. It was a great honor and an immense pleasure to work with an artist of his outstanding caliber.
Myles Brand, at the unveiling of his presidential portrait in 2004, said that leading Indiana University is a hallowed trust that one is privileged to have but for a fleeting moment. He went on to say, though, that what was truly important was to try to leave it a better place when you left. This is what we all strived ceaselessly to achieve. Whether we were successful is for posterity to decide.