Creating a climate where
excellence can flourish

Photo: Jordan Bender

President Austin congratulates Kyle Noonan ’05 (CLAS)‚ an honors student in economics who represented the graduating class during the afternoon Commencement ceremony.

Regardless of what the calendar says, for colleges and universities graduation season marks the official beginning of summer. At the University of Connecticut our May commencements create a positive aura that usually sees us through until fall.

But as in summers past, we also face challenges. Some, like the rapid increase in demand for a limited number of places in the freshman class (nearly 20,000 applications this year for 3,200 spaces in Storrs), are a function of our success. Others represent ongoing facts of life, such as budget constraints and tightened federal funding for some aspects of cutting-edge research.  

Yet, as we show in each edition of Traditions, the University continues to move forward. In the pages that follow you can read about faculty who have received national recognition, high achieving students, the success of student athletes, and other achievements by members of our community. Such distinctions are primarily a tribute to the individuals who earn them, but they recognize something more fundamental: a commitment made over time and reinforced every year to create a climate in which excellence can flourish.  

Those are easy words, but at UConn they are backed up by tangible commitments. The state’s investment in UCONN 2000 and now 21st Century UConn creates the physical infrastructure in which scientists can do their best work, humanists can do their best thinking, and artists can reach their creative peak. Privately endowed chairs provide support to recruit and keep outstanding faculty. Merit-based student aid attracts the most talented students from Connecticut and out of state, helping to make UConn a more attractive and exciting place in which to teach. Finally, our commitment to assure that exceptional faculty earn richly deserved public recognition helps promote a culture that nourishes quality.

UConn is a public research university, with all that term implies. We are properly held accountable to the citizens of our state for every important policy and allocational decision. We strive to be excellent, not exclusive. We cherish the more than 100 high school valedictorians and salutatorians who will come to campus this August, even as we value equally the other 3,100 freshmen at Storrs and the 1,000 arriving at the regional campuses who represent one of the most talented and diverse classes to enroll at UConn. We have the responsibility of giving each young person at UConn the opportunity to attain a high-quality education at the hands of a committed and dedicated faculty.  

Our ability to meet these goals is the true measure of our excellence. As you read this issue of Traditions, please recognize that the quality we celebrate here is important to UConn primarily because it helps sustain a University community where all of us can share in the benefits of the extraordinary contributions of outstanding faculty, staff and students — and where each member of the community can work, and learn, in an environment that strives to bring out the best in everyone.