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President's Perspective: Solutions for a Healthier Environment and Society
As our university’s 233rd year began I had the pleasure, on a beautiful August evening, to join with faculty, staff, and students for our annual Convocation and Twilight Induction. The focus was, of course, our newest Catamounts, the Class of 2027. They are among the most extraordinary new classes in the university’s history: the best prepared in terms of academics and with the greatest diversity in backgrounds and experiences, and in the states and countries from which they come.
These students are already adding to an expanding list of superlatives at UVM. For the fourth consecutive year, our researchers garnered record-setting external support for our research enterprise–over $262 million from state and federal agencies, corporate partners, foundations, and generous individual donors–cresting the quarterbillion-dollar mark for a second year.
This significant growth in research funding and our National Science Foundation ranking as a top-100 public research university signal that UVM is a place our nation looks to for solutions to the most pressing needs of our time. Just as important, these research accomplishments are among the key reasons this university attracts the best young minds from near and far. Our students come here to make a difference in the world by immersing themselves in research and community engagement. They see that UVM is grounded in an unwavering mission to help people and planet thrive.
That whale on the cover is not, of course, a Vermont whale. It is part of a UVM research project off the coast of Costa Rica, one of many studies that extend far beyond the Green Mountain State, part of our global footprint, contributing— in this case—to scholarship in evolutionary biology and acoustics.
Closer to home, we bring our expertise to bear on the most pressing problems of our time. There may be none more heartbreaking than the effects of opioid dependence–a tear in our social fabric that seems to consistently resist repair. But UVM clinicians and scientists whose story is told in this magazine have made successful inroads into the problem and in the process made Vermont a national model for the treatment of substance use disorder. Today, with the nature of addiction changing, researchers and clinicians are retooling their approaches, using the impressive body of knowledge developed at our university to help build a healthier society.
We’ve had many partners in our work–more than could ever be listed here. But one standout is clearly the Honorable Patrick Leahy who served Vermont, and Vermont’s flagship university, for nearly five decades in the U.S. Senate. His support and guidance were crucial to the growth and success of so many areas of research, education, and service at UVM, and will continue through his appointment as my first President’s Distinguished Fellow. I also look forward to the many years ahead during which our new research vessel, named in honor of the partner in so much of his successful work, Marcelle Leahy, will allow faculty and students to add to the knowledge and care of our precious Lake Champlain.
I am pleased that we can illustrate in this magazine a small part of the voluminous archive of the senator’s legislative career–the third longest in U.S. history. The senator has entrusted his papers to the university to curate and maintain as a primary resource for scholars, leaders, and others addressing contemporary challenges.
Senator Leahy set a high bar in his service to our beloved state and country. The students, faculty, and staff of UVM are committed as ever to the same, now and for the future.
I hope you share my pride in reading about their efforts in this edition.
