Annual Address 2013
David C. Hodge
September 3, 2013
While we welcomed these distinguished visitors to our campus, we also provided an extraordinary, and for most participants, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to perform at Carnegie Hall. Four hundred and seventeen of our students in six different ensembles wowed the crowd with truly exceptional performances. Carnegie Hall had never done anything like this before and the logistics of moving that many people on and off stage were incredibly challenging. That made the appreciation of the results all the better. As our Convocation speaker, Jane McGonigal noted, "The hard part is the fun part!" Although we cannot fully recreate the special moment of that concert, I am delighted that we can enjoy a snippet of the performance here today. Sophomore clarinetist Christopher Rueda will perform a solo version of the "Festive Overture" by Dmitri Shostakovich. This piece was played at Carnegie Hall by the Miami University Wind Ensemble, including Christopher. He is accompanied by Bruce Murray, chair of the music department.
Many of our students then followed up with another extraordinary event, as the marching band represented Ohio in the 57th Presidential inaugural parade in Washington, D.C., at the request of Michelle Obama who was so impressed with our students during her visit here. It has been a little hard to tell our first year students that Carnegie Hall concerts and inaugural parades don't happen every year!
Our female athletes captured the Jacoby Cup again, awarded to the Mid America Conference university with the best all-sport record of achievement. Our women's teams set a school record for Jacoby Trophy points by winning seven conference championships. We captured our third straight MAC Sportsmanship Award, a nice reflection of the spirit on campus. The Synchronized Skating Team won its 9th consecutive national title, tying the record for all national skating championships. Our ice hockey team won the final regular season CCHA championship title, and now looks forward to playing in the new National Collegiate Hockey Conference. Not to be outdone, our alumni distinguished themselves with John Harbaugh coaching the Ravens to a Superbowl title and earning induction into the Cradle of Coaches.
Our students continue to shine in competition for many of the nation's most prestigious academic awards. James Tong Morton, a junior at Miami University with a quadruple major in computer science, electrical engineering, engineering physics, and mathematics and statistics and a minor in Chinese, won the Goldwater Scholarship. Benjamin Fenton, who is completing both his master's and bachelor's degrees in biology, received honorable mention. Dirk Auman, senior biochemistry and engineering physics major and honors student, won the Astronaut Foundation Scholarship. Kayla Orta, a sophomore, received a 2013 National Security Education Program Scholarship for International Study, while four other Miami University students received Benjamin A. Gilman International Scholarships to help fund their summer and fall study abroad experiences. Three Miami University seniors were awarded Fulbright English Teaching Assistantships.
Miami University's forensics team won the national championship for the third year at the 31st annual Novice National Tournament, and the James Lewis Family Mock Trial program team placed eighth in the nation at the 2013 American Mock Trial Association National Championship Tournament.
Kudos to these students and to their professors and faculty and staff mentors who do so much to challenge and support our students.
We achieved a milestone in the life of our regional campuses with the creation of a new division, the College of Professional Studies and Applied Sciences. The role of the regionals has changed dramatically since Middletown was founded as the first regional campus in the state. The new divisional structure will provide expanded opportunities for the regionals to design programs and majors that better align with the needs of residents and employers of Southwest Ohio.
We welcomed an exceptionally strong incoming class in Oxford last year and recruited an even academically stronger incoming class for this fall. In fact, the Class of 2017 is the most academically accomplished and diverse class in our history. This outcome was the result of an "all in" attitude across campus, or in Collins' term, a whole lot of "pushes" in the same direction. Everyone was involved in providing a warm and highly personal welcome that impressed prospective students and their parents. It is difficult for printed material to adequately convey what a real, and genuine, interaction can. By every one of these interactions, we demonstrate that we are who we say we are. With this class, we launched the Academic Scholars program that invites a small cohort of students into a department or interdisciplinary program where they are intensively engaged in those activities that surround and augment our curriculum, such as interacting personally with visiting speakers and mentoring, while enjoying the special benefits of being a part of an ongoing cohort.
