Mark A. Murray addressed the GVSU community as its president for the first time at Opening Convocation Friday, reaffirming the university's commitment to excellence in teaching enhanced by active scholarship.
Today, in this convocation, we reaffirm the importance and the excitement of what we will do together at Grand Valley State University in the academic year we are beginning, Murray said. As awesome as our call is, we know we can accomplish great things, because we are building on the great successes of the years just passed. Excellence in teaching enhanced by active scholarship. We know that in fulfilling this call we will again draw on the best of our skills and capacities in service of our students, this learning community, this region and the state.
He concluded: I am pleased to be among you at this great institution. Let us go forward in the weeks ahead, and do our work with great enthusiasm and success.
To accommodate a larger-than-usual audience, the convocation was held in the Recreation Center of the Fieldhouse.
Shirley Fleishmann, professor in the Padnos School of Engineering, was the keynote speaker. Fleishmann taught at the U.S. Naval Academy before beginning her tenure at Grand Valley in 1989. She has received numerous teaching awards including being recognized as the 1998 Michigan Professor of the Year by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching and the Council for Advancement and Support of Education.
For the full text of President Murray's speech CLICK HERE.
