GRADUATE STUDENT WELCOME
The following remarks were giving by Deputy Provost Peter Conn at a reception for new graduate and professional students last Thursday at the Annenberg Center.
The Challenge: Excellence and Leadershipby Peter Conn Penn has been a center of advanced study for over two centuries. The earliest professional degrees conferred by the university--which were awarded before the American Revolution--were in medicine. Embodying that long history, and the continuing excellence of our medical education, let me salute Dr. Robert Barchi, Penn's provost, a graduate of Penn's medical school and now the university's chief academic officer. Over the course of our two hundred and fifty year history, the topics of study in graduate and professional education have changed, and the methodologies we use have changed as well. Those earlier generations of students would have had considerable trouble predicting that some of you would come to Penn to do research in areas from computer science and genomics to gender studies and ethnomusicology. Furthermore, along with our subjects and techniques, the profile of our students and faculty has also changed. Those changes are to be celebrated. Consider: you were just welcomed to Penn by Judith Rodin, the first woman president of an Ivy League university. Dr. Rodin is also a world-class psychologist and a member of our faculty. A career such as hers would have been unlikely in the past, and all of us are enriched by the widened opportunities that the university now offers. At the same time, in the midst of all these intellectual and human transformations, certain values persist. Let me emphasize just two. The first is excellence. You have chosen to study at Penn because you know what every survey confirms: this is one of the finest institutions of higher education in the country--indeed, in the world. Penn's faculty exemplifies luminous accomplishment across an immense range of disciplines. Measured by whatever yardstick is relevant--number and influence of publications, academy memberships, prizes and fellowships--our faculty includes many of the women and men whose work is defining and re-defining their fields. Along with our faculty, Penn's excellence is based on its students--and here I salute all of you. You are, in a word, exceptional: drawn from around the country and from around the world, you and your peers have presented records of superlative accomplishment, and your presence here ensures that our work will endure, as your own achievements make their contribution to our collective enterprise. The second durable value that guides our work is leadership. Some of you in this room are destined to play significant and perhaps even decisive roles in the professions, in business, in academia. As alumni of our programs, you will join a roster of leaders who have, in some cases, quite literally changed the world. I hope you will understand your opportunity as a challenge. This is Benjamin Franklin's university, committed to an ideal that joins theory and practice, and dedicated to the idea that knowledge should make a difference. This is also Benjamin Franklin's town, and I want to close with a word about Philadelphia. As many of you already know, and as the rest will soon discover, this is a wonderful city, offering a combination of history, architecture, culture, and entertainment that few other metropolitan areas can match. As a habitual walker, I also claim that this is quite simply the most walkable city in the country. I hope you will take the fullest advantage of what Philadelphia has to offer during the course of your years here. Congratulations on your achievements; good luck on the tasks that lie ahead; and welcome. |
SEE ALSO: CONVOCATION SPEECHES BY PRESIDENT RODIN & PROVOST BARCHI
Almanac, Vol. 47, No. 3, September 12, 2000