President's Blog: From the Heart

Hundreds of diverse voices beautifully blended together, slowly filling the Kennedy Union ballroom with the familiar refrain of "Lift Every Voice and Sing."

It’s no secret that some Ohio companies outsource programming and software engineering to other time zones around the world. That’s largely because they can’t find enough highly skilled professionals here.

On a chilly, overcast Saturday in Mesa, Arizona, I only felt the warmth of the season when I joined 15 University of Dayton alumni and friends sorting clothes at Central Christian Church for the homeless and working poor as part of “Christmas off Campus.”

We take walking for granted, but graduating mechanical engineering students Ellen Lucchesi and Michael Fornadel will walk down the aisle at winter commencement with a much better appreciation for this simple act than most of us will ever have.

“You cannot predict the future, but you can create it,” management consultant Peter Drucker once wrote. Dean Andy Strauss and faculty in the School of Law are quietly reinventing legal education, abandoning what has long been a cookie-cutter approach to educating lawyers and teaching the law.

What does our oft-stated commitment to community really mean? It’s as simple as respecting the dignity of all people, as defined by their identity, their background, and their beliefs.