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President's MessageLast year in our annual report we featured some of Duke’s most talented students – past and present – who relied on financial assistance to attend college. Their Duke experience enabled them to make contributions to the university and the world, which is why our ongoing $300 million financial aid endowment campaign remains one of my highest priorities. In this report we keep the focus on students, this time featuring some of our outstanding seniors. Everywhere I turn on campus I see the exuberance of young people coupled with genuine desire to make a difference. What makes this enthusiastic spirit so distinctively Duke is the extent to which these students merge their academic work with their engagement with the world. Let me share a few examples. One group of students took their knowledge of art history and, working closely with their professor, helped assemble an exhibit of African-American artist Romare Bearden for Duke’s Nasher Museum of Art, featuring works that had never before been exhibited. Another student came to Duke expecting to be a math major but, after taking an educational psychology class and tutoring Durham elementary school children, is heading off to teach high school in Harlem. One young woman became fascinated with the intersection between the humanities and the work she was doing in a science lab. She was selected as a Department of Homeland Security Scholar where she worked on developing a vaccine against anthrax, then wrote her results in such a way that non-scientists could understand the challenges of creating this vaccine. Students who build on their academic training by using it to fuel their sense of personal initiative are very common at Duke, and this report features many more examples. Their stories of engagement typically share one common element: dedicated teachers who inspired them to become agents of their own education. Duke’s faculty members are leaders in sharing knowledge and spurring others to find their own passions. They distinguish themselves with the power and individuality of their intelligence and their drive to ask new questions and solve them in novel ways. As evidenced by last year’s total of $570.5 million in sponsored research, this is a skill the outside world recognizes. As you read this report, you will learn of the many wonderful people and accomplishments that characterize this great institution. I am pleased to share them with you, and I thank you for your interest. Richard H. Brodhead, PhD |