In Lumine: The President’s Blog

The following originally appeared in Inside Higher Ed. Last weekend, I had the privilege of returning to my alma mater for the inauguration of Elizabeth H. Bradley, the 11th president of Vassar College. Returning to Vassar as the president of Transylvania University felt different from my arrival as a student in 1984. I was raised in the Bronx by Irish Catholic immigrants. Our Catholicism was quiet, expressed mostly by giving neighbors a hand, weekly Mass and private guilt. We had little time to follow the political issues of the day, and the internet did not yet exist. During my years at Vassar, however, there was no hiding from political issues. Well-informed, passionate students conversed about apartheid outside classes and staged demonstrations near the dining hall. Students engaged intensely with one another and professors. Courses forced us to seek out quiet spaces in the library where we struggled to master content that was opening us to new perspectives on the world.

Dear Transylvania Community, The excitement is palpable as we welcome our upperclass students back to campus and begin another academic year. Along with the refreshing energy that comes with the start of the new year, there are important initiatives underway, including the renovation of the Carpenter Academic Center, which will be complete in the spring of 2018. The anticipation of the new academic year is fueled by hope: hope for new accomplishments, new friends, new ideas. Yet, this year our hope is muted with no small degree of unease. In these turbulent political times, we at Transylvania will redouble our commitment to welcoming and supporting every member of our community, especially those who have found themselves thrown into a sea of uncertainty by the recent announcement relating to the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program.

The following originally appeared in The Huffington Post. The issues surrounding the recent unrest in Charlottesville arrived on our doorstep in Lexington, Ky., when our mayor, Jim Gray, courageously called for an acceleration of the process underway to remove two statues from Cheapside Park in downtown Lexington. Once one of the largest slave auction blocks in the country, the site of this park and the Confederate statues that reside there are just three short blocks from the Transylvania University campus. If that isn’t close enough to home, both statues, one of John Breckinridge and the other of John Hunt Morgan, are Transylvania alumni. TRANSYLVANIA UNIVERSITY ARCHIVES John C. Breckinridge’s statue is located less than a mile from Transylvania University’s campus where Breckinridge once attended. Transylvania is a small school that has played an outsized role in shaping the history of our country with more than 100 United States representatives, 50 senators, two vice presidents and two Supreme Court justices among our alumni. We are proud of our 237 year history. Yet the history of any U.S. institution as old as we are is complicated.

The following is a transcript of Dr. Carey’s remarks to the Lexington-Fayette Urban County Government during discussion of the removal of two Confederate statues in downtown Lexington. Transylvania University is one of the finest liberal arts colleges in the country. We have been here since 1780, two years before the City of Lexington was incorporated. Although Transylvania is a small school, it has played an outsized role in shaping the history of our country. We are proud of that history. We have thrived for so long for two important reasons: the mission we fulfill and the values by which we live.

The following originally appeared in The Huffington Post. In a recent New York Times article (6/6/17), Natasha Singer discusses ways technology billionaires are using their expertise and money to reform education. Reed Hastings, CEO of Netflix, has invested in DreamBox Learning, a math-teaching program that, like Netflix, relies on artificial intelligence to simplify the choices and decisions of its users. An algorithm tracks students’ computer keystrokes, collecting up to 50,000 data points per student per hour. This data helps teachers pinpoint the math concepts a student is struggling with. By streamlining the learning process, the theory goes, education is more efficient and more personalized. Mark Zuckerberg, chairman and CEO of Facebook, envisions an educational process in which students ultimately teach themselves. Using software that his company helped develop, students select their own assignments, work at their own pace, and, when they run into difficulties, summon a teacher who is on hand to help. He also sees the program as a way to personalize student learning. Rather than sit in a classroom with 30 students following a common lesson plan, students cluster around computers and follow a learning plan they have configured. Mr. Zuckerberg believes this approach is akin to the dynamics of a start-up company, where collaborative sharing of ideas and reinforcement of individual enthusiasm, in this case, boosts student learning.