International Institute of Buffalo Keynote Address
June 8, 2007
Colleagues and Guests: Good evening –
It is a special pleasure to be with you tonight as we celebrate our support for the work of the International Institute of Buffalo.
I would like to thank our gracious hosts and friends from the Institute – Pam Kefi, Professor Rajiv Kishore, Alice Sullivan and Bruce Acker for their kind invitation to be with you today.
We are also fortunate to have in our presence Amherst Town Supervisor and this evening’s 2007 Global Citizen, Dr. Satish Mohan. Further, we are pleased to share this evening’s festivities with the Honorable Neelam Deo, Consul General of India and, Dr. Ravi Bansal, Chairman and CEO of Airsep Corporation.
All of these distinguished individuals have come together this evening to celebrate the beauty and tradition of the Indian culture and the contributions the Indian community has made to Western New York.
Congratulations to all!
In preparing my remarks for this event, I began to reflect upon the challenges facing immigrants in achieving leadership roles throughout the US higher education spectrum. With that said, I hope it is within my prerogative to shift the focus of my address from the challenges facing immigrants in this vast and wide educational spectrum to, instead, constructing opportunities for individual successes for the betterment of our communities.
The challenges of gaining entry into US higher education and the challenges of becoming a university leader, dare I admit we are aware. The challenges – whether it is the cultural chasm, language barriers, racism, or xenophobia – we must continually strive to overcome. The challenge, however, is not simply to overcome. We must change for the better the social, political, cultural and economic contexts from which we have historically departed; and instead conceive and implement a new paradigm – a new social contract – which provides educational opportunities, economic self-sufficiency, political empowerment, and cultural legitimacy to all regardless of ethnic heritage, country of origin, and religious background. I believe that such change, such empowerment, is achieved in very great measure through education.
As provost of the University at Buffalo, I would not expect you to find my thinking on this matter to be contrary. Education, I believe, provides our citizenry with the foundation from which we can build strong, resilient democracies and vibrant, life-affirming communities.
So, instead, when we speak of constructing opportunities for success in higher education leadership, I believe it is important to frame our thinking and approach with a perspective that begins with the individual and culminates with the collective.
When we begin thinking about education and educational opportunity, we naturally turn our individual attention to the family and to the classroom. Next, we explore the efficacy of the organizational structure that has traditionally defined (and, ultimately stratified) the US educational system. And, finally, we examine our role as a citizenry in actively participating in the dialogue surrounding educational excellence.
Constructing educational opportunities, as the research – time and again – has demonstrated begins with our families.
Families impart their values, ambitions, and love upon their children and extended relations. These values whether grounded in religious tenets or cultural traditions provide the foundation from which our children live, learn, evolve, and ultimately contribute as valued family and community members.
Our children entering into their schools and classrooms do not leave (we hope) their values and ethicality at home. Rather, these family values establish the foundation for whom they are today, and the building blocks for whom they will become.
From a very personal perspective, education has been an integral part of my life for as long as I can remember. I was born and grew up in the small village of Patna in the district of Faizabad in India. In my small village, residences had neither electricity nor running water. Even without these basic necessities, I have wonderful childhood memories growing up in this rural community. Unfortunately, village life then, and now, does not provide the same opportunities for education as for those from affluent urban communities.
However, I was fortunate. I was born into a family where education came first – lives were built around education. My great-grandfather established a school for adults to learn Sanskrit and Vedas. My grandfather was a teacher, as was my father. It is not surprising then I too became a teacher. I suspect it is part of my genotype. And, from the very beginning of my education, I learned the value of knowledge and discovery. I also learned the importance of giving back – teaching others, imparting the excitement and demonstrating the value of learning.
From my subjective perspective, I believe there are important lessons to be gleaned from this short personal story. As families, we must have high-expectations for our children. And, we must have high-expectations for our teachers, administrators, and the institution of education. These high expectations cross many strata including: Curriculum, Educational Policies, and Teacher Education Programs.
Indeed, we rely upon our schools to provide transformational educational experiences. In essence, inquiring and discovery transforms our worldview. Sonia Nieto in her tome, Affirming Diversity, writes: “No educational philosophy or program is worthwhile unless it focuses on two primary concerns”:
Constructing educational opportunities must also be understood from a structural perspective. We, who are educational leaders and citizen participants, must help to build strong bridges between the k through 12 environment and the higher education system. Linking these two traditionally independent entities, I believe, will serve to promote academic access to college and university. Colleges and universities have an important role to play in realizing an integrated educational environment. Working together with our k-12 educational colleagues, the college and university community can communicate academic and intellectual expectations for our students who seek entry to college and university. We, in the higher education community, have a moral responsibility to create the context – whether through teacher education, college-level learning curricula, or de-mystifying the financial aid process – for our students to be successful.
Allow me, for a moment, to impose my perspective through the lens of the University at Buffalo.
As a public university, we believe it is incumbent upon us – as an institution – to contribute to the fulfillment of our nation’s democratic imperative: “the right of every human being to access knowledge; to exercise freedom of thought and of speech; to learn to think critically; to participate in new intellectual discovery; to advance the development of self; and to contribute to one’s own perspectives, thoughts and talents to the benefit of the common good” by improving the ways in which we ensure public access to public universities.
International universities, like UB, provide students with essential opportunities to learn with others who are from diverse backgrounds. It is through these formative experiences students are provided with the skills and competencies so they may contribute thoughtfully in an increasingly heterogeneous and complex society. Reflecting on Guarasic’s treatise Democratic Education in an Age of Difference, Sylvia Hurtado writes, “Community and democratic citizenship are strengthened when students understand and experience social connections with those outside of their often parochial autobiographies – when they experience and reflect on the way their lives are necessarily shaped by others from different backgrounds and different perspectives.”
It is, I believe, the moral responsibility of educational institutions to provide the fora, through formal academic and informal experiential experiences, from which critical intellectual and democratic competencies may be cultivated. In doing so we may fulfill the Jeffersonian ideal of democracy through an enlightened and educated citizenry.
Educational institutions do not exist in isolation. An educational institution and the community in which it exists must recognize the necessity for nurturing a healthy synergistic relationship as the vibrancy and vitality of each depend upon one another. To establish and sustain these synergistic relationships, our citizenry must participate in local and national educational conversations. We, as leaders in higher education, seek the expertise and intellectual diversity of our community to inform the relevancy and efficacy of educational practices.
Educational opportunity and success are critical factors in ameliorating racism and promoting equality. Education equips us with the intellectual resources to engage in dynamic, thoughtful and informed discourse bringing to the fore the destructiveness – political, cultural, economic – of intolerance. I believe in the power of transforming one’s mind and one’s heart through education. And, this is how we continue to construct opportunities.
Through this constructive paradigm, we have witnessed much progress in promoting educational success – individually and as a citizenry.
Over the past 30 years, the University at Buffalo has built an extensive presence in East and South East Asia. Moreover, we proudly acknowledge our network of strong international partnerships around the globe. And, as a tribute to the quality of a UB education, our university has one of the largest and most diverse international enrollments in the nation – ranking 10th in the US and enrolling over 4,000 international students.
One of the most meaningful impacts of UB – characterized as an international university – is the fact that our domestic students – sparked by their collegial relationships with their international peers are participating in Study Abroad at a rate five times better than the national average.
If the University at Buffalo is a microcosm of the broader educational enterprise, then we must strive to create leadership opportunities for our national and international students. Perhaps more fundamentally, we must seek to educate all of our students with the goal of having our graduates emerge with an informed global perspective.
According to the McKinsey Global Institute, India – assuming an annual average growth of 7.3% over the next two decades – will overtake the world’s fifth largest consumer market by the year 2025. This exponential growth has major economic, social, political, and cultural impacts. From an economic perspective this predicted growth forecasts an expansion of the middle class from 50 million people to 583 million people. This economic expansion, of course, is predicated upon educational opportunity for Indian nationals. Educational opportunity assumes access (both financially and academically) to college and university, relevant academic programs, and leadership preparation. In the aggregate, these assumptions (as well as a few others) contribute to the economic, social, cultural, and political vibrancy of a nation and its people.
Reflecting on this fundamental premise of educating all of our students to have an informed, relevant, and global perspective, I turn to IBM. IBM’s Global Innovation Outlook 2.0, suggests three necessary and relevant conditions to promote and foster innovation. Allow me to quote:
Innovation is no longer invention in search of purpose, no longer the domain of a single solitary genius looking to take the world by storm. Instead, innovation is increasingly: Global, Multidisciplinary, and Collaborative.
We have all witnessed over the last decade the previously unimagined global connection of people and their ideas unencumbered by geographic distances and language constraints. With encumbrances all but eliminated, educational institutions, business, and industry are partnering, collaborating in new multi-disciplinary ways at a tempo previously unheard. The result: innovation, economic growth, expanded educational opportunities thusly creating stronger communities.
Let me underscore this premise with a note from India. In the April 7, 2007 issue of The Economist an article entitled, “Hungry Tiger, Dancing Elephant: How India is changing IBM’s World,” reported on IBM’s annual investors’ day. This event, traditionally held in New York, was held last June in Bangalore. Knowing of the economic expansion occurring in India, especially in the economic hub of Bangalore, I think we can collectively surmise why IBM decided to transport this important corporate event half way around the world. A few facts from the Economist:
During this annual investors’ event, Mr. Palmisano announced that IBM would invest an additional $6 billion in India over the next three years, three times the investment of the last three years.
I illustrate this IBM example not to debate the investment strategy of IBM in a multinational 21st century context. This illustration is meant to provoke reflections as to those factors that have created the conditions for success in the country of India.
I suspect the origins of this success are found – first and foremost – with our families: Families imparting to their children, their children’s children, and extended relations the value of education.
Delving deeper, I suspect we will find the origins of such success within the k-16 educational enterprise: The valuing of knowledge, critical analysis, and informed discourse embedded and permeating throughout relevant, inspiring, and rigorous curricula.
And finally, I suspect we will find the origins of success in the value of civic engagement: The compulsion to bring our humanity to the fore when working to solve or ameliorate vexing societal problems including the destructive forces of intolerance.
I began my remarks this evening, telling you my story of growing up in India and the tradition of teaching in my family. I believe I remarked that being a teacher was all I ever dreamed of being suspecting a genetic predisposition.
This past semester, I had the distinct honor to once again find myself in the classroom. I taught a small seminar class for undergraduate students, and one would think my students could be a bit intimidated to have their provost as teacher. Well, I assure, you, my fancy title had no intimidating affect on these students. Each week my undergraduate students from India, Nigeria, New York City and WNY were thoroughly engaged and enthusiastic learners, eager to present their own perspectives, theories, and opinions. I suspect they learned as much from me as I learned from them.
Perhaps I owe my love of teaching and working with students to my father and my father’s father. I do know, however, that my family imparted to me – whether explicitly or tacitly – the value of learning and discovery, inquiry and investigation. And, as these values are part of the fabric of my being, of our being, I believe we have the responsibility, dare I say moral responsibility, to create the conditions for learning, to impart the value of learning, the love of knowledge, and joy of discovery for today’s generation and to future generations.
This, in the aggregate, is how we construct opportunity.
Thank you.
Last Modified: Friday January 04 2008