Photo by Matt Kalinowski

Each May, thousands of BU students assemble for Commencement at Nickerson Field in a state of … what? Excitement? Definitely. Apprehension? No doubt. Expansive hopes? I am certain that the majority experience the ceremony with a glow and a trust in their futures, full of real ideas and ready to get started.

What gives them this confidence and hope? In today’s economy, too many workers feel they need to downgrade their hopes, or tuck them away for future reference (time permitting of course). In CAS, we give all our students—undergraduates and graduate students—a reservoir of skills, knowledge, and experience to draw on to fulfill their dreams and support them during tough times. CAS alumni won’t be those workers who tuck away their hopes because the world is a challenging and fast-changing place. To the contrary, their deep and broad education prepares them to lead the changes that will take place.

We couldn’t do this without you. Now, halfway through BU’s first comprehensive capital fundraising campaign, I am thrilled to have the partnership of so many alumni and friends who are supporting our ability to provide the education and experiences that assure the future success of CAS and GRS alumni and the research breakthroughs of our faculty. If you have not done so already, I hope you will join with us to help make that critical difference. And you can have an impact, no matter how much you can offer, because supporting CAS is a cumulative effort. Together, we can create new faculty positions, scholarship opportunities, graduate fellowships, research opportunities, improved learning spaces, and enriched academic experiences that will allow BU to make an even greater difference in our students’ lives and encourage our faculty and students to make an even greater difference in the world.

The world is taking notice of the difference BU faculty, staff, and alumni and friends are making. This year, we learned that BU has moved up from 51st to 41st in the nation in the 2014 U.S. News & World Report university rankings. As I write, I am about to depart for the first time to the annual meeting of the arts and sciences deans of the Association of American Universities, the organization of the 62 top research universities of the United States and Canada, of which BU just became a member last year. So going forward, CAS will benefit from my interactions with my counterparts at the leading universities of this hemisphere. Our economics department is ranked 9th in the nation in research productivity by Research Papers in Economics, ahead of Dartmouth, Cornell, and Georgetown. Two of our up-and-coming junior faculty members, in mathematics and computer science, were among just 126 scientists to win this year’s coveted Alfred P. Sloan Foundation research fellowships.

In this online edition of arts&sciences, you will see great examples of the BU and CAS difference. Hear from Creative Writing Program alumna and Pulitzer Prize–winning novelist Jhumpa Lahiri in a BU-exclusive Q & A. Learn how chemist Mark Grinstaff and his team of researchers are using new imaging technology and better lubricants to reduce the need for joint replacement among osteoarthritis sufferers. And watch what astronomer Catherine Espaillat is finding out about planet formation using the Discovery Channel Telescope that BU helped fund.

I hope you enjoy the journey.