Reflections on this year
Dear Members of the Boston University Community,
It was wonderful to see so many of you over the weekend as we celebrated with the Class of 2026. My sincerest congratulations, again, to our students and their families on this momentous achievement, and to all the staff and faculty who enriched the students’ Boston University experience. I offer a special thank-you to the hundreds of you who volunteered to make more than 50 celebratory events possible across our University.
This time of year offers us an opportunity to rest and reflect. At a time of tremendous turbulence in higher education, you have accomplished so much in your research, scholarship, creative expression, and patient care. In the face of this churn, it is important to take stock of these achievements.
Transforming Boston University
Together, we established our shared values, which serve as the foundation for the ways we work, learn, and live together.
Your valuable feedback and ideas about our campus environments are helping to inform our evolving Campus Framework, which will enable us to be more intentional about campus planning and ensure our future physical spaces are modern and dynamic for years to come.
Our AI Development Accelerator (AIDA) is enabling our University community to critically embrace artificial intelligence while remaining clear-eyed about challenges as well as opportunities.
Through our Arts Initiative and the Office for the Arts, we began to explore new ways to bring the arts onto our campuses, including new events and activities during Orientation.
Our “You Are Why” initiative is highlighting the critical work we do here at Boston University and its application far beyond our campus borders. It is also helping us raise resources for research, graduate education, and undergraduate research—as well as support for Boston University Launchpad, our new undergraduate internship initiative.
This year, we took steps to revitalize existing partnerships and explore new ones. We focused on our deep and long-standing leadership in convergence, and the members of our Task Force on Convergent Research and Education identified eight broad research areas where we can collaborate to leverage our strengths.
We drew on our history of convergence and community impact to establish our “North Star”: Boston University will be THE global destination of discovery, education, and human connection—a place of convergence where disciplines, communities, and realities merge and visionary thinkers unite to create transformative experiences and solutions for the world’s greatest challenges.
And we built a strategic framework, Charting Our Future, to help get us there.
Combined, these efforts allowed us to continue the complex and valuable work of transforming our University into an institution that will be as vital in the future as it has been since its founding.
Academic Successes
Teaching, learning, and research are at the core of our mission, and we continued to excel here. Researchers across our schools and colleges secured more than $439 million in research funding this year, despite a difficult national research environment.
Our faculty published bold new research that pushes boundaries and sets new benchmarks—such as a study that explores neurogenesis in the zebra finch as a possible window for insight into our own human brains; and a new book that is one of the first-ever published works in Ende, an endangered language spoken by fewer than 1,000 people in southwest Papua New Guinea.
Several of our colleagues were recognized with career-defining awards and accolades, including a Guggenheim Fellowship, two Breakthrough Prizes, two inductions into the American Association for the Advancement of Science, a National Academy of Inventors Fellowship, a Carnegie Fellowship, and two Sloan Research Fellowships, to name just a few.
Our students continued to make us all proud to be Terriers. The recent thesis exhibitions from our College of Fine Arts students were thoughtful, provocative, and bursting with vitality. Our law students gained valuable hands-on experience and served as true advocates in clinics and practicums supported by the School of Law.
Enterprising students in the Questrom School of Business—and indeed many students across our schools and colleges—built start-ups with the potential to change the way we live, work, and more. One project, for example, aims to treat symptoms of neurological disorders such as Parkinson’s disease.
Students in the College of Communication produced professional-level video and print stories about the people and programs in Boston communities where local news deserts have left residents without vital information.
And our student-athletes showed us what dedication looks like in the classroom and on the field. Our softball team won its fourth-straight Patriot League title this year, and our women’s rowing team won its third-straight Patriot League title. Terriers across the board—in swimming and diving, cross-country, rowing, and more—earned individual awards that highlight their sterling attitudes and relentless drive. And more than a few Boston University ice hockey alumni had medals around their necks by the end of the Winter Olympic Games this year.
Convergence Everywhere
It is not lost on me that these myriad achievements, and so many others, were accomplished in a year that also challenged us. Globally, nationally, and on our campuses, we faced difficulties that demanded more from us—more innovative problem-solving, more compassion, more grace, and more listening.
Ultimately, addressing some of these challenges has served to bring our campuses closer together. We are revitalizing our partnership with the Boston Medical Center Health System so that our research goes further, and our care for some of the city’s most underserved populations continues to be top-notch. We are expanding our global network so we can engage more robustly with the world around us. We are transforming the ways we work together, so we are more resilient to future shocks.
Of course, we will continue to face challenges in the months and years ahead, along with new obstacles we cannot foresee, but I have no doubt that our community will continue to meet them with poise, together.
The next academic year will be an important one, as we transform our budget, ramp up our administrative modernization efforts, embark on convergent hiring initiatives, and welcome a new provost and chief academic officer. But, for now, find respite and reflect on a job well done.
Boston University shines brightest when each of us hones the qualities only we possess. Together, our individual strengths become a collective force to move this University forward. Together, we create an environment of convergence—not just in our research but in our relationships across the entire University. And as president, I could not be prouder.
I am grateful to each and every one of you for your hard work and dedication this year. Thank you for bringing your varied talents to this great University. I hope everyone has a restful summer, and I look forward to everything we’ll accomplish together next year.
Sincerely,
Melissa Gilliam
President
*5/20/26 This message was sent to students, faculty, and staff.