Building a Positive Foundation for the Future

Thanks to the creativity, versatility and commitment of our community and our province, Acadia has successfully weathered the pandemic to date. Our response and learning over the past year have put us in a strong position for continued success and a return to a more traditional on-campus experience in the fall of 2021. My colleagues in the administration, faculty, and staff have worked seamlessly with our partners at Sodexo, Chartwells, and Follett to develop and implement health and safety protocols that have effectively protected our campus and, in turn, the wider community, from the coronavirus. Acadia’s resilient students have met the challenge of hybrid learning and adapted to new ways of socializing responsibility and living together on and off campus. The ASU has helped to reimagine the Acadia experience under the tough reality of life in a pandemic and our neighbours in the Town of Wolfville continue to support and embrace our students in ways too numerous to count. It has not been easy – far from it. The effort to keep everyone safe and maintain campus operations has been a constant struggle, but there have been moments of great joy and insight as we have learned new ways of coping and overcoming challenges that we might once have considered impossible. We take great pride in our collective success and move forward with confidence into planning for the fall. Taking a variety of factors into consideration, I was pleased to endorse the recommendation of the Academic Planning Task Force for a full return to campus for the fall term. In so doing, Acadia remains committed to following the protocols and practices that have kept us safe to date, but assuming the recovery unfolds as anticipated, with more latitude and flexibility in their application. While our focus has been on the immediacy of the health crisis, humanity's greater challenges have not waned. In fact, the pandemic has shone a brighter light on many inequities in our society. Acadia will use the Acadia 2025: Transforming Lives for a Transforming World strategic plan as a framework to examine and address these imbalances as they present in our administration and teaching, learning or research spaces. I remain optimistic that our community can work together to tackle the unfair barriers to access and achievement imposed by racism and other forms of discrimination. While we prepare to return to the kind of Acadia experience for which Acadia is known in the fall, we are also celebrating the joy and satisfaction of graduation. I extend my congratulations to the Class of 2021 as they enter a world of rapid and continuous change. Acadia has worked hard to inspire and equip graduates to become critical thinkers, lifelong learners, engaged citizens, and responsible global leaders. I am proud of what they have accomplished individually under difficult circumstances and I have every confidence that together as alumni they will continue the tradition of excellence shown by those who have come before them. Please visit the convocation website to tap into Acadia’s virtual convocation celebration and to hear from our outstanding array of honorary degree recipients. Members of the alumni family have been, and continue to be, Acadia’s bedrock. The leadership and contribution expressed by alumni serving on the University’s boards or committees, helping to recruit new students, supporting current students through scholarships, internships, or summer jobs, or by acting as mentors is invaluable. I can never thank you, or members of the Alumni Association’s board, for all you do to for Acadia. The success of the Campaign for Acadia will stand a testament to your commitment to your alma mater. Indeed, alumni pride bonds us together across time and geography, and we are grateful for you. Never in recent history has our motto – in pulvere vinces – been more appropriate in defining the enduring spirit of Acadia. As we look forward with pride and a great deal of optimism, there is little doubt that the University and our community will deal with the multi-dimensional impacts of the pandemic for some time, but we will continue to do so together boldly with care and courage.

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