Before a standing-room-only audience in the Vallejo Auditorium at 犹他谷大学 (UVU), President Astrid S. Tuminez delivered the annual State of the University address.
Before a standing-room-only audience in the Vallejo Auditorium at 犹他谷大学 (UVU), President Astrid S. Tuminez delivered the annual State of the University address. During the course of her remarks, she recapitulated the university’s achievements in 2023, including record-breaking retention rates, increases in the school’s endowment, the securing of historic donations, the groundbreaking of a new campus building, and multiple university awards.
“When I think about the phrase ‘popular education,’ I think about 犹他谷大学,” President Tuminez began. “We’ve issued a very powerful invitation to people [to] come as you are. 弗吉尼亚大学有你的位置。 We don't care what your life professional academic experience was. 如果你想要更好的自己，你想要改善你的生活； 来弗吉尼亚大学，我们会帮助你。”
President Tuminez demonstrated how UVU students, faculty, and staff have made an impact on the university and the community at large through research projects, grants, athletic achievements, scholarships, local and national recognitions and awards, and competitions.
“说到底，我们是一所非常有竞争力的大学，”她说。 “We are the underdogs; 我们有很大的压力。 We go into the fields and test ourselves and show the world ‘yes, we can be as good as you, even better.’”
The university president, now entering her sixth year with UVU, commented on the challenges facing higher education, including waning interests in higher education itself.
“If you see what's being featured on television or on the internet, it is the massive devaluation of the value of higher education, very different from America in the post-Cold War period when everything was about education — now it's a loss of trust.”
President Tuminez remained optimistic and owed her optimism to UVU’s values of exceptional care, exceptional accountability, and exceptional results.
“让我感到鼓舞的是，我们弗吉尼亚大学没有遇到这种情况，”她说。 “And the reason for that is we have a very clear vision to become the university of choice for every kind of student, whatever their experience or background is, for every student to succeed here, get an education, and succeed in working life.”
Tuminez concluded her remarks by recalling her recent visit to her home in the Philippines and the experience she had speaking with the young students in the village library named after her mother.
“I looked at this, and I thought, ‘This is why I am at UVU because [of] the faces of these students.’ They're Filipino, yes, but these are also the faces of every student that walks in the hallways of UVU. We’re in the business of hope, or the business of dreams, and nothing really honestly can be more exciting than that — except perhaps dancing to Taylor Swift music.”
